Taipei 101
Stepped out in the late morning yesterday, Fri, 12/21/07, with Twin#1 to visit Taipei 101, with it's 101 floors it is currently the world's Tallest occupied building.
We amiably walked down to one of the main streets and picked up the 216 Bus (for 15 Taiwanese dollars, approx. 50 cents) to the 101 Business district. Unless it is unusually hazy or smoggy in the morning, I can usually see the top of the building from the Twin's apartment. To see the massive structure up close is extremely impressive.
It has a large 5 story fancy mall attached next to the office building wherein are found Parisian designers, Dior, Prada and high end retailers like Bose and Tiffany and Co. Not surprisingly it is very quiet inside the mall since it caters much more to the Saks Fifth Avenue Crowd than the Sears crowd.
We grabbed lunch in the food court which was massive and slightly overwhelming with its myriad of Singaporean, Japanese, Taiwanese, Thai, Hakka and Chinese cuisine food choices. I ended up having a simple fried rice with pineapple and shrimp, while Twin#1 had a warm ramen soup from one of the Japanese eateries. They also had a French bakery/deli, an ice cream parlor from Switzerland, Subway and KFC. The KFC here serves one of my favorite Chinese desserts, a small egg custard tarte called "Dahn Tah" so I sampled one. I think they make the pastry shell with extra butter...it was deliciously good. =)
After milling about the mall for a couple of hours, picking up some postcards and taking several pictures of the big ginormous building adjacent, we caught the 216 back to the apartment where I settled in for the strenuous work of reading, browsing the internet, watching a movie and napping. ;)
We met up with Twin#2 at Mos Burger for dinner. Mos Burger is Japanese food chain that serves Burgers and fries. They have the added innovation of offering a "burger" that comes in a bun made out of rice. The twins tell me their Veggie Rice bun Burger is extremely tasty. I of course had to try out what their version of a Burger and fries tastes like. The fries are Potato Wedges which I suspect are made of "pressed potatoes" and remind me the most of the fries served by KFC. The Burger had a bun and a beef paddy and a sauce...and although quite tasty doesn't really taste like a "Burger" (and I'm not comparing it to McDonald's burgers which are their own thing, but any old burger you would get at a greasy spoon in the U.S. I'm not sure what makes the taste difference, but out of sheer curiosity I have sampled "Burgers" in Cuba, Nicaragua and Mexico and have found that although the ingredients appear the same: Bun, ground beef patty, lettuce, etc. The taste is always its own unique.
We completed the evening by picking up a bag full of chocolate cookies at a local bakery and heading home for the night.
-Del
P.S. Even though we are in sunny, warm tropical Taipei, there are Christmas trees and ornaments on many of the public spaces and certainly at the commercial sites, especially the mall. Lest you forget to buy, buy, buy so you can give, give, give. Even the Mos Burger had Christmas trimmings and wishes you a Merry XMos. *Del rolls her eyes*
We amiably walked down to one of the main streets and picked up the 216 Bus (for 15 Taiwanese dollars, approx. 50 cents) to the 101 Business district. Unless it is unusually hazy or smoggy in the morning, I can usually see the top of the building from the Twin's apartment. To see the massive structure up close is extremely impressive.
It has a large 5 story fancy mall attached next to the office building wherein are found Parisian designers, Dior, Prada and high end retailers like Bose and Tiffany and Co. Not surprisingly it is very quiet inside the mall since it caters much more to the Saks Fifth Avenue Crowd than the Sears crowd.
We grabbed lunch in the food court which was massive and slightly overwhelming with its myriad of Singaporean, Japanese, Taiwanese, Thai, Hakka and Chinese cuisine food choices. I ended up having a simple fried rice with pineapple and shrimp, while Twin#1 had a warm ramen soup from one of the Japanese eateries. They also had a French bakery/deli, an ice cream parlor from Switzerland, Subway and KFC. The KFC here serves one of my favorite Chinese desserts, a small egg custard tarte called "Dahn Tah" so I sampled one. I think they make the pastry shell with extra butter...it was deliciously good. =)
After milling about the mall for a couple of hours, picking up some postcards and taking several pictures of the big ginormous building adjacent, we caught the 216 back to the apartment where I settled in for the strenuous work of reading, browsing the internet, watching a movie and napping. ;)
We met up with Twin#2 at Mos Burger for dinner. Mos Burger is Japanese food chain that serves Burgers and fries. They have the added innovation of offering a "burger" that comes in a bun made out of rice. The twins tell me their Veggie Rice bun Burger is extremely tasty. I of course had to try out what their version of a Burger and fries tastes like. The fries are Potato Wedges which I suspect are made of "pressed potatoes" and remind me the most of the fries served by KFC. The Burger had a bun and a beef paddy and a sauce...and although quite tasty doesn't really taste like a "Burger" (and I'm not comparing it to McDonald's burgers which are their own thing, but any old burger you would get at a greasy spoon in the U.S. I'm not sure what makes the taste difference, but out of sheer curiosity I have sampled "Burgers" in Cuba, Nicaragua and Mexico and have found that although the ingredients appear the same: Bun, ground beef patty, lettuce, etc. The taste is always its own unique.
We completed the evening by picking up a bag full of chocolate cookies at a local bakery and heading home for the night.
-Del
P.S. Even though we are in sunny, warm tropical Taipei, there are Christmas trees and ornaments on many of the public spaces and certainly at the commercial sites, especially the mall. Lest you forget to buy, buy, buy so you can give, give, give. Even the Mos Burger had Christmas trimmings and wishes you a Merry XMos. *Del rolls her eyes*