Taiwan Trip - Highlights

There are some other places that we visited, but I am not going to talk about it in details, because most of them can be found easily when you google them up.

Sun Moon Lake 日月潭 The must-do activity will be taking a lake cruise, the cruise will depart from Shuieshe 水社码头, then Yidashao 伊达邵码头 and Syuanguang 玄光码头 and finally back to Shuieshe.
It a beautiful lake, the water is greenish and the sky is high and blue with white cloud 碧海蓝天白云... I was holding a Taiwanese beer in hand while enjoying the lake breeze... :)

This cable car station @ Yidashao 伊达邵码头 is new, now we can take the cable to the Formosan Aboriginal Culture Village.


Formosan Aboriginal Culture Village

We watched perfomance by the 9 different aboriginals @ Naluwan Theather 娜鲁湾剧场, I find it quite close to the aboriginals in Malaysia, colourful costume, passionate dancing, tanned skin... Btw, we learned Naluwan, means "I love you" in their language. In the cultural village, there is also a theme park where you can play roller coaster, exciting water games... and some of us even got a very special treatment by the insect in the village, because most of us were wearing shorts and I think our blood is "sweeter" to them, we got insect bikes all over our legs... and even now, some scars still haven't subside.




Yehliu Geopark

This place is very special because all the land sculpture is formed by the influence of wind, wave and land movement. For more infomation, click on the link below:

http://www.ylgeopark.org.tw/ENG/info/YlIntroduction_en.aspx

We didn't stay in the park for very long, it is due to the unbearable hot weather (I can stand very hot weather/ environment, if I complain hot, mean really hot, probably you can melt in that weather already), so, what we did were... QUEUED to take picture with "Queen head" stone and ciao. Of course we know there are many special sculptures, but this is not a good place to visit in summer.

Coastal highway

It's not a tourist spot, but the driver was asking if we would like to travel to Yilan through the normal highway or coastal highway... of course we chose the later, at least more to see, even if there isn't anything to see, we can enjoy the sea breeze too.

The driver stopped at 2 spots for photography sessions, one of it has a natural pond where the the local people make it a abalone farm. I walked down, and saw a worker in the pond, so, I asked if he could sell 2 fresh abalone to me... then he just ignore my request... later I realised, the Taiwanese abalone is the mini type, so, of course when I say I want 2, the worker will probably think I was fooling him.

National Traditional Art Centre, Yilan

Throughout the trip, I love this place the most... I guess this place is supported by the government and it's a brilliant set-up to encourage their people to love art. There are probably 2 row of shoplots, then each lot they are not only selling art stuff, but they have guru to teach you to learn their art. There are shops selling hand-made soup, clay/ porcelain item, paper art, glasses, jewelry, charcoal, leather stuff... I signed a clay learning lesson for only NT$150, and I learned and made myself a bowl in 10 minutes! I also learned paper art, using the paper box material to make a frog doll. There are also stages for traditional Chinese opera, story telling classes, performance theaters... Frankly speaking, if you were throwing there for 2 days, I definitely will not be bored.


Eslite Bookstore

This bookstore is also in my top favourite places list. Unfortunately, I only got only 2 hours there, but I got few books in mind. This Eslite has 6 floors, when I entered, it's like a book ocean, stuffs that they are selling are very very good in quality, books are so cheap and there are so much to see. I was trying my very best to cover all floors and "jog" around (walking is not fast enough). I spent most of my time in the CD section, because my friend actually give me her wish-list, she wanted to get Jolin Tsai's latest album for her husband and my best friend asking me to get her Jay Chau's lastest album in Taiwan for her, then I bought myself 2 CDs too - YanJ's and LeeHom's lastest album.
Then I quickly rushed back to international book section and got myself a translated noval, 11 Minutes by one of my favourite author - Paulo Coelho. It's a 18sx rated noval in Malaysia, so, it's kind of difficult to find in the bookstore here. But hey, don't get me wrong, it's a meaningful noval. Paulo Coelho's books are always very inspirational... First book that I read from him was 'The Alchemist"... I've finished reading 11 minutes, it's nice, but a little bit difficult for me to understand what is he trying to tell us.
At first I couldn't find this book, I found other Paulo Coelho's book, but not this, due to time contraint, I got the customer service personel to help me locate the book. In just 5 minutes, the guy brought the book to me at the counter, so fast and efficient, bravo bravo...
Then the time's up, I had to leave to my next destination. So, I have decided, if I have a chance to go back to Taipei, I will spend a night there, save cost for a night of accomodation and I can explore the place at my preferable pace. Opps, I've left out a very important point, this flagship Eslite bookstore @ Xinyi is open 24 hours.


Jianguo Holiday Flower Market
It was our last day in Taiwan and we have a few hours in the morning before going to catch our flight back to KL. So, we went to this weekend flower market where they sell a lot of flowers and fruits. And it's because of Chinese Valentine's day, they has a lot of roses too. But this place is just good to kill time, or if you were like me, have a habit to buy fruits back to the country, you can try to see what fruit is in that season.
I bought a box of peach back (8 peaches in a box), they were all very fresh and sweet.

Taiwan Trip - Puli's Paper Dome

This was actually not in our initial itinerary, we were recommended to do a day trip to Sun Moon Lake (SML) by the driver and he stopped us by this place - Paper Dome while we were on the way to SML

We have nothing in mind what is this place about and has no expectation to it. Then we were told the entrance fees is NT$100, so at first we were quite hesitate, but since we were there, NT$100 can be rebated when we purchase souvenir inside, so, we went in.

At the entrance

Walking to Paper Dome

The cafe & lotus farm

Beautiful lotus... blossom-ing

Another cafe & souvenir shop

Before we know the story behind the building, it seems simple; after studying the history, the dome is "big". For those who can read Chinese, you can click on the link below. If not, I try to do a simple introduction.

http://paperdome.homeland.org.tw/pd/about/about.htm

The dome was built during Kobe's (Japan) earthquake in 1995, it was served as a place for the victim to do their prayer as well as serving as a place for them to gather, pacified each other's broken hearts. So, when Taiwan experienced 921 earthquake, the restoration committees brought the dome to Taiwan and continue it's mission in pacifying broken hearts.

The interior

The beautiful exterior

The doors and the shadow

Holding hand in hand (between the Japanese & Taiwanese) in post-diaster recontruction

Dragonfly in pink!

Beautiful flowers by the dome

It's really a place worth visiting... If I ever have a chance to go there again, I want to pray in the dome, pray for a stronger me and regain my faith in love and life.

Taiwan Trip - Fashion Streets

Besides food, clothes is another "thing" of attraction in Taiwan.... varieties, cheap, fashionable... you name it, they have it. Place you can never miss are Wu Fen Pu 五分埔 & Xi Men Ding 西门町. The former is a wholesaler market, but it doesn't mean you can't buy thing in a piece or two, just that you have to have your objective, or else, you will end up over buying a lot of beautiful/ nice fashion items which you don't actually need/ wear. Later is also a place where you can shop for fashion items, but the items are mostly for youngsters.

Wu Fen Pu
A place with hundreds of wholesalers but there is no repetition on fashion items that they sell.

Xi Men Ding

Long queue at one of the entrace to Xi Men Ding, initially we thought they were queue for food, but when we walked close, they were queueing to tailor made their school uniforms... We were wondering, is there only this shop tailor-making school uniform? Isn't there any ready-made uniform selling in school or mall?

Taiwan Trip - Old Streets

Old street (老街) I would say is another culture in Taiwan. It's similar to night market, eat and shop till you drop, the only difference is, one is during the day and later is at night.

1. ShenKeng 深坑

ShengKeng is famous for its bean curd, ma la style, fermentated (stink) and bean curd ice-cream. I'm sorry, I can't put something smell like "shit" in mouth, although I really wanted to try, but I tried the bean curd ice-cream, very very nice, especially the one with black sesame taste... strongly recommended!!


The street is under renovation, the project started from the end of the street and gradually moving to the entrance. So, we are able to see the old and new building along the old street. At first I thought the seller might not like the idea because the renovation will interupt their business, but, after interviewing them, some actually quite positive about it, they like the government idea of standardization, the street will become cleaner and tidier. From a tourist point of view, I like the old buildings, unique, classic with a glimse of culture. What do you think?

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2. RiYueTan Old Street 日月潭老街

We were rushing there for an early dinner after Aboriginal Cultural Village and rushing back to jetty to catch our last boat back to the lake cruise starting point. What I can remember is, we eat everything that we came along, my stomach was like a big bowl of rojak, dumping everything in... ice-cream, duck pancake, chinese burger, sausage, herbal eggs, fries... I don't even have a time to take a proper picture of the street too.

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3. JiLong MiaoKou 基隆庙口

We only stopped by this place for lunch before heading to Jiufen. This is a short street with a lot of nice food. I even tried their BBQ octupus leg. And the crazy part is, along the street, there's a shop selling underwear, I bought a dozen of panties there... because the one that I use to wear was doing very good promotion, so, I grapped all.

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4. JiuFen Old Street 九分老街

This is an old street up on a hill. Famous snacks @ JiuFen will be the yam ball and the vege kuih. For me, they tasted so so. But it is a very very beautiful street, especially the part where all the cafes situated along the stairs.






From Jiufen, we are able to see the coastal line down the hill too. Very breathtaking. The only scary part is, the roads up and down the hill are all very very narrow, I would say, with my driving skill, I doubt if I am able to drive the car up and down again and yet the car can still remain in one piece.

Jiufen is a place good for sightseeing and resting, if you were someone shopaholic or like happening places, you will be bored to death there.

Taiwan Trip - Night Markets

You can't tell anybody that you've been to Taiwan without visiting their night markets... it's a shame. I only visited 2, Shilin & Luodong. I felt a little embarrass because due to time constrain I didn't spend enough time to experience their night market culture.

We went to Shilin night market after we failed to locate our fine dining restaurant @ Yangmingshan, so, we just had a quick dinner and walk around before we called it a day.

Another reason that made me hesitate to walk around is the crowds. The streets are all congested with people, it's quite difficult for a person like me with Agoraphobia (Fear of open spaces or of being in crowded, public places like markets). The famous stall in Shilin is "Hao Da Da" Chicken Chop, the queue was so long that I didn't spend my limited time there.

I'm quite proud of myself because in such a situation, I still manage to get 2 pairs of shoes there! Should I have a chance to go back to Taipei, I'll try Raohe Night Market. I heard there has more to see and more delicious food.

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The 2nd night market that I visited is Luodong Night Market @ Yilan. When I was there, the local was celebrating "Ghost Festival", so, most of the stalls were closed. But luckily, we still manage to eat what we are suppose to eat in the market.

"Ghost Festival" is a very important celebration among the Taiwanese, that night, they have 2 big stages and 2 food-ful & beverage-ful of street for the praying ceremony, stage performances for the "brothers" (they called ghost as their brothers).

Some people even told us that there will be strip dance on stage around 9pm. Huh?!! Strip Dance in a praying ceremony?!! I didn't prove the statement right, we were leaving for our nice homestay with hotspring in our room.

Going the Distance

电影观后感：

（没心思斟酌于文字的运用和文法的流畅，纯粹想要记录当下的心情而已，所以就用了point form来记载。）

- 真是当头棒喝啊！真的应该醒了。。。不能再这样执著地活在超理想和现实的童话里了。

- Long distance relationship doesn't work; at least not for him, not for her, not for you and not for me.

- "I thought we were someone" (movie dialog), I think she means she thought their relationship is special, but at the end of the day, nobody is someone/ special.

- 再见亦是朋友的成功率远比远距离恋爱的成功率高。

- And I finally understand what you mean...

Taiwan Trip - Accommodation (Pt. 2)

Continue...

In my previous post, I mentioned throughout the 7 days 6 nights Taiwan trip, I was "nomad-ing"/ staying in different places every night. 1st night where I stayed in a lady sauna place was a memorable and interesting one, but not the most comfortable yet.

2nd night - Eva's apartment (Taipei)
Due to pack itinerary on the 3rd day, so, I have to stay with the girls in the apartment where there's only a king size bed, so the driver doesn't have to go to pick us up at 2 different places. Thanks to the girls, they allowed me to sleep on the bed. However, I still couldn't sleep well, because the bed was extremely hard, then the next day only I knew there's a bamboo layer underneath the bedsheet. No wonder la...

3rd night - Eva's another apartment (Taipei)
We were departing to Jiufen and Yilan the next day and the apartment need to be vacant for another gang of friend of Eva from HK. Of course we have small luggage for our 2 day trip down to Jiufen and Yilan and the big luggage need to be shifted and kept in another apartment of Eva. But, the van that we booked wasn't big enough to fit all of us together with our luggage. So, we were separated into 2 groups. And I and another 2 friends were the lucky one, we were in the 1st gorup, so, I got a chance to stayed in that apartment and get to tried a very delicious supper near the apartment. I slept in the living room that night, where there's only wooden antique furniture in it. The next morning I got bruises on my hip bone area although I have slipped 2 big pillows under my head and my buttock. That's why people called me "Tofu" (as fagile as tofu).

4th night - Jiufen Tophome Homestay
http://www.tophome9.com/

The homestay is run by a retired couple, they are very passionate, they even prepared us frozen soya milk and bun (mantou) for breakfast, all we need to do was just heat them up in the kitchen the next morning. The homestay is a 3 storey building, we occupied both of the rooms in 3rd floor, which we got the best view of Jiufen from our balcony. Most importantly, I finally got a soft bed to rest my tired head after 2 days sleep on hard surfaces. I quite like the homestay although 1 of my friend said "somebody" pull her hand in the middle of night....

(p/s: please make sure that your driver is skillful enough to drive on super narrow road/ alley to the homestay, and because it is located up on the hill, you got to make sure that the car has a up performing brake system, or please prepare your heart to scare to death)

5th night - Yilan ZhengHua Homestay
http://zhenghuatw.pixnet.net/blog

photos taken from homestay website/ blog

This is the most luxurious stay throughout the trip!!! Luxurious is just in term of the setting, the fees is still very very affordable. This will be my No.1 in my recommendation list! You know what? Besides the comfortable 5-star bed, each room is equipped with private hot spring. Although it is not easy to locate this homestay, but believe me, it worth every single trouble that you meet.

This homestay is run by a family too, the wife is very pretty and she is a good chef too... I can never forget the simple yet delicious sweet potato porridge, vege and tea as breakfast specially prepared for the guests.

The only thing is, we took the room which can fit 8 persons, located on the roof top and the water pump is not very strong to pump the hot spring water up to our bathroom, so, we didn't manage to enjoy the priviledge. So, I would recommend even you are travel in big group, choose smaller rooms, then you will be able to enjoy the hot spring with more privacy.

6th night - Taipei (nameless motel)
I think, we have brought enough trouble to Eva and most of us were actually quite exhausted, so, we were thinking to pick a homestay in Taipei for a good rest before leaving Taiwan. Then we listened to our driver, he recommended this "hotel" to us. The hotel is located on 4th floor in a building, when we walked in, we found some "extraordinary" complimentary stuff in room - condom. Then we have colourful disco light in the bathroom too!! So, for us, this is a motel not hotel. But it's still alright for us, because it doesn't has a lot of rooms and we already occupied 3 rooms, furthermore, we were in a big group, most importantly, for me, Taipei is quite a safe city.