Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Prior to becoming drenched
Rounding out my Taiwanese... roundabout was a visit to the 3rd largest city in the country, Taichung. Or Taizhong. However you want to spell it. I prefer the latter.

Despite being the 3rd largest, Taizhong has a completely different feel to it than the rest of the country. It doesn't really feel like a big city. Yeah they for sure have some city stuff, but it kind of feels like a giant suburb with a small downtown core. Even Taidong, which has about 5% of the population of Taizhong, feels more urban. They're planning on building a metro system over the next few years, and I don't really see it taking off - I think they're going to have to lay too much track, and the stations will be too far from anything.

Consequently, you may think I am turned off by this non city slicker lifestyle, but this time I was lucky - I had a car! Well, at least a friend had a car. I arrived in Taizhong around 4 o'clock, and my friend Meimir was going to swing by to pick me up. Meimir just recently got her license, so I was prepared for a death defying struggle through Taiwanese traffic. It turns out she was just a passenger and her far more experienced mother was driving. Woohoo!

Eyy, this guy!
Apparently I have a reputation for being a mountain climbing, so Meimir arranged for us to climb a mountain before dinner. Unfortunately I don't have a clue what the name of it was. As is typical for all old Asian people, Meimir's mom kicked ass at climbing this mountain and didn't even break a sweat. Not that we even needed to sweat.

It started to drizzle on the way up, but when we got to the top, it was full on monsoon mode. I have yet, in my life, been in a rainstorm so heavy. I wasn't so much walking down the mountain as I was swimming. I put my umbrella away, cause it was doing a heap of no good. The trail basically became a river, and I thought for sure someone was going to slip. But we prevailed nonetheless, and went back to Meimir's house for a shower and to change clothes.

Quite hungry at this point, we went off to the night market for dinner. Turns out when I don't have to navigate myself, I don't have a gorram clue where I am going. And I think Meimir assumed that I 1) Don't know what food I like and 2) Can't read Chinese, because she liked to buy me things that I knew would not be my first choice... like spicy oyster noodles. I've had them before. They're okay. I would've preferred another kind of noodle. But alas, it was purchased for me before I could say otherwise.

My host for the evening
I was actually staying with April's family that night, but she was working for another hour - so we stopped by her workplace to annoy her, then retired to the Family Mart to drink and watch the drama of a cat and dog chase outside the window. Meimir went home, and I got to ride on the back of April's scooter from Taizhong to the suburbs. This was terrifying, yet fun. I think if I was going to be in Taiwan for longer I would get a scooter. We felt like we were going mach 2, but a quick look at the speedometer only registered 50 kph. Pfft, a snails pace!








Plan B - Work at 7 in Taizhong
April's family owns a 7-11, as well as the attached building - which has their house and a suite of dormitories they rent out. I got to hang out in the back room of a 7, which means I can scratch off one big item on the bucket list.

They put me up in one of their dorms for the night, which was really awesome and pretty much the biggest room I've ever stayed in in my life. The next morning I met her brother Cliff, and we went out to see the nearby earthquake museum.












This is a road. Frak a buncha that.
I am guessing the Taizhong suburb earthquake museum has never had a foreigner come here before. For one it's way out in the middle of nowhere in a town with pretty much 0 interest for tourists. It's quite cool though - basically 15, 20 years ago there was a really bad earthquake in this area. Tons of people died. This school was really hit hard, but instead of cleaning it up they just said "Ah to hell with it", and built a museum around it. I learned that earthquakes can really tear shit up.





After lunch and a rest, we went into the city proper. I wanted to see this interactive science museum, which is quite large but probably hasn't changed since the 80s. The one thing of note was the TOTALLY AWESOME dinosaurs. The T-Rex was like, pretty big. Also it moved and roared.










NAAAAAAAAAAAAAA TZEBENYAAAAA!!
One more stop on the way back was a giant market for dinner and some shopping. I ordered a pork... egg... pancake thing, which probably should've taken 30 seconds to make. I think we waited close to 30 minutes though. This girl must have been making an order for all of Taizhong on the side, but was just constantly cheery and beaming the whole time. If not for her bubbly attitude, I probably would have told her to please take my money and go away, because I have eaten my shoes in starvation.

And THAT is the Taizhong experience. In general, I find that people are really, really patient. Life's a lot slower than Taipei, or really anywhere I have ever been in my life. I also learned that while I don't mind waiting for things, not knowing how long it will take will drive me crazy. Things like lines, or stations with posted times I'm happy to stand in, because you know why there is a wait. "Mystery waiting" drives me nuts. And I learned that when I am by myself, I travel like a boss. I think most people go on vacation to relax. I did a little of that in Kending, but that seems like a giant waste of time for me. You can do nothing anywhere. Bus isn't coming for 45 minutes? Don't just wait for it. Hell, if you start running now you can probably get there faster than the bus would, plus it's cheaper, and more importantly, you get to see stuff on the way. I'm still a firm believer in not making plans when travelling, because nobody has ever said "Man, sticking to schedules is SO much fun."

Heading back to the train station, I made it there with perfect timing - there was a train back to Taipei leaving in 10 minutes. I hopped aboard, and found a seat next to a guy that I thought didn't look native. I know that's weird to say, but I thought he looked Chinese. Just a casual thought. Then he started talking really loud on his cell phone, and eating his food super fast. He had a pamphlet with simplified Chinese on it, which all but confirmed my suspicions.

Then he passed out and snored really, really loud. Oh, mainlanders. I sometimes miss your "I don't give a shit." attitude.

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

So last we left... me... I was leaving Kending to start my trek back north to Tainan. To get there I had to go through Kaohsiung, the 2nd biggest city I visited a few months ago. I got a shuttle back from the aquarium to another small hamlet that was on the main bus route back to Kaohsiung. When I got there the timetable said I had to wait another 50 minutes to catch the next one. Damn.

While waiting, a dude in a van pulled up and asked where I was going. I knew he wasn't going to Tainan, but from Kaohsiung I could get anywhere, so I said there. He said he would take me for 300 kuai, compared to the 220 the bus was. Seeing as how I had a 50 minute wait ahead, I agreed. I went to open the door, and I swear this is true, when I opened the door the van was full of girls. Worth. The. Extra. 80.

Only one of them spoke English, and were on their way to Kaohsiung to see some sort of art thing. I had no interest whatsoever in that. They asked me if I wanted to come along and I said definitely. On the way they taught me some phrases in Taiwanese, which would've been like, super helpful back when I was with that group in Taidong. I didn't tell them I had been to Kaohsiung before and knew exactly where we were going, because the one girl seemed to enjoy telling the silly foreigner all about her home.

Anyway the art show was like...ice cream? Or something? God I don't understand art. I mean yeah, it looked like ice cream. I guess it's art. WHATEVER.

They asked me where I was going, and I said that actually I was on my way to Tainan. There was a "Oh no way, so are we!" moment. It's funny how that works - so we took the MRT back to another train station I was not aware of, and then took a short trip to Tainan. I didn't realize it's basically a suburb of Kaohsiung. They were nice enough to walk me to my hostel and we said our goodbyes.

Which, by the way, this hostel is bar none, the best hostel I've ever been to. It has like a European, villa style vibe to it. It was super clean and super cheap with a giant kitchen. The next morning, I wanted to rent a bike to see the sights. The front desk guy said that actually they don't have bikes to rent anymore.

"Tell ya what... I work until this afternoon, just take mine."

So the clerk literally just gave me his bike for the day. Tainan isn't too much of a tourist area. A suburb, Anping, was the capital of Taiwan back in the days of Dutch rule. As such, there's a few things to see out there. The first is an old fort, which is honestly just a walled park with some fake guns on them.

Next is the main museum in the area, where the Dutch had their governmental office and basically ruled from there. There is a tree house. Because... well I don't know why. And last a big ol fort near the city center.






The pictures kind of speak for themselves, but really Tainan isn't much of a tourist destination. I just enjoyed a bike ride around the city, and the it's easy to navigate. They also have a pretty amazing night market that oddly had a lot of Mexican food. I got a pretty great burrito, and then there was this dog. I don't know why this dog was there. But he didn't need any reason to be this cool.

Monday, July 29, 2013

Kending is my favorite place in Taiwan aside from Taipei. In fact, it's the only other place in Taiwan I would want to live if given the choice.

Getting to Kending is stupidly hard, I think. There are buses from Kaohsiung, but I hopped off at Fengliao to avoid all the backtracking. Fengliao is a small hamlet with nothing at all, so all I did was catch the Kending bus. Kending is far south, in fact, the furthest south you can get in Taiwan. I stopped off at the hostel and went out to catch the bus to Eluanbi, the park at the tip of the island.

Eluanbi is home to the worlds only fortified lighthouse, to protect against the baddies of Asia... or something. It's a short walk to the top of the hill it's on, and from there you can see down to the coast. They built this really cool boardwalk around the area, but I was a bit surprised at how high up it was with no railing. Seriously, if you fell you would probably break a limb and get cut pretty bad - those rocks are sharp. But I made it to a pavilion marking the "This is for serious as far south as you can go" point. The sun was just about to set, so I parked it for about 15 minutes to get this photo.

Heading back into the city, Kending exploded while I was away. The main street through town was just filled with people to create the coolest night market I've ever been to. Move over, Shilin. There was so much food, and all of it sounded amazing. Deep fried Oreo? Got that. But the real star was the rice filled chicken leg. I don't know how they did it. It was a regular chicken leg, with bone - but when you bite into it, there's rice mixed in with the meat. Do they have like a rice injector gun or something? It was totally awesome and delicious. With tons of shops, clubs, and bars lining this street, I stayed out for hours looking around.


Next morning, I wanted to hit up a few more sights. The first was to, and yes this is it's name, Nixon Rock. It's a bit of a trek because no buses were running that early, but I made it out there and got my silly photo. Try and judge for yourself if it looks like Nixon. I think it's "resembles a face in general" rock.







Heading back to the city center, there was one more stop, the Kending Aquarium. The Kending Aquarium is the largest in Asia, which makes it a pretty serious contender for largest in the world. It was quite impressive, with underwater walkways, sharks, stingrays, jellyfish, ya know, all the good things. They made a mock-up pirate ship there too, with all the rooms converted into various tanks. Kending is supposedly home to 70% of the coral reefs in the world, so they had a pretty impressive collection. Their penguin exhibit in particular was huge, and pretty adorable overall.

I guess despite for my love of Kending, this entry was pretty short. Most of my time was spent sitting on a beach drinking, or wandering around the night market. They had a little bit of everything, minus any foreigners at all. I wish it was easier to get to - they should really build a train down there. There's not too too much to do in the area, but if you're looking for a cheap, tropical getaway for 4 days or so - I don't think you can get much better than this.

Saturday, July 27, 2013

The train trip from Hualian to Taidong is really nice. In fact, they should market it as a vacation in and of itself. It skirts along the coast, passing through countryside, mountain, and along the beach.

On the way there, I was studying while a little boy, maybe 4 or so, was walking back and forth on the car with his mom a few steps behind. He did this for about 15 minutes without any incident, until he randomly saw me sitting near the aisle. He just stopped, and stared for an uncomfortably long time.

哎弟弟,你叫什麽名字?(Hey little brother, whats your name?)

O_O

.
.
.

O_O

Eventually his mother came and took him away and saved me much awkwardness.

So arriving in Taidong, I was ambushed by cab drivers saying in broken English "Taxi? You need taxi?" I haven't ever really felt homesick for China, but that was one time that I did. I really miss the aggressive sales tactics and negotiating prices. I looked at the bus schedule to when I could go to the museum, but the time passed without any bus showing up. I relented and got a cab, which actually was pretty cheap.

Speaking of China, the museum is a prime example of what China would NOT do. They were building a new train station for Taidong a few years back, when they uncovered a burial ground of aboriginal Taiwanese. China would say "Who cares, fill it in with concrete and call it a day." Instead Taiwan went and preserved it, and built a first class ancient history museum on site, and tried really hard to preserve everything as is. Their IT guy was not preserving their computer system however, because in the main exhibit the computers were down, and a lot of the monitors had blue screens of death on it. That was the first time I've ever had to say the plural of blue screen of death, so I'm not really sure where the S goes. As expected, there were some guys playing around with Windows, but more interestingly, I noticed that the error message on the tiny screens in front of the exhibits let you access the GUI. It had a voice recorder app, and the tablet had a built in mic. I recorded a greeting and put the file on their NAS. Maybe one day some curious IT guy will find it.


It's a really cool place, albeit a bit far from the city. In fact, the regular train station is too. I hope when they go back to the drawing board for a new station, they put one not out in the suburbs. So, I started to look for a way into Taidong. As luck would have it, it turns out there was no way into Taidong. And there were no cabs waiting. I was told a tour bus arrived in an hour, and I could maybe go back on that? But usually the tickets are purchased in advance. Again, I waited and no bus came. I was thinking "I'm going to have to walk 10km to my hostel." However, a large group on a hotel shuttle was milling around outside. I went up to the driver, and looking as pathetic as possible, asked him if I could hitch a ride with him back to Taidong. He was nice enough to say yes, but that they were going to another few places first. Alright then.

So on the bus, the tour guide got on the mic and said that we have a new friend joining us, and I introduced myself. She spoke in Mandarin at first to me, but when doing the tour switched to Taiwanese. I tried to act like I totally knew what was going on, I think to the amusement of the people around me. I pulled out my phone and was wondering where in the world we were going. We stopped at this temple a bit outside of town, which I had no desire to see. The driver also stayed and didn't turn off the motor, so we weren't there for but a minute or so. Driving back closer to the city, I noticed my hostel was a much more comfortable 2km or so. We stopped at a banquet hall type place, and I figured we may not get any closer than this - so I thanked them and went on my way.

My hostel was actually on Google Maps, which I have never seen happen before. However it leads back to what appears to be a bunch of sheds and abandoned buildings. I actually stepped inside a lobby type area, but had no idea if this was a hostel or not. I called them, and the guy said he would come grab me at this street nearby. It turns out the lobby I stepped inside WAS my hostel. They really need to put up a sign... and get a better location. Seriously, would you think there's a hostel here?



While there I met some more friends, Brandy and Mark. Both native Taiwanese, they were in Taidong to visit a hot air balloon show a bit outside of town. They were also going to a concert that night, and asked if I wanted to come along. Why, sure! So we went off to a park to see a very talented native Taiwanese sing. Seriously, she was really good. I met an Australian guy named Robert, who asked if I had ever tried Taiwanese chewing gum. I cautiously said no, and he offered me some. Turns out it was a betel nut, which I had indeed tried once before - it's basically chewing tobacco, and is kind of a working class sort of thing. I took it to be polite, and while not the most unpleasant thing in the world, it's not exactly great. Try it if you come. But only one time.

Heading back to the hostel, we picked up a bunch of beer. Mark, like all Taiwanese, was in the military. BUT, he was actually was part of the honor guard that protects the most important monuments around Taiwan - 3 in Taipei, and 1 in Taoyuan. He answered some of my stupid questions in regards to that.

1) The rifles are M1 Garands.
2) All the clips are empty.
3) Every day, they have to get up at dawn and stand at attention, outside, for 2 hours.
4) While standing at attention, there are coins placed on each shoulder. If one falls, they have to go back to training.
5) While doing the routine, there are plain clothes guys in the crowed watching. Any slip-up and you're out of the honor guard.
6) They are so focused they don't really see people individually, so my silly faces are for naught.
7) The tours are 3 months long.

Later the singer from the concert showed up! We had a few drinks with her, and I chatted with another guy named Ben. It was 1am though, and amazingly, we were getting up at 4am to go watch balloons.

Wait... the show is at 4am? Shit.

So 4am comes along, and they wake me up. Thankfully they were driving, and the trip was about 45 minutes each way. As you can expect, I promptly fell asleep in the car. The show itself was cool, I especially liked the Darth Vader balloon. They played the imperial march when it took off. All in all, a lot of balloons leaving this mountain to fly around for a bit.

Back in Taidong, I took a nap before checking out. The first spot I wanted to see was the old train station right next to the hostel. Basically, when they shut this thing down, they decided instead of bulldozing it, they would just turn it into a park and let people paint, play music, or do whatever they want. It turned into a sort of artist village, and it's pretty cool to run around the old station and tracks. After checking that out, I went off to Liyu mountain to get a birds eye view. Again, not terribly tall, but it did have some cool looking temples on the way. Unfortunately there wasn't anything else in Taidong, so hailed a cab to go back to the train station. The cab driver was super nice - he told me exactly how to get to Kending, and we chatted about the weather, Taidong, life in general. I didn't have the exact amount and he didn't have change, so he was really cool and waited for me to buy a ticket to break my $1000. Nice fella.

Taking the south link line, it's about 50% tunnel through the mountains in the center of the island. This continues until you pop out the other side, near by destination, Fengliao. But that's it for next time.

Thursday, July 25, 2013

I have completed my week long trip around Taiwan, which was quite a trek. I met lots of new people, became more familiar with a train system than I thought possible, and learned that I can fall asleep on a park bench with little effort. But over the next few weeks I'll try to type up and post my time spent at all these various little spots around Taiwan, and my impressions of them. My first stop on the trip was Hualian.

















I had to work until 6:00 on Friday, so I rushed out to Taipei main to catch the train there. It was about a 2.5 hour journey, so I wasn't sure how late the trains ran. Well I was lucky and yet unlucky. There was a train leaving in about 20 minutes after I got there, but it was completely sold out. You can get a commuter ticket, intended for short term trips where you stand the whole time. However, standing for that long with my bag was not really appealing. About 30 minutes after that, there was another train that I would only have to stand for a little ways, then a seat would become available. I opted for that one instead.

It turns out commuter-only tickets are fun. You just kind of park yourself in the walking area off to the side of the bathrooms/water dispenser. And fortunately it was night, so the lack of AC wasn't too big of a concern, but I wouldn't want to do it during the day. Anywho I was going car to car trying to find a place to crash when I came across Guy.

I call him "Guy" because I don't know his name. He was a foreigner, judging by his accent American or Canadian, playing a ukulele. I knew there was a long trip ahead, so I sat across from him and struck up a conversation. Guy is very strange. At first I enjoyed his company, but at around an hour in, I wanted to run away. I asked him his name, to which he responded "Man, I don't do interviews, there's so much more to talk about!"

Okay then.

Turns out "more to talk about" includes his idea that hallucinogenic drugs are the best thing ever, and that he didn't buy a ticket because "the trains going there anyway" and "They don't need money - its all the governments plan to keep the population in check". His attitude was amusing until he started saying really crass comments in English to the people walking by us. "Ah look at this old lady, what a bitch." and "Nice legs darling, come back to my place and I'll show you a good time." I don't know what it's like in Hualian, but in general, people in Taipei can speak English - especially young people. I decided that if he wanted to embarrass whatever country he was from he could do it by himself, so I made for my seat. "Hey man, you just gonna bail? Okay yeah whatever, get out of here then." Yup. Seeya, asshole.

Anyway, I made it to my hostel, had a nice rest, and woke up the next morning to head off to Taroko Gorge. Taroko is a pretty place, and there are several tours there daily. But it's kind of the off season, so not as many now. I took the bus to the end, a village high up in Taroko called Tianxiang. I sat down in a small restaurant for lunch and ordered my favorite, beef and noodles. The owner came up to me with an Asian man and said in Chinese, "This guy doesn't speak and Chinese but can speak English - can you help him order?" I chuckled at the absurdity of the situation. I told him what most of what they had to offer, and we ate together.


His name is David, who was very nice but I feel a little sorry for. He owns a company that sells bubble tea in Seoul, and is in Taipei most of the year to help launch the business here. His wife and kids live back in the UK, who he rarely sees - so he decided to do a weekend getaway. After going around Tainxiang, it was time to leave, but a landslide blocked the road. Stuck there, David and I drank for about 2 hours. So, that was fun.








Going down to the next stop, I bid him farewell and started to hike down. It's really pretty there, and although the bus stops have people milling about, usually I was completely alone in this vast canyon. I was quite surprised when I came across a cafe in the middle of nowhere. I got another beer and took a rest.

Continuing on, I found another bus waiting at almost at the entrance to Taroko. I didn't know when another one would come, so I quickly ran and hopped on. Grabbing a seat at the back, I found Jordyn. Jordyn is an intern in Taipei, on her last week before heading back to the states. She was super nice, and was apparently not offended enough by my likely terrible BO to talk to me. Turns out we stayed at the same hostel, in fact, the next room over. She was going to a beach, and was cool enough to let me come along.

Hualian beach is so so. It's really just a park next to the ocean, because nobody really swims there. It's covered with rocks, and really isn't all that pretty. But for some reason it's also next to an Air Force base, and there were F-16s both on the ground and in the air. I thought that was cool.

After a stroll around the beach, we went to catch the last bus back to the city. Hualian is the city of waiting, because I swear the bus took 1.5 hours to get there. In all, I probably spent 5 hours of my day waiting on fraking buses. So, screw you Hualian. After getting back to the city we went to the night market, which is so incredibly small it's not worth it.

If you can believe it, we met more people at Hualian night market. We ordered some food, and sat at a table with a very nice couple. The guy was named Apollo, AKA the coolest name ever. He and his wife live near Kaohsiung, and invited us out to visit - unfortunately I didn't have any time to do so, but we had a nice chat anyway. I went to get some watermelon juice for us, and I swear to god, I had to stand 30 minutes in line. After waiting all day, I was about ready to kill someone.

So after saying goodbye to Jordyn, and getting a nice rest, I was going to go around Hualian and see the city before heading off to Taidong. This included a hike up Meilun Mountain, a visit to the Martyrs Shrine, see a several hundred year old tree, and finally eat at a famous restaurant. Meilun is a pretty wussy mountain, but was a nice way to spend 30 minutes. The Martyrs Shrine was pretty. Now, as far the tree goes, that is the biggest load of BS I've ever heard. This tree is not 100 years old. I'd be shocked if it was 100 days old. No tree grows like that. The info I got from the hostel said it's completely natural, I guess in the way that your mouth "naturally" spewed nonsense. Maybe they mean just the top, but I find the whole thing suspect. Take a look at the pic and decide for yourself. Yes, this was absolutely the right place. A sign nearby said the same.





The last stop before leaving Hualian was Gongzheng Dumplings. The line was massive, but I had nowhere else to be, so why not? The guy in front of me said this place invented Xiao Long Bao. I acted impressed, but thought in no way was that true. A quick internet search confirms that. Regardless, I walked back to the train station with my bounty of baozi, ready to leave this city of waiting and lying.

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

It's the 7-11 snack roundup round 2! This time, 33.33 (repeating, of course) percent more strange.

Recently we've gotten more kinds of beer. This Swedish one is no slouch at 7.5% ABV, but it was too watery.

These were basically cheetohs with some sort of... flavoring.  A bit spicy with little to no BBQ flavor to speak of.

I buy these a lot, the 7-11 brand teas. They're super cheap and not bad, although this Japanese one was a little bitter.

7-11 does everything, including microwave dumplings. These are pork, and actually not half bad.

WHAT IS GOING ON with this packaging? Fish flavored crackers shaped like a fish, they tasted more like rotten fish.

7 also has bread. This, per the name, is melon bread. I'll be damned if it doesn't taste like bread with a hint of melon flavor.

Haha, I love the name of these! Crunchy potato chip like things with salt. A bit plain but otherwise good.

These are actually Japanese as well, they're crackers with gooey chocolate inside. Tasty but expensive!

Kirin, the Japanese beer manufacturer, apparently decided to make some cola. Tastes as you'd expect, but Coke Zero is much cheaper and slightly better.

I don't know why there is a koala here, but these are just shortbread cookies. Pretty solid.

Mixed fruits and veg drink - you'd think something containing celery and spinach would taste horrible, but it actually holds up. I'll be buying more of these.

Rose Tea - unexpectedly good, with just a hint of sweetness. I'm a big fan.

These are 7-11 brand, and come in a big bag for the same price as a competitors small bag. Not so good, a little bland. Pairing with a Cabernet Sauvignon is optional, but like most things, it's a great idea.

Instant noodles, Taiwanese style. Cheap, salty, bland, I prefer the cheapo Maruchan ramen.

Essentially cheese puffs but with strawberry flavor instead of cheese. Pretty flavorful actually, I dug these.