Jifeng Iron Shop: sixty years of blacksmithing, reborn through the tempering of blade and fire

In the mountains there is blacksmithing for forestry, and on the plains there is blacksmithing for farming; though both are called blacksmithing, they are different fields. Qishan sits at the junction of mountain and plain, and this is where industries intersect. Here there are not only immigrants, but also peoples who have cultivated the land deeply. Jifeng Iron Shop is where the pioneering ancestors who opened up the mountains and broke new ground stood in this intersecting space, and it continues to answer the call of carrying on the pioneering spirit and the action of tempering.

[The blacksmithing youth who returned home twenty years ago]

"When the iron is red-hot, you bully it; when the iron is not red, it bullies you." Blacksmithing has forged a philosophy of life. Master Lin Xiangmin, a young man who returned home twenty years ago, inherited the family's fine blacksmithing skills and has studied the insights behind different blacksmithing products. Looking around the shop, there is a dazzling array of blades of every kind, from Indigenous mountain knives, Southeast Asian machetes, Damascus steel blades, axes, machetes, to chieftain knives and more; it is practically a craft collector's shop. "The letter knife given to Indigenous Peoples Council minister Icyang Parod when the Southern Tsou were established as the Hla'alua people was carefully forged by me." Constantly researching and forging ironware and traditional utensils that keep pace with the times, Master Lin proudly says that Jifeng Iron Shop is a model example of traditional industry transformation.

Lin Xiangmin began working with blacksmithing during junior high school, because his father Lin Jiguang was the founder of Jifeng Iron Shop. From childhood he let his children move about and explore inside the blacksmith shop, cultivating their interest in this trade and later passing on the blacksmithing technique. After entering the trade, Master Lin also studied Southeast Asian, Indigenous and Han blades, and found that Southeast Asian blade shapes and leverage points are the best: not only is the center of gravity forward, but the mass sticks to the hand, and the blade spine bears force evenly, so he began mass production, making local farmers who cut firewood love them. "Bunun blades are relatively small and compact; Southern Tsou blades have a big head and small belly; Northern Tsou blades have a small head and big belly, like a pig-killing knife." Master Lin is truly very knowledgeable in his study of different blades; in discussions of blades, one can vaguely see each people's way of life and thinking.

[An iron shop for clearing mountain forests, with axes as its mainstay]