When we land, it will already be Wednesday in Taiwan, and indeed, even back home despite being 12 hours behind.
By this point we were on approximately our fifth winds, so after chatting with Matt and Rosie, unpacking, and unwinding for a spell, we decided to seek out our first meal in Taiwan. We walked several blocks to a place that is known for their goose, and had Smoked Goose, Steamed Bamboo Shoots, Spinach, and (for Matt and me) Spicy Wontons - which we ended up getting a second order of after we downed the first one. We grabbed iced teas from a cooler to enjoy with the food (they will note what you took and add it to the bill.) Everything was delicious, even the things we were less familiar with!
We swung by an egg custard place to try to get dessert, but they were sold out, so instead we popped into the FamilyMart convenience store, where I found a few interesting flavors of chips to try out, and some matcha ice cream waffles, and the others got drinks as well. Too tired to walk, and not wanting to face the uphill climb back, we grabbed an Uber back to the condo. We hung out late into the Taiwan night chatting and trying the various desserts and snack foods, including a very unusual Strawberry flavored chip that they had gotten earlier. Nobody really enjoyed it, the sweetness on a chip was discordant to our American tastebuds, but it was interesting! The day itself was brief, and our bodies have absolutely no idea what time it’s supposed to be, but we were exhausted and looking forward to a day of relaxing and planning for the two weeks to come.
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| So many unique chip flavors to be tried this trip! |
Day 2: Thursday March 12
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| The building where Matt and Rosie live |
Sleep did not come easily, as the guest bed (which came with the condo) was incredibly firm, and still our bodies were not accustomed to the timezone. We rested on and off through most of the night, before I gave up and got up. Rosie had work today, but Matt was already up, so we played a couple of fun games of Dominion (I had packed a collection of enough cards to give us plenty of variety, in a nice new card-case that I had ordered before the trip). We each won a game, and once Teresa woke up, we went out to grab breakfast. We walked a few blocks once more, to a small place called Yummy Burger where we tried several dishes which we split: a bacon and egg sandwich, potstickers, omelette crepes, and turnip cakes, french toast with chicken nuggets, sausage, and hashbrowns, and fast-food style cheeseburger. They even came with milk tea, and all three of us ate for about $9 US! My favorite was the more Chinese style dish with the potstickers, omelette crepes and turnip cakes.
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| Breakfast at Yummy Burger |
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| Turnip Cakes and Potstickers |
After breakfast, we hiked along a nice path by the river-side, which took us to a large department store (Carrefour) and decided to pick up a nice mattress topper. (It would cost as much as one night in a hotel, and instead we could use it every night we stay with them for a much better sleep. It will be our gift to Matt and Rosie when we leave.) We also picked up more chips and other snacks, and ended up buying a lap table for bed/sofa use that folds up small so we can take it home. Since we had a lot to carry uphill, we booked another Uber to return to the condo.
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| Hiking along the river |
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| Outside the Carrefour |
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| Inside the Carrefour |
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| International food! |
Back at the condo, we started looking into plans for the coming weekend. Rosie was fortunately able to take off Friday through Tuesday even though we had short notice on the change in plans, so we were looking into all traveling to another city in Taiwan and getting hotel rooms. We investigated several hotels in Jiaoxi, which is a hot spring town in the Yifen prefecture, in the east of Taiwan; and also looked briefly into Tainan, which is a very old city with a lot of history and mixing of cultures in the very south of Taiwan. Before we settled things, Rosie got home from work. While Teresa and Rosie caught up; Matt and I took a pleasant walk to get me an Easy Pass card at 7-11 (Teresa already found one she liked in the morning. They come in many different designs you get to choose, and you load the card with money to use on pretty much all public transit, and can even use them to buy goods!) Taoyuan doesn’t have very many sidewalks, so a lot of walking is in the shoulders, or hugging the edges of the road. Thankfully, drivers here aren’t nearly as scary as in mainland China, but we still have to be careful, and there was one point we took a detour on a winding side-road that passed by several houses, a military base, and was lined with a lot of greenery. Once we got back, Matt and I started another game of Dominion, which we paused when it was time to catch the bus to make our dinner reservations.
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| Taking the bus, something which would become a frequent feature of our trip |
We all walked uphill a couple blocks to the bus stop; where we had apparently just missed a bus and had to wait at least ten minutes for the next one, which was a few minutes later than it was supposed to be. I got to make the first use of my Easy Card, tapping it on entry, and again when we arrived. We entered a vast department store (in Taiwan it is more like a vertical mall filled with different stores and restaurants) and took the escalators up and up, eventually checking out a store that had many gacha toy capsule machines, where we killed some time before our reservation, and got a couple souvenirs. (The machines give you a random capsule toy based on a shared theme).
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| Coronavirus warning at the restaurant. They took our temperature and gave us hand-sanitizer before we entered |
When it was time, we proceeded up to the top floor--the 11th--to the Eatogether Buffet where we had a 7:30 reservation. And let me tell you, this buffet puts Las Vegas buffets to shame, for a fraction of the price. Not only was there a massive selection, but everything I tried was so well prepared, flavorful and more delicious than expected. The caramelized sweet potato bites (labeled “sweet potatoes with caramel sauce”) were simply crispy/sugary on the outside, smooth and sweet on the inside bites of heaven. Everyone agreed that these were a highlight of the buffet, and Teresa and I both ate a bunch of them! Also excellent were the puff-pastry covered cream of corn soup, spare ribs, the chicken stir-fried in Chinese spices, the barbecued pork with honey, and many many more Chinese dishes and even less-Chinese sides like creamed corn and garlic mashed potatoes. A drink of “apple cider vinegar with aloe” tasted a lot like lemonade with refreshing chewy bites of aloe (a bit like getting jellies in bubble tea). But they also had (included) milk tea and other teas, beers and sodas and juices of many varieties. They also had a station where you they made you duck wraps, which were more the Hong Kong style than Peking Duck, but Matt really enjoyed them, and tons of seafood and sushi, which I bypassed. And then there were so many desserts - including a full pastry case and Haagen Daz ice cream, but my favorite was the green-tea shaved ice with red bean and jellies on top. Scratch that, after dessert I went back for my real favorite, more of the sweet potatoes with caramel sauce. We are going to have to find a recipe for that somehow!
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| One quadrant of the buffet |
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| Puff-pastry cream of corn soup |
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| Teresa and Rosie enjoying themselves |
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| Rosie and Matt and food! |
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| Matt and more food |
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| Getting duck |
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| The pastry case |
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| My favorite - the sweet potatoes with caramel sauce |
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| Don't come between Teresa and her desserts! |
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| Getting my just desserts! |
When we wrapped up and paid the bill (which translated to about $25 USD a person; not bad for all-you-can-eat food of this quality!), we needed to walk off some of the calories, so we checked out some other department stores in the surrounding blocks. I particularly enjoyed a videogame shop that had tons of interesting finds that you don’t see in America; I picked up a few Amiibos that are hard to find, and we got a cute miniature Zelda: Breath of the Wild box (which can actually hold the game cart)! They already have Persona 5: The Royal on sale. (Which doesn't come out in America until April 1st!)
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| Heading back down from the 11th level where the buffet was |
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| Videogames! |
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| Persona 5 Royal on one side, Animal Crossing on the other. It's like foreshadowing of our back-home quarantine! |
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| These are only some of the Amiibos they had for sale |
Finally we grabbed a cab back to Matt and Rosie’s place. Matt and I wrapped up our game, and before crashing for the night we settled our plans for the rest of the two weeks we have left. We opted to keep this particular trip on the relaxing side, and also to ensure we still have plenty of time for nearby Taipei and other day trips to surrounding areas in the north of Taiwan, so we found a nice hotel (the Resort One) in Jiaoxi to spend Sunday through Tuesday in. Each couple got rooms there, and, plans now finalized, everyone crashed. Tomorrow, Rosie finally starts her time off, and we will all head in to Taipei at last for our first real day of touring!
Day 3: Friday, March 13
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| Waiting for the bus to Taipei |
We slept far better on the new mattress pad, although still waking up at random times in the night, and getting less sleep than usual due to jetlag. Once we were all up, showered and ready to go, the four of us hiked a few blocks to the bus station to finally head up to Taipei! It was a fairly wet day, although rarely raining very hard when we were out and about. The bus was very comfortable (like a tour bus), but oddly denied my easy pass due to an “incomplete fare” - somehow I hadn’t properly tapped out the other day; but thankfully we had the cash. (The bus is only $69, or about $2.30 USD). It was a relaxing ride about 40 minutes up to Taipei. Since talking isn’t socially acceptable on the buses here, we all brought headphones, and I got to finally check out the just-released Steven Wilson single Personal Shopper from his upcoming The Future Bites album.
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| On the bus |
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| Matt and Rosie on the bus |
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| At the Taipei Train Station. Normally there would be large crowds just relaxing in this square, but during the Pandemic it isn't allowed |
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| A random robot on display |
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| Everywhere we went there were people sanitizing surfaces. They take preventing Coronavirus seriously! |
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| Teresa found a cute soda machine |
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| Posing at the train station |
Once we arrived, Teresa and I booked our High Speed Rail tickets for our upcoming ryokan stay, and then we checked out many of the restaurants at the train station to choose where to grab lunch, they all looked really good! We ended up finding an absolutely amazing place when they offered us a discount to stop standing around outside looking at the menu, and come inside. We ordered several dishes (dim sum style) to share amongst ourselves. We got xiao long bao (Chinese soup dumplings), dan dan noodles (a kind of spicy peanut sauce over hand-pulled noodles), braised beef with thick hand cut noodles, beef scallion wraps, potstickers, crispy breaded pork cutlet over fried rice, pumpkin and mushroom soup, and we each ordered a special drink - Teresa and I got homemade peach and lychee sodas, respectively - which had huge chunks of real fruit in them. This was a veritable king’s feast, and absolutely everything was delicious beyond compare! My favorites were the beef scallion wraps, which had a kind of hoisin sauce and were fried; but the XLB (with fresh shaved ginger to blend with a mix of soy sauce and rice vinegar for a dip) was also amazing, as were the dan dan noodles (which were so long that Matt and I had a lot of trouble getting them out of the bowl! I joked that we would have to eat them Lady & the Tramp style, and Matt seemed willing to give it a shot!) And, ok, well, basically everything but the soup was my favorite, but that was for Teresa since we had gotten several spicy dishes! By the end of this feast of absolutely amazing food and drinks, when we settled the bill--including the 15% discount they had lured us in with--we discovered that we had each just paid the equivalent of $13 USD - barely more than fast food back home! I must say, I’m most impressed by Taiwan as an underrated foodie destination. Everything we’ve eaten here so far has been incredible, and remarkably affordable. Matt says in Taiwan their food culture is strong, so restaurants have to compete on quality, and there are tons of first-rate restaurants everywhere.
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| The restaurant where we had our amazing feast! |
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| All together before the feast |
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| Choose your style of hand-pulled noodles |
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| Several inspirational fixed price courses; we opted to roll our own though! |
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| Putting in our order |
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| Helping myself to some Xiao Long Bao |
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| Rosie and Teresa enjoying their Peach Soda |
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| My Lychee Soda (and Matt's beer) |
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| Braised Beef Noodle Soup, Pork Fried Rice, Dan Dan Noodles and Beef Scallion Rolls |
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| All together with a finished feast! |
We took the Taipei metro to the Taipei 101 tower, but we opted to wait on going up the Taipei 101 (once the tallest skyscraper in the world), as it was fairly foggy, and the views would mainly be of clouds. We did get some great photos from the bottom of the tower where you can’t even see the top, since it is cloaked behind mist! Instead we walked through the massive shopping mall inside; it seems that in Taiwan shopping malls are still thriving, and are really huge and really beautiful. We grabbed bubble teas at the Kung Fu Tea (which is our favorite back home). We each got couples pictures outside by the famous LOVE sign. Then we walked to yet another mall that had a Studio Ghibli store, and got some souvenirs. Needing a break from being on our feet (especially Teresa, who is still recovering from her work-place injury to her hip), we grabbed ANOTHER bubble tea from Tiger Sugar, which is Rosie’s favorite, and sat at the tables outside. This bubble tea completely blew away Kung Fu Tea, sorry to say! Their boba have a delicious brown-sugar/caramelly flavor to them, where Kung Fu Tea’s are more honey flavored.
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| Teresa found a Krispy Kreme in the Metro station |
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| Tokyo Metro |
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| Taipei Metro |
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| Taipei Metro, they are scanning everyone's temperature as they enter |
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| Waiting for the train |
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| Photographing the Taipei 101 |
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| At the base of the Taipei 101 |
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| The top of the tower is above the clouds! |
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| Rosie and Matt |
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| We found my market! |
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| Enjoying our Kung Fu Bubble Tea |
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| Outside the Taipei 101 |
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| Another view from the front of the Taipei 101 (it will be featured in a lot of photos) |
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| Heading down to the Studio Ghibli Store |
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| Riding the catbus |
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| Waiting for the bus |
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| Getting money from No-Face |
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| Tiger Sugar Bubble Tea! |
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| Dramatic view of the Taipei 101 |
From this point, we opted to split up and check out shopping. Matt and I went off in search of a videogame store, and Teresa and Rosie hung back and checked out other shops on their own (I know they found a Lego store, which had a massive Bubble Tea Lego that was bigger than Teresa!) Unfortunately, after a long walk, the store that Matt found on Google maps didn’t appear - there was a bank where it was supposed to be! Instead, we boarded a bus - standing room only - and headed to a massive electronics bazaar. There were multiple floors of little shops selling a variety of goods, including a few videogame stores. It was fun to explore! I found a camera shop where I was finally able to buy a replacement for my missing rubber eye-piece of my DSLR, and we found a shop that had decent prices on the Japanese “raffles”, where you buy tickets for random prizes based on a theme (you always win something, but the better items are rarer, and they show you how many are left of each prize, so you know the odds). Since they had one for the Final Fantasy VII Remake, and I liked the looks of every single prize, I decided to buy a couple tickets to it… and later came back and bought a couple more! What can I say, Final Fantasy VII is one of my favorite games of all time, and these make up for missing out on the FF7 Remake themed Tokyo Skytree (which is closed now anyway). I won a couple towels, a Cloud figure in the original PS1 blocky style, and a shot glass with the FF7 logo. Matt also entered a few raffles for some animes.
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| An interesting looking building |
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| Taipei Street |
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| Taipei Street, from a walking bridge |
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| There are ornate temples dotted around the otherwise modern cities |
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| The small temple |
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| Detail on the temple |
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| Motorcycles and Mopeds are the most popular form of transit in Taiwan, and you find them everywhere! (We even saw whole families riding on one, and someone riding with two dogs!) |
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| Taipei 101 reaching into the clouds |
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| Beautiful view on the outside, but we're glad we didn't opt to go up the Taipei 101 today! |
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| At one of the videogame vendors at the electronics bazaar |
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| Matt at the electronics bazaar |
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| Outside the bazaar |
I should mention that everywhere we went, they had infrared at the entrances to check for anyone with a fever, and at the restaurants they specifically would take your temperature before you could enter, and give you a squirt of hand sanitizer. There were frequently workers sanitizing surfaces like handrails and such, and most of the Taiwanese people were wearing face masks. I can’t imagine America is taking the Coronavirus this seriously! We have been hearing just crazy news from back home - now they’ve banned all large gatherings, schools are closed, sporting events are cancelled, telework is being expanded, the Smithsonian is closed, Disney World even closed! But still many people can’t get tested, they can’t pass a bill to give people sick leave (but they CAN throw away trillions to try to salvage the cratering stock market), and the president can’t even speak anything true or scientific about this very serious pandemic. We feel so much safer here - in fact, we would love to stay longer, since things seem too crazy back home to deal with! We were also taking our own precautions, taking a break to wash our hands whenever possible, using hand-sanitizer when not, and avoiding touching common surfaces. Everyone around here seems to be very conscientious of keeping safe, and currently Taiwan is one of the best countries in the world in preparedness and containment of the Coronavirus.
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| Taking the elevator to our fancy dinner |
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| Our first Peking Duck restaurant! |
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| This is a very swanky restaurant |
When it was time to meet up again for our dinner reservations at a fancy Peking Duck restaurant, Matt and I grabbed the metro to meet back up with Teresa and Rosie. This restaurant was on the 31st floor of a Marriott, and was absolutely beautiful - we all felt under-dressed in jeans and t-shirts - and the food was again divine. The full duck was carved table-side, and they prepared the pancakes for us, as well as giving us platters of tender meat and perfect crispy skin and a plate of sauces and seasonings to dip them in (the crispy skin is wonderful in sugar!) They even asked which fillings we didn’t like, and made them special for you if you had a request (I didn’t want celery in mine). We also had Jasmine Tea, a pumpkin puff dessert, egg custard pastries, and Teresa got a fruit plate (she didn’t think she would eat much duck, but ended up loving it and eating as much as any of us!) Unfortunately, this is where Teresa learned that she has a bad food allergy to dragon-fruit! Thankfully, this was the end of the meal, so we paid the check (again, roughly $25 USD per person for a verrry fancy meal), and then went in search of a drug-store. With everything in Chinese, luckily Matt had a friend he could call who was able to translate for us, and found out they didn’t have what we needed, but they referred us to a pharmacy that did a few blocks away. We grabbed Teresa allergy medicine to help her, and then took the metro back to our bus stop. By the time we got back, it was very late (midnight), and we were all very exhausted.
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| Teresa and Rosie enjoying the appetizer |
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| Presenting us with the different dips |
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| Carving and preparing our duck at the table-side |
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| Perfect little pancakes |
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| Teresa receives her first pancakes |
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| Ready to embark on our meal |
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| The centerpiece |
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| Another plate of pancakes! (I got mine without celery, so they made them special) |
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| The whole group |
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| Teresa was pleased to receive her fruit platter; and less pleased to discover a new allergy |
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| Pumpkin Puffs |
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| Waiting for the bus back home at the end of the night |
Day 4: Saturday March 14
Despite once again attempting to sleep in, and how exhausted I was last night, I again woke up every couple hours in the night, and finally couldn’t fall back asleep around 7AM, so checked things out on my phone while killing some time waiting for the others to be up. This is another day to go into Taipei, although it’s still fairly cloudy and wet, unfortunately. With how exhausting the last day was, we’re very much looking forward to heading to Jiaoxi tomorrow for a relaxing hot springs town to relax and recuperate! Matt was kind enough to take care of our laundry for us, and take it to a nearby drier (they have a washer and clothesline only, on their balcony.) He also got everyone bacon and egg sandwiches! We decided to let Teresa sleep in, since she needed her rest, and played another game of Dominion. After four games, Matt and I are completely tied. Finally, as the clock ticked past noon, we decided it was time to get going, so I woke Teresa and we all got ready and headed out to catch the bus. (Matt and I stopped at 7-11 on the way to use the ATM to get extra cash).
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| Diarama at the Metro station |
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| Figuring out where we are going |
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| At the Metro station |
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| On the platform as the train arrives |
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| An underground mall at a Metro station |
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| Penguin on the bench |
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| Examining the gacha machines |
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| Interesting art on the walk |
To give Teresa a nice treat after her allergy scare yesterday, we headed to the Rilakkuma Cafe. This is a cute themed restaurant where all the food is styled around cute bear (and chick) characters from Japan. We all got drinks, and everyone else got desserts - but I got cheesy-fried-pork-cutlet with curry and rice, since this is another recommended Taiwan favorite. It was cutely presented (with the rice shaped into a bear), and was tasty enough, but didn’t blow me away. The latte art on our drinks was incredible (I got a matcha au laite), and Teresa was very happy with her cheesecake!
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| Entering the Rilakkuma Cafe |
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| Teresa and Rilakkuma |
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| Getting our temperatures taken to be allowed inside |
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| A page from the menu of cute food options |
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| Teresa posing in the cafe |
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| Both of us |
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| Rosie |
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| Decorative detail at the Rilakkuma Cafe |
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| The dessert case |
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| Decorative detail on the wall |
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| A dessert at the cafe |
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| Teresa's dessert, my cheesy pork cutlet |
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| Matt and Rosie share their dessert |
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| How do you eat a cute bear-shaped rice-ball? |
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| Just go in for the head |
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| Teresa's cheesecake |
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| Latte art! |
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| Detail on the latte art |
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| Detail on the latte art |
Once we wrapped up, Matt found a ramen place, and they were still hungry, since him and Rosie had shared a dessert, so we headed there and I ended up getting a second lunch to try it! They were able to bring over one of the staff who understood some English to help explain the menu to us, as we had been using Google translate to try to scan and understand what our options were. The food was absolutely delicious - a very different style of ramen then I am used to, with a soup that was so thick and flavorful, it was almost more of a sauce than a broth: all the toppings would float above it from how thick it was! Rosie and I got the soy sauce flavored soup; Matt opted for “salty”, and Teresa got cold noodles with a soup to dip them in. Portions were generous, and since I was already a full meal in, I couldn’t finish mine, but it was well worth trying!
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| Outside the ramen restaurant |
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| Getting seated in the small dining room |
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| Teresa and Rosie |
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| They had a cute guestbook where we found these drawings! |
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| About to embark on my second lunch of the day! |
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| Teresa's cold noodles and soup |
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| The whole group |
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| The ramen kitchen, with our English-speaking friend |
From here, we took the metro to the Sun Yat Sen Memorial park and museum. We walked through the pretty park, and entered the free museum, which included an exhibit on Sun Yat Sen (much nationalist propaganda was featured), and also art and calligraphy exhibits.
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| Adorable cats in pods |
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| Walking through Taipei, passing the mopeds |
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| Taipei intersection |
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| Taipei grafitti and a parking ramp |
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| Object at rest; objects in motion |
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| Repair shop |
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| Streetlamp |
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| Crossing |
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| In the park |
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| Together in the park |
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| In your eyes |
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| Taipei 101 from the park |
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| Statue |
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| Watch out for... trees I guess? |
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| The Taipei 101 peeks through the canopy |
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| Walking along the park |
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| Wildlife |
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| People playing outside the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Museum |
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| The flags of Taiwan |
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| Another view of Taipei from the museum |
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| Teresa and Jason |
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| Matt and Rosie |
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| Matt and Rosie being cute together |
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| Inside the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Museum |
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| Sun Yat-Sen |
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| Checking out the exhibit |
By this point we had done a lot of walking, so Matt suggested going to the “Continue?” Game Bar to get drinks and sit. I’m not much for bars, but I agreed since it had a cool theme, and was across the street from the electronics bazaar that we hadn’t finished browsing the other day, and we could let Teresa and Rosie sit and rest. There was a minimum buy there of $350 a person (about $12 USD), so we all ordered drinks, which were themed after various videogames, and checked out the bar - it was decorated in gaming paraphernalia, and there were many consoles available to play on. Rosie and I headed upstairs to play a bit of Rock Band, although only got through one song before we decided we should check if our drinks were out, and sadly didn’t get back to it. (Teresa couldn’t handle the stairs anyway). All the drinks were very attractive, although they took a long time to come out, one-at-a-time.
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| Leaving the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall |
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| Do Not Climb |
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| Utility boxes are all beautifully painted |
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| Fancy architecture |
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| Moped riders at sunset |
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| Crosswalk at sunset |
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| Bridge at sunset |
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| Streetlights |
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| More utility box art |
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| The menu, with creative videogame themed cocktails, at Continue? |
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| We choose YES |
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| Console Decorations at Continue? |
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| Controller decorations at Continue? |
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| Questionable wall art at Continue? with signatures |
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| Teresa's Cocktail |
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| My cocktail |
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| Matt's cocktail |
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| Our table |
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| Rosie's Cocktail |
Unfortunately, when I leaned over to show Rosie the picture I took of her with her Pikachu drink, I elbowed mine and tipped it off the table, smashing the glass and spilling all over my clean pants! I had to also pay for the broken glass, which was a surprise, but fair, as it was only $100 (which sounds scary until you figure out it’s about $3.33 USD), and since they don’t tip in Taiwan it wasn’t really too bad. But by this point, I was just not feeling it. I was tired, now soaked, the bar was small and the seats were uncomfortable (the tables looked neat, but had nowhere for your legs to go), and the main game I really wanted to try (the Taiko drum one that’s popular in Asia) was out-of-order. All the other games I can just play at home anyway! So Matt and I decided to go ahead and return to the electronic bazaar. There were another 3 stories (total of 6!) that we hadn’t explored the other day, but unfortunately, most of the stores had started closing at 8, so we had to rush through to see what we could. I did find an amiibo and a Pokeball Plus controller that I wanted for a decent price at one of the videogame sellers. I opted to wait on entering the FF7 raffle again, since there weren’t many of the good prizes left, and hopefully I would find it elsewhere. We returned, settled up, and all headed out to go to one of Taiwan’s famous night markets.
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| Cute mascots on the metro "Love Train" |
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| Riding the love train |
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| Mascot window art detail |
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| Outside the night market, with a large temple in the background |
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| Detail on Temple Wall |
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| Temple gargoyle |
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| More temple detail |
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| The entrance to the Raohe St. Night Market |
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| Outside the Raohe St. night market |
I still wasn’t hungry, but the Raohe St. night market turned out to be perfect for that, because you could try many things that were all very small, and just get what you want. The night markets in Taipei open when it gets dark, and are open until midnight. This was basically a very long street filled with street food, vendors selling all kinds of goods for great prices (including knock-offs, but also hand-made items), shops also selling everything, and claw machines and gacha capsule toy mini “arcades”. Teresa decided she wanted to try some claw machines, so went into every arcade to find ones that had items she wanted and that looked achievable - although most were very unfair, she eventually did win a prize. I also got a capsule toy (a cat figure on a cat tree). As for the food, it was again excellent - the best was a special beef bun that was cooked in charcoal ovens, but we also had amazing candied strawberries, bubble tea, a caramel matcha waffle, some kind of sweet custardy puffs, hand-made peanut mochi (not my favorite flavor), and others. Matt had me try a spicy chicken skewer he had gotten, and it was really fatty and chewy and then also tough and cartilege-y … and only after I had been chewing it, and really not enjoying it at all, did he inform me that these were chicken buttholes. Thanks, Matt. Hey, I tried something new, and legitimately didn’t like it before even knowing what part of the animal it came from. He loved them for some reason. We did a little shopping, and got a few things for good prices. We barely made it halfway through the market by the time they started closing up, and as it was after midnight, we had to grab an Uber back to Matt and Rosie’s place for another very late night.
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| Teresa examines the claw machines |
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| Famous beef buns |
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| The brick oven where they cook the famous buns |
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| Teresa plays a claw machine |
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| One of the many food stands |
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| More bubble tea, with appropriate shirt! |
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| Street food stalls |
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| Examining the goods |
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| The BEST candied strawberries on a skewer |
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| Rosie, Matt and Teresa getting waffles |
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| This claw machine has face-masks |
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| Teresa won a prize from this machine! |
