Taiwan

Dan and I got back from our short trip to Taiwan on Monday night. I really liked Taiwan and could actually see myself living in Taipei - a city that is, in many ways, similar to Hong Kong. Yet, Taipei's air is cleaner and the city seems to have a greater sense of its heritage and culture. Plus, the food is delicious. They're big on snacks.

We started out in Taipei for two days, then took a train down south to Hualien to see Tarako Gorge (about 40 minutes away), an incredible National Park. Then we took a quick trip to Liyu (Carp) lake, then spent half a day back in Taipei, soaking at the hot springs in Beitou.

Some random highlights from the trip:

- National Palace museum carvings: We saw the famous jadeite bok choy/cabbage. My personal favorite was stone made to look like a piece of pork.

- Old men, everywhere: We went to a park near Lungshan temple which was filled with old men spending their afternoon talking and (I think) gambling. Then we walked around the neighborhood and heard old men singing karaoke. Then we saw even more old men at the Sun Yat Sen Memorial, flying kites. And then, we went to the public hot springs in Beitou on a Monday. So, with everyone else at work, the place was filled with, you guessed it, old men.

- Taiwan friends: Taiwanese people are so friendly! In our experience, Taiwan is truly the Land of Smiles, not Thailand (we felt like we were being ripped-off a lot of the time). Whenever we got lost, there was always someone who wanted to help us out, even if there was a language barrier. Plus, when we were stranded at Liyu Lake (a rural area) and needed to make our train back to Taipei, we asked some people in a restaurant to help us call a taxi and this super nice couple offered to drive us 30 minutes back to Hualien! Or when we asked someone how to get to the public bus stop, he walked us all the way there and made 100% sure we knew the arrival time and where to get off. We also made new friends! Kai, a friend of a friend from Bard, showed us around Taipei our second day there. We went out for a delicious lunch and walked around his university.

- Taroko Gorge: this gigantic park was absolutely breathtaking. I'm not exaggerating. It's full of rivers, mountains, tunnels, waterfalls, marble gorges, etc. We also tried some aboriginal Taroko food, which resulted in one of the best dinners I've ever had. We also stayed at this hostel on top of the mountain and could hear the river outside our room.