"Water conservation – Taiwanese style.
I was walking down the Lover’s Path near Wulai Township when out of the blue I happened across the following sign:
Love the environment. Treasure resources.
Be grateful for water. Preserve water source.
Awwwwwwww!
Wow, what a change – for once the appearance that somebody in Taiwan actually gives a damn about the environment!
To understand where I’m coming from you’ve got to appreciate that in Taiwanese society the environment often takes a backseat to industrial progress and the economy. Much the same as anywhere else to various degrees but for against the backdrop of a tropical island, it tends to stick out more here.
Water especially holds little value as more often than not it’s pouring rain. These last few days alone feels like we’ve had more rain then would fall an entire year in Australia.
Personally I’ve become pretty accustomed to this and don’t bat an eyelid when I see someone running their hose unattended, washing their car on a cloudy day when it’s obviously going to rain later or rinsing off the road outside their house (why, I have no idea).
So seeing this particular sign dug up old memories of water conservation (I come from a country perpetually in drought).
As I got all warm and fuzzy inside, letting the sign convince me that at least in some small way the government was doing something to encourage water preservation, scarcely 100 meters down the road from the sign I then ran into this:
What you’re looking at their of course is a busted water pipe, spraying out water 24 hours a day in waste. I suppose you could make the argument that it was an unintentional gardening fixture but it’d be somewhat of a stretch…
In an everyday situation in Taiwan I wouldn’t bat an eyelid seeing a pipe gushing water down a mountainside, but 100m from a water conservation sign… really?
Shame on me for having hope yet.
February 25th, 2012 at 1:18 pm TaiwanTeacher(Quote)
Must a “rain forest project” of some sort. It looks like the Park Service is trying to preserve that stand of rare ferns and the crop of endangered moss shown in the picture.
February 25th, 2012 at 3:51 pm ausGeoff(Quote)
Maybe they should have a closer look at their own web page…
http://waterpark.twd.gov.tw/www/english/leakage/index.html
“Leaving the leakage alone, every drop of leak will converge into a huge amount of water, and reservoirs will dry out more faster.”
The TWD does seem extremely proud of its efforts to control water wastage, according to their site. This must be a “whoops” scenario LOL.
February 25th, 2012 at 3:56 pm ozsoapbox(Quote)
To be fair, that 2002 drought was ages ago now. And besides, since when does history every repeat itself anyways?
Waste away Taiwan!
February 25th, 2012 at 4:54 pm TaiwanTeacher(Quote)
Oz – I presume you were you a good resident-guest of Taiwan and immediately reported this leakage to the proper authorities, or otherwise made arrangements for them to be aware of it. Yes?
February 26th, 2012 at 11:17 am ozsoapbox(Quote)
Oh yeah definitely, because the Taipei Water Management Office speak English and everything.
‘waaaaaay?’
‘Yo, you guys aware there’s pipes in Wulai leaking water everywhere?’
*awkwards whispering*
‘uh, hello? Wulai… shuei pssssssshhhh everywhere!’
*more awkward whispering*
‘bu ting bu tong bu ting bu tong!…. *click*’
February 26th, 2012 at 7:20 pm ausGeoff(Quote)
Maybe email them a video of the leaking pipe after panning across that sign?
And add, just to clarify(!) things… “Wǒ de qìdiànchuán chōngmǎn le shànyú.”
February 26th, 2012 at 11:16 pm TaiwanTeacher(Quote)
@ausGeoff – Shang Di bao yo ni. Xie Xie!