Lots to be Proud of

I said goodbye to the world of cyber connectivity, to my apartment for the past year, and to Korea and jumped on a plane bound for Taipei, Taiwan last last Tuesday. This trip was most specifically and practically for a visa run so that I could stay in Korea for another 90 days--but it turned into so much more!

I will try to post this trip and it's updates in a few, smaller posts as opposed to one GIANT posting full or blah blah blah and tons of photos. But I can now see the problem with traveling without connection to the rest of civilization--I now have to play catch up, but do so in a some how non-overwhelming way. So here goes: Days 1 and 2 of Taiwan.

I have to start by saying that I'm incredibly proud of myself for so many reasons about this trip--First of all, I was packed HOURS before we left! In fact, I had my backpack almost completely packed days prior to departure, it was only the last few things and toiletries that were thrown in before leaving the apartment Tuesday morning. This is a big accomplishment for me! Usually I am still throwing things in the bag as I am being forced out the door. AND, usually I extremely over pack. This time, I was gone for 6 days and only took my school-sized backpack and my messenger bag as a carry-on/for daytime carrying of cameras and maps and water and the like. This is so HUGE for me! I'm getting better. See, old dogs and new tricks and all that, and I'm living proof that it IS possible!

The next feat of amazement was that we arrived early for the bus to the airport. EARLY I tell you! And when I say early, I mean like 20 minutes early. Therefore, we ended up being early to the airport for our flight. Suffice it to say that this trend of earliness ran through the ENTIRE trip. It truly is amazing. It IS possible for me to be on time. Never would have imagined it to be so.

But, now onto the trip itself!

Creepy pink bunny welcoming us to Taiwan

We arrived in Taiwan expecting to run into a lot of difficulty as most everything we read/heard was that English was not prominent throughout the country and our Chinese skills are, well, at a zero. But boy were we surprised! Not to be too over zealous, as we did run into many people who's English level was quite low to nonexistent, but everyone at least tried to communicate with us or to get someone who could speak some English to help us. And they were all so kind with our attempts to communicate with them in Chinese!

The first things we noticed were 1) how green the country is. There is a lot more grass and vibrant green trees and plants than our surroundings of late here in Korea. And 2) that they use and have English letters and words EVERYWHERE. Even on their license plates!

It is quite easy to maneuver around the city of Taipei as there are lots of maps (with English translation below the Chinese) and all the street names are printed in both Chinese and English, as well as most all of the business names. So after fairly easily finding our hotel, we took a little bit of a nap and then headed out for some sight seeing of Taipei 101 (the second tallest building in the world now that the Burj Khalifa has opened in Dubai).

 Then it was onto the night markets for some strange new foods like durian, pig knuckle, and snake!

Goose heads

BBQ'd snake

Durian is the yellow, spiky fruit to the left

assorted pig parts, including tail and knuckle

We also tried snake soup and Steve drank snake blood and snake urine (shots), which I was not interested in sampling.

After eating breakfast at our hotel, we packed up and headed south on a train--also very easy to use because it is all translated into English as well. We took the five and a half hour trip to the second largest city called Kaohsiung (pronounced cow-shung). It was very similar to Taipei in both energy and easy of navigation. It took us a few hours of walking around, but we finally found ourselves a hotel right at the edge of the largest night market there, and then found us some dinner--some of the best hamburgers I have had in over a year. It was beautiful! 

We then made our way into the night market for some more strange and new foods. This time we had chicken heart, Steve ate chicken butt (not delicious he reported back), and we had pig brain soup. We also ate a delicious milk/shaved ice and fresh fruit dessert that was so good, we got another one before we left the following day! 

there are at least two pig brains in that bowl

So that's it for days one and two in Taiwan. The biggest achievements thus far are my packing skills overall, my timeliness, and my ability to suppress my gag-reflex. That's a lot to be proud of!