Blonde, bronzed and dipped in salt, Alex Mowday looks like your typical Sydney surfer.
Which he might well be, if not for the fact that the Australian-born windsurfing devotee has called Taiwan home for 25 years.
Mowday had been living in Hong Kong, designing and manufacturing sailboard rigs, when he mooched over to Taipei in search of 'the perfect wave' and intelligent sailboard design.
During a weekend race meeting on the island of Penghu, he discovered a 'windsurfers' paradise' - 'clean air and water, and relentless winds - I mean the wind blew 24/7. And the steadiest wind I had ever experienced,' he says.
These conditions made Penghu perfect for the rigs Mowday was developing, and he moved there in 2002, also setting up a surf station 'catering for the hard-core windsurfers in Asia'. Around that time he began coaching some young athletes, including local prodigy Howard Chang Hao, who went on to complete at 17 as the youngest sailor in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and the first Taiwan-born sailing Olympian.
By then Chang's family had also moved from Taipei to Penghu, enabling their son to follow his dream and, like Mowday, they have never regretted it.