Taipei Walker

Today has been a full day of walking around in Taipei. And we found new treasures on "Treasure Island", a common praise for Taiwan.

Around 1-2am, right after Rosanne and I had left a fancy netcafe at 忠孝复兴 station, we were at an unusual place in the very centre of Taipei -- Cheng Pin Bookstore (诚品书店). This incredible bookstore, where a line of taxi wait outside even at 3 o'clock in the morning, welcomes the intellictually curious Taiwanese 24 hours a day. What I like most about it is that it has a grand collection of titles by Taiwanese authors in a full spectrum of topics.

After some browsing I found that I could learn about very "Chinese" subjects such as buddism, or Chinese philosophy in a much less painful way than the one force upon Mainlanders in the old school way of education. Taiwan styled literature is probably more modern, more scientific; but I don't know for sure.

Another thing I liked about this bookstore is the great number of books and magazines (especially magazines) either in Japanese, or about Japan. I bought a book explaining elementary Japanese grammar in a pictoral setting -- The book I used to use (标准日本语) doesn't agree with me after many years of education in Canadian school, where our textbooks had more margin space and pictures than words. Not to my surprise, the best selling and feature titles were about how to make money in China as a Taiwanese businessman.

Rosanne loves this bookstore and had to visit it before leaving Taipei
At 3:30am we walked back to Tonghua St. (通化街) to get some food. Here's a picture of 通化街 at 3:30am -- Incredible! This particular restaurant is full of people! Neighbouring ones were doing pretty good, too!

I had a 排骨庚面 (Rib-noodle soup) with 猪耳 (pig ears) as appetizer.

台湾的街头小吃极其厉害。来台之后我几乎没去过所谓“正规”饭店，而且小吃的分量小，我很少一餐把自己喂饱，唯恐到时候看到更好吃的没了食欲。其后果是，我每天都要很多餐。堕落。

... I was just saying the street food in Taiwan is so great I've been to actual restaurants only a couple of times.

Ok. Full now after those pig ears. Next, slept to 2pm -- Today was another day where I missed lunch.

We woke up to Rosanne's craving for some 仙草 (Xiancao - Heavenly Grass). We went and got some. I got 爱玉 (Aiyu - Love Jade). Topping? Of course 芋圆 and 地瓜圆, the purple stuff and the yellow stuff. This thing is so good I use a "medium" sized picture to honour it -- on the left is Love Jade, and right Heavenly Grass. This reminds me of a verse I wrote recently:

问世间何谓仙草，
真教人欲仙欲死！

Next we went to a famous Xiao Long Bao place called Ding Tai Feng (鼎泰丰) near 忠孝敦化口. Since I had had as much of these buns as a typical western kid had eaten cereals and pancakes, I didn't find any extraordinary new sensation in their version of the Xiao Long Bao -- but it was still good.

Journeying on, Rosanne wanted to get some bakery at au bon pain near 101. I gasped, "Really!". Hadn't had that stuff in ages! Bakeries in Asia are short of muffins, bagels, bagette, and the likes.

Well, we taxied to 101. Cab driver did some non-kosher maneuvers en route and told us there were no police on the streets of Taipei that day because of a big protest urging Chen Shui Bian to step down as leader of Taiwan.

We didn't find that au bon pain but did buy some trifflings for our new home a Taiwanese version of one of my favourite stores, Muji. The Taiwanese store is called 生活工场. I think the 生活工场 is a good deal for the price, about 1/2 of Muji. Qualitywise, Muji still wins. Creativity, getting there.

After seeing Rosanne off on the Airport limosine, I revisited Taipei 101 and its neighbour "New York New York". I didn't do it justice the first time I reviewed as that visit tainted by too much rain. Well, NYNY was great! A motley assortment of trendy and strong branded franchises make up this modern shopping complex. Along the walks are many patios filled with happy, relaxed shoppers and cafe-goers.

Here's a shot of the scooter lot near by. For every 3 Taiwanese, there is 1 scooter.

Rosanne tells me there is au bon pain at the airport. Good place for business travellers.

I'm planning to go to Ping Dong (屏东) to visit Vicky tomorrow. I haven't seen her in years. More Japanese horror movies on 5 star bus rides ...

If anyone wonders why I'm writing more than before it's because I can no longer find that channel that broadcasts Starcraft games exclusively. I'm now watching mostly Warcraft and Counterstrike -- less of a fan there.