Over five years, Beck followed pilgrimage after pilgrimage: the famous 大甲 procession, the wilder 白沙屯, the great midpoint temple at 北港, and the 南瑤宮 procession near his home in 彰化. He learned that no two are alike.
白沙屯, he found, is "more peaceful" — but its route is decided by the goddess, not a schedule, and keeping up meant sprinting across rice fields when her palanquin suddenly changed direction. 大甲, by contrast, is "livelier and uses a lot of firecrackers," and even has a tracking app so followers can find the palanquin in real time.
At 北港朝天宮 he filmed something most visitors never see: the "flying palanquin," in which bearers spin a sedan chair high in the air, a sign that the deity has entered them. Taiwanese viewers told him the footage looked like National Geographic. He has also shouldered Mazu's palanquin himself, feeling in his own legs the weight that thousands carry for nine days.