As my third week in Taipei will be completed, I have been experiencing and learning new fun and interesting things. At this point, I am also waiting for Chinese New Year (a long break, which will start from February 6th to 11th) to explore more of Taiwan.
After a hectic plane ride from Chicago, I arrived in Taipei, seeing smiling-face Li-Ching and his (4-year-old) son, Yo-yo, who were waiting for my arrival at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport (though my boarding pass still bears Chiang Kai-shek International Airport as its name). We managed to fit all three pieces of my luggage in his car by scarifying Yo-yo’s car seat. He has to sit on my lap in the passenger seat. The boy has been growing up to be a happy, big and tall kid since I saw him last time in Chicago about two years ago. Since it had passed his bed time, Yo-yo was dropped off at his home with the mom before Li-Ching brought me to Carrefour (家樂福 (Jia-le-fu), or คาร์ฟู) to get some food and necessary items. Later, he showed me my new home and my office. As the time had moved well into early morning, we decided to eat at McDonald in front of Jai-le-fu near my apartment. This Jia-le-fu turns to be my regular shopping spot for food and other stuff. I went to bed around 2am (1/12/2008). This concluded that I arrived safe and sound.
The next morning (8AM) I went out to get my first breakfast in a Chicken rice restaurant near Jai-le-fu (this complex has five to six restaurants including Italian and Japanese cuisine). One of the servers in this Chicken Rice restaurant spoke English, so my order went smoothly. Chicken rice was pretty good, and it came with soup. After the meal, I came back for a nap which turned to be a sleep from noon to 6pm. After getting hex wrench from Jai le fu, I quickly reassembled my bike and set out to explore the neighborhood. Biking in rains due West along Nangang Rd (until the end of section 3; I live on the section 2) was fun. It was quite cold but not that bad for me. A Taiwanese friend in Chicago already warned me of the rainy cold weather in Taipei, and I found it to be similar to his description (and to what I understood him).
My apartment is located in a small alley (a bit hard to find since the alley number is confusingly arranged around here). The apartment has just been turned into three small rooms with a private bath in each. My room is quite spacious and furnished with a bed, a couch, a closet, a desk, a chair, a small refrigerator and a (flat-screen) TV. The bathroom is connected to a small courtyard in the back which is surrounded by buildings all four sides. This means that not much sunshine for this courtyard (too bad.. well, at least for now, there is no sunshine all over Taipei). I am thinking of turning this space into a cooking area and/or a little garden. A common hallway space has a washer and a place to hang clothes. I park my bike in one corner close by my apartment’s door. By this time, I have met both housemates. They work in Nangang Industrial Complex—one for Game Software Company and the other for Semiconductor Company. Both are very friendly and helpful. Even though my lack of Chinese, we can communicate fairly well in English.
I have been biking to work everyday; a one-way ride usually takes about 15 minutes and, of course, through the rain. Often, I felt that biking is faster than taking a bus. Luckily, Nangang roads do have relatively fewer vehicles than other parts of the city, so the rides, thus far, are relatively smooth. However, I do not like how buses and taxi are driving. Sometimes they can be quite annoying. A housemate suggested me to be ware of them as “taxi and bus don't pay a card according to the card;” I am quoting him. I do not understand why they need to come too close to my bike even though the street is wide open on other lanes. I have both front and rear light signals and wear a helmet. This adds safety for biking at night. However, I am still need to be vigilant. One more thing, I do need to get a mudguard because Taipei winter is very wet!
The night market I had my late lunch on Friday after the ARC card application.
A snake-tail line waiting in front of a Xiao-Chi stand in the market. I do not know what is being sold.
First weekend…
A crowd is enjoying a free concert near Taipei Main Station; I guess the guy must be famous.
So far, the sunny days were in the first weekend. The weather was very nice for traveling, and I took it as a sign of good welcoming me to Taipei. Saturday, I met with a Thai friend, P' David, who has been a visiting student in TaiDa (National Taiwan University) for almost a year and a half. He has been given me advice since I first contacted him via emails while I was in Chicago. He has been very helpful even though we had not met. We walked from Taipei Main Station to Ximending in the morning. Taipei Main Station is a big interchange station of MRT lines and usually crowded. This structure is huge and composed of both MRT and “around-island” trains. This area houses many shops including various bookstores, hotels, restaurants and some governmental offices. During the walk, he pointed out Shinkong Mitsukoshi Building (新光三越) to me as “a genetic marker” for Taipei Main Station in case I lost my direction.
An emerging crowd in front of a square in Ximending as the day gets brighter.
Ximending is a “hang-out and having-fun” place for young people, or as a guide book describes “at weekends it’s packed with Mandopop fans checking out wannabe performers and wearing the latest fads.” We were cruising through these narrow streets as shops were opening up their doors for an emerging crowd of kids. There are many movie theaters in the area as well. During the walk back from Ximending to Taipei Main Station, I spotted a festival near Zhongshan Hall and found that there was a microwave for NT$990. It was tempting to get it, but it would be too troublesome to carry it back home, so I passed it. We had lunch at a restaurant that was not too far from Zhongshan hall.
The lover's bridge at Fishermen's Wharf in a Sunny Saturday. A day like this is longed-for in Taipei Winter months.
After lunch we hopped on Danshui MRT for fisherman’s wharf and the lover’s bridge. To get there, we had to continue our journey on a bus. The bridge got its name from numerous pairs of couple coming to view sunset here. This was true for this evening as well. People were sitting in pair along the pier as the sun was softening his ray. The wharf has various restaurants and coffee shops with live music; many people were walking or biking around here. On the east side, a stage often holds open-air concerts and performances. Today, many young (or old alike) ladies were sitting in line for a depute concert of F4 as they reunited. I also heard a group of girls conversing in Thai for their favorite F4. The other end of the pier is where Danshui River meets Formosa Strait. On both sides of this Strait, the political tension between two nations is still going strong. I later learned that Danshui itself has a very long history of a very important port and went trough degeneracy and renovation. I would like to come back to learn more of the town history.
A group of dancers waving at audience near Danshui Station.One the way back, we saw a cute group of adults dancing on a stage right by Danshui Station, so I could not resist taking a snap shot of them. I guess everyone is taking full advantage of sunshine. Biking path runs on both sides of the river down to downtown Taipei and even farther south. Actually, one of them runs parallel with the MRT line. I want to ride my bike from Nangang to Danshui some days (I saw the narrow bike path packed by crowd of bikers, runners and walkers).
Fried Stinky Tofu in Gongguan nightmarket.
P' David is enjoying Stinky Tofu soup.We got off at Gongguan for Chou Doufu (Stinky Tofu). I personally felt that its smell (well of this one) was not bad and it tasted pretty good. We had both (medium spicy) soup and fried ones with rice. My Taiwanese friends were so surprised that we had rice with Chou Doufu. We walked around to get pearl milk tea (where we had to stand in a long line). Actually, they used only milk tea from a package and added tapiocas which made its taste just good. Amazing, isn't it? Hehehe… Gongguan also has many Thai restaurants, but only one is owned by Thais, according to P' David. Later, we walked cross TaiDa campus through Coconut Tree Blvd. to P' David’s dorm before I went home by MRT from a station at the other side of campus. Today P' David taught me several useful Chinese phrases, but I only remembered less than half of them. Well, it goes little by little, right?
Dong-dong is very pleased in his mommy's lap.Sunday Ya-Wen and her parents invited me and JJ for lunch. She picked me up from Jing-An Station, which is near her place, to go for lunch at a Japanese fusion restaurant. JJ and his friend, Laurence, came to join us later. The food was very good and we all were full. After lunch we went to her place to visit Dong-dong and for tea. Dong-dong has been recovering slowly from a severe burn on his back (he lost lot of hair). He had a hood on to prevent him from licking the burned area. He does not like the hood that much, so Ya-Wen took it off once awhile. Just a second after the hood was taken off his neck, he started to clean his wound right way! Dong-gong must believe that his wound was dirty, right? It was too unfortunate of Dong-dong to get burned in a pet shop because of staff’s neglecting. He was put in a dryer for too long after he got a haircut.
Dong-dong enjoys JJ's and Laurence's company.Longshan Si is one of the most famous temples in Taiwan. The main god is Gaun-yin (พระแม่กวนอิม), a female Bodhisattva. The shrines surrounding the main shrine are of gods and goddesses from Taoism each with his or her specialty, and people come to ask for specific wishes or blessing from each of them. For example, people put their examination ID with their offering for passing the coming exam. Ya-Wen often came here with her parents when she was young. After that we went to eat wa-gui (碗粿) and Fish Ball Soup at a restaurant near by the temple. Wa-gui is a Taiwanese word and the dish is Taiwanese specialty. Plus, wa-gui in this restaurant was awarded for its excellent taste, and I agreed with this completely after finished my bowls. Today I had been fully fed and even got some fruits home.
Faithful devotees in front of main shrine of Longshan si. During New Year, many Taiwanese come to pray for good luck.
Ya-wen and her mother. Mom is carrying a fruit bag that was given to me after we offered them to gods.
Wa-gui (碗粿) and Fish ball soup are very tasty and interesting. I added all sauces (e.g., garlic, hot sauces) into my Wa-gui. :)Second week….
With the boss at GRC Wei-ya (thanks Christine for the photo).I guess that I has come here with some luck. Given that I had been in Academia Sinica for only a week, I got a chance, at the beginning of the second week, to go to the end of the year party (Wei-Ya) where the employer had a dinner party for employees and thanks us for our hardwork for the whole year... (Yes, I had been working very hard for the first week!) In additional to this, I was lucky enough to get a prize of NT$10,000 gift certificate to spend at a department store (SOGO), which was one of the two special prizes. When the president of the institute picked my name up, he said the lucky one was in Dr. Li Lab but he could not pronounce the name. Right then, everyone in the lab realized that it was me, and Wen-Hsiung read my name for the president. One more thing, my raffle number was “168”, whose sound in Chinese closely resembles the phrase “yi lu fa”, which means “going on the way to be rich.” Thus, this is considered a lucky number! Some friends said, "I have been here for three years, but never got anything [at Wei-ya].." Well, I bought some cookies (thanks to Meng-shin's help) to treat my labmates later on for our good luck in the coming year. :) Actually, the prize I got that night was only half (5,000), but I received the other half the next day. I think that there was a technical issue.
Second weekend…
Saturday, Baker, one of my housemates, took me to dinner with his brother, Frank, in GongGuan. I had Ba-jang and Clam Noodle in a Japanese-Chinese Restaurant. I think that they chose this restaurant because of its pictorial menu. I learned that Baker does not eat anything that live in the sea, not because of allergy, which surprised me (Taiwan is an island, OK?). We walked around for some xiao chi.. We had red bean pastry (sweet cake stuffed with red bean pastry) and Grass Jelly with “Yu yuan” at “Meet Fresh” (鮮芋仙). Frank said that the former is much better in his hometown (Pingtung) than here. It was a long line to get this one (and always), but I think that the tastes is just alright. By the way, this was my first time riding motorbike in Taipei.
Grass Jelly with “Yu yuan” is one of my favorite Xiaochi.Sunday, I went to see out with P' David to Longshan Si and Snake alley. It was fun to come back to Longshn Si and of course there were many people. Snake Alley is also interesting, but I hate snakes. Later, I took David to eat wa-gui at the restaurant Ya-Wen took me last week. After that, we came for a hot-pot in Da-An district. Hot pot was so spicy, really! P' David said I was complaining on its spiciness but still kept putting stuff into the spicy soup. Well, it was good yummy spicy… One of the waiters is Thai so he talked with us a bit as well as a Taiwanese gentleman whose Thai ex-wife lives in Chaingmai. His Thai is every good because he used to work as a tour guide in Bangkok for ten years. He also told us that his son (with the Thai ex-wife) was just killed in a motor bike accident in ChiangMai last year at the age of 17.
David gets ready for hotpot in Da-an.Interesting note on trash in Taipei...
Nothing is as smooth as silk. One thing I found difficult is throwing out my trash. First, I had to buy expensive special trash bags...getting one of these is tough too since it is only available only at some convenient store (7-11). I finally got a hold of them. Second, trash truck only comes at a specific time of day and specific days of weeks.... The time it comes, I am usually out in Lab so I have not thrown my trash since I arrived here. Luckily, it is nothing smelly because I did not cook yet, and I put it in the backyard. :) Third, I have to recycle my stuff, which is good. I like this, but recycling truck comes at specific time and specific days too... and certain types of recyclable things can be picked up on certain days only... it is for awhile that I find this out since my landlord, housemates and I do not communicate that well because of the language. Another thing, it is hard to find a trash bin on the street as Taipei City put this policy in place to improve atmosphere of the city.
Chinese Class...
I recently started my Chinese class at the institute. The course is offered to foreigners who are working here. It has been quite interesting. But somehow, I am feeling that I do not learn at full capacity because I haven't done much practice and homework. (whom should I blame this on, Bush or Taksin?)
So far, my life in Taiwan has been good and fun. I cannot wait to explore more of Taiwan, especially Taipei. Well, importantly, it has to be under the fact that I have been working hard and doing good research.
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