Three weeks in and still loving it

As I start to establish a routine with work and settling down here are some first impressions of the wonderful country that is Taiwan.

Food

So much variety and everything I've tried is pretty amazing. They really like eating intestines and all things with taro. I definitely eat out a lot more than what I'm used to because it's just so convenient to buy things. The night markets, which have their own specialties, are everywhere and all put our Richmond night markets to shame. 

People

The Taiwanese are very very enthusiastic to help and not afraid to talk to you, especially if you seem a bit lost. There was one day I was out walking and was getting bitten by mosquitoes on my legs. This old lady comes up to me and says "oh no, you're getting bitten" before taking out this anti-itch cream and directly applying it on me. 

Nature

Taiwan is actually covered in mountains and scenic natural areas. Although a lot of their nature is pretty developed by Canadian standards, they are still beautiful nonetheless. Even Taipei has hiking trails right in the city. I did the Four Beasts Mountain path last week, and this week discovered paths with great viewpoints of the city really close to where I live at Jiantanshan. Two very popular naturey places close to Taipei that I've been to are Danshui and Beitou. I really liked Danshui as it has a lot of historical influence from the different countries that have tried to colonize Taiwan, which can be seen in the architecture of its buildings. Beitou contains three sources of hot springs, one of them I went to called Geothermal Valley, and became more developed during the Japanese colonial period thanks to their fascination with hot springs. 

Youbike

This deserves its own category because I am someone that can't live without a bike. Taipei has an amazing bike share system which I've definitely been taking advantage of. Riding here is a bit of an obstacle course as you constantly have to hop on and off from the sidewalk to the road while dodging pedestrians, scooters (of which there are A LOT of), cars and just about everything else you can think of. I even accidentally ran over a cat once.

Over the National Holiday long weekend (Oct. 9-11), I ended up going to Donggang in the south of Taiwan last minute with one of my coworkers and her friends. There was a big religious boat burning festival that happens only once every three years. The main event is that they parade this large beautifully crafted wooden boat (which takes 2-3 years to construct) throughout the entire town before bringing it to the ocean side and then lighting it on fire to exterminate the evil spirits and pray for good fortune. We followed the parade for a while and it was quite the experience with fire crackers and music noises going off everywhere. 

Last Saturday I hiked up Teapot Mountain with some new friends from behind Jingguashi Gold Museum, which even involved a little bit of scrambling. Later we went to Jiufen, which is a mountain side town filled with shops and night market-style eateries. Sunday I biked to Yingge, which is world famous for pottery making, to check out the Ceramics Museum before heading to Sanxia. Just about every city/town has an old street but the one in Sanxia looks especially authentic. Walking along you literally feel as if you were transported many years back.