Monday, September 30, 2013

Winter is coming. Despite this, I made the journey to the north.


Blah blah Taiwan sucks at being cold, damn this hot weather, where's snow, etc. At night it gets to be around 70 degrees here. Shocking, I know. But I have already seen people wearing jackets and gloves. It's like a bizzaro world where the laws of physics are reversed, and more clothes make you cooler. Anyway since I live in a city who literally has "North" in its name, it's not possible to get much more north. Something I wanted to see though, were the ports of Guandu and Bali. For no reason other than I see boats go to them.

Guandu is a park and Bali is an industrial area. Well, moving on.


During the trip the bus stopped at some museum so I hopped off. It was a bit small, but free, so that's good. Some ROC pilot back in the 60s was flying over Taipei when he noticed his compass go crazy. It turns out there was a huge deposit of iron in the ground, which revealed some sort of ancient burial site. The museum was mostly boring, with your standard assortment of old things. All in all it was a pretty dull day, but at least I took the mystery out of the boat destinations. At the industrial park, I did stop at a beef noodle restaurant though. They had a sign outside saying they won some sort of award, and I believe it. This was hands down the best beef noodle I've had in the city. That one in Taipei Main Station? Move over chumps, you suck. Some mom and pop place in the middle of nowhere is better. I'd go there more often if it wasn't so far away.


For more exciting news, I also made a journey to the east. I don't really have a command of Game of Thrones geography to know what is east, so... where the Dolthraki are, I guess?

Tiffany and I went to Jiufen, and I went again by myself to climb some mountain I thought looked cool. Jiufen is really awesome. Taiwan had a gold rush back in the day, which the Japanese were all too busy to get their hands on. Jiufen became a mini El Dorado for a while, and brought in a lot of cash. Then the gold dried up. A lot of people did pack up and move. But the one's that stayed said "Actually, this town is pretty cool, let's turn it into a tourist thingy." And that they did, but again - totally worth it. It's basically ripped out of a movie, sitting on the side of a mountain up in the clouds. The old street was really cool, a narrow corridor of alleys twisting through the city leading to god knows where, jam packed with people and vendors. I bought a reasonably priced ocarina, and the food - oh god, so much food. Wash it all down with a Coke Tea (it tasted very weird) for a good time. They have an old movie theatre there playing movies from the 70s for free, so we caught one of those as well. As I said I went back to hike a mountain I saw there, which was definitely up in the clouds. I did manage to squeeze one pic of the city down below during a cloud break, though.

Anyway after Jiufen it was a dash back to Jilong to get some dinner. On the way we walked through a park that was completely filled with cats. So many cats, it gave me paws. But they were being fed by the locals, so it wasn't a complete catastrophe. Anyway I'm going to stop milking these cat puns meow.




Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Just a bit of housekeeping here.

Something I did not mention before the crew arrived is that I went to a Taiwanese baseball game. Taiwanese baseball has an odd history, in that its history is odd. It started out back in 1989, and there were 2 separate leagues. Eventually they merged together, and at its peak, had 7 teams. Then in 1996, some players were approached by some shady types for game fixing, which was rejected and immediately reported to the authorities. They patted each other on the backs, said "That's some good policin', Lou." and went about their day. Exceeeept it happened again next year, and this time, they admitted to game fixing. And then in 2005. And 2008. And 2009. As a result, people don't really have a lot of faith in the fairness of these games.

However, I was coming in with 0 knowledge whatsoever. Game fixed or not, it's going to end with someone winning and I'm okay with that. I had no stake in any of the teams, I was there to see some guys run around a diamond and drink beer. I realize that last sentence was ambiguous, I mean I am drinking beer, not them. Although that would make for a better game. Anyway getting back on track I knew that the teams were actually corporate owned and operated, but what I didn't know is that they were still representatives of particular cities. It turns out my very own neighborhood has the privilege of hosting the Taipei Elephants. They were playing the Rhinos, which come from Kaohsiung. I know nothing about either of these guys except that I need to represent - therefore, my home team is awesome and that the away team is a bunch of talentless jackasses.

They had vendors there, and I did want to try Taiwanese baseball fare as well as find a hotdog. One was selling burritos, which turned out to be duck and vegetables - America, seriously, get on this idea. Another was selling pig blood cake so... nah. Anyway I had my beer, burrito, and hot dog, so I consider it a success. During the game I made up Rhino "facts" to entertain myself and bore Tiffany. Did you know, Rhino players pee on the seat, and never clean it up? They also are those guys who always push to get on the train before everyone else gets off. And here's the big taboo - after using the plastic chopsticks at a restaurant, they stick them back in the box. Terrible people, let me tell ya. They also lost 4-0, so they can take their sorry asses back to Kaohsiung. But I'd be glad to have them back for another game.

And right, that brings us to today. I wanted a "Travel around Taipei" day for myself, and set out to find the 4 gates of Taipei. I don't think this is on any travel guide, and honestly it's not terribly exciting - but there is a popular area called Ximen, which literally means "West Gate". I thought that it would make sense that there is a north, south, and east gates as well. It turns out yes, but they are certainly not marked well. They were the entrances to the city from a long time ago, when it was surrounded by walls and much much smaller. Now they're each about 1 subway stop away from each other, more or less. Except there often is no subway stop, so that requires a lot of walking. They do all exist except the aforementioned West Gate. It was demolished when they put up the subway station there, although I did find a plaque commemorating it's location. Anywho it was a fun mystery to find all these, since as there are areas named "North Gate" for example, the location of the actual gate itself is not mentioned on any site I could find. They were usually plopped down in the middle of an intersection, but really, how many intersections do you think there are in Taipei? Along the way I discovered there are actually 2 south gates, and the east gate is nowhere near the East Gate area of Taipei. So here ya go, photos of these darn things. Seeya next time, internet / future me.

The former location of the West Gate

The Auxiliary South Gate

The South Gate

The East Gate

The North Gate, the only one that has not been rebuilt.

Saturday, September 14, 2013

What a week! At long last, I got some visitors from back home. Jesse, Dan, and Lindsay completed their Tokyo - Taipei tour just yesterday, and I hope they had a good time. It was fortunate for me that they began their trip in Tokyo, as I'd imagine they would be far less jetlagged. I had the Sunday they were to arrive off of work, which Tiffany and I spent together. Their plane was to arrive around 10 o'clock, which definitely did not happen.

There was talk about me checking at the BnB for them in advance, as to not make the owner wait around all night. That idea was scrapped, and then seemed to rise from the ashes after their plane got delayed. I had already set out before knowing that, around 9:00 - for a 30 minute trip. I knew I had some time to kill, so I wandered around Taipei Main enjoying a coffee. Around 11 o'clock I headed over and met the owner, Tom. Turns out Tom is a pro kickboxer, originally trained in Thailand and the Philippines. Pretty crazy! He also has a pretty ballin place right next to Taipower. And a stray roof cat. Seeing as how he is black and white, I named him Panda. Tom wanted to leave before the MRT closed, so I checked to see where the guys were. It turns out they were still at the airport. Tom basically said "Well forget that", gave me the keys, and got out of there. Meanwhile I got to sit around for 2 hours at a free hotel and watch Youtube.


We started day 1 with some Xiao Long Bao on our street corner, and headed to see the CKS Memorial. I've been there several times, it's pretty cool. People seem to have mixed feelings about CKS though. On the one hand he did kind of establish modern Taiwan. On the other he killed a lot of people that didn't need to be killed. Anyway the weather on the first day was not that bad, so we didn't die from heat exhaustion immediately. After the overly elaborate changing of the guard ceremony at CKS, we continued up the red line to visit Tanshui. Tanshui was a bit quiet on a Monday morning, but they still had their regular staples lined up - we paid a visit to the Fisherman's Wharf, checked out Fort Santa Domingo, and I got my garlic corn. A new sight this time was to the oddities museum, which I didn't know they had up there. We got to see a 2 headed turtle, a uhh... thing, and another weird thing? Anyway all the pics are on Facebook. After all the walking around, we stopped at Beitou for some hot springs action, which I am always a fan of. I am pleased to learn the Beitou hot springs are open much later than I thought. Jesse was originally a bit apprehensive about the super hot water, but it turns out he was the one that seemed to enjoy it the most. The temperature that day was a little shy of 120 degrees F. You have not lived until you go from 120 degree water to half that in mere seconds. Brisk! We followed up the temperature differential (which would be a good band name) with a trip to Shilin Night Market. We enjoyed a very Taiwanese meal complete with oyster omelette, spring rolls, shrimp, and noodles. I was pretty excited to play the shrimping game, and Dan and I each managed to get a shrimp to munch on. Later we tried to play the fishing game, which Dan and I failed miserably at. However, Jesse and Lindsay took up the task and each caught a few fish like it was no big thang. Like, what the hell guys? Being goldfish that were near death anyway, we (read: I) decided Panda may eat them. Spoiler alert: He did not.



The next day, we were joined by Tiffany to begin our Maokong excursion. Maokong is the best place on earth, and we began the trip by stopping at the Tea Appreciation center, the tea trail, and... wow, I just did the exact same thing with Boggs two weeks ago, so read that. But I don't mind, Maokong is awesome. It was a bit hot that day, but we still managed to pick up some tea and feed some definitely overfed koi. Back on the Neihu line it turns out the air intake on the roof of the train is really good at sucking up hair, which is just another reason why the Neihu line is the best one. We had one more stop for the day though, the world famous Taipei 101 for some beer floats, as well as the overpriced jade stuff. We got a bit lucky in that the sun set while we were up there, and got both a day and night view. Quite famished at this point, we stopped off for dinner at a place Jesse was quite interested in eating at - Jolly's. Jolly's is an odd sort, in that it is a Thai fusion restaurant / microbrewery. Their beer selection was pretty good, but I was not a huge fan of the Pilsner I got. Their special Rye Ale was much more appealing, but I only got a sip from Jesse's sampler. Their green curry though - oh wow! I was quite stuffed, but we kept the beer thing going, this time at Shida Night Market. The crew picked up some dirt cheap T-shirts, and surprisingly we drank more beer. There was also a giant dog guarding the 7-11, so that's new.
Day 3 was a bit more relaxed, out to the town of Pingxi and Houtong. Pingxi is the home of the sky lanterns, which we got to do. I was a bit disappointed we didn't get to eat their famous chicken butt, but that opportunity would present itself later. We also stopped by Houtong, aka the cat village. There are lots of cats there. It's kind of fun. On the way back we went to Ximen to eat at a restaurant Lindsay was craving (and me as well), the Modern Toilet! Only to discover they are renovating the exact days they were visiting! Balls! Instead we got conveyor belt sushi and beer flavored ice cream at Snow King. Which yeah, is pretty great, but it just doesn't match eating chocolate pudding out of a plate shaped like a toilet. On the way back we tried to fit inbetween the bars of the MRT, with varying levels of success.


After a chill day 3 it was full steam ahead on day 4. A very ambitious schedule, we started with the National Taiwan and 2/28 Museum. The NTM has greatly expanded since last I went, with both the basement and loft areas open. Their travelling exhibit was about dresses, which was... oh so fascinating. They had a terminal where you could design your own dresses and post to Facebook, which I was really excited about seeing the guys do. Unfortunately it produced an error when you went to do it - balls! The 2/28 Museum was as expected, and we all took the time to write them encouraging notes for the time capsule. Next was lunch at the all you can eat BBQ restaurant (awesome!) which, really, has this circle bacon I am a huge fan of. We popped up to the Lin An Tai Homestead, but our enjoyment was a bit dampened by the extreme heat. Not wanting to go back to the MRT, we hailed a cab to visit the next place, the Martyrs Shrine. On the way I was thinking "Where in the world is this cab driver going?" It turns out he also did not really know where, and after getting lost I told him where to go. He was quite nice, and gave us a really nice deal on the cab fare in exchange. Unfortunately most of the Martyrs Shrine was closed, but we did meet a really nice guy who just started his 1 year tour in the military. He chatted with us for a bit about the country's history, and bid as adieu. On the way back we stopped at Huashan Park for our kitchy artisty things, and Gonghua Plaza for electronics we can't afford. We also made a pit stop at the Taiwan Beer brewery, which I am quite unimpressed by. Their tap wasn't working, so it basically was just a 7-11 with fresher beer. Lame. The final destination was Longshan Temple and the surrounding market. Jesse found his massage parlor, which actually was a pretty good deal. We let him be for the 40 minutes while we walked around. The guys ate pig blood cake, chicken butt, and pork fat rice, so scratch all those delicacies off the list. Heading back to pick up Jesse, it had been closer to an hour than the allotted 40 minutes. We wandered around in some of the alleys when a lady approached Dan, who was at the front of our line. All dressed up, she first tried to be subtle about what her intentions were. After a polite decline, she maybe thought "Oh, they are not understanding me" and whipped out some very blunt gestures, much to my amusement. On the way out we met an old man who spoke very good English, who was quite drunk and took it upon himself to give his opinion on world events, CKS, Taiwan, and showed us his drivers license for really no reason.

Whew! It was a whirlwind of a tour, and although we didn't get to everything, I think we gave Taipei quite a run for the money. Unfortunately this will be my last stretch of holiday for a bit, because if you can believe it, I only have 4 months left here. How the time has flown! Speaking of which, I need to begin to organize my next trip to who knows where. Thanks for visiting, everyone!

 

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Good morning, Future Weg. This is Past Weg getting you up to speed on what you did recently. So sit down on your hover couch with a space beer and listen up.

First of all, HOLY SHIT. You know that rain you had yesterday? It caused a heck of a landslide in that Jilong city you were at last week. One minute this car is driving past McDonalds, and then suddenly it turns into Super Taiwan Kart.



Right so, first you went to the International Candy Exhibition at Chang Kai Shek Memorial Hall, a combination of words previously unheard of by science. I hope for your sake they have not caused the universe to fold in on itself. This was really weird, as it was a bunch of art and sculptures made entirely out of candy. Also when you got really close, you could smell them. And of course it said don't touch, but I secretly did - I'm proud to report I have felt up the Statue of Liberty, and she is quite squishy.













The funny thing about chilling at the CKS Memorial - I casually mentioned the changing of the guard ceremony, and phrased it in a "Oh, you know when they do x" kind of way. However, the look on Tiffany's face showed me she had no idea what I was talking about. She sheepishly admitted she had never been to the CKS Memorial before. You know, that giant thing that's on every postcard. That thing with it's own subway station on the main line. That thing you have been to 4, 5 times in the 7 months you've been here. The ceremony dealie was starting soon so we popped on up, and I missed something I have oh so wanted to see.





At a point in the beautifully choreographed display, one consisting of M1 Garands with bayonets, a guard messed up. They all hold the guns down at a 45 degree angle, and flip them up to be standing vertically in front of their face. One of them flipped a bit too far, hit above his eyebrow with the blade, and knocked off one side of his helmet. It was standing crooked, barely holding on with the other strap when an attendant rushed out to fix it. As I learned from my pal in Taidong, that means he goes back to basic training. Sucks!

Now, why did I miss it? I got a Facebook message from - wait for this relationship - my roommate's girlfriend's roommate's boyfriend. It was a "hey, where are you?" "Oh hey, long time no see, I moved to Taipei."

"Yeah I know, which station? I'm here now"

So I had dinner with Boggs, which was quite unexpected.


And that brings us to today, where I went around the city with him on our mutual days off. Or at least, part of the city. It was raining a lot, but we went up to Maokong anyway. We went to see a new place for me, the Tea Appreciation Center. Hey. Tea. I appreciate you. <finger gun> After lunch we took a stroll through the fields and visited Zhinan Temple, where we got set with our respective gods I guess. This time the lady said we could take photos, but only of our gods. So, here's mine, as well as anyone else born in 1984. We are like, SUPER GOOD at high fives. I think I made that same joke last time but it's still a good one.





Heading on back we stopped at the Martyr's Shrine, which turns out closes an hour before I thought it did. We hiked up Jiantan Mountain to get an otherwise foggy put passable view of the city, then off to Shilin Market for food and shopping. I'm getting better at that stupid shrimp carnival game, because I caught 3 shrimp this time. I ate all of them, because the tears merely enhanced their flavor.

After that we got a giant fried chicken...


And I got a corndog shaped like a penis.