Taitung Luye 2626 Market: Enjoy local goods under a green shaded avenue
Bicycles, green shade, phytoncides: the Wuling Green Tunnel in Luye, Taitung, China, not only once appeared in a television commercial, but has now also transformed into a weekend market. On the second Saturday of every month, over a hundred stalls gather beneath the green shade. Besides displaying and selling the local Fulou tea and roselle, there are also hand-woven bamboo and peach items from the Bunun people, with an emphasis on local, eco-friendly and LOHAS values, using good mountains, good waters and good products to invite everyone to come here for a stroll and together support local industries.
Even though it is 2626, it is not slipshod at all
Most people who hear of the 2626 Market for the first time will probably wonder why the name sounds so much like the Taiwanese homophone "ling-ling-lok-lok" (scattered and sloppy). Liao Chung-hsun, director-general of the Yongan Community Development Association who was the driving force behind the market, says with a laugh that indeed many people, upon hearing 2626, automatically think of 2266, but this name was not chosen at random. 2626 represents the market time: the second Saturday of every month, from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. This convenient and easy-to-remember name solved a major headache for the community development association.
As early as last year, the community development association had already set up a weekend market on every Saturday and Sunday afternoon in July and August, but because the timing was not so fixed, promotion required a great deal of effort. After expanding the scale, in order to build name recognition, Liao Chung-hsun had a flash of inspiration and came up with the name 2626. He mocked himself, saying that anyway, when you first start something it is bound to be slipshod. But the name did successfully leave a deep impression on many people, and some groups that came to observe joked that in the future there might even be a 3388 Market.
The predecessor of the 2626 Market came from the Luliao Coffee Festival. Luliao is the old place name of the Yongan Community in Luye, and is also where the Green Tunnel is located. In 2009, Liao Chung-hsun discovered that the Green Tunnel, once most beloved by tourists, had in recent years become increasingly declining, and the fame of the locally produced coffee had also fallen, so it could only be sold to other counties and cities. In order to win back tourists' hearts, the community development association worked hard to raise 30,000 yuan in funding and held the first Luliao Coffee Festival at the Green Tunnel. Unexpectedly, it was very well received, which made him deeply realize that as long as there is a themed feature, even with little money it can still be done impressively, and this also opened the opportunity for him to later found the 2626 Market.
A vendor used creativity to turn the local Fulou tea into fried tea leaves, wrapped in rice balls to great acclaim