Taiwan!

We're in Taiwan this weekend! I (Brad) had a conference in Taipei this weekend, and Emily decided to come along. We'd never even considered Taiwan as a holiday destination, but since work was paying for most of the trip (except Emily's ticket), we thought we'd give it a try.

We didn't do much research ahead of our trip, so we wound up seeing an interesting mix of things. We started off at the "Taipei 101," which up until a couple years ago was the world's tallest building (it's still got the fastest elevators in the world, which was quite a blast).
The observation decks (on the 89th and 91st floors) turned out to be more interesting than we'd expected. As it's so much taller than any other building in the city, the views are pretty spectacular (there are no other tall buildings around to obstruct the view).

One of the fun elements of the observation deck - a post office! They were selling postcards and stamps in a little kiosk, and had a mailbox close by. We always try to mail postcards to our nephews whenever we visit a new country. What better place to mail a postcard than from the top of one of the world's tallest buildings!After visiting the tower, we took a bit of a walking tour of the city. We stopped in a 7-11 convenience store at one point to buy water and look what we found in the candy section:
We really felt like we were discovering hidden bits of Taiwan!

Eventually, we walked to the "Sun-Yat-Sen Memorial." Sun Yat Sen was the founder of the "Republic of China" (the first government to replace the Imperial Chinese government after the last Emperor left the throne in 1911). He died long before Taiwan was established as an independent republic, but he's still revered here as the "father" of the current Taiwanese government. Taiwan and greater China share a complicated political history, but the point is that the Taiwanese people love Sun Yat Sen.

His memorial has an "honor guard" constantly on duty. We were fortunate enough to show up just before the changing of the guard. It was pretty impressive:
Our last stop for the day was at the "Miniatures Museum of Taiwan." I had come across it online before our trip, and knowing how much Emily loves small things, I thought we'd give it a try. It was one of the most random museums we'd ever visited. They had exhibits on Barbie, dollhouses, miniatures of various rooms of the house, and an impressive gift shop selling everything you need to create your own little miniature world.
Before coming to Taiwan, our friends and co-workers in Hong Kong had told us all about Taiwanese food (this place is generally agreed upon as home to the best Chinese food in the world). We walked around the neighborhood by our hotel for awhile, looking for the most authentic restaurant we could find. We settled on a little place that looked busy. It turned out to be great:
We picked out a fresh raw fish from the display case and they grilled it up while we waited:
Today, I (Brad) spent most of the day in my conference. In the evening we had some free time and we took a trip down to the "Shilin Night Market." We found a restaurant with an interesting theme. The name will probably give it away:
The seats were actually toilets:
The food was served in plates shaped like toilets:
(or like bathtubs):
After the meal, we continued exploring the night market:

Night markets seem to be a uniquely Asian phenomenon. We love them. The market we visited today was supposed to be the biggest in Taipei. I don't know how it compares to the others in the city, but it was certainly a busy place. We bought some fresh juice and generally enjoyed just walking around (except for the times when we came across the "Stinky Tofu" vendors - that's a smell that's hard to describe, although it smells a bit like a combination of well-used gym shoes and an open sewer).

Overall, Taiwan has been a pleasant surprise. The food has definitely been better than any Chinese food we've encountered thus far (although we only have Beijing and Hong Kong to compare to). The people have also been very friendly. In spite of the language barrier (not many people speak English here), people on the street seem eager to help tourists. We've also been pleasantly surprised with how courteous people are in public spaces (mostly as compared with Beijing - where it's hard to walk 1 block without being intentionally shoved out of someone's way). We still don't know what there is to see elsewhere in Taiwan, but we're definitely open to the idea of visiting this country again.