Taiwan Today

For years, visitors have traveled to the township of Singang in Chiayi County to learn about Taiwan's religious background, drawn by the more than 70 temples, both large and small, that can be found in the area, although it has a population of just 35,000. One of Singang's most impressive religious structures is Fongtien Temple, which is primarily dedicated to Matsu, the goddess of the sea. Founded in the early 19th century, this temple has become almost synonymous with Singang, drawing multitudes of Matsu worshippers. But since early 2007, potential travelers to the township were given another enticement to pay a visit--the Incense Artistic Culture Garden, which is a combination museum, guesthouse, factory and restaurant.

"Singang is a holy place where businesses making and selling joss sticks, joss paper and divine figures thrive," says Chen Wen-chung, a Singang native and creator of the incense center, explaining the cultural background that spawned his hometown's newest attraction.

Now 45 years old and sporting a crew cut and a solid build, Chen started to learn about incense culture by apprenticing as an incense coil maker in Kaohsiung soon after his discharge from Taiwan's Marine Corps in his mid-20s. After three months of apprenticeship, he started to make incense and then set up a series of incense shops in Singang about 20 years ago. "The incense manufacturing business reached its peak right before I entered the sector. Everyone was crazy about lotteries and they visited temples a lot to pray for good luck with money," Chen says.

However, like other traditional industries in Taiwan, the incense-making business gradually suffered a decline. The lottery craze began to subside and society became less religious, with temples receiving fewer worshippers than before. The business's slowdown also owed much to the cheap imported incense from China, which began to arrive in early 1990. "As the production of incense here decreased, my income became unstable. Many workers decided to quit despite decades of experience in the business," says Tu Chi-chia, who has been making incense on and off for 27 years. Tu is now working at Chen's incense center, where visitors can see him and two other workers demonstrating the skill of making joss sticks.

A New Start

Chen's decision to combine industry with tourism not only created a future for Tu, but also gave him a new start in his career. Covering 10,000 square meters, the center offers accommodations and includes an area where visitors can see some of the plants that provide raw materials for making incense. The rooms in the guesthouse have been decorated with an incense motif, so each room smells of a material that incense can be made from such as sandalwood or fennel.

Everywhere in the center, visitors can find "incense lamps," which have lampshades made of joss sticks. The design of the incense lamps won one of the 12 prizes handed out in the first "One Town One Product" Design Awards presented by the Small and Medium Enterprise Administration in 2007 to facilitate the development and innovation of local specialty products. "Two temples have already placed orders for the lamps," Chen says.

But the center's main feature is its museum devoted to incense culture. "Collecting data for this hall was the most time-consuming job when I was preparing for the center," Chen says, adding that his is certainly the only incense museum in Taiwan, and perhaps the only one in the world. It is one of more than 200 "culture halls" subsidized by the Council for Cultural Affairs to promote local specialties in every town in Taiwan. Since the program began in 2002, it has allocated NT$2.4 billion (US$78 million) for the development of the halls.

At Chen's museum, visitors learn about the Buddhist origins of incense. The story goes that when Buddha gave a sermon in India some 2,500 years ago, his followers often felt embarrassed by the smell of their sweat, thanks to the hot weather common in the subcontinent. To fix the problem, some fetched pieces of fragrant wood and burned them. The smoke not only dispelled the bad odor, but also reduced the drowsiness caused by the high temperatures, making it easier for the followers to understand Buddha's philosophy. Over time, devotees developed a tradition of showing their respect for Buddha by burning incense.

"If you look at the details of A City of Cathay, you can see that shops were already selling incense," Chen says, pointing to a replica of the Qing court version of the famous ink painting depicting urban life during China's Qing dynasty (1644-1911) at the hall's entrance. In China, incense is still frequently used in religious ceremonies, both Buddhist and Taoist.

Coexistence

Aspects of the two religions sometimes coexist in temples in Taiwan, although they are different in many respects. Buddhism originated on the Indian subcontinent, while Taoism began in China. With a history roughly as long as Buddhism's, Taoism involves the worship of folk deities such as Matsu, who is revered by people living along China's southeast coast and in ethnic Chinese groups in Southeast Asia. More than 400 temples in Taiwan are mainly dedicated to Matsu, including Fongtien Temple in Singang and the famous Chaotian Temple in Beigang, Yunlin County, both of which are within a 10-minute drive of Chen's center.

The buildings where Buddhists and Taoists worship are called "temples" in English, but in Mandarin the word generally used for a Buddhist temple is si, while a place of Taoist worship is called gong or miao. "And in general, Buddhists use better quality incense than that used by Taoist worshippers," Chen says. "Buddhists emphasize quality over quantity when using incense."

Sometimes Buddhists do not use incense at all when praying, but worshippers of Taoist deities usually pray with three incense sticks at a time, representing their respect for man, earth and heaven. After the prayers, the first stick of incense is put in the center of the censer, the second is then placed on the right side facing figures of Taoist divinities, and finally the third is positioned on the left side facing the same figures.

There is also a story of a goddess in Chinese mythology known for her use of incense in her attempt to save her father. As the legend goes, a girl once tried to treat her sick father by feeding him herbal soup. After finding that her father could not eat the soup, the daughter decided to burn the herbs and have him inhale the smoke. Chen says that in the story the father was soon miraculously restored to health, and the daughter has since been worshipped as the Goddess of the Nine Heavens by incense makers.

Indeed, many ingredients used to make incense also play a role in Chinese herbal medicine. Chen points to an exhibition room displaying numerous glass jars containing raw materials used in Chinese medicine such as nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves. Chen says that they all can be ground and then mixed with powdered agarwood or sandalwood, both of which also have medicinal effects, to make incense. Of all the ingredients used to make incense, agarwood is the most prized, followed by sandalwood. Naturally incense with a high percentage of agarwood can fetch a premium. Neither of the two plants is endemic to Taiwan, so the former is generally imported from Indochina and the latter from India, Indonesia and Australia.

Making incense sticks involves preparing thin bamboo strips, dipping them in water and then stirring them in powder made from the ground bark of the nanmu tree. The combination of water and nanmu powder makes the herb-based incense powder stick easily to the wet bamboo. The majority of incense produced by Chen's factory is priced at NT$400 (US$13) per kilogram, but that made with pure, top-quality agarwood incense powder can be up to 80 times more expensive.

High quality agarwood, which is known for its rarity and pleasant fragrance, had a special place in the hearts of China's incense aficionados in ancient times, says Chen. The museum has opened a display room featuring dor from the Sung dynasty (960-1279)--the era when the custom started to take root among social elites in ancient China.

Japan also has a long history of using incense. In a traditional ceremony known as kodo, (the way of fragrance)--similar to those of sado (the way of tea) and kado (the way of flowers)--people appreciate the fragrance of incense as part of a formal event that follows a set of rules.

Similarly, Chen is now planning to offer incense at the center's restaurant to stimulate visitors' appetites before meals. This new idea might appeal to Huang Man, who came to Chen's museum from Taipei with her relatives out of curiosity. "I've never seen the raw natural materials incense sticks are made from. Seeing those herbal ingredients makes me feel safe when I smell the incense here," she says. "I don't go to temples often because I'm afraid the incense is unhealthy, but here the incense smells good. It doesn't make my eyes sting."

Health Concerns

Nevertheless, many people in Taiwan are becoming concerned about burning incense. Three years ago Gaston Wu, a chemistry professor and a member of the Consumers' Foundation, published a report warning about the dangers of exposure to incense smoke, which he found to be high in carcinogenic substances. The Consumers' Foundation advised people to pray by putting their palms together instead of burning incense. "After the Consumers' Foundation report was released, sales of incense in Taiwan immediately dropped," the incense center's Chen says. "But it's inappropriate to make sweeping generalizations. If you conduct tests on low-quality incense that contains chemical compounds, of course you would find it harmful to the human body. However, not every incense maker sells such products," he says.

At the end of 2006 the incense center founder commissioned Chen Lih-geeng, an assistant professor at the Graduate Institute of Biomedical and Biopharmaceutical Sciences of National Chiayi University, to research the issue. The professor is conducting a two-year analysis of the health impacts of burning incense, as well as a study of the raw materials that go into it.

"The crucial issue is the density of the incense smoke," Chen Lih-geeng says. The 2005 Consumers' Foundation experiment was conducted by burning many sticks of incense in a small space, the researcher says, while his tests on the smoke produced by a couple of incense sticks in a larger space have indicated there is little impact on health. "So it's okay to burn a few joss sticks in your home, which is usually the case," he says. "Perhaps it's not so healthy to stay in a temple, where a large amount of incense is burned. Even so, if the stay is short and the temple is well-ventilated, you should be okay." The researcher regularly reviews the results of his experiments with Chen Hsiu-tao, Chen Wen-chung's younger sister and a biotechnology major, who then discusses them with her brother.

Chen Wen-chung initially considered transforming the land the center now occupies into an organic farm. After more than 20 years as an incense maker, however, he eventually decided setting up the incense center would be more meaningful for him. The center has provided a way for Chen to put his years of experience to use, promote incense culture and maintain the links to this centuries-old craft.

Write to Oscar Chung at oscar@mail.gio.gov.tw