taiwan 2.0!
sooooo i loved taiwan so much i decided it deserved another whirl! a month after my first whirl!
mostly i wanted an excuse for all the food, i think. and the shopping. and time alone with my sister. (and tynislove i guess...) to be fair, it didn't seem like we'd get that much alone time, since the rest of my family tagged along as well, but my parents were totally lame and pretty much spent all their time in the hotel (WHICH WAS KIND OF AMAZING BECAUSE IT'S, LIKE, THE SAME COMPANY THAT PRODUCES WANG WANG BISCUITS AND THEY HAD THEIR MASCOT ON EVERYTHING LIKE AN ERECTED STATUE IN THE LOBBY AND EMBEDDED ON THEIR TOWELS AND IT WAS HILARIOUS)
(case in point:
i'm still cracking up just looking at it)
anyway! we were running on a really tight schedule, since we had maybe three and a half days to get everything done, which was a day less than we'd had on our last trip. i even made a little (colour coded!) map of the train lines and all the places we were aiming to visit. because that's just how i roll.
um, yes. so we set off the second we got our luggage and hotel room sorted. it was way past lunch time, so we stopped at gao ji, a shanghainese restaurant nearby the hotel. the xiao long bao was pretty delish, but it was the sheng jian bao that really won us over.
we decided to split up from the parental units after that, because they wanted to rest and also they had a dinner appointment that we weren't too keen on joining in on (also, seriously, we had 3 and a half days THERE WAS NO TIME FOR REST). we headed over to wufenpu, which i hadn't managed to hit up on the last trip. it was huge, but we were all so overwhelmed by the size of it that we forgot about pictures. it was pretty pricey though, and not as awesome as i remembered the shopping to be the last time, so after a couple of hours we headed over to raohe, a night market heralded to sell the best food of all the night markets in taiwan.
and holy crap, did they live up to their reputation. their hu jiao bing was ridiculously good; it was drizzling and there was still a line. we picked up so much food along the way, pretty much bought something from every different food stall we passed as we walked from one end of the market to the other: cong you bing, oluak, the hugest cup of milk tea i'd ever seen, fried cuttlefish, a humongous grilled mushroom, fried milk cubes (!??!?!), strawberries dipped in... whatever they were dipped in, taiwanese soba, pork noodles, egg custard - served in the eggshells!!! it was all a ridiculously amazing experience, probably the best eating experience i had in all my time in taiwan.
it was pretty late by the time we headed back to the hotel, but the lovely thing about it is that the markets don't really open till late in the day anyway, so waking up early is kind of a waste of time. we headed to ximending the next day, which is sort of like a little shopping street that's really popular with the younger crowd. we'd already been the last time, but the best lu rou fan place in ALL OF TAIWAN is there, so. yeah. we had to go again.
we stopped for fried chicken (which was eh), and really famous noodles at ah zong mian xian, which was pretty delicious but it didn't rock my world. i wasn't worried, though, because i knew we were headed for my lu rou fan place next. and it didn't disappoint in the slightest. on top of lu rou fan, we had chilled pig's ears, vegetables, goose gizzard, salted goose, and probably a couple other dishes i can't remember. we only remembered to take photos at the end, the food was so good!
we sort of went shopping a little after that, but i wasn't really looking. it was wet and rainy and i just wasn't in the mood. but then i looked in a shop window and they were selling PLAYBOY BOOTS. playboy boots, you guys, i didn't even know those existed before. so i freaked out a little and then went inside and ended up BUYING A PAIR, oh my gosh. i am the worst sort of impulse shopper. it's so ADORABLE though, the details are just too cute, i can't even be sorry i bought it.
so we wandered around a bit, had ourselves a bit of bittergourd juice - which wasn't as good as i remembered it being, alas - and the taiwanese version of prata which was, just, holy crap it was so good. which was great, because that meant we polished off the entire thing because it could get rained on too much. my parents were getting pretty tired by then, which meant (unfortunately) that they left us just as the food tour got even better (which seemed to be a recurring theme on this trip). we made a little trek towards a famous bao place (the name of which escapes me!), and sat down and had two giant baos each. i ordered 20 at first, and the shoplady gave us the hugest what the fuck look i have ever seen on anyone, ever, and suggested we get ten. THANK YOU SHOPLADY. those were some big baos.
we stopped by yu's almond tofu after that for some of their specialty almond tofu, and then headed to this ice cream place nearby with, like, a stupid number of flavours. there were something like eighty different types of ice cream, i kid you not. we weren't allowed to try any, more's the pity, but we settled on ordering a couple of weird flavours and a couple of normal ones.
from right to left (the order we were instructed to eat them in): watermelon, earl grey, lychee, and sesame oil chicken. (yeah, those are actual chicken bits.) IT WAS ACTUALLY REALLY GOOD, although only my sister and i seemed to think so. :/
anyway, we headed to shilin night market after that to meet up with my parents for some dinner (oh my god did we ever stop eating? i think not.) and walked around to shop for a while before stopping for pretty much the same meal we had the last time i was in taiwan. unfortunately, we'd had so much amazing food by then that the food at shilin seemed even less appetizing than it had the first time, which was a bit of a bummer, especially for my parents. i did end the meal on a good note when i bought a fried octopus, though, so that was something.
then my parents went back to the hotel (i honestly don't know what they did the entire trip cooped up in that hotel room), and we stayed out to shop. it was pretty late by then, though, and we didn't have as much time as we wanted to look around. i had to grab everyone and herd them to the train station before we missed our last train.
surprisingly, the girls were awake enough to spend half the night tmi-ing all over each other and sharing sex stories (even with my mother), and we made a little trip out to get a midnight snack (onigiri and a bunch of chips, om nom nom). which is why it was a good thing we didn't have plans till 12.30 the next day; lunch at an upscale japanese restaurant called fresh station. it was my parents' idea, because that's where their friend had taken them the first night, and they'd enjoyed it a lot.
iiiiiiiiiii... didn't. (understatement.) the food was fine, it was just served in such TINY PORTIONS that i literally got hungrier with every dish. they started us off with sashimi, for fuck's sake, and took so long to prepare the two slices of fish that i literally broke down halfway through the meal. i was weeping and laughing and slightly hysterical; it wasn't pretty. i've never threatened a chef with bodily harm (under my breath) so much in my life. just--yeah. i wouldn't go back again. it's very pretty presentation, though! and the complimentary dessert made everything a little bit better -- even though i didn't have any.
anyway, after the meal, we made a quick stop at sogo to grab some stuff for tynislove's parents, and then set off again in search of better food. we stopped at chen san ding for their famous variation of milk tea (THEY PUT GULA MELAKA IN IT AND IT'S SO DELICIOUS OMG, I HATE PEARLS BUT THOSE PEARLS WERE LIKE--HEAVEN). and then took a slow stroll to get some strawberry ice dessert at tai yi milk king. that was a bit of a disappointment, but we didn't let that slow us down. my parents went back to the hotel, and we headed back over to shilin to finish up with the shopping we hadn't managed to do the day before.
as it turned out, there wasn't as much shopping as we thought there would be, and also at that point my throat was killing me, augh. so we decided to head back to the hotel a couple of hours ahead of schedule, and go for mala instead. that, of course, was a hit with everyone, but to be honest, the last day of the trip was a bit of a blur for me, because i spent most of it feeling awful and sick and wishing there was a miracle cure for sorethroats.
and that sorethroat turned into a fever, which turned into a cough and a cold that's lasted for three weeks now. which apparently helped in exacerbating my infected wisdom tooth - which then led to me scheduling surgery to get all four removed mid-february - and culminated in my period coming early. and all this just days before my parents left to visit my brother in new zealand, and my sister left to go back to school in berkeley. so--yeah, this new year has not started out the best.
but here's to pushing forward and looking ahead! and also maybe more nail art, although i'm already losing patience with it a little bit. bonus photo ahoy:
mostly i wanted an excuse for all the food, i think. and the shopping. and time alone with my sister. (and tynislove i guess...) to be fair, it didn't seem like we'd get that much alone time, since the rest of my family tagged along as well, but my parents were totally lame and pretty much spent all their time in the hotel (WHICH WAS KIND OF AMAZING BECAUSE IT'S, LIKE, THE SAME COMPANY THAT PRODUCES WANG WANG BISCUITS AND THEY HAD THEIR MASCOT ON EVERYTHING LIKE AN ERECTED STATUE IN THE LOBBY AND EMBEDDED ON THEIR TOWELS AND IT WAS HILARIOUS)
(case in point:
i'm still cracking up just looking at it)
anyway! we were running on a really tight schedule, since we had maybe three and a half days to get everything done, which was a day less than we'd had on our last trip. i even made a little (colour coded!) map of the train lines and all the places we were aiming to visit. because that's just how i roll.
um, yes. so we set off the second we got our luggage and hotel room sorted. it was way past lunch time, so we stopped at gao ji, a shanghainese restaurant nearby the hotel. the xiao long bao was pretty delish, but it was the sheng jian bao that really won us over.
we decided to split up from the parental units after that, because they wanted to rest and also they had a dinner appointment that we weren't too keen on joining in on (also, seriously, we had 3 and a half days THERE WAS NO TIME FOR REST). we headed over to wufenpu, which i hadn't managed to hit up on the last trip. it was huge, but we were all so overwhelmed by the size of it that we forgot about pictures. it was pretty pricey though, and not as awesome as i remembered the shopping to be the last time, so after a couple of hours we headed over to raohe, a night market heralded to sell the best food of all the night markets in taiwan.
and holy crap, did they live up to their reputation. their hu jiao bing was ridiculously good; it was drizzling and there was still a line. we picked up so much food along the way, pretty much bought something from every different food stall we passed as we walked from one end of the market to the other: cong you bing, oluak, the hugest cup of milk tea i'd ever seen, fried cuttlefish, a humongous grilled mushroom, fried milk cubes (!??!?!), strawberries dipped in... whatever they were dipped in, taiwanese soba, pork noodles, egg custard - served in the eggshells!!! it was all a ridiculously amazing experience, probably the best eating experience i had in all my time in taiwan.
it was pretty late by the time we headed back to the hotel, but the lovely thing about it is that the markets don't really open till late in the day anyway, so waking up early is kind of a waste of time. we headed to ximending the next day, which is sort of like a little shopping street that's really popular with the younger crowd. we'd already been the last time, but the best lu rou fan place in ALL OF TAIWAN is there, so. yeah. we had to go again.
we stopped for fried chicken (which was eh), and really famous noodles at ah zong mian xian, which was pretty delicious but it didn't rock my world. i wasn't worried, though, because i knew we were headed for my lu rou fan place next. and it didn't disappoint in the slightest. on top of lu rou fan, we had chilled pig's ears, vegetables, goose gizzard, salted goose, and probably a couple other dishes i can't remember. we only remembered to take photos at the end, the food was so good!
we sort of went shopping a little after that, but i wasn't really looking. it was wet and rainy and i just wasn't in the mood. but then i looked in a shop window and they were selling PLAYBOY BOOTS. playboy boots, you guys, i didn't even know those existed before. so i freaked out a little and then went inside and ended up BUYING A PAIR, oh my gosh. i am the worst sort of impulse shopper. it's so ADORABLE though, the details are just too cute, i can't even be sorry i bought it.
so we wandered around a bit, had ourselves a bit of bittergourd juice - which wasn't as good as i remembered it being, alas - and the taiwanese version of prata which was, just, holy crap it was so good. which was great, because that meant we polished off the entire thing because it could get rained on too much. my parents were getting pretty tired by then, which meant (unfortunately) that they left us just as the food tour got even better (which seemed to be a recurring theme on this trip). we made a little trek towards a famous bao place (the name of which escapes me!), and sat down and had two giant baos each. i ordered 20 at first, and the shoplady gave us the hugest what the fuck look i have ever seen on anyone, ever, and suggested we get ten. THANK YOU SHOPLADY. those were some big baos.
we stopped by yu's almond tofu after that for some of their specialty almond tofu, and then headed to this ice cream place nearby with, like, a stupid number of flavours. there were something like eighty different types of ice cream, i kid you not. we weren't allowed to try any, more's the pity, but we settled on ordering a couple of weird flavours and a couple of normal ones.
from right to left (the order we were instructed to eat them in): watermelon, earl grey, lychee, and sesame oil chicken. (yeah, those are actual chicken bits.) IT WAS ACTUALLY REALLY GOOD, although only my sister and i seemed to think so. :/
anyway, we headed to shilin night market after that to meet up with my parents for some dinner (oh my god did we ever stop eating? i think not.) and walked around to shop for a while before stopping for pretty much the same meal we had the last time i was in taiwan. unfortunately, we'd had so much amazing food by then that the food at shilin seemed even less appetizing than it had the first time, which was a bit of a bummer, especially for my parents. i did end the meal on a good note when i bought a fried octopus, though, so that was something.
then my parents went back to the hotel (i honestly don't know what they did the entire trip cooped up in that hotel room), and we stayed out to shop. it was pretty late by then, though, and we didn't have as much time as we wanted to look around. i had to grab everyone and herd them to the train station before we missed our last train.
surprisingly, the girls were awake enough to spend half the night tmi-ing all over each other and sharing sex stories (even with my mother), and we made a little trip out to get a midnight snack (onigiri and a bunch of chips, om nom nom). which is why it was a good thing we didn't have plans till 12.30 the next day; lunch at an upscale japanese restaurant called fresh station. it was my parents' idea, because that's where their friend had taken them the first night, and they'd enjoyed it a lot.
iiiiiiiiiii... didn't. (understatement.) the food was fine, it was just served in such TINY PORTIONS that i literally got hungrier with every dish. they started us off with sashimi, for fuck's sake, and took so long to prepare the two slices of fish that i literally broke down halfway through the meal. i was weeping and laughing and slightly hysterical; it wasn't pretty. i've never threatened a chef with bodily harm (under my breath) so much in my life. just--yeah. i wouldn't go back again. it's very pretty presentation, though! and the complimentary dessert made everything a little bit better -- even though i didn't have any.
anyway, after the meal, we made a quick stop at sogo to grab some stuff for tynislove's parents, and then set off again in search of better food. we stopped at chen san ding for their famous variation of milk tea (THEY PUT GULA MELAKA IN IT AND IT'S SO DELICIOUS OMG, I HATE PEARLS BUT THOSE PEARLS WERE LIKE--HEAVEN). and then took a slow stroll to get some strawberry ice dessert at tai yi milk king. that was a bit of a disappointment, but we didn't let that slow us down. my parents went back to the hotel, and we headed back over to shilin to finish up with the shopping we hadn't managed to do the day before.
as it turned out, there wasn't as much shopping as we thought there would be, and also at that point my throat was killing me, augh. so we decided to head back to the hotel a couple of hours ahead of schedule, and go for mala instead. that, of course, was a hit with everyone, but to be honest, the last day of the trip was a bit of a blur for me, because i spent most of it feeling awful and sick and wishing there was a miracle cure for sorethroats.
and that sorethroat turned into a fever, which turned into a cough and a cold that's lasted for three weeks now. which apparently helped in exacerbating my infected wisdom tooth - which then led to me scheduling surgery to get all four removed mid-february - and culminated in my period coming early. and all this just days before my parents left to visit my brother in new zealand, and my sister left to go back to school in berkeley. so--yeah, this new year has not started out the best.
but here's to pushing forward and looking ahead! and also maybe more nail art, although i'm already losing patience with it a little bit. bonus photo ahoy: