Located in the Dashanbei (大山背) region, Hengshan Township (橫山鄉), Hsinchu County, Dashan Beiyue (大山北月) is a scenic restaurant and much more. It was formerly Fengxiang Elementary School (豐鄉國小), which was founded in 1923. However, the school was abandoned in the 1980s due to insufficient student enrollment. In 2006, the Hakka Affairs Council changed this space into the Dashanbei Hakka Culture Ecological Museum and leased it to businesses, but many operators were unable to successfully operate the site.
(All images: FTV)
In 2014, a young couple, Chuang Kai-yong (莊凱詠) and Wu Yi-jing (吳宜靜), fell in love with the natural scenery and human history here, and won the rights from the Hengshan Township Office to operate the site. Since then, they have revitalized the old school building, injected their knowledge of Internet technology, and thoroughly integrated local resources, to increase the value of the agricultural products from Hsinchu’s five townships and sell them in the market, successfully helping farmers reap the rewards of their hard work. Now, Dashan Beiyue has become a success story for many people who have returned to their hometown.
Dashan Beiyue is located on a hill and is surrounded by clouds and mists. Although the natural scenery is charming and it used to be a school building with an interesting history, its location makes it hard to reach. Therefore, it was gradually forgotten by people over the years, and the local population also rapidly declined due to out migration. After Chuang Kai-yong took over operating the site, he first discovered that Dashan Beiyue was actually in the middle of Provincial Highway 3, a route promoted by Taiwan’s government as a romantic getaway.
In addition, the five townships near Hengshan Township—Guanxi, Hengshan, Zhudong, Beipu, and Emei—all have very unique agricultural products. However, because of the lack of resource integration and connectivity, the area’s agricultural products were often unsalable, and farmers could not get the rewards they deserved. Therefore, Chuang turned Dashan Beiyue into a sales platform, designing packaging for farm products and finding distribution channels for them in the front-end of the sales process; and in the back-end, he promoted the products on Internet platforms such as Dashan Beiyue, and launched “Slow Food Package” in the restaurant. He also held concerts, exhibitions and other activities, successfully helping local farmers sell all of their seasonal agricultural products.
There are various agricultural products on the counter in the restaurant’s store, such as turmeric, kumquat sauce, and bitter gourd candies. The store is open all year round. It always follows the seasons to introduce the most delicious agricultural products to tourists. The most famous product in the store - "bitter gourd candy" - is a show of solitude for bitter gourd farmers; it’s a product that has been processed with added value, creatively packaged and named "Bitter & Sweet.” The hope is that consumers would eat more bitter gourd and once tasting the candy, they would understand it symbolizes farmers’ hard work in planting, cultivation and harvesting, a process that can be described as going from bitterness to sweetness. As expected, the candy received an enthusiastic response as soon as it went on the market, and it was successfully sold out.
In fact, there are countless products that Dashan Beiyue packs and sells for the Hakka village farmers. Just citrus alone has been developed into jams, beer, soft candy, gift boxes, desserts, etc. In the store, there are also regular menu items, such as Emei’s Oriental Beauty Tea, Guanxi’s xiancao cold noodles, Beipu’s Hakka lei tea, Hengshan’s kiln baked bread, and Zhudong’s Hakka mochi. In addition, hidden menus often appear in the store, such as loquat that is freshly picked in the morning added with moon peach blossom sauce to make loquat tart, orange daifuku, passion fruit tart, and wild ginger flowers used to make various dishes. Every product and every dish represents Hakka villagers’ respect for the earth and appreciation for natual resources, as well as their love of nature and belief in living in harmony with earth.
Now Dashan Beiyue, in addition to being a platform for selling the products grown along on Taiwan Romantic Route 3, also combines forest trails, curatorial space, and slow-living dining. It organizes a lot of splendid curated exhibitions, such as one featuring the drawings of Liu Xing-chin (劉興欽), a graduate of Fengxiang Elementary School and a national treasure cartoonist. Liu also drew special designs to promote his hometown farmers’ special agricultural products, which was further evidence that there are so many people who are willing to work together for their hometown and return home to protect the beautiful mountains and forests. If you have time, come to Dashan Beiyue and look at the greenery of the mountains. In the spring, they are full of cherry blossoms and in the summer, they are covered with tung blossoms. Here, you can listen to the stories of the mountains and regain the pure beauty of childhood.
