Here’s a description for those of you that might be interested in isiting Taiwan. (Brooklyn, this might help you a little bit. Living in a place like this would be so very different than visiting.) I’m going to use a question/answer format.
If I go on a package tour, will I experience Taiwan?
Taiwan is clogged with people in package tours, a lot of them from the People’s Republic of China (they’re required to be in a tour group). If you go in a tour group, you’ll always be standing at a distance from the people of Taiwan. If you go on your own, you will have to take some small risks, like being embarrassed when you do the wrong thing or being given food that isn’t what you thought you ordered. If you make a mistake, the Taiwanese will politely forgive you.
Are there sources of information on Taiwan travel?
We have Lonely Planet and Rough Guide and they’re both very useful although they are outdated. Because they’re outdated , you have to get current information when you arrive for things like train schedules. Both books are very useful although Rough Guide is much better for finding food.
Tripadvisor.com is a great web site for travelers but you need to dig into the forums to get really detailed information. I got the name of our Taroko tour guide from forum entries and she was great.
Is Taiwan expensive?
The airfare is the greatest expense. There is a wide range of hotel prices so use Tripadvisor.com and the books to get rating and then reserve online using hotels.com or agoda.com. We mostly had very good places to stay for about $90 or less a night. You can get cheaper rooms and much more expensive ones.
Everything else is very cheap as long as you don’t eat in hotel restaurants or buy ridiculously expensive souvenirs. Riding the subway never cost us more than $1 and taking the fancy high speed chain on a long trip up the west coast cost $45 each. You might spend $2 for dinner eating on the street and up to $5 for a good dinner in a typical restaurant.
Is Taiwan safe for travelers?
It’s very safe. I never used the security pouch I bought for carrying money safely—I honestly felt I didn’t need it. Of course you need to be watchful and not get yourself into bad situations, but we walked down some pretty dark streets and I wasn’t worried.
How hard is it to travel here if you don’t speak Chinese?
All major transit stations have signs in English and the trains and subways have station announcements in English while en route. The hotels that serve foreigners all have English speaking staff and tourist attractions have English speakers and signs in the interpretive centers. Bus drivers don’t seem to speak much English but the prices is usally marked.
What about everywhere else? If you’re buying things in store or even a stall the price will usually be clearly marked. If it isn’t marked, you can ask for a price using the handy phrase “Duoshao quian” (how much does this cost) and pantomime writing it down. You should learn the words for numbers, if possible.
Public transportation is great in Taipei not as good in other parts of the country. Cabs are cheap but cab drivers don’t usually speak English so if you need to take a cab, either have the card from your hotel with the name in Chinese (if you are returning there) or have the characters for the place you are going to written down or available in a book. Rough Guide has the names of places in Chinese in each section.
Where are the best places to visit?
Taiwan has a lot of beautiful natural wonders as well as interesting cities. Want to lay on tropical beaches, go south to Kenting. Like mountains, there’s Taroko National Park. the cross island highways, Alishan, or Yangmingshan. Hot springs are anywhere there are mountains. Want to learn about Buddhism or Taoism, it’s everywhere. The best part is that the island is small enough that you can do a lot of those things in a short period of time.
Is there tipping?
The general rule is no, there is no tipping. I guess some expat businesses and some high end hotels ask for or expect tips but we haven’t run into that.
Send me any more questions I need to answer.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Saturday, May 8, 2010
My Last Day - Sumup Is Coming Tomorrow
I'm at the airport waiting for the 11:20 p.m. flight to LA.
We spent my last day walking revisiting some old places and exploring some new areas.
We started by revisiting the beautiful Longshan temple so I could pay my final respects to Guanyin. The temple was very busy, particularly in the rear corner near the deities that represent excellence in literature. Young people, probably getting ready for exams, crowded into that area, bringing offerings of food and their sincere desire for their own success. The temple attendants were giving out Longshan pens and I was lucky enough to get two.
We wandered through the market area nearby and then window shopped at the row of Buddhist religious supply stores. We decided to walk north then to Ximending.
Ximending is where young people shop, watch movies, and perhaps party in Taipei. The action is centered on a series of streets that feed into a a three block pedestrian mall, a mall that actually didn't have motot scooters on it. It was Saturday afternoon when we were there and it was almost packed. We thought it would be packed later.
The sad things is that a great majority of the stores contain foreign designer brands, not Taiwanese or even Chinese brands, I looked at a few items and the foreign goods seem to go on sale for about 10% to 15% less than they sell for in the US. A $150 iPod was about $125--not enough to make me busy some for resale.
We hopped back on the MRT to head north to yet another neighborhood in Taipei. We walked a bit and got to Dihua Street, historically one of the famous shopping streets in Taipei. We walked south on Dihua (which was treacherous since there was no good sidewalk and lots of traffic) until we got to the City God Temple. Many of the neighborhoods that we've visited used to be villages, each with a City God temple. Those villages grew together to form modern Taipei, so now it's neighborhoods that have City God temples.
We walked two blocks from there to the museum of the Taipei puppet compnay. In a small but tall building they had collected examples of very old stick, string, and shadow puppets from China, Taiwan, and India and these really interesting water puppets from Vietnam. The also had an exhibit about how tthe Cultural Revolution in China affected puppetry there.
We went back to the hotel and I finished packing, then we went to have dinner in one of our neighborhood restaurants. In the first restaurant the servers were eating dinner and didn't really want to help us make sense of the menu. We left and went into another, always busy restaurant a block further from the hotel. They were very helpful and we successfully ordered a very good meal. We chose a fish that was on ice in the front of the restaurant and they cooked it in some delicious broth. It really melted in your mouth.
I took a bus to the airport that took an indirect route to the airport. I had to switch terminals and search for the departure area but I successfully made it to the gate.
We spent my last day walking revisiting some old places and exploring some new areas.
We started by revisiting the beautiful Longshan temple so I could pay my final respects to Guanyin. The temple was very busy, particularly in the rear corner near the deities that represent excellence in literature. Young people, probably getting ready for exams, crowded into that area, bringing offerings of food and their sincere desire for their own success. The temple attendants were giving out Longshan pens and I was lucky enough to get two.
We wandered through the market area nearby and then window shopped at the row of Buddhist religious supply stores. We decided to walk north then to Ximending.
Ximending is where young people shop, watch movies, and perhaps party in Taipei. The action is centered on a series of streets that feed into a a three block pedestrian mall, a mall that actually didn't have motot scooters on it. It was Saturday afternoon when we were there and it was almost packed. We thought it would be packed later.
The sad things is that a great majority of the stores contain foreign designer brands, not Taiwanese or even Chinese brands, I looked at a few items and the foreign goods seem to go on sale for about 10% to 15% less than they sell for in the US. A $150 iPod was about $125--not enough to make me busy some for resale.
We hopped back on the MRT to head north to yet another neighborhood in Taipei. We walked a bit and got to Dihua Street, historically one of the famous shopping streets in Taipei. We walked south on Dihua (which was treacherous since there was no good sidewalk and lots of traffic) until we got to the City God Temple. Many of the neighborhoods that we've visited used to be villages, each with a City God temple. Those villages grew together to form modern Taipei, so now it's neighborhoods that have City God temples.
We walked two blocks from there to the museum of the Taipei puppet compnay. In a small but tall building they had collected examples of very old stick, string, and shadow puppets from China, Taiwan, and India and these really interesting water puppets from Vietnam. The also had an exhibit about how tthe Cultural Revolution in China affected puppetry there.
We went back to the hotel and I finished packing, then we went to have dinner in one of our neighborhood restaurants. In the first restaurant the servers were eating dinner and didn't really want to help us make sense of the menu. We left and went into another, always busy restaurant a block further from the hotel. They were very helpful and we successfully ordered a very good meal. We chose a fish that was on ice in the front of the restaurant and they cooked it in some delicious broth. It really melted in your mouth.
I took a bus to the airport that took an indirect route to the airport. I had to switch terminals and search for the departure area but I successfully made it to the gate.
Friday, May 7, 2010
We left Tainan on the high speed train about noon. The special high speed station is beautiful but it takes an expensive cab ride to get there from downtown Tainan. The speed of the train is truly amazing--at one point the display showed the train was cruising at about 155 miles an hour. The train car is a bit nicer than the standard train car, comfortable but not too fancy, and the ride is very smooth. We need one of these from the Twin Cities to Chicago.
We checked back into our minimalist room in the Ambience then headed out for one of the key expeditions of the trip--exploring the neighborhood Sally lived in when she was ten. We walked south on Xinsheng Road, turned right onto Lane 150 and there was the block she lived on and the park she played in. In fact, there was a concrete playground slide in the park that was the exact same type of slide that she played on as a little girl. While the house she lived in is gone, things generally looked like the pictures Sally took when she lived there.
Sally will spend more time in that neighborhood after I leave and will take a lot of pictures. It was raining on and off the whole time we were in the area so it wasn't a great day to explore. Today we're having normal May weather, rainy and warm, although the Taipe temperature of 25 degrees C is much more comfortable than the heat and humidity in Tainan.
This was our first rain of the trip and it was easy to ignore as long as you had an umbrella. The rain was not easy for the people on motor scooters to ignore, however, so they were wearing a variety of ponchos and rain coats. It must be very uncomfortable for the scooter riders when monsoon rains start in late summer.
We wandered in a broader area for a while, then checked out the hotel Sally will move into on Sunday. It's called the Dandy and it's slogan, painted on the wall by its door, is "Simpleism, Simplistic, Simple, Dandy." I think the Dandy may even be more minimalist than the Ambience, which could be interesting or perhaps frightening. There was something that wasn't white in the Dandy lobby so I'm not sure they can beat the Ambience.
We had dinner at a famous Taipei restaurant that has branches all over the world (but not in Minnesota). It's called Ding Tai Feng and it's specialty is jiaodze (dumplings). They had a variety of jiaodze, xiaomai, and lots of other appetizers and dishes so we ordered a spread of jiaodze, pickles and vegetables and it was all delicious. This place had about six or seven college age people working our area, shuffling in food quickly and quietly while also making small talk in English so we felt comfortable. We probably were there for less than 30 minutes total but we didn't feel rushed.
We found the bus stop for my airport bus tomorrow night, got some fresh soybean milk and some old school cookie things, sat on a white couch in the hotel lobby, and watched the traffic go by on Changan Avenue.
Tomorrow is my last day in Taiwan! We're going to go back to the historic old district for a look at things we missed on our last trip to the area and then have dinner at one of the rowdy restaurants near the hotel that are always packed until 1 a.m. every night. Then out to the airport where the flight to LA begins at 11:30 p.m.
We checked back into our minimalist room in the Ambience then headed out for one of the key expeditions of the trip--exploring the neighborhood Sally lived in when she was ten. We walked south on Xinsheng Road, turned right onto Lane 150 and there was the block she lived on and the park she played in. In fact, there was a concrete playground slide in the park that was the exact same type of slide that she played on as a little girl. While the house she lived in is gone, things generally looked like the pictures Sally took when she lived there.
Sally will spend more time in that neighborhood after I leave and will take a lot of pictures. It was raining on and off the whole time we were in the area so it wasn't a great day to explore. Today we're having normal May weather, rainy and warm, although the Taipe temperature of 25 degrees C is much more comfortable than the heat and humidity in Tainan.
This was our first rain of the trip and it was easy to ignore as long as you had an umbrella. The rain was not easy for the people on motor scooters to ignore, however, so they were wearing a variety of ponchos and rain coats. It must be very uncomfortable for the scooter riders when monsoon rains start in late summer.
We wandered in a broader area for a while, then checked out the hotel Sally will move into on Sunday. It's called the Dandy and it's slogan, painted on the wall by its door, is "Simpleism, Simplistic, Simple, Dandy." I think the Dandy may even be more minimalist than the Ambience, which could be interesting or perhaps frightening. There was something that wasn't white in the Dandy lobby so I'm not sure they can beat the Ambience.
We had dinner at a famous Taipei restaurant that has branches all over the world (but not in Minnesota). It's called Ding Tai Feng and it's specialty is jiaodze (dumplings). They had a variety of jiaodze, xiaomai, and lots of other appetizers and dishes so we ordered a spread of jiaodze, pickles and vegetables and it was all delicious. This place had about six or seven college age people working our area, shuffling in food quickly and quietly while also making small talk in English so we felt comfortable. We probably were there for less than 30 minutes total but we didn't feel rushed.
We found the bus stop for my airport bus tomorrow night, got some fresh soybean milk and some old school cookie things, sat on a white couch in the hotel lobby, and watched the traffic go by on Changan Avenue.
Tomorrow is my last day in Taiwan! We're going to go back to the historic old district for a look at things we missed on our last trip to the area and then have dinner at one of the rowdy restaurants near the hotel that are always packed until 1 a.m. every night. Then out to the airport where the flight to LA begins at 11:30 p.m.
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Thursday, May 6
Sally woke up early and got us tickets on the high speed train back to Taipei. This fast train takes less than two hours while the regular train takes more than four. The only problem with the high speed train is that this is a completely new rail system and the stations are outside of the cities, instead of in the center of the city like the normal train stations. It’s an expensive cab ride.
I like Tainan. This is a T-shirt and shorts town, not fashion conscious like Taipei. Things seem to be move a bit slower here, maybe because of the heat or because this isn’t a center of business or government like Taipei. People here are perhaps a bit less polite than the hyper-polite folks of Taipei, but they still are very friendly once you connect with them.
What I don’t like is the motor scooter driving here. There isn’t much public transportation, unlike Taipei, so it seems like every single person has a motor scooter and no one knows the traffic laws. People ride through red lights, drive the wrong way on streets, drive down every inch of sidewalk looking for parking spots, and cut across the places where pedestrians stand when they are waiting for a light.
Today we went to Anping, the first settlement on Taiwan in the 1660s. The Dutch built a fort there and some aborigines came and created a settlement next to it. We went to the remains of the fort and then walked down nearby Yangping Road, one of the original market streets on Taiwan.
What about temples, you ask? There are more temples in the relatively small Anping area than you could visit in a day. We did go to the most important temple, the first Matzu temple in Taiwan. Koxinga (the general who conquered the Dutch, remember?) brought Matzu statues with him from China and they build this temple to house them and as a place to pray for safety on the seas. The Japanese destroyed the temple when they gained control of Taiwan in the late 1800s but the temple was rebuilt in the 1960s and the original Matzu statues, which somehow survived the Japanese, were collected and put into the new temple.
It’s still the celebration of Matsu’s birthday so the temple area was full of people cooking, cleaning, setting things up, and preparing for performances. The area was also full of dozens of tables covered with offerings that worshippers brought. This included every time of food you could imagine as well as a couple of cases of Taiwan beer.
When we went into the temple, the atmosphere was more solemn. There was a temple attendant reading a prayer in the front of the hall and a group of monks chanting (using wireless microphones) in front of the main altar. There was a stream of people coming through the temple to worship but no buzz of people talking about preparations or other non-worship matters like in the Grand Matzu temple in downtown Tainan.
We left there and wandered until we ran across a very pretty Guanyin temple not far from Matsu’s temple. This wasn’t a large temple but the walls were beautifully carved with lines of text and depictions of what I presumed were important events. The door guardians were fifteen feet tall and very colorful.
As we looked for another landmark we wandered down some alleys into old style houses with little courtyards. Sally said that Taipei used to look like that which is hard for me to believe.
We did sample two famous Anping treats. We stopped at Chou’s and had shrimp rolls and coffin cakes. To make a coffin cake you cut of f the top, hollow it out so it looks like a coffin, add vegetables and a sauce and then put the lid back on. Both treats were very good.
It was hot and sticky so we took a cab back to the hotel and took a break. In the evening we walked down to our favorite vegetarian restaurant and had a wonderful meal. We walked back slowly, watched a Bruce Lee movie and that was the day.
BTW, the hotel is filling up. Tour buses are starting to disgorge large numbers of tourists into the hotel. Also we discovered that the amazing breakfast buffet is costing us $1000 NT ($30 US) every day—this compares to the free breakfasts at all the other hotels. We’re not doing that again.
Back to Taipei tomorrow
I like Tainan. This is a T-shirt and shorts town, not fashion conscious like Taipei. Things seem to be move a bit slower here, maybe because of the heat or because this isn’t a center of business or government like Taipei. People here are perhaps a bit less polite than the hyper-polite folks of Taipei, but they still are very friendly once you connect with them.
What I don’t like is the motor scooter driving here. There isn’t much public transportation, unlike Taipei, so it seems like every single person has a motor scooter and no one knows the traffic laws. People ride through red lights, drive the wrong way on streets, drive down every inch of sidewalk looking for parking spots, and cut across the places where pedestrians stand when they are waiting for a light.
Today we went to Anping, the first settlement on Taiwan in the 1660s. The Dutch built a fort there and some aborigines came and created a settlement next to it. We went to the remains of the fort and then walked down nearby Yangping Road, one of the original market streets on Taiwan.
What about temples, you ask? There are more temples in the relatively small Anping area than you could visit in a day. We did go to the most important temple, the first Matzu temple in Taiwan. Koxinga (the general who conquered the Dutch, remember?) brought Matzu statues with him from China and they build this temple to house them and as a place to pray for safety on the seas. The Japanese destroyed the temple when they gained control of Taiwan in the late 1800s but the temple was rebuilt in the 1960s and the original Matzu statues, which somehow survived the Japanese, were collected and put into the new temple.
It’s still the celebration of Matsu’s birthday so the temple area was full of people cooking, cleaning, setting things up, and preparing for performances. The area was also full of dozens of tables covered with offerings that worshippers brought. This included every time of food you could imagine as well as a couple of cases of Taiwan beer.
When we went into the temple, the atmosphere was more solemn. There was a temple attendant reading a prayer in the front of the hall and a group of monks chanting (using wireless microphones) in front of the main altar. There was a stream of people coming through the temple to worship but no buzz of people talking about preparations or other non-worship matters like in the Grand Matzu temple in downtown Tainan.
We left there and wandered until we ran across a very pretty Guanyin temple not far from Matsu’s temple. This wasn’t a large temple but the walls were beautifully carved with lines of text and depictions of what I presumed were important events. The door guardians were fifteen feet tall and very colorful.
As we looked for another landmark we wandered down some alleys into old style houses with little courtyards. Sally said that Taipei used to look like that which is hard for me to believe.
We did sample two famous Anping treats. We stopped at Chou’s and had shrimp rolls and coffin cakes. To make a coffin cake you cut of f the top, hollow it out so it looks like a coffin, add vegetables and a sauce and then put the lid back on. Both treats were very good.
It was hot and sticky so we took a cab back to the hotel and took a break. In the evening we walked down to our favorite vegetarian restaurant and had a wonderful meal. We walked back slowly, watched a Bruce Lee movie and that was the day.
BTW, the hotel is filling up. Tour buses are starting to disgorge large numbers of tourists into the hotel. Also we discovered that the amazing breakfast buffet is costing us $1000 NT ($30 US) every day—this compares to the free breakfasts at all the other hotels. We’re not doing that again.
Back to Taipei tomorrow
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
We visited all the Level 1 and some of the Level 2 shrines in central Tainan. There’s probably a dozen more places to visit in that area but the attractions close pretty early in Tainan and we were pretty hot, grubby and tired by 5:30 p.m. I couldn’t cover all we did today in detail so I’ll write some highlights.
The first place we went: We started at Chihkan Towers, buildings on the site where the Dutch surrendered to the famous Chinese general named Koxinga. Not real exciting except for a nice statue showing the surrender.
The last place: We ended at the Koxinga Shrine which was built in a different spot in the city. There was some interesting history here but it was not very moving.
The happiest, lightest place: The Lady Linshui temple is dedicated to women in childbirth. It’s incredibly ornate and very bright with beautiful murals of woman and children playing. We saw one pregnant woman sitting by the statues of the birth assistants for a month and a very pretty song and dance done by a temple attendant for another woman.
The darkest: Tie. The City God temple and the Dongyue temple. The City God is responsible for counting up your good and bad deeds during your life, information that will be used to decide if you’re going to hell or not. The City God temple is full of warnings, including large, scary figures holding chains and paddles, as well as a huge abacus he uses to count your deeds. In the front hall of the Dongyue temple, the Emperor of the East Mountains takes those numbers and determines which of the eighteen levels of hell you go to if you’re a sinner. The middle hall has murals depicting the horrors that bad people will go through in hell and the back hall is a gloomy, quiet place where a scary Fendu Da Di, emperor of Hell, glares down at you.
The spectacle: The grand Matzu temple was crowded with people parading, eating, worshipping, and standing in line for food being given out by the temple. We expected this since it’s around her birthday. The best moments occurred when the very large temple bell and drum began to sound and a line of temple attendants passed ritual items up to the altar and then back through the incense to a back altar.
The best statue: There is a beautify Guanyin statue at the back of the God of War temple that has Guanyin looking down with a compassionate but stern look on her face. It reminded me of the Guanyin that I learned about in the Journey to the West, a classic Chinese story. In that story Guanyin often saves the hero, Monkey King, from the predicaments he gets into, but also scolds him for being so mischievous and demands improvement in his behavior.
Best food: Tie. Lilly’s Fruit Shop serves shaved ice topped with fresh tropical fruit or a number of other mixtures—I had persimmon and Sally had honey-bean. Slack Season Dan Ti Noodles makes a delicious local dish called danzi mian that we both really liked.
Tomorrow we go to Anping, the other historical area in Tainan.
The first place we went: We started at Chihkan Towers, buildings on the site where the Dutch surrendered to the famous Chinese general named Koxinga. Not real exciting except for a nice statue showing the surrender.
The last place: We ended at the Koxinga Shrine which was built in a different spot in the city. There was some interesting history here but it was not very moving.
The happiest, lightest place: The Lady Linshui temple is dedicated to women in childbirth. It’s incredibly ornate and very bright with beautiful murals of woman and children playing. We saw one pregnant woman sitting by the statues of the birth assistants for a month and a very pretty song and dance done by a temple attendant for another woman.
The darkest: Tie. The City God temple and the Dongyue temple. The City God is responsible for counting up your good and bad deeds during your life, information that will be used to decide if you’re going to hell or not. The City God temple is full of warnings, including large, scary figures holding chains and paddles, as well as a huge abacus he uses to count your deeds. In the front hall of the Dongyue temple, the Emperor of the East Mountains takes those numbers and determines which of the eighteen levels of hell you go to if you’re a sinner. The middle hall has murals depicting the horrors that bad people will go through in hell and the back hall is a gloomy, quiet place where a scary Fendu Da Di, emperor of Hell, glares down at you.
The spectacle: The grand Matzu temple was crowded with people parading, eating, worshipping, and standing in line for food being given out by the temple. We expected this since it’s around her birthday. The best moments occurred when the very large temple bell and drum began to sound and a line of temple attendants passed ritual items up to the altar and then back through the incense to a back altar.
The best statue: There is a beautify Guanyin statue at the back of the God of War temple that has Guanyin looking down with a compassionate but stern look on her face. It reminded me of the Guanyin that I learned about in the Journey to the West, a classic Chinese story. In that story Guanyin often saves the hero, Monkey King, from the predicaments he gets into, but also scolds him for being so mischievous and demands improvement in his behavior.
Best food: Tie. Lilly’s Fruit Shop serves shaved ice topped with fresh tropical fruit or a number of other mixtures—I had persimmon and Sally had honey-bean. Slack Season Dan Ti Noodles makes a delicious local dish called danzi mian that we both really liked.
Tomorrow we go to Anping, the other historical area in Tainan.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Taiwanese Dogs
There are lots of dogs in Taiwan, just like in the US, but they seem to lead very different lives than American dogs.
Taiwanese dogs appear to be pretty independent and they are rarely tied up or leashed. It’s normal to walk ldown a Taiwanese street and see a dog lazily watching people pass by their storefront or apartment building. You also see the more active dogs doing a studious patrol of their own little area. You often see dogs walk down the street without a person nearby looking like a canine neighborhood watch when they walk in a group.
The dogs mostly ignore strangers. Sometimes they will make the effort to look a person over and almost always decide you’re not interesting. If they think you have food, of course they’re more interested but I’ve never seen a dog here act aggressively toward a person.
The dogs usually ignore other dogs in the area but I have seen a few squabbles, usually involving dogs on leashes. When another dog looks at you in a certain way, you just have to respond. You know what I mean.
Taiwanese dogs appear to be mostly mixed breeds. I have seen some pure breed dogs-- some Pugs, a Golden Retriever, and some Daschsunds--but these were exceptions. To me, they’re the kind of dog you look at and say “I wonder what kind of dog that is.”
The funniest/scariest thing is watching Taiwanese dogs ride with their people on motor scooters, sometimes on the back and sometimes down by the pedals. I saw a very small leashed dog hop off the scooter at a red light, run around the scooter, and then hop back on.
There is a restaurant down the street from the Beauty Star Hotel where you can bring your dog to eat dinner with you. It was kind of empty the first few times we went by but they did have some decent business by the time we left the neighborhood. (What do you suppose they do with all the dog hair they sweep up?)
For you cat lovers, yes there are cats here but I don’t see them much. Besides, cats are the same everywhere, right? :)
Taiwanese dogs appear to be pretty independent and they are rarely tied up or leashed. It’s normal to walk ldown a Taiwanese street and see a dog lazily watching people pass by their storefront or apartment building. You also see the more active dogs doing a studious patrol of their own little area. You often see dogs walk down the street without a person nearby looking like a canine neighborhood watch when they walk in a group.
The dogs mostly ignore strangers. Sometimes they will make the effort to look a person over and almost always decide you’re not interesting. If they think you have food, of course they’re more interested but I’ve never seen a dog here act aggressively toward a person.
The dogs usually ignore other dogs in the area but I have seen a few squabbles, usually involving dogs on leashes. When another dog looks at you in a certain way, you just have to respond. You know what I mean.
Taiwanese dogs appear to be mostly mixed breeds. I have seen some pure breed dogs-- some Pugs, a Golden Retriever, and some Daschsunds--but these were exceptions. To me, they’re the kind of dog you look at and say “I wonder what kind of dog that is.”
The funniest/scariest thing is watching Taiwanese dogs ride with their people on motor scooters, sometimes on the back and sometimes down by the pedals. I saw a very small leashed dog hop off the scooter at a red light, run around the scooter, and then hop back on.
There is a restaurant down the street from the Beauty Star Hotel where you can bring your dog to eat dinner with you. It was kind of empty the first few times we went by but they did have some decent business by the time we left the neighborhood. (What do you suppose they do with all the dog hair they sweep up?)
For you cat lovers, yes there are cats here but I don’t see them much. Besides, cats are the same everywhere, right? :)
Tuesday, May something
I’m writing this in our somewhat posh room on the 22nd floor in the Far Eastern Shangri-La Something Something—Tainan. The hotel has 37 floors and I think right now we’re almost the only people here. I base that on the fact I have only seen two other people in the building, there’s an elevator immediately available every time we need one, and the staff run over to beg us for something to do every time we go into the lobby. Also, the guy in the gym followed me around the whole time I was in there.
We started the day with breakfast at the Ambience, then got on the “limited express” train to Tainan. That trip covers most of the west coast of Taiwan and only takes four hours. We went through some good sized cities, had views of the central mountain ranges to the east, and saw lots of rice plants and banana trees.
We arrived in Tainan about four and promptly were met at the door of the train station by a cab driver who was trying to take us out of turn. We went over to the first cab in line and he only took us after the dispatcher yelled at him. He took us about five blocks and charged us $100 NT. Well, we’re not in Tapei anymore.
After we checked into our room, we walked into the center of town and began the historic walking tour that’s in the Lonely Planet book. The walk showed us that there is quite a bit of money in this town—we walked past several blocks of obviously expensive mens’ and womens’ clothing stores and some well stocked electronics and music stores.
We made it to the Confucius Temple about 5:30 and found out that it closed a few minutes before. The ancient South Gate of the city was also closed. In fact, most of the historic sites closed around five, which was a change from Taipei.
After walking for a few minutes it was time to find something to eat, the most stressful part of every day it seems. We went to a lane that is supposed to have good food but it was mainly coffee shops and a couple of noodle houses. On the way there I had noticed a nice looking little restaurant on the main street so I suggested we try that. It was clean and had some people in there so we went in.
A guy in the front of the restaurant handed us a menu in English. It was a vegetarian restaurant. There are a lot of vegetarian restaurants in Taiwan because there are a lot of Buddhists but we had never been in one.The diners were a mix of young people, probably students at one of the local universities, and families with young children.
We got two set dinners which included everything from soup to desert and we ordered some dumplings. It turned out to be a huge amount of food with lots of green vegetables and interesting mushrooms. That was a great meal for about $4 US each. I think we'll go back there at least once since the other dishes we saw looked good too.
We wandered a bit more then came back to Shangri-La, watched a movie and crashed.
We started the day with breakfast at the Ambience, then got on the “limited express” train to Tainan. That trip covers most of the west coast of Taiwan and only takes four hours. We went through some good sized cities, had views of the central mountain ranges to the east, and saw lots of rice plants and banana trees.
We arrived in Tainan about four and promptly were met at the door of the train station by a cab driver who was trying to take us out of turn. We went over to the first cab in line and he only took us after the dispatcher yelled at him. He took us about five blocks and charged us $100 NT. Well, we’re not in Tapei anymore.
After we checked into our room, we walked into the center of town and began the historic walking tour that’s in the Lonely Planet book. The walk showed us that there is quite a bit of money in this town—we walked past several blocks of obviously expensive mens’ and womens’ clothing stores and some well stocked electronics and music stores.
We made it to the Confucius Temple about 5:30 and found out that it closed a few minutes before. The ancient South Gate of the city was also closed. In fact, most of the historic sites closed around five, which was a change from Taipei.
After walking for a few minutes it was time to find something to eat, the most stressful part of every day it seems. We went to a lane that is supposed to have good food but it was mainly coffee shops and a couple of noodle houses. On the way there I had noticed a nice looking little restaurant on the main street so I suggested we try that. It was clean and had some people in there so we went in.
A guy in the front of the restaurant handed us a menu in English. It was a vegetarian restaurant. There are a lot of vegetarian restaurants in Taiwan because there are a lot of Buddhists but we had never been in one.The diners were a mix of young people, probably students at one of the local universities, and families with young children.
We got two set dinners which included everything from soup to desert and we ordered some dumplings. It turned out to be a huge amount of food with lots of green vegetables and interesting mushrooms. That was a great meal for about $4 US each. I think we'll go back there at least once since the other dishes we saw looked good too.
We wandered a bit more then came back to Shangri-La, watched a movie and crashed.
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