Taiwan Grad Trip! An event to mark the end of 4 years of my education and to symbolise the friendship that has been forged during them. Not all were able to join us for our graduation trip and off goes the 3 of us as we embarked on our trip together, Linghuey, Andy and me!
Contents
Day 1: Day of the Beginning
There was to be no luxury of service, drinks, or movies on board the 5 hour budget flight, and had to survive on a solitary can of Pepsi which was gulped down shortly after it landed on the mini foldable table. That cost me $3! Well at least there were quite a number of us, the ME group, Sheerine, + us = 10, to entertain ourselves. Liwei had a nifty thing with cards but the real fun started when Andy took out his PSP, and choice of game was some word hunt thing, similar to the Yahoo! games. He was just too good though. Can’t beat the speed at which he is able to spot and link up the words, hack. CHEAT.
At CKS Airport, our first stop was to get the Youth Pass, which we didn’t need to show at all subsequently through the trip! Haha, guess we still do very much look like students after all so didn’t had to show it, not like there were many opportunities, hmm. It was a 1 hr ride to the city on the Guo Guang bus. First glimpse of the sheer number of bikes in the city and their many face masks. We had to collect our train tickets that had previously been booked in Singapore and along the way grabbed some bread as we were already starving by this time. It was some extra large green tea bun along with a standard pork floss bun, done ‘breadtalk’ style. Yummy?
What followed was our first attempt at navigating the streets of Taipei and it was a failure! Luckily though, through it, we had a brief glimpse of the Taipei Underground Mall which we will not be revisiting.
Our hotel, Keyman Hotel was quite near the Train Station, really a quaint little hotel, very much non-descript but the room was ok, clean and bright. We managed to get through to Ivan, Andy and LH’s friend, luckily! He was on exchange in Taipei, and helped us out as our unofficial ‘tour guide’ of the night. Oh at the train station we also purchased the EasyCard which is the equivalent of our Ezlink and we started “t-teeing” our way to Jiantan MRT for our first travel stop.
Shihlin Night Market. The most iconic night market in Taipei. Ahh, just lots and lots of food, alot of must try, and with it being our first night and all, it was probably the one where we ate the most! Shihlin’s a huge place and after satisfying our initial craving of food, we did spend most of the night weaving in and out through the stores although we weren’t interested to shop all that much considering our long journey ahead. Think this is probably one of the more interesting night markets, with a mixture of both food and shopping. We stayed there till around 11pm and although we did attempt to cover the entire area, it was just too big.
Day 2: Beautiful Scenery and Expensive Coffee
We will look back upon and think of this day, the day that will be forever etched in our memories, the day 2 of our trip, the one that made it great.
Having to wake up at 6+ to check out and catch our early train to Hualien, we were all very much zombified still and breakfast was settled at 7-Eleven (our first of many stops), before we went to grab the train, which was rather comfy and though we didn’t look out much, there was quite a nice view outside. We managed to contact our tour guide who was very friendly and he picked us up at the train station for our Taroko Gorge Day Tour. He’s like a mini celebrity on the TripAdvisor / Hardwarezone forums with many people raving about his services and all that was said was indeed true! But before that, a dabao lunch stop first “清淡又好吃”. Well its good advice cos the food / COFFEE price up at the gorge was really not economical.
And off we go up the mountain! Hmm, sat in front, which meant, with a talkative Tour Guide, I had to keep replying him all the way! All through out the day and night! But haha, it was quite fun anyway,but my chinese cannot make it, so it was hard to both understand and be understood.
… at the entrance …
Our first tour stop was the 砂卡礑 trail, where we had to walk in for 20 min, could see the valley and the water formation underneath. It was quite beautiful and the fun started when we climbed down towards the rocky area.
.. big rock (one of the smaller ones still) …
Other than some oppurtune photo moments along the way, the next place should be the Swallow Grotto or 燕子口.
Alot of places for one to stop and look for the swallows, but they fly so fast, anyway, they aren’t really very pretty haha.
…swallow in flight…
…the view from on top…
… there’s a red indian (stone) in the background …
Oh well, after that we made a stop. Mr Taxi Guide asked us whether any of us drink coffee and said the coffee here was their own brew or something, ahh, the stupid normal iced coffee cost us S$7.50. It did tasted a bit different, but ahem, expensive! Haha.. well, tourists are always meant to be chopped. We then had our lunch, which was the bento, soup with funny looking meatballs, and yakult!
… lunching in the great outdoors …
… next stop after lunch …
Its suppose to be some 9 turn tunnel cave, where in times of darkness, goofiness reigns. And no, the entire 9 turn isn’t like such, there’s alot of breaks in between for you to look up and admire and realise just how bloody big the whole place is!
One of the attractions there was this rock formation. Its some fish jumping over the gates of hell / heaven to retrieve eggs or something. Haha. Gosh, the story they tell sometimes. But yup, initially I couldn’t recognise how it was a fish, but it gets easier after staring at it for awhile. Guess that goes with most of things in life!
Yes.. more weird things to spot!
… king kong in the background …
Oh there’s a weird Planetary Museum somewhere along the way, its free anyway, and we stopped there for our toilet break, ermm.. well, just not something you would expect to find in the middle of like a mountain reserve haha. Imagine the person working there so sad, although slack, no transport, and so very very boring. Boring-ness in work is really a bad thing, I can vouch for it!
… temple here too! …
And finally, we arrive to the highlight of Taroko! The cave. Pitch Black. Cold. Damp. Equipped with raincoats and umbrellas. We started to move towards an unknown destination with only the trust of our Tour Guide.
… us scared …
This was really just a teaser for later, but having emerged from the dark tunnel, well, more rest and pictures ensued, as what followed was a long walk to the next point, which wasn’t all that bad actually as we get to have a closer look at the mountains from here.
The next point was quite nice. As we walked closer and closer, the gushing noise of water grew louder and so did our anticipation as well, but it was still quite beautiful. Its erm, a vertically challenged waterfall! A suspension bridge connected it to another area where we could see more waterfalls in the background, but those were rather far away, and anywhere with a suspension bridge always adds some fun!
There was another tunnel and this time, there really was not a single light source as it was twisting inside also, so we were not able to see the light coming from the exit until we were nearer. Wah, haha, there wasn’t a difference between opening and closing your eyes and really had to trust the person in front as well as the railing to hold. It was really quite fun! And then… finally we arrive at the 水濂洞 or Water Curtain Cave.
It was a wet wet wet place. The water level was around calf height and we finally get to don our raincoats. Shoes off, pants rolled up, raincoats on, which also means dangerous place for cameras. Ahh…
… in preparation …
… geared up …
… inside …
… + our taiwan friends …
… pitch black actually …
We really couldnt see much when inside the cave, but the water kept falling from the top and there was really alot, and very cold water too! We made friends with a Taiwan couple there who was also at the cave same time as us, they didn’t know that it was possible to go in and well, comparatively more ill-equipped as opposed to us. They were very nice people and they gave us alot of suggestions on things to do later on at both Kaohsiung and Taipei.
We had plans to play with fireworks later on at night and our tour guide graciously invited them along also, so the 5 of us continued on for the rest of the trip. The return trip down Taroko was definitely not as exciting having just completed the highlight so we only stopped a couple of places, the 岳飞亭 and somewhere else with a place unknown, before we made a departure.
It was getting dark and wanted to see the sunset I think at 七星潭, but it was too dark by the time we reached so we couldn’t really see much here. Its just a very normal beach, although one that is next to a cemetery, makes it a tad weird and discomforting.
Ahh.. Finally dinner, which was some wanton thingy, no noodles, just wanton, erm, I didn’t really liked it, but its supposed to be quite famous in Hualien so oh well, haha, which was actually quite filling so wasn’t too bad.
… our ubiquitous 泡泡茶 stop …
Our taiwan friend bought for us some weird cereal oat thingy, which also had pearls inside, or didn’t, ermm quite weird ah, like drinking oatmeal, very filling and thick! Our taxi driver then picked us up again after dinner and off we went to 鲤鱼潭. Once again, cannot see anything at night, but that was not what we were here for and the main purpose is to play with fireworks! Our taxi driver had kindly sponsored us some to play and he had drove all the way home earlier while we were having dinner to take them.
… master at work …
… the first shot …
… takeoff! …
… my turn! …
… booomm …
… lh’s salvo! …
… nice arc …
Fun!!! Never had the chance to play with fireworks before and this was quite exciting. Scary, ahem, no thanks to Andy who couldn’t plant the stick properly leaving it stuck in the ground. Ended up, it stayed there and exploded! LH and me were left staring at it in shock and ears still ringing as we were closest to the blast. Haha, but it was still fun nonetheless!
With that, we moved off to another area where there were fireflies! One more not available in Singapore moment!
… view on the other side of the pond …
… the firefly catching squad …
Haha, quite cute! Didn’t know fireflies keep switching on / off their lights and there were quite a number of them, managed to catch a couple too but they are equally good at escaping as well, haha. Firefly actually looks like a giant ant, hmm, abit more friendly looking though, make up your own imagination! If you wanna see, then go catch your own!
Last stop. Ali Ba Ba 民宿. We had booked this room based on the pictures we saw and seriously, for one of the rare times, the pictures did no justice with the rooms looking better in real life! The owner’s mum offered us a quad room as we had 3 people but we had initially booked for the normal double room which was 500-700 NT cheaper, and so we asked if we could stick to our original plan of the double room. She said she would check for us but wah, when she came back, it was with her son (the owner) who wasn’t in too good a mood. He was FURIOUS. Haha.. somehow, the message that got across was that we wanted the quad room at the double room rate, and he was extremely crappy, haha, said he was worried that we could be some criminals, murderers and the like, and was about to chase us out, then since we are students, etc, then ok. Haha, his mum was like constantly hitting him lightly, asking him to tone down etc. Anyway, after that unpleasant moment, the mum came back and offered us the room at 1300NT, cheap! We were more than happy to pay 1500NT for it already, but hey, more discounts = good!
We had full access to the house and this was the downstairs which was well equipped, and that’s us after shower and off to find our supper!
There wasn’t much food left by that timing, so we trooped off to 7-Eleven and Andy and I being less adventurous, stuck to classics like cup noodles, which wasn’t cheap, around 2 dollars, but it had meat, and large chunks, not the crappy dehydrated sort. LH was definitely more brave, she tried some food on a stick, abit like yong tau foo.
Taroko had so many things to see, its all just so serene and beautiful that many of the pictures here, each can tell its own story. Then the multiple experiences at night, many of them being the first time, also made for good fun. Well, and to conclude it, we all had a nice room to get much needed rest!
Day 3: Day of the Worst Dinner
Another waking up early day, gosh, the trip starting to take its toll as we have another early train to catch, this time a draining 5 hr ride to Kaohsiung. We dumped out stuff at the main house or erm lobby, where we found the Ali BaBa mascot, the one that made us chose this location, and we eagerly snapped pictures with it! Haha, guess the entire decor of the place is not only aesthetically pleasing but with the numerous soft toys around, makes for quite a homely feel. We went around looking for breakfast and stumbled on this roadside stall that sells erm, 饭团. Its just meat wrapped in rice, with quite a number of other weird ingredients, not too bad I guess.
Onboard the 5 hr train ride, LH was immediately in la la land and dunno y, Andy and me hardly slept the journey. Lucky got PSP to keep us entertained! The stupid tennis game, ahhh. Nightmares. Haha, after we finally beat some nameless person in Round 3, had to go against Andy Roddick, cannot win! Oh well. We did stop at some of the train stations to take photos, ahem, so I’ve been to Taitung! Lunch was also bought earlier at 7-Eleven once again, AHH. No wonder we got quite sick of it later lol, but the train do sell food and though we didn’t buy, the prices didn’t seem all that expensive.
The previous night before, we were kept entertained by this Taiwan talk show, done mostly in Hokkien and perhaps the novelty of the language kept us hooked. It got us in stitches with 2 phrases! “没拜拜就没保庇”, “吃人够够”. Which was so applicable to our Kaohsiung segment, as we got exploited as tourists and with so many things not going our way, sigh.
Oh well. When we finally arrive in Kaohsiung, we had to look for our Hotel and upon finally pinpointing the location, we realised it was on the other side of Kaohsiung. Kinda like the city vs the slums, and we were on the slummy side of town, with a nice railway line separating the two, with the way there being not very accessible, had to go through some construction area. So sad! The entire city looked very sad, yellowish-grey skies, smog-ridden, had a stench of despair to it and it quickly infected us as well, but well, still smiling in the pictures below as we made our way across the track.
As we had booked a double room once again, this time, we decided to be more secretive and Andy / LH went to check in first while I loitered outside, but it was one of the better things in KS actually, as the room given was actually a 2 queen/king sized bed so we had ample space! Anyway, while waiting downstairs, I went walking round the Hotel area, but it was so ulu! All the shops were closed and very little people around, really felt like a deserted side of town.
After they came down, we started on our travelling and first qns already kenna banged. When we looked at the tourist map, they had already drawn in the MRT stops so we thought we could move around via that, however upon enquiries, it wasn’t scheduled to be open until end 2007. Oh well. As we had to crossed back to the city side, this time we took a more populated route, the railway bridge cross over but wah, they actually charged a ticket, 月台票 just to cross the platform! It’s only 6 NT ~ 30 cents, but the audacity of it all! Just a stupid flyover, and not like its airconditioned or have escalators or what not, ahh, walking also need to pay toll charges, stupid!
Well, with that idiocy out of the way, we took a bus to the Gushan Ferry Terminal for a 10NT ferry to Qi Jing, where we saw this shop called dua wa gong (大碗公) haha, very big! They have another size bowl (even bigger) displayed outside but think that one really not meant for consumption, can feed 10 people lo.. but they did put 世界杯3000CC, so well, erm, go there and try again?
Somehow ferry rides aren’t all that bad, there’s the seaview, breeze, feeling of being on deck that makes it all quite fun, its just a short ferry ride though, something like the old harbourfront to sentosa distance!
First stop at Qi Jing was the 天后宫 temple and just said a little prayer before moving on. Haha, should have prayed more though! We then walked around the beach, towards the harbour, lighthouse area and just kinda took our time exploring there. The pier design was quite unique though, with a long platform stretching out, and ships had to pass through sort of a gate to enter the docking areas. There was a star gazing tunnel, and if you clap your hands, the birds will chirp, which was really quite dumb, since it erm, doesn’t fit in with the astro - theme at all?
The beach was unique in the sense that the sand was black? No idea why though.. probably just the mineral content, but unique as it is, the colour wasn’t all that enticing for us to go play with as well, it resembled dirt! Who can blame us!
And well, dinner time. Being at the beach, it is apt to have seafood! So of we went searching for a suitable restaurant. Haha, bad bad experience. Perhaps we were enticed by the supposedly cheap prices but its actually based on per person and well, overall it ain’t cheap! Guess the 3 of us weren’t much of weird seafood eaters, so perhaps this wasn’t such a good idea after all!
We ordered 5 dishes (from top in clockwise manner):
1) Sotong Ball! (Not shown in picture, this is one of the best actually) 2) Squid like tentacle - deep fried 3) Shark skin (Super chewy, gah, like rubber) 4) Clam shell like thing 5) Weird hard crunchy thing, black in colour
haha, so many unknown weird descriptions and aiya, with stuff like this, how to stomach it down, and the cook was bad, dishes weren’t nice and the stuff were just erm, weird and bad. The shellfish had sand inside also, damn bad la…
the remains
not much difference lo, haha… food here really cannot make it, give me a night market anytime! We left the place as well as Qi Jing feeling displeased and cheated, haha cos it turned out to be quite expensive also, think around $15 plus per person and not high end seafood also. (SOTONG BALL LO!)
Back in Kaohsiung, we headed for the Love River and started an intensive session of photo whoring that finally stopped when we ended up at the Harujuku square street market (name also must copy!) + show off my camera abit!
… finally at the river …
… heart pose …
… nice red flowers in bloom …
… the scenic view …
… another perspective …
It was quite nice just walking down the river and looking at the sights, sadly didn’t had a chance to go the Taipei Lover’s Bridge which was suppose to be nicer at night with the lights but this wasn’t a disappointment and turned out much better that the stories we have heard of it, haha, like the stench which other than a small segment, didn’t carry over to the rest of the river.
Next stop, 城市光廊 or Urban Spotlight. Not sure what it is exactly but seems more like a chillout place with a live singer and lights in an urban park?
Other than an eggtart, doughnut, shopping, stationery break in between, we ended up at the LiouHe Night Market! Well, food’s always good, we tried quite a nice variety once again, fried ice cream! oyster omelette (we requested without oyster after our seafood scare, erm abit bo hua hor), dumplings, etc etc.. There was also a near fatal accident as I poked Andy with the satay stick ACCIDENTALLY. Ok, I need training on how to feed a person haha.
With that, tired, we took our tired bodies back to the Hotel, but were still rejuvenated enough to play dice! Loser drinks a full glass of water, or subject to a whack with the cane that we bought. Luckily, I was not the one who had to keep waking up to go to the toilet, whew!
Day 4: Bike Ride Excitement
It was meant to be a lazy day with us having the initial plans of spending it at a water theme park. We had thought of going to Kenting, with the nice beaches and all, but was put off by the two hours journey that was required. So, the water theme park which was situated in Kaohsiung itself would be better for a simple R&R day!
Breakfast at the hotel was quite lousy, porridge with mostly vegetarian side dishes and for the international side there was just erm.. toast. The saving grace would be the pork floss, which went exceptionally well with the porridge or the toast and sufficient to keep me happy. Haha, ate almost 1 bowl of the pork floss. We also da-baoed up some together with bread for LH who as usual, cannot wake up!
At the bus interchange, we asked how to go to the Water Theme Park and were informed of the directions. Things started to go terribly astray when we reached there as there were hardly people on the streets and at the mall next to it. Weird. The entire place sort of resembled that of a ghost town? With some checking around, wah, the stupid water theme park closed down. What’s the information counter at the bus interchange doing?!
Sigh. Disappointed. No choice, we now had to make the most out of the situation and we headed towards a new shopping mall which we had spotted earlier. It kinda fit into the Singapore mould of shopping malls, as typical as they go, the same standard boutiques, design, feel! But there were 2 shops that stood out that made it worth our visit!
1) A shop that sold a bit retro stuff, but very much fashionable, and lots of other items but the picture here are of the sneakers, displayed on moving shelves, that go back and forth. The entire shop has a atas-theme to it, warmly lit, chandeliers, moving platforms, classy cabinets, and has a restaurant inside, for people to soak in the atmosphere. It’s kinda similar to Tea Cosy at Plaza Sing, nice place too!
2) A Candy Shop that might not have the same variety as our local Candy Empire but it makes up for it in its novelty items, sweets packaged as magazines, syringe, wine bottle, condoms, sanitary pads, and many more. Haha.. oh well, we bought enough to have one of those “so light that you don’t feel it” advertisement!
Well other than these, we went around manhandling the toys / rides.. =)
Time to leave the place and we took the free shuttle bus back to the main railway, by a stroke of luck, we alighted at this busy street, very night market sort. The street was filled with loads of students and we were one of the few tourists around, haha.. struck gold! The place where locals go and students, hmm, maybe we are older than them, but hey, mentality wise, food preference, should still be about the same? I would still consider ourselves as students too!
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Wee.. food foood foooood! We basically followed what the others were eating and weren’t disappointed, the octopus ball thingy which is sold at Orchard also but cheaper and nicer here, some prata thingy, which sadly can’t compare to local standards, though they eat it in a variety of ways, (we chose the one with pork floss) and some huge crispy crepe/pancake thingy.
We went back to the hotel after that to dump our shopping stuff and had a nice footbath in the tub! Ahh, felt damn good to rest those tired legs and giving them a well deserved massage + soak. So tired to go out again, but with the night still early, we headed towards the night market for the last time in Kaohsiung, spent searching for more interesting things to eat. On the list of Kaohsiung attractions, there were supposedly three fashion streets for shoppers but when we actually checked it out, the items there were more like for an entire previous generation, and we weren’t from that era so we hurriedly left!
As the weekend was approaching, there were more street performers at the night market, a red indian music performing group as well as some goth chick playing the violin or something. Was looking around to see if there’s anything to buy but the shopping desperations weren’t around yet, so still had time to ponder. Oh while watching the indian performance, kept getting whiffs of the 臭豆腐… wah, haha, I can’t stand it!
On to another highlight of our trip.
Scooter Rental!
We were on our way back to the hotel already, and happened to see a bike rental shop with prices quoted at around S$5 per hour. I can’t remember who exactly suggested it, but there was the idea of renting a bike to ride around for fun. Haha, so off we go on our bike escapade! I approached the store owner and putting on a false air of confidence, said I wanted to rent a scooter and asked about the available range and rate. It was a good choice that we stick to the smallest capacity one!
He did ask for my driving license and all, but not sure whether he couldn’t care less or that he couldn’t read English, he approved my application anyway. As there were 3 of us but only 1 license, we chose 2 helmets, but nobody dared to ride pillion with me, so I rode off first and made plans to meet them on the opposite side of the road where the shop owner can’t see us. Having never ridden a bike/scooter before, I had no idea how to put down the lock / brake (handbrake equivalent) and just rev the handlebars, which of cos led to lots of noise and the bike staying still. I had to sheepishly ask the store owner for assistance like I had forgotten such a basic thing, haha, bet he saw through it though as he had a look of doubt on his face but he still did helped me anyway.
When that was accomplished, the first start took me off on a quick start and jerked into the main road with heavy traffic, almost into the path of a bus! Not noticing the presence of the bus until he horned me and Andy/LH telling me to siam, haha, I had to quickly zham brake and use my feet to edge the scooter to the side of the road. So malu! Haha.. after that got out and pushed the bike to a less empty side of the road to start riding! It became much better on the 2nd try and had gotten the hang of the control.
… with better control …
After that, we just keep letting each other try the bike, taking turns and just riding around a quiet street. The thing was, there was a police post at the corner and they do patrol around quite often so we were quite crazy riding there, but they didn’t say anything although after a few times, we decided that’s that and moved to a empty carpark for our mini scooter tour. Well, the whole purpose of the 1 hour rental wasn’t to go places, it was just like for us to try out how it was and heh heh.. take photos!!
Going back time also very funny, cos it was a busy street outside and I had no guts to make a turn that involved cutting across a few lines of traffic so I stopped at the side road, and pushed the bike back. Haha.. the shop owner was once again quite scared when he saw me come back as such and straight away ask, “为什么用推的回来？” then he tested the bike immediately. Haha… ok la, it was definitely one of the more exciting moments of the trip, super adrenaline high!
Day 5: Day of the Angry Bouncer
Wow.. time is indeed passing quite fast. Our next travel stop would be the lotus flower pond and we took a train to Zuoying. When we arrived, we had thoughts of dumping our bags into the train locker but there were none present at the station. As the weather was good and since we were there already, might as well take a look at the vicinity, and with that we repacked our bags and set off. Cursed is my mouth… after we boarded the taxi and drove out of the railway station, raindrops started to fall and well, there really wasn’t much turning back.
Thankfully, our taxi driver was once again quite nice and suggested driving us around the pond to take a quick look. At the first two stops however, we took umbrellas down and took photos but we got a little carried away and took too much of her time. She said that it was unfair to her (which was true) and suggested we pay her a fixed price / hour instead. That would have made sense had the rain continued at a drizzle pace but it soon gotten much heavier and we just decided to take a quick drive for the rest of the stops. At least, hmm, we can proceed to Taipei earlier via the High Speed Rail.
… big statue …
… view on a rainy day …
The train station was damn nice looking, resembled an airport actually and we got our tickets from the self checkout machine, we learn fast! Trains depart on the hour and we were rather early so could busy ourselves and scrutinize all the various advertisements, machines, and well, even signboards.
We were quite excited about the HSR, but ended up terribly disappointed. The train wasn’t as fast as we had anticipated it to be, it just felt a tad faster than a normal train. Sad sad. However, clean / good service, big comfy chairs, cutting short our journey by more than half. All great! Heheh, the train speed was around 230+ km/h, not Japan fast but hey, never been to Japan before so can’t compare!
Taiwan High Speed Rail != Bullet Train
Soon it was back in Taipei for us, and we made our way to the 国军英雄馆. Our last hotel stop! Well, it was a very simple place, and as the name suggests, very erm.. army like? Our room looked like a bunk, smelt like one, and well, basically, just felt like one too. Thin mattress, thin blanket, 1 pillow, the bare necessities of it all. Room was freezing cold also! Not sure if its due to the cold taipei temperature or our ineptness but just.. brr! Every night! BRRR!! Oh well, other than that, its advantage is really is location, very near Ximenting and it provided us with lots of convenience. Price wise was ok, at 500NT per person so well, win some.. and lose some.
Recently at work, was talking to Beng Chuan about hotel taboos/things to do, he was saying before he enter a room he will: 1) Knock on the room door, and say “sorry to disturb”. 2) Open door and enter it sideways to allow “them” to pass you on the way out. 3) On all the lights and taps. 4) Check if bible is flipped open (if there is one)
WAH.. so many. Haha.. as for me, first thing I do is well, erm, usually, figure out how to open the door and if that is successful, ermm.. test the springiness of the bed? (Subsequently get more bags dumped on top, and even.. sheesh, some guy in a pink shirt)
For the record, the bed passed the test.</span></div>
Lunch was settled at MOS Burger, before heading on to Guanghua Market, where Andy wanted to shop for a mobile phone. The place resembled that of SLS, similar pricelist flying around, loads of components, displayed computers running, erm, geek world? But haha, was never one to really shop around in SLS either, more of a online search and just go down to make the purchase person, so the place wasn’t all that attractive, but interesting nonetheless. Anyway, we left the place empty handed. Price wise for components, Singapore could still be better or almost equal so yup, no point buying stuff here except for the novelty items or Taiwan brands.
With that, we headed back to one of the more famous temples in Taipei, 龙山寺. Alot of people, be it locals or tourists and alot were moving around doing the prayings and offerings. Well temples are temples and we did our part both here and subsequently later at 天后宫 which is nearer to XMT. Midway, we had a 泡泡茶 that had a signboard saying serving since 197+. Wah grandfather of 泡泡茶 stalls haha. Erm, it was quite normal (crappy), and mmm.. yep, no tradition needed here for plain bubble tea!
Our XMT shopping kept getting held back, haha.. we were almost there then got detour-ed to the Red Playhouse, a place to stage shows/plays but it was listed on the map as a tourist attraction so we headed there. Turned out that the first floor is the standard tourist trap of souvenir shops and haha, after a quick browse we headed upstairs and it turned out to be some university media faculty event so erm, we joined in the fun? Not like there was much happening except that they were screening / advertising their own productions and the students manning their exhibits. There were free drinks / food which we didn’t get to take.. sob and free magazines! Which we did take, and ended up dumping them shortly thereafter because erm, they were rather heavy? Haha..
… the red play house foray …
That marked the end of the sight seeing for this day and it was on to shopping shopping shopping (and oh, dinner somewhere in between, but that’s not very important is it).
Well, tons of people, shops all around, interesting? Yup.. it was a Saturday night so atmosphere was perhaps a tad livelier, and best of all, the weather, it had rained quite abit during the day and had stopped by late afternoon, leaving the rest of the day in a permanently cool weather which was just great! At least walking around and all that didn’t felt so sticky and when hit with a blast of cold air, just well, keeps us going.
Over dinner, we made plans for the rest of the night and finally agreed on clubbing and with Ivan uncontactable, we went around asking some of the salesperson where are the best places to go. But wah, kenna conned! Haha, we got recommended to this place, Lava which had supposedly free flow for a high cover but when we go there, it was a high(er) cover for only 3 drinks. BAH.
… the dance floor …
We made our way there around 11, after going back to the Hotel to dump our shopping stuff, managed to take a train still, so.. economical economical. Well ok lah, I’m not one to club so don’t know much about the music or people, but felt the music wasn’t that great and the place was quite small actually and worst, got this extremly sweaty / WET guy near us. Wah, damn gross. Haha, it was like standing next to a minefield, hmm worse, the minefield rather active in gyrating also. AHHH. The free drinks they had to offer was definitely a larger range compared to Singapore (I think) but wah, with the menu given to us, we really could make some terrible choices for the unknown drinks. Haha, some tasted really really very horrible haha, arghh.. so, lesson learnt, a more varied choice might not be always a good thing.
Finally figured out why our entrance fee so high. Waste our money! Got some lingerie competition, and wah, got 2 of the 4 girls really quite fierce and even took their top off with an aim to win although their arms were strategically placed. I wanted to take some pictures, (no not of the topless girls, they had already worn back), and after I snapped, haha, the stage emcee or one of the crew immediately shone a torch at me and bam, the bouncer quickly came walking over, “删掉！” Wah, Strict, haha, so quickly obeyed and deleted the photo, he happy I happy, lucky never make me delete any of the other photos.
Hmm, top prize was like $S100 dollars, crazy, so low! Anyway, yup, that was just a brief event and after that, we sat outside for awhile, finished up our drinks and left! Think it was almost 3 am by then. Someone said its good to take Vitamin C after alcohol consumption so we went to buy some lemonade which lol, remained largely undrunk for the night. Hey, didn’t feel any difference the next morning! Taxi back quite shuang, no midnight surcharge, haha.. but wah, after clearing our stuff and bathing etc, we finally KO-ed at close to 4 am. ZzzZzzzZzzzzzz.
Day 6: The Amazing Race
After a tiring night out clubbing, it was once again time for us to drag our weary bodies out of bed to accomplish our itinerary for the day. Slave drivers? Weren’t holidays meant to be relaxing? Oh well, only 3 days remain and the desire to visit as many places as possible proved too strong a lure and we got ready and all set to leave, though at an hour behind schedule. Breakfast was settled at our old favourite.. 7 - 11, with me trying their curry rice, a typical jap dish but with so many jap influences having seeped into the taipei culture, what’s new?
… clearly tired …
We missed the bus, and it was on an hourly basis, scary.. so had to wait quite awhile for the next bus, damn sian, and it was a wet cold morning, with an overcast sky, pretty much making us feel the same way. Well, the bus finally arrive and took us off to YangMingShan (YMS), and upon arrival there, it was pretty easy to spot fellow Singaporeans, and no it wasn’t through the way they speak, rather just their actions and mannerisms were tell tale signs to give themselves away, (and yes, us included as well). Perhaps the kiasu nature, the bunching up at the map, the clothes.. etc. So the bunch of Singaporeans all gathered at the YMS bus stop and waited for it, machiam like the starting line, and off we go!
THE AMAZING RACE - TAIPEI YMS VERSION
“Make your way to 竹子湖 and collect the local produce and your next clue.”
First stop! we alighted at the designated bus stop but it was still an extremely far walk in. By this time, we had labelled some of the more colourful (literally) Singaporeans that were with us on the bus, they had donned bright yellow rain coats and well, we called them Team FedEx, but seriously, its DHL that’s yellow, so erm, stupid mistake made by Andy.. but we didn’t spot it then and happily called them Team FedEx anyway. With us being typical kiasu Singaporeans, we couldn’t really afford to lose to them right, but haha, we did anyway. We were taking our time walking and it had started to rain so umbrellas were necessary and slowed us down abit. FedEx became so far ahead that we lost sight of them and without people to follow, we ran into some navigation problems as we lost sight of the route markers and had to resort to a little intuition and through the clearing, we could spot the signature yellow of team FedEx and were able to find the correct way!</span>
At 竹子湖, it wasn’t all too impressive, a little post history reading revealed that actually, it used to be a pond but had then since dried up and became a place for farmers etc. So erm.. really quite boring and with the rain and all, it really wasn’t all that awe - inspiring, by the time we were done, team FedEx had long gone and some of the backmarkers had caught up with us, a group we affectionately termed team NUS, they were a bunch of 4 girls, from Engine I believe, and we just exchange glances / stares without saying hi. We scrambled to leave before we got overtaken once again. Oh and before we forget, we had to obtain one of the local produce and tada! Lilies!
With that, we walked back to the bus stop to get our next clue, another 20-30 min walk in the rain, the 竹子湖 was really not worth going.
DETOUR. A DETOUR is a choice between two tasks, each with its own pros and cons. Teams must successfully complete one of the tasks described on the clue in order to proceed.
1) Proceed to Erziping and take on a 1 hr hike up to Datun’s Peak in gruelling conditions such as freezing cold rain. 2) Proceed to another equally boring area, and take on a 1 hr hike in equally gruelling conditions.
Well given tasks such as these, we clearly had to take Option 1. So off we go up the mountain and it was cold, wet and erm.. wet. Sigh, yup, terrible day to be walking but lucky we all wore slippers, we had foresight! But that made for a little uncomfortable trek/walk and we made it nonetheless. All the way up the mountain to a plateau where well, could see more mountains in the background! Midway up, had a little voice from nowhere incident, thanks to a phone that didn’t have a ready keylock :S, made from a moment of confusion… And oh at the top, well, perhaps the view was obstructed due to the rainy weather which led to quite a number of clouds or mist surrounding us. Gosh.. with the task performed it was on to next one which was well, ROADBLOCK. Erm, not really a roadblock but the closest there is.
</span>
A ROADBLOCK is a task that only one team member can perform.</span>
Andy took it and it involved walking back down the mountain barefoot and wasn’t he happy! With his slippers having tortured him the whole way, he was more than excited to strip off the naughty lil thing, and embraced the great outdoors full-frontedly. The task was easily completed and soon we arrived back at the start of the trail and boy were we hungry!
Time for a food break and well, there was only one store there but luckily it sold rice dumplings and each of us took one and gosh, in harsh surroundings, food always taste good and revitalised us a fair bit, though not enough as I was still blurred enough to walk into a female toilet, and didn’t realised it until a lady emerged from the cubicle. Talk about embarassing.
Back at the bus stop, we were on the verge of giving up before deciding to take the FAST FORWARD for this leg of the race, skipping the remaining tasks and heading straight to the pit stop. With hardly a trace of energy left, we were in no shape to visit the rest of the tourist spots and headed back to the starting point to leave YMS. Seems like the better attraction were of the later stops, with the natural hotspring and the waterfall all towards the end. More planning needed here!
After a backbreaking race, we desperately needed a break, both from the rain and from the physical exertion. We aimed to go to Beitou for a good hot spring soak and upon boarding the bus from YMS, the 3 of us slept soundly till we arrived back at Jiantan, following which, we took the train to Xin Beitou where we combed the streets looking for a hotspring place. Well there were really two options only,
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a public hotspring that would cost 40NT per person
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private hotspring i.e. Hotel which provides us with a room / bed / etc for approx 800NT for 3 hrs
If divided by 3, a private room isn’t that bad, at least its sheltered from teh rain, nice comfortable room, with shower facilities, air con, etc. We went around looking for one but weren’t able to find one that had a reasonable rate or accommodate the 3 of us, so after awhile, we settled for the public hotspring.
Hmm… woo, a lot of people were inside, but most were of the senior age group and a few foreigners or kids. It was divided into 3 levels, with the hotness of the water separated accordingly. The baths were of the natural rock design, had ‘super hot’, ‘just nice hot’, ‘medium hot’, and ‘you call this hot?’ levels followed by two icy cold pools (perhaps extra cold due to the rainy weather). Foolhardy perhaps but we jumped into the medium hot one, which was actually quite ok, the area where the water flowed in from was a tad too hot for comfort initially but once we adapted, it became quite shuang.
After soaking for awhile, we tried the ice cold pool, and wow.. big big difference, haha. The water was still evaporating off our back etc and can still see the vapour trails and immersing the body totally inside was both nerve wrecking and let’s just say, I prefer staying in the hot pool. Think the drastic change in temperature could also result in momentarily giddiness so erm, be careful! Anyway, after that short stint, it was back in the hot pool and just lying there, with raindrops lightly pattering on your head was ultimate shuang-ness. Refer to pic.. for a better understanding.
Well, part of the hotspring experience is to see how hot you can take, so up we went to the highest level. Ok, the temperature there was CRAZY. It was also the smallest and gosh, most crowded so had to squeeze our way through. Well, that was a bad move, cause wanted to test the water temperature first, but without having much space to move, had to go all the way inside, and that’s done by entering the pool, haha, so with no turning back, dip in and faster climb up at the other edge. Wah, pain! It wasn’t only me through all 3 of us had problems with the water temperature and I was already the one with either the dead nerves or thickest skin as I could stay in the longest but yup, as one of the auntie there said, why torture yourself, the whole point about hotspring is for enjoyment! We agreed with her and finally settled down in the just nice hot, which was next to the crazy one.
After a relaxing soak, we emerged refreshed and energised from the hotspring and were all ready to continue our itinerarry for the day, which was more shopping! We had watned to go to Danshui Fisherman Wharf + the Lover’s Bridge and had aims to catch the sunset there, but we were running behing schedule and tired from the travelling, in the end, shopping wins. We decided to go back to Shihlin Night Market and later at night catch the Miramar Ferris Wheel (but haha, once started shopping, ahh, ferris wheel was cancelled also. Oh, Danshui had the “Ah Gei”, some toufu / tanghoon conception, which we had been looking for as it was supposed to be quite famous but weren’t able to find. Well, realised it was available at Danshui through Jiali’s pictures.
Anyway, we were starving and at Shihlin it was a food hunt again. Despite it being the second time we were here, and the 鸡排, we were all craving for it… Deep fried goodness, yummy!
End of day 6. We didn’t get to complete our planned itinerary, had to cut short both the YMS tri pas well as the Danshui segment so hmm, guess we were getting quite tired, both physically and mentally and lacked the initial eagerness that had carried us thus far. Despite that, we still had lots of fun, be it at the hotspring or later on at Shihlin, even revisiting it was able to find new places to explore, new food to eat.. oh we finally ate chou toufu, haha experience was terrible! I always couldn’t really tahan the smell, but ermm.. had to try it anyway. First bite, hmm still ok, despite smelling bad, still tasted like normal toufu. After passing it to Andy and LH, wah, their facial expressions were priceless. Make it seem so terrible then they keep saying the smell regurgitating in your mouth and all, that wah, I became so conscious of my next bite that I ended up feeling the same way too! Gah! So after a couple of bites, we threw it away lol.
Hmm, lets stick to both nicer smelling and nicer tasting food. If it tastes like normal toufu, then just eat normal ones for goodness sake!
Day 7: Day of the One Oh One
After a lazy morning breakfast at XMT’s Mac, we saw a guy sprawled on the floor, erm.. after a hard night’s partying perhaps? Hmm.. hope he was ok. Oh well, I erm, didn’t want to get involved so just left him to his nice little nap, or so that’s what I hope it was. We then caught the train to the Chiang Kek Shek Memorial Hall and toured the area around, took a few photos, explored the place. There were quite a number of exhibits, mainly of calligraphy and a few paintings, which LH was excited about for her mum so she bought a book of them, which we will have to return the next day to collect the autographed version.
From the CKS Memorial Hall, we had a good view of the Taipei 101 and we spend some time at the garden there taking photos before we walked over. At 101, you are only limited access to the first 5 floors and subsequent levels require us to pay. 101 was one of those high end departmental stores, lots of branded boutiques as expected of the exclusiveness it’s trying to create so with us being the wrong target crowd, we didn’t stayed or shopped long. As it was still daytime, we figured it wasn’t that nice a view from the top and decided against going up, so we went to New York New York but it turned out to be just another departmental store. Hmm, we were recommended food here but we couldn’t find any restaurant that was within our budget so we settled lunch at the food court. The thing about Taipei food court are that the prices aren’t exactly cheap, hmm, comparable to Singapore but the portions are huge! They serve lots of hot plate / western food / hot plate stuff which was quite good actually.
From there, we headed to WuFenPu, the wholesale market place and as described by friends who had been there before, its really for girls, perhaps 1 out of 10-15 stores are stocked with male stuff. The stuff here probably just abit cheaper compared to Shihlin or XMT or elsewhere unless you buy more, though compared to those places, the stuff here are probably more varied I guess. Streets were small and crowded with all the people and clothes displayed outside yet there were still motorcycles weaving in and out through the crowd, with their pullcart of shopping behind. Scary!
Anyway, we headed off to RaoHe at around 6+, the night market was located across WuFenPu and though it isn’t that big as compared to Shihlin, it has mainly food here and definitely some interesting stuff. Although, there seemed to be an overabundance of 臭豆腐 stalls! There are like 4-5 stalls at the entrance alone? Gah… damn smelly, not much to shop already so we just walked around, eat.. and walked back to TP 101 to take the MRT back to the hotel.
While walking back, saw a few binglang stalls, we didn’t try the betel nuts, and hardly get to see any binlangxishi in our so far 7 days here.. of those that we did see in Taipei or Kaohsiung hardly looked like they dolled up or if they do, ermm, weren’t exactly the SYT that we thought they will be. Anyway, hmm, yup something we didn’t try. It doesn’t look that nice though, especially after they spit it on the floor, leaving some reddish brown stain.. zz. More importantly, 7 days down.. one last one to go!!! =)
Day 8: Time to Say Goodbye
Ah.. its been two months since I came back.. time to finally finish and close this chapter of my Graduation Trip. So.. it was Day 8 in Taipei, our itinerary for the day being the two memorial halls and finish up XMT! Last day breakfast was at a local stall outside our hotel, serving sandwiches and burgers which were quite good infact, and kinda felt like should have ate it more often… well, discovering a gem on the last day is far better than never discovering it at all.
We went back to SYS memorial to get the calligraphy book, and there were some problems as the author wasn’t there but it was miraculously found hidden under the table as we were about to leave, so hmm, a little good luck on our last day. With us being the lazy sobs that we were =), we cancelled visiting the CKS memorial and went straight back to XMT for some walking around and eating… Shopping in the afternoon and on a weekday wasn’t all that great, a certain vibrancy was missing but the food made up for it, and at least tried the 阿宗面线 + the shaved peanut ice which were famous…
Well, finally time to leave Taiwan and after checking in, we met up with the initial group of NUS people who did a different itinerary for the past 8 days and well, we were basically comparing notes and complaining how terrible Kaohsiung was =), before we headed off for some last minute shopping to clear the Taiwan dollars / coins that we still have. Only to be stumped later cos there was a vending machine which allowed us to bring drinks onboard, why pay 3 dollars for a can of coke when there’s a bottle for 1 dollar! Although that made for many sneaky drinking involved. There was mild turbulence onboard the plane, forcing the flight attendants to be seated and that marked our dinner time. We hurriedly whipped out our donuts and drinks and could eat/drink without fear of getting caught. Gosh… hate budget flights!
A quick 8 days was over just like that, marking the end of my graduation trip.. it was definitely loads of fun and yup good memories all in all… and oh! my little present for myself.. a little doughnut for breakfast!
