thanks to the pope’s visit to the philippines and the declaration of days of national holiday, we had some time before we needed to report to our clerkship site in tacloban. so my friend ariella and i made an impromptu three day trip to taipei, taiwan! it was a great decision. super nice place – so clean and verdantly green and densely populated and western for being in the far east.
on day one i took a long nap, and then we went up what is currently the fourth tallest tower in the world, the taipei 101 tower. really great view from the top, and the elevator that takes you to the 90th-something floor does so in about 11 seconds- currently the second fastest elevator in the world! then we went to the largest and most tourist oriented night market in taipei, shilin. night markets are vast expanses of hawkers selling everything imaginable at night, especially snackish foodstuffs of usually exotic varieties. really probably the best place ever!
on day two i headed out into the surrounding hills to a hot-spring strewn place called beitou. there is a public outdoor hot spring that costs just a dollar to enter, and it is full of elderly taiwanese retirees who spend their days there. it was glorious. the pools are extremely hot, and one can alternate them with an exceedingly cold pool. that night we headed to a cutting edge “for the youth” neighborhood called ximending, inspired by the subcultures of tokyo’s harajuku. we got hotpots, and the highlight of the trip was, when it became clear to those around us that we didn’t know exactly what we were doing, the tweens at the table beside us called their english-speaking friend on speaker and had her explain to us how to use the hotpot – “dip meat hot water some seconds, when change color can eat.” they were really nice.
on day three we visited the chiang kai-shek memorial hall, a huge memorial ediface not dissimilar to the lincoln memorial in washington dc. chiang was the founder of the state that is now taiwan, and i found the history lesson presented on the ground floor of the mausoleum to be quite enlightening. chiang was the leader of the chinese nationalist camp following world war two, and opposed communism. he found his side losing to the communists in the civil war that erupted in china within the power vacuum that followed the defeat of the japanese. chiang retreated to taiwan, a place where he had never before lived or even visited, and created a state called the “republic of china” (r.o.c.), with the ultimate goal of reclaiming all of mainland china for the nationalists. obviously that hasn’t happened. chiang and taiwan were favorites of the west during the cold war and indeed remain so today. we then visited an ancient buddhist/taoist/folk religion temple called longshan to smell some wafting incense and listen to some chanting. then we grabbed some sushi and headed to the airport to return to manila.
