Saturday

It's about time I finish blogging about Taiwan, right? I apologize for the almost month-long delay - the holidays and work got in the way. I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Stay turned as I finish up sharing my last couple days in Taipei, starting with Saturday, 12/21.
I woke up around 9am to blog a bit and grab something to eat. I skipped the hotel buffet and opted for another breakfast sandwich from Tyler's favorite street stand in Noodle Alley, complete with a 7/11 iced coffee. I guess now I'm hooked too.

Noodle Alley

My first plan for the day was to ride the MRT to YuanShan Station, and walk to the Confucius and Dalongdong temples. Right outside the station, there seemed to be a lot of activity going on. I followed the noise and music to Taipei Expo Park, where I found a farmer's market and a stage with people playing none other than...Christmas music! I browsed through the market, and received a lot of strange looks and stares. I'm really noticing that white people are not common in Taipei, and especially not white females. After grabbing a fresh sample of jasmine tea from one of the vendors, I was on my way out. Right outside of the market, I saw a group of 5 women taking pictures of each other. I walked over to them, and using hand motions and a lot of pointing, offered to take a picture of all of them together. This turned into a 10-minute ordeal. I stood there snapping continuous photos as they changed poses at least five different times. And after that, they all wanted pictures with me, and then of me individually.  Too funny.
I eventually broke away from the paparazzi and reached my first destination, the Taipei Confucius Temple, which is modeled after the original Confucius temple in mainland China. As I'm sure many of you know, Confucius is one if the most influential Chinese philosophers in history. He advocated for education, strong family values, and simplicity, and the design of the temple reflected his teachings. Unlike the intricacy of the Longshan temple, the Confucius temple was modest and did not include any statues of gods or deities. I learned as lot as I read about Confucius's life, peaked in a room full of schoolchildren reciting his poetry, and listened to a small concert band practicing ritual hymns. There was also a handful of people scattered around the temple with sketchbooks, working on beautiful drawings of the temple. A girl who spoke a little English told me that they were a group of university students taking an elective in art. I could use a lesson or two in drawing...



Adjacent to the Confucius temple was the Dalongdong Bao-an temple. Yes, Dalongdong (I found this pretty funny). The temple was established in 1742, and is usually visited by people praying for good health or recovery from illness. Both the Confucius and Dalongdong temples were very peaceful and quiet, and seemed to be seldom visited by tourists. They were a nice break from the other more populous attractions in Taipei.

Next up was the National Palace Museum, one of the most famous museums in the world. Long story short, most of the museum's artifacts were taken from Beijing right after WWII. During a civil war between the Chinese communists and Chinese nationalists, the nationalist government, who was about to lose, retreated to Taiwan. With them they brought many precious artifacts, so that they wouldn't fall into the hands of the Communists.

This museum was a pain to get to because it required a MRT and bus ride, not to mention is was extremely crowded! There were bus loads of visitors, many from mainland China. I spent the next few hours exploring the museum's exhibitions, which stretched from 6,000 BC to the post-war period. The museum contains 655,000 pieces (only about 1,700 on display at a time), making it the world's largest collection of Chinese art and artifacts. There were three floors packed with jade, pottery, bronze, paintings, rare books, and more. Unfortunately, no photography was allowed. The most famous artifact, which I waited in a long line to see, was the Jadeite Cabbage, a piece of jade carved to look like a vegetable. It symbolized purity and fertility in one of the emperor's wives. I recommend this museum to anyone who is interested in history and technology. There were many exhibits with impressive multimedia, interactive technology. After finishing up, I stopped by the neighboring Zhishan Garden, which was free with my National Palace Museum admission ticket, and then headed back to the hotel to freshen up.

Tyler and I got all dressed up and headed to the National Concert Hall (remember my visit earlier in the week), where we had tickets to "A Cozy Christmas Eve" - a Finnish fiddling concert. It was a sold-out show, and we thoroughly enjoyed listening to JPP (Jarvelan Pikkupelimannit), comprised of four fiddlers, a harmonium player, and a double bassist. The well-known group travels regularly across the world and has produced 10 albums. The music was wonderful, and it was fun hearing holiday music from Santa's hometown in Finland. :)

We were starving after the show, which ended at about 9:30. We hailed a cab back to our hotel's district, and walked to a restaurant/lounge that was recommended to Tyler by one of his coworkers. I walked into PATINA lounge and almost turned around and walked right out. It was not what I was expecting - dim lights, smoky air, and leopard print couches. Honestly it kind of grossed me out. But what the heck...we sat at the bar and ordered the bartender's (who spoke English!) recommendation. A sliced steak with fried garlic and a gigantic seasoned prawn, both beautifully prepared, were cooked on a small grill behind the bar. Wow! I guess you really can't judge a book by its cover.