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Taking the
delicious Dong Dong taro balls, we walked to
Dakeng Circle. It was Dakeng's landmark,
which was built by laying stones. There was
20 meters for its diameter of the circle and
an old maple tree in the middle. The tree
was about 16 meters tall so that people must
be attracted when they were traveling in
Dakeng or Xingshe. It was said that this old
maple tree was more than 180 years old (some
people said it was 300 years old).
The presenter
said according to one eighty-year-old local
old resident's memory, this old maple tree
was so big when he was a child but the
leaves of the tree were still bushy at
present. However, in the early 1970s' the
trunk of the tree was once rotten severely
even dried up for parasitism. After the
nearby residents spent three years rescuing
so that the old maple tree could survive and
represent a beautiful scene.
Besides visiting
the maple tree in the circle, we still took
a picture under the tree. I felt it was
good! Except experiencing the beauty of this
old maple tree in this ecotourism tour, we
still interviewed Dakeng Cultural
Association for getting more information
about the maple tree in Dakeng Circle. I
remembered that Aunt Guo introduced us the
former name of Dakeng Circle was "Koupu," It
was because that the people of Dakeng were
lived by farming. During the Japanese
occupation, it was a market. Besides,
peoople were attached to the old maple tree
from generation to generation. The old maple
tree sprout in spring, and the leaves were
busy and green in summer, which symbolized
the farmers' harvest. In fall and winter,
the leaves of the maple tree became dried
and yellow, which symbolized the ending of
the harvest. The history of Dakeng is
recorded year after year.
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It was said that the Fu De Cih ( a shine's
name) under the old tree was the belief
center for Dakeng's residents. Fu De Chih
was only built by piling several big stone
during the Japanese occupation. There were
two gods' statues made of two big stones.
The nearby residents thought the Fu De Cih
or Tudi Gong temple was too humble, so the
villagers started to donated and collected
money. They rebuilt the temple by bricks and
caved a new god's statue of Tudi Gong.
people rebuilt the temple again after the
earthquake on September 21st in 1999 and
added several kinds of stone tables and
stone chairs for people's resting. The
couplet on front of Fu De Cih, which means
the land can be left for the offspring, but
the moral conduct should be cultivated by
oneself, tried to admonish the following
descendents. Aunt Guo said
Dakeng Cultural
Association has more research on Dakeng's
humanity, so we had more understanding of
maple tree of Dakeng Circle from here.
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