Matsu Made Us Famous

Matsu is all the rage in Central Taiwan this time of the year, (as I described in a previous entry), and the pilgrimage of her small statue has been described as one of the best things to see in Taiwan, if given the chance. As a result, we were delighted to find out that the religious pilgrimage comes directly into our little town of YuanLin--a street away from us, in fact. So as we were preparing to take Coco to school on Wednesday morning we heard firecrackers and noisy festivities headed toward us, and we stopped everything and ran to see the hoopla. We weren't disappointed. 

Some of the pilgrims following Matsu for over a week.

I always wonder how these guys manage to not tip over with this much recycling in tow. 

In connection with their reverence of Matsu, the Taiwanese believe that if you crouch down on the ground and allow Matsu to pass over you, you will be blessed with peace and safety for that year. Considering this deal too good to pass up, we thought we'd jump into the mix and join the crowd ourselves. What took place from that point on was hilarious. Thankfully, Jamin took some video that you seriously have to watch. It is a riot--especially since it involves a television interview with your friendly neighborhood foreigner at the end. 

Here's the official television interview  directly after being blessed by Matsu. (Note: this news station is not just local, but national, and was broadcast that evening across the whole country).

After that funny moment we walked momentarily into the local Matsu temple to take in the sights. 

As if this wasn't enough, Hubby got hit up for another television interview with a national station as we were standing there taking pictures. Here's the link to this interview, which was also aired that evening. 

That night at 6:00 p.m. we sat around the dinner table all together, and were stunned to hear the phone start to ring off the hook as all of Ama's friends called frantically from all over Taiwan, saying we had to turn on the TV to watch both interviews. We roared to see all of us on television, and grinned at how quickly Matsu's powers held sway. Maybe we shouldn't discount the little lady after all. :)