Ni Hao, Taipei!

We did our best to sleep during our 15 hour flight to Taipei. We knew the plane would land at 5am and we wanted to hit the ground running! 

After catching the metro (MRT) to the city, we checked in (we had booked the night before so our room would be ready), had breakfast, and headed out for a guided walking tour exploring the history of Taiwan. Here is the briefest summary I can come up with: For 6000 years before it was "discovered by the world", Taiwan was inhabited by indigenous people who originally came from various parts of Southeast Asia. In the late 1600s, Europeans "discovered" the island, using it as a base for trade. The Portuguese sailed by in the late 1500s and gave the island the name "Ilha Formosa" meaning "Beautiful Island", but they didn't stick around. It was the Dutch East India company that first set up trading posts, followed by the Spanish. In the 1660s a Chinese general named Zheng Sen (also known as Koxinga) finally kicked the Dutch out and took the island for China. China held the island until the end of the Sino-Japanese War in 1895 when it was ceded to Japan who ruled it as a colony until the end of WWII when it was handed back to China. Whew! I'll stop there, and cover the Chiang Kai-Shek bits later. 

Our first stop on the tour was the beautiful Longshan Temple. This temple is located in one of the oldest districts in Taipei, and was built in 1738 by Chinese immigrants from the Fujian province. It's dedicated to several deities from a combination of Buddhist, Daoist, and local folk religions. Today it was packed with worshippers, on account of the first day of the Taipei Lantern Festival. 

I love the way that the Taiwanese incorporate religion and daily life decisions, big or small. Trying to decide whether to switch careers, or which person you should date? Ask the temple god, and be sure to bring a generous offering to butter him up. We saw many beautiful flower arrangements but also plenty of tasty snacks — one of the gods must have a major affinity for Pringles and Doritos because there were some Costco-sized snack packs on his altar! The photo below shows an altar for one of the more health-focused gods, since the offerings on the table are mostly fruit, nuts, and tea.

Our next stop was the Bopiliao historic area. The architecture here is very well-preserved, with many of the Victorian red brick buildings dating back 200 years. The area has been revitalized and restored in the last two decades, with some of the buildings housing art spaces, bars, cafes, and shops, with a focus on blending the old with the new.

We had a few other main sights on the tour, including the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall as well as the 228 Peace Memorial Park. Chiang Kai-Shek was the leader of the ROC (Republic of China) party that fought the communists for control of mainland China in the decades before and just after WWII. His faction lost and in 1949 he had to retreat with his government to the island of Taiwan. This is one of the gates to the very grandiose CSK Memorial Hall -- commissioned by his successors in the ROC government after his death in 1975.

Kai-Shek is a controversial figure in Taiwan nowadays, we learned why during our visit to 228 Peace Memorial Park. Prior to 1949 his party, the ROC, was in power in both China and Taiwan. Here in Taiwan, there was already a conflict between the ROC and the local Taiwanese. Only mainland Chinese could hold positions of authority in the government, and there was a language barrier as well — mainlanders spoke Mandarin while locals mainly spoke Hokkien. On February 27th 1947, an unauthorized cigarette seller was accosted by an undercover official and her goods were seized. She could not understand the official and started a scuffle to stop the confiscation. Chaos ensued as other local Taiwanese protested the action and an innocent bystander was killed by the police. The next day -- February 28th (228) -- there was widespread revolt and anti-government demonstrations by the local people. This precipitated a brutal crackdown by the government -- many thousands of Taiwanese were killed. The years from 1947 right up through 1987 were known as the "White Terror" where the island was placed under martial law, another 3000-4000 Taiwanese people were executed, and over a hundred thousand more people were imprisoned. In 1998 this memorial park was dedicated to honor those who lost their lives during those years. 

No sleeping in for us! We had nonstop tours booked for our second day in Taipei. First up was a breakfast food tour. We got to sample typical Taiwanese breakfast items like warm soy milk, egg pancake, noodles, pigs ears, and of course some world famous boba milk tea. We are reasonably adventurous eaters but even Kevin was daunted by that huge plate of sliced pig's ears! (Slightly chewy, with the texture of cartilage...luckily we were not expected to finish it...)

We also visited a high end tea seller where some of the teas were going for the equivalent of $180 USD per pound. We had a chance to watch them measure big heaps of tea and package it for sale. 

I’ve discovered that my palate for tea is just as useless as my palate for wine. I can’t tell the difference between the fancy stuff and the bargain basement kind. But I do enjoy the slow process of preparing and serving the tea (more on that in a future post). In case you are wondering, each of those enormous shiny cannisters is full of dried tea.

We had time for a couple of coffees before our afternoon walking tour that took us through the Golden Age of Taipei. Most of this tour focused on the area of the city called Dihua Old Street which is a well-preserved district featuring low-rise Hokkien style buildings side by side with Japanese colonial architecture and Victorian style buildings. It’s packed with shops selling traditional dried goods (fruits, herbs, and mushrooms seemed to be popular items). Peppered into the mix were bookshops, gentrified cafes, shops selling leather goods, and even bespoke perfumes. Dihua Old street so far has been a highlight of Taipei for us. 

Just a quick side note to compare Dihua Old Street to Ximending, the neighborhood where our hotel is located. It's described as one of Taipei's most vibrant and energetic neighborhoods and in my opinion that is an understatement. For me the crush of crowds and various sights, sounds, and smells was almost sensory overload. This pedestrian-ish area (there are still plenty of zooming motorbikes and a few taxis) really picks up in the evening when hordes of tourists and locals all mingle in the streets. 

Right now Taiwan is celebrating its Lantern Festival in just about every city. This is a way to celebrate Lunar New Year with glowing larger-than-life lantern installations. 2026 is the Year of the Horse according to the Chinese Zodiac. The Ximending area has quite a few traditional lanterns, as well as some pop culture plasticized ones. I definitely prefer the traditional style lanterns, like this one.

Okay, end of side note, back to the tours! For our third tour of the day we had booked a food tour of the Ningxia Night Market. Night Markets in Taiwan are a mainstay of local culture. Many apartments are small and have tiny kitchens, so people tend to go out to the night markets to get dinner or snacks. Our guide had us try some pretty adventurous foods (for us, anyway!) From best to least favorite, we tried:

• Taro Custard Pastry (pastry filled with a sweet egg custard)
• Fried sweet potato balls (like hush puppies)
• Aiyu honey lemon jelly drink (like drinking blended up lemon jello)
• Scallion Pancake (not like an American pancake, but a kind of green onion-flavored crispy fried rolled-up crepe that is sort of chewy inside) 
• Peanut ice cream roll (like an ice cream burrito stuffed with shaved peanut brittle and cilantro)
• Gua bao (a soft bao bun stuffed with pork belly and pickled vegetables, kind of eaten like a taco or hamburger)
• Braised pork rice (five spice pork served over rice)
• Oyster omelette (just what it says)
• Grilled squid stuffed with cucumber 
• Stinky Tofu (fermented tofu that is fried. Not gonna lie, this one was hard to keep down. We each tried a bite but I can’t decide if the smell or the taste or the texture is the worst part). 

Wow, that is a LOT of words to describe our first two days in Taiwan. Are you still with me? If you're feeling overwhelmed then imagine how we are feeling, jetlagged and almost delirious from all the stimuli in this fascinating, phrenetic city!