Little rain isn't gonna stop us

The second half of our 2013 Chuseok vacation was 2 days in Taipei. Naturally, with my luck, the timing wasn't great; there was a typhoon hitting the south end of Taiwan just as we were arriving at the north end of the island.

The good news is that it didn't hit the city directly, only got caught in waves of rain.

The bad news is that the threat of the typhoon caused the cable cars up to Maokong Mtn to close, which was a main attraction in Taipei. There are tea houses at the top which are said to be delicious and full of traditional Taiwanese foods.

Because of the rain, we were secluded in the hotel room most of the time, which worked out just fine when we were trying new kinds of snacks from the convenience store and playing cards. I taught Alex and Roberta the classy games of Bullshit and Rummy.

I'm not convinced that Roberta isn't some kind of Irish card shark who's just been biding her time...

But when we braved the rain to explore the city, we were all pretty impressed. Downtown was clean and there was art on every street corner.

Rain apparently keeps everyone inside...? More room for us to play!

My lovely travel companions :)

Interesting and providing valuable public service!

 We spent most of our full day in Taipei at Taipei 101, the tallest tower in the city. The top floor is an observatory, but was decidedly more interactive than Shanghai's. The entire floor was full of interesting facts about Taiwan and the construction of the tower itself. Not only that, but we got to go to the center of the building and get a look at a damper, the giant wrecking-ball-thing that keeps the massive building steady during at storm with gusting winds. The cartoon damper people were a little excessive, but it was still fascinating to get a firsthand look at something I had never given much thought to before.

After the observatory we stuck around and looked at the shops, sat outside of a Starbucks waiting for the rain to take a break, and did a fair amount of people watching.

At night we saw the Shilin night market, the largest in Taipei and only a few blocks away from our hotel. We ate at a Mongolian BBQ restaurant, which was delicious and SO cheap, then walked around to investigate the content of the booths. There were T-shirts for several dollars each, carnival games, and cheap knick knacks that make you wonder who actually buys them. Walked away from the market with several 'gifts'. I put gifts in quotes because I have grown attached and am unwilling to part with them. Namely my stormtrooper and smurf t-shirts. Terrible grammar and all, they're mine.

Night market, where you can find anything and anything cheap

Oh and food. Glorious food. The smell of roasting chicken and some kind of bread dessert product was everywhere, and it was mouth watering.I was surprised not to see very many strange food items. The stinky tofu (yes, that's the actual term) was expected, but besides that I only saw some gelatinous thing that had pictures of frogs on the side. Assume away.

Mongolian stir fry at the night market.
Cheap, delicious, and filling!

I would eat dumplings every day if I wouldn't look like Jabba

'Crab Hand Roll' flavored chips. They were surprisingly delicious

We also got to visit Longshan Temple, one of the oldest, most intricate temples within the city. There was a service being held at the time, and walking around taking photos while people were offering incense and singing prayers felt disrespectful, so we didn't stay long. Although not particularly large, it was still incredibly beautiful. I am always intrigued by how vastly different the Chinese/Japanese/Korean temples are in style, even those of the same religion (Buddhist, typically).

Overall, I really loved Taipei, so much so that it's on my short list of cities to potentially live in one day. The people were incredibly friendly, the food was delicious, it was clean and relatively easy to navigate. Not much more I can ask for in a city.


안녕!