Having found incredibly cheap airfare, (About $200 round-trip. Thanks Scoot airlines), from Incheon to Taipei, we decided to spend the first half of our summer vacation gallivanting around Taiwan. The plan was to spend some time in Taipei and then proceed to travel around the rest of the island using the HSR, (that means High Speed Rail), and non-HSRs, (non-High Speed Rails--not the actual name for regular trains, I just coined it). The plan was to spend a day in Taipei before hopping a non-HSR to the sleepy town of Hualien where we would trek through Taroko Gorge. We'd take the NHSR (it still means non high speed rail) two hours back to Taipei and switch over to the HSR (remember, High Speed Rail), bound for the second largest city and one of the most important port-cities in the region, Kaohsiung. From Kaohsiung we'd need to take a 2-6 hour bus ride, (it was hard to find information about this leg of the trip), to the southern coast and a town called Kenting, (I think it took about 5 hours actually). After soaking up some sun for a few days, we'd need to ride the bus back to Kaohsiung, (this time it only took 3 hours), and transfer to the HSR, (I'm not explaining the acronym again because it brings nothing significant to this story), bound for Taipei where we'd spend our final 2 days gorging ourselves on terrifically cheap and delicious edibles.
I'm sorry about the long winded introduction but I haven't written anything for a while so I'm prone to ramble. The point was to explain that we were staring and ending our trip in Taipei, hence the title of this entry: "Taiwan Parts 1 & 4: Taipei"
So...
We touched down in Taipei around 1:00 in the morning, (cheap flights are sometimes cheap for a reason), and taxied from the airport to our hotel, (which was decked out like a hotel: queen size bed, down comforters, HBO; but priced like a hostel thanks to Agoda). The hotel was a short walk away from Dihua Street, (try to remember that name, I might come back to it later), which was practically Main Street in Old Taipei...really old Taipei...basically Dihua Street was Taipei before Taipei was even Taipei.
Having arrived early in the morning we decided to sleep in on Saturday, no use starting a vacation feeling exhausted, and when we woke up we would just wonder around the city in a nice and leisurely fashion. Our first stop was National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall...
...where this guy just hangs out all day...
...flanked by two of these guys...
...who do this...
...and this...
...at the top of every hour.
We just happened upon the changing of the guards and it was really neat, (to borrow my Dad's favorite adjective), to be able to see it. I felt really bad for those guys though because I was literally sweating bullets and I was standing in front of a fan...in the shade. The memorial is a famous symbol for both Taiwan and China and according to my research, (ahem,wikipedia), the vast courtyard in front of the monument is a popular platform for airing you grievances against the government. I didn't see any protesters or rabble-rousers though, just a bunch of sweaty tourists, (it was really hot). Here's a picture of a building:
It's not just any building though, it's Taipei 101, the 3rd tallest building in the world. When we arrive in new cities, it's become customary for Caroline and I to seek out something tall, (a tower, a ferris wheel, a fancy hotel bar), and head for the top. Considering how I never plan on visiting Dubai and I'm not allowed to visit Mecca, Taipei 101 is the tallest man-made structure the world has to offer me, so this seemed like the appropriate time for us to honor that tradition.
The elevator is also the fastest in the world, (I think), and it gave pretty much everyone a stomachache, (one kid even threw up at the top. Not in the elevator though, in the weird cafe/museum/viewing room/gift shop at the top). The views were pretty nice, but Taipei 101 is so much taller than the rest of Taipei that it didn't really seem like we were almost 1,700 feet above the ground. Here's the view looking west:
And one looking East:
In my opinion the most interesting thing about Taipei 101 is the massive damper that's used to counteract typhoons and earthquakes:
It's the largest Tuned Mass Damper in the world and all 660 tons of it hang suspended between the 92nd and 87th floors.
I've previously mentioned Dihua Street but just in case you've already forgotten, (though I'm sure I asked you to remember it), it's the street that cuts through the heart of the oldest part of Taipei. We had some spare time one day so we decided to have a look. We saw...
A shop selling candy:
A shop selling tea:
A shop selling candy and tea:
A shop with a lot of wires attached to it:
A yellow building that may have actually been a Transformer:
Some houses with tress growing out of them:
and some ancient cave writings:
We also visited the Confucius Temple, where I admired some old dioramas:
...and learned how to count using pieces of rope:
This was probably the best temple that I've been too because it also had elements of a museum. Each building was dedicated to the different teachings of Confucius. The building that explained Confucian Mathematics was easily my favorite, though the calligraphy section was also really neat.
Just up the street and literally surrounded by apartment buildings, was Baoan Temple where I continued to admire things:
I wasn't lying about the apartment buildings:
That about sums up how we spent half of our time in Taipei, and I don't know if you've noticed, but all of these photos were taken while the sun was still out. How did we spend our nights you ask? Well, I was supposed to leave school 15 minutes ago so sadly I think I'll have to continue this with a followup post which I'll inevitably be forced to title "Taiwan Parts 1 & 4 Volume 2: Taipei After Dark"
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