Terrific, Taiwan

It is such a wonderful feeling to be pleasantly surprised by a vacation. Before this spring, I had no interest in going to Taiwan. I believe I once said maybe, maybe if we visited every other major Asian city first, then I would go. Then this spring, some friends of ours went for along weekend (Melissa and Nate for those that know them) and raved about it. This had my interest peaked. After some discussion with them, we decided to head to Taipei, Taiwan for the girls’ semester break at school.

So, Saturday, the 24th we headed out. Boy was I wrong about Taiwan! A clean, fresh air, urban city! Clean, wide sidewalks, a wonderful subway system and excellent food choices. Did I say clean? The city is surrounded by hills, parks and trails. Getting outdoors here is easy and exercise something the Taiwanese incorporate into their lifestyle. We learned that they are crazy about recycling and they reuse almost everything. This is such a departure from where we live now that I was in shock to hear this. We arrived at our hotel by 11:30am and though we were lucky enough to get connecting rooms (I can’t tell you how complicated it gets for 5 of us at a hotel…), the rooms weren’t quite ready yet. Oh, so anxious to eat at our favorite dumpling spot, Din Tai Fung, we grabbed a taxi right away. A little history for you. We were first introduced to Din Tai Fung in Singapore a few years ago when we were there for Christmas. Friends raved about it, so we gave it a shot. Our whole family, plus the entire other family we were with (the Charles Family) were in food heaven. It was such a good experience.  Knowing  that Taipei was the home of Din Tai Fung and it’s original restaurant, we chose to head to the original location. As we got out of the taxi, we noticed the line was long, the sidewalk packed and we thought “we cannot stand here with three kids forever waiting for a table,” so we got back in the taxi and had the driver take us to another, less-crowded location. We were rewarded with a 10 minute wait with ample space to loiter. Needless to say, we stuffed ourselves with 30 dumplings, pork fried rice and pork chop noodle soup. I would be remiss to not mention the yummy Taiwanese beer we drank too. It tasted good, but I have little confidence it had any alcohol in it.

It was back to the hotel for some down time with the kids. We eventually made it to the Taipei 101 Mall (the first 5 floors of Taipei 101). For those that don’t know, Taipei 101 is currently the world’s tallest building and houses the world’s fastest elevator as well. Taipei 101 was right next door to our hotel, so we visited several times. At the mall we found all the top designers, major labels and things we don’t ever even buy in the states. I had not seen a Coach store in quite awhile, which was a nice surprise. Nope, didn’t get the $800 purse I liked either, it just seemed like so little for $800. Now, the DeBeers store was a delight to see as well. I officially indoctrinated my children with how beautiful diamonds are. Curt and I taught them all the cheesy sayings about being a girl’s best friend, forever, blah, blah, blah. I think they would have been more impressed at a beetle museum, but of well.

Hungry and tired we headed back to the hotel for dinner a the pool and an evening swim. The temperature outside was perfect, but the water temp was a bit chilly. Supposedly it was heated with an amazing underwater sound system, but neither seemed to be working…so up to bed we went.

We got up Sunday morning and headed to Yingge Pottery Village. We managed to take a train there and hike around the little village on foot. Jones sure is getting heavy to carry on our backs, but he just loves the view. We walked the cobblestone streets, ate ice cream, went through most of the shops and the girls made their own pottery on the wheel. The people were friendly and strangers wanted to play with Jones. It was a great family outing! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We  headed back to the city to an area called Tienmu. Here we were thrilled to meet up with Aleah’s Kindergarten teacher, Maria Peters, who now teaches at the Taipei International School. She took us to a mall to eat and to a fabulous park.   It was so refreshing to see kids at a park in the city running all around. The facilities were fantastic and we were very impressed. The hills surrounding Tienmu were lush and green and people were out running, soccer was being played in the grass, I can’t tell you how “normal” it all felt! I was seriously thinking how much fun it would be to live there. I heard Mandarin, Dutch and English on the playground, although I am sure there were many more languages floating about. What a surreal experience! We had to say goodbye to Maria, but she did point us in the direction of another expat restaurant favorite, Fang’s. The kids were wiped out. Jones was asleep in Curt’s lap, Aleah was nodding off and Ellery was coloring away, her mind in some distant land. We ate more yummy Chinese food and carted our exhausted rears into a taxi and back to the hotel.

Monday was a day for shopping…well , that was what we planned anyway. We headed first to the Bade Lu Antique market only to find out it only happens on the weekends…UGH! OK, so back to the subway we go. Taipei 101, here we come. The day was gorgeous, so the view was bound to be fantastic. The line was short and the whole place was not crowded. It took 37 seconds to go from the 5th floor to the 89th floor. Amazing! We were rewarded with fabulous views. The girls were interested in the audio guide, so they wandered around pushing the appropriate numbers and listening to tidbits on the things they could see out the window. It was a pleasure, really, to see that your children are maturing in a way that they are actually learning things on our vacations. We then went up another floor to the open air deck. Looking more like a prison in the sky, with all the metal safety structures to keep us from jumping off, it was cool to know we were on such a remarkable building. It’s the tallest in the world…for now anyway. Once our heads were out of the clouds we had a nice Italian meal at the Taipei 101 mall. So close to the hotel, but instead, we ventured out to another market, Shillin Market. There wasn’t much there to buy, but if we were hungry, there was lots of interesting stalls to eat at. Too bad we had just ate. With English NOT the primary language, we knew there had to be more to this market as people talk highly of it and it’s written up in the travel guides. We tried inquiring, but didn’t get anywhere. We left disappointed, only to find out when we got back to Manila, that we missed the street all the vendors were on. Somehow it eluded us…oh well.  Instead of heading back to the hotel, we took a trip to Longsham Temple. It’s a popular temple in Taipei, as it’s beautiful and very active. You could here the chanting for half a block and the peace it exudes is almost contagious. The girls were very intrigued by the motions of those praying (bowing and standing, etc.). We didn’t get many pictures inside of it, as people were praying to different gods and it seemed a bit disruptive and intrusive to take too many photos. The smoke from the incense were hurting my eyes, so I led the family out a little faster than I had thought I would. Seemed all that smoke couldn’t be good for us. We meandered around for a few more minutes outside and then headed in the direction of the hotel. On the way from the subway stop to the hotel we went in a huge department store. The kids area alone was amazing. We ended up eating at a restaurant inside, it’s name eludes me, but it wasn’t very good anyway. Sluggishly, we walked to the hotel and everyone hit the bed hard and fast…so tired.

Tuesday was our last day in Taipei, so we packed it all in as best we could. We rented a car and driver and went the hot springs. It was fantastic! Imagine a dozen small hot tub, each different temperature and some even with different smells (Mandarin pool, Lemon pool, Peach pool, etc.).

There was an outdoor play area for the kids with FREEZING water (though the kids didn’t mind too much) and an indoor pools as well. This was a perfect family playground. We spent almost 2 hours soaking wet enjoying the warm pools. A little snack and back down the hill we went to our 2nd helping of Din Tai Fung. Mmmmm, yummy! From here, the driver took us to the National Palace Museum. We were a bit delayed from the schedule we made, so we got to the museum with only an hour to spare before closing. Again with the audio tour, the girls entranced themselves in Chinese history (ok, Taiwanese, but so much of it is Chinese as well). Mom, come look at this, did you hear that, walk with me over here. They were so into it, we barely could listen to our own headsets. We were practically the last people to leave the museum, but we enjoyed the hour. Back in the car to an old Chinese Tea House in an old Japanese home. Weird, huh? The house still stands from the Japanese occupation and it sits on a well used thoroughfare. We tried desperately to listen to the waiter, learn how to properly serve the tea and enjoy the somewhat meditative experience of drinking it. BUT, we have three kids, one is barely over a year old, and it was the end of a VERY long day. We were in and out in 30 minutes or so as Jones just couldn’t deal with patiently drinking tea when there is walking and climbing to be had at every turn. So off we went back to the hotel where we had dinner at one of the hotel restaurants. Good food, but hotel restaurants are typically not our thing, too sterile! So no bragging on this meal.

We were packed up and out of the hotel by 8:30am the next day and back to Manila we went, wishing we had had more time in Taipei. It never gets old to be pleasantly surprised!