“Don’t hurt anyone except with a kiss.” The naughtiest child in Taitung is the sun.

Text and photos /“Obailai Travel Observation Diary”by Tsai Da

On this earth, how could you bear to give any harm other than a kiss?

That day in Taitung, I encountered a mischievous child named the sun, playing hide-and-seek in the boundless sky. Along Provincial Highway 11, the gentle ocean splashed with waves, and the playful sunlight danced with the spray on the windshield. The sky and the terraced fields stretched into one line—watching birds in the sky through the water in the paddies felt like an upside-down world, and we were all enveloped within it.

Being tightly embraced and held by the earth—it felt so real.

The wind also came, whispering in my ear, reminding me to remember this sight. The passing egrets, those little gentlemen, bent their heads searching for worms, leaving their light footprints effortlessly in the mud. I have been here, and perhaps I will vanish, but I once existed. The more I travel, the more I realize that traveling is life, and life can also be travel.

It turns out, I never really stopped.

We live in concrete, where cold walls won’t hold a handprint.
The world is far away, yet also so close.
Go to a place a little closer to the sky.

“If you’ve ever been embraced by the earth, you’ll never be able to give anything but a kiss as harm.”