City God Temple (城隍廟)

  Hsinchu (新竹) is popularly nicknamed "The Windy City" for its windy climate and "The Garden City of Culture and Technology" by its tourism department. when the modern era came to the country the words "Made in Taiwan" became synonymous with "Hsinchu". The area has a history of over 400 years and was used as an administrative capital by the Qing Dynasty and the Japanese.  

  It is populated predominately by the Hakka people (and engineers) and is one of the areas where Hakka culture is well-preserved and celebrated. The Hsinchu Science Park is the home of many major corporations and helps to fuel the worlds hunger for technology. The city is full of historic locations like the City God Temple (城隍廟) and the beautiful Japanese-era train station while the county has mountains, rivers, aboriginal tribes and old streets such as Beipu (北浦老街) and Neiwan (內灣老街) as well as having the tallest standing statue of the Laughing Buddha(彌勒佛) in the world at Emei lake(峨嵋湖). Hsinchu is a great place to visit to learn about the history of Taiwan but also to sample some of the special foods that the area is known for.

The temple I'm introducing today is the Hsinchu City God temple (新竹城隍廟) which is regarded as the most important 'City God' temple in Taiwan and the "provincial" headquarters of all the City God temples in the COUNTRY meaning that all of the other City God temples more or less need to pay homage or at least respect to the Hsinchu temple.

The Hsinchu temple isn't the oldest City God temple, nor is it the biggest, so why then is the so-called headquarters of all the City God temples in Taiwan? Well for that answer we have to look at the history of Taiwan and governance over the island. Hsinchu has always been an important place in Taiwan and has a history of over 400 years of development. When the temple was constructed back in 1747 during the Qing Dynasty the city was an important centre for political activity and therefore the Qing (who controlled a small part of the island at the time) designated the temple as the City God HQ for the island. Currently there are over 95 City God temples in Taiwan with the temple in Hsinchu, the temple in Taipei's historic Dadaocheng (大稻埕) district and the Tainan temple (the first city God temple in Taiwan) being the most important.

The temple is extremely important to Hsinchu and is one of the city's main attractions. It is also one of the older temples in Taiwan and the wear and tear of time and hundreds of years of burning incense is certainly noticeable on the walls throughout the complex. It's not as shiny and elaborate as most Taoist temples in Taiwan  

There is a traditional wet market next to the temple that is open in the mornings and afternoon and a night market surrounding it. Within the temple complex there is a strange cafeteria-like set up offering all of Hsinchu's finest foods making the temple a one-stop shop for all things "Hsinchu", something you don't often see with the majority of the temples in Taiwan – especially since most temples only provide vegetarian meals. If you visit the temple, I highly recommend you stop at any of the restaurants offering Hsinchu's fried rice noodles (炒米粉), Pork ball soup (貢丸湯), Taiwanese meatballs (肉圓) and braised pork rice (滷肉飯) or crossing the street for some amazing duck noodles or rice (鴨香麵/飯) if you see a line of people waiting for something that is probably a pretty good indication that something is good at that restaurant.