Dinner and Night Markets

Tonight we were taken out to dinner by some of John's works connections here in Taiwan, it was a really fabulous meal, we were seated in a small private dinning room and our hosts choose all the food.  Which can be a little worrying but at the same time I believe that when you are the guest in another's country its the tradition to allow the host to choose.

Everything was delicious, we had Pork thigh, we had chicken, vegetables (which I love in China they are always fresh and always always full of flavour), there was bamboo, Tofu soup, Taiwanese pizza and dessert of watermelon and date pizza.  All fabulous!!

We then headed for the night markets, and that was where we finally really got to see some of the traditional Taiwan, there were stalls selling all kinds of weird and wonderful foods, that smelt either fabulous or I am not kidding like actual shit.  There were iphone covers, dog outfits, clothes, watches, fans, chopsticks, you name it they had it.

Dogs - now lets talk about dogs, as with most 'westerners' that they eat dog, everyone in the market had dogs, and they clearly love their dogs.  They had fans on their dogs to ensure they kept cool, they were all well groomed, all either held or were being played with.  So I am thinking perhaps we think they eat dog and perhaps they actually don't its probably just one of those urban myths.

Having said that, have not seen a Cat here, well until tonight when at the market we saw a couple of kittens in cages for sale, I asked one of our hosts tell me they are pets and he just looked at me, I took it that he didn't understand, as they were very cute kittens and reminded me of my two beautiful boys at home whom I miss so very much.

We brought a coke each tonight, as it was hot, like stinking hot and sticky, the coke was in a glass coke bottle, you know the ones that cost you like $4 in Australia per bottle here they are about 65c each.  Go figure.

At the end of the market is a temple and we went in and had a look around it was very beautiful.  The funniest thing was when we came out there were people scratching scratchies and both Leanne and I laughed at this until John pointed out one of the traditions in the temple is to ask for things and they had probably asked for wealth, which in a country like this I understand. 

I adored these markets and had a wonderful evening.  Tomorrow we head back to Shanghai so the facebook firewall hits and this will be my way of communication.

Until I blog again, goodnight and peace and happiness to you all.

My husband

The term punching above your weight is not a term I like or use however it is one I can relate too.  My husband is smart, extremely smart and he is kind and generous and fiery and loses his temper quickly, he is frustrating, he get frustrated, he doesn't suffer fools and stupid people (which is the majority these days unfortunately) annoy him.

But to me he is my world.  I am so very proud of him and his achievements, he works extremely hard, he takes things extremely personally and if he thinks he has hurt someones feelings it affects him deeply, these are the things not many know about my boy, he also loves his family fiercely, unconditionally and puts them about all else.

I love him with all my heart and know how blessed and lucky I am to have him in my life.

Gosh the weather is making me very sappy x

Culture and shit

Today was culture day, Jo and I decided we really should head out and see something other than department store so we headed to the National Temple and Museum.  It was ok, it did have allot of really old pottery and items from the Ming and other dynasties which was very interesting, but seriously four floors and about 100 rooms later we are both over it.  The gardens however were divine and I find I like being outside in this country allot more than inside.  The air smells different, and not always good different but it lets you realise you are no longer in Australia.

Took heaps of photos but again as everything on this PC is in Chinese and I struggled daily to remember how to log onto the blog I am keeping this as simple as possible until I get to Shanghai tomorrow as I know I will then be able to download some photos and show you where I have been.

Its hot today, like stinking hot I would say around 35 and its clear as a bell and humid as hell, thats ok, I just remember how cold it was when we left and I smile and be thankful for the warm heat that hits my skin.

I am also wearing a skirt, this is almost unheard of, seriously unheard of I don't do dresses and skirts but its sooo warm I threw one on and actually like it.  Go figure!

Missing my boy he is off working again, but then again someone has to justify this trip and that someone is him. 

Taipei 101

The building ranked officially as the worlds tallest from 2004 until Dubai took over in 2010.

We finally worked out how to buy tickets and headed up to the fifth floor where you catch the lift, officially the worlds fastest which travels at 1010m per minute, it is ridiculous how quickly you go from level 5 to level 87.  We stepped out on the observation deck and it was breathtaking, Taipei really is a beautiful city, I have many photos and hope to upload a heap tomorrow.

We then climbed the final 4 floors using the stairs and walked out onto the outside viewing deck, that kinda took my breath away how high up you are and how far you can see.  There is no smog in Taipei, well that has not been any so far, and it really is beautiful.  You see fabulous green mountains and then beautifully designed buildings and lovely traditionally set out gardens as far as the eye can see.

We then travelled down the elevator which actually made me feel sick it went so fast and headed into the food court to have lunch.  Two options, noodles or McDonald's, I opted for noodles, I am not coming to China and eating McDonald's, blahhhhh.  The food was yummy as ever, spicy and full of flavour and vegetables I didn't recognise but didn't care as they just all tasted great.

So far I have not really noticed that the price of everything is cheap, for e.g. I adore Macarons and they had them here for $4.50 Australian each......holy fuck, they stayed there.  Cupcakes however were 70c each and divine.

More tomorrow its late and I am off to a temple, museum, gardens, dinner and night markets tomorrow so there will be lots to talk about.

Brooke xoxox

Shop until you dropppppppp

Jo and I met for breakfast at 9.30 and the breakfasts are amazing, it is a mix of the usual you would find at all hotels across Australia as well as traditional Chinese breakfasts, which include smoked salmon salad, noodles and chicken and soup.  I had a smoked salmon salad and it was wonderful, its really lovely to have such fresh and usual food first thing in the morning.

We then headed out to the huge shopping complex next to the hotel, and the whole bottom floor is just shoes, and I mean every type of shoe you can imagine and then some, I found about 794 that I liked however as I am a size 9 I found 2 pair that actually fit me.  This as you can imagine almost sent me into a deep depression, however I am informed that Shanghai have women with much larger feet so I am crossing my fingers that I find some pretties there.

I got myself a pair of earrings that cost $2 and I love them!  I got my kids a pair of chop sticks each for $1, as we eat allot of noodles and rice at home and they are always interested in John and I eating with the sticks so now they have their own.

There were many other levels of home wares, clothing, gadgets and such however the shoes had made me quiet sad, its hard to look at so many beautiful shoes and not be able to fit in them, I am still trying to come to terms with this.  I am contemplating trying the traditional Chinese foot bandages to see if I can shrink my feet to fit into their ridiculously small shoes.  And if you think I am kidding you clearly do not know me.

Taipei

Its hot like hottttttt its around 32 when we arrive, its steamy but its such a lovely change from Melbourne which was around 6 when we left.

Our driver thinks he is Jason Statham and does some awesome driving to get us to our hotel, the traffic is again something you have to see to believe, but it works, there is no road rage to say, as people don't make it a sport to keep others out of lanes, they understand that you keep left if you are going slow and the faster you go the further right you are on their huge highways.  And guess what people (yes mainly people of Adelaide who can't drive) their 5 million people get to their destination with huge traffic jams as the traffic flows!  Horns are not to make people feel like idiots, they are there to tell you in case you have not seen them that there is a car in the lane and a quick toot toot is all that is needed. 


Scooters are everywhere, obviously owning a car in this country is a luxury many cannot afford so most drive scooters and they nip in and out of the traffic at high speeds and are parked everywhere, most leave their helmets on the scooters as they head for the place of work for the day as obviously the crime rate is not like Australia where if you don't nail it down some wanker is going to take it.

The hotel is pretty swish and get this the mini bar is free, not there is only beer, soft drinks and chips but its free, then there is a HQ Bar on level 2 that has fully stocked fridges, snacks and Internet mac's for use 24 hours a day all free.  So you can head down there load up on all your necessities and then head back to your room and its all free.  You gotta love free stuff, would never work in Australia, but I am loving it here.

The food is fabulous, so far in my humble opinion its not as good as Beijing but it is still fresh and full of flavour, and so far I have not tried anything too weird but will keep you updated.

26 hours and counting...

So we boarded the plane in Adelaide bound for Melbourne, we stopped for a drink before hand at the only place in Adelaide Airport that sells alcohol and after a second mortgage on our home we had a drink.  Well played Adelaide Airport, way to rip off the people.  We then met up with Robert and Jo, Robert works with John and Jo is his wife and we all boarded our first international leg bound for Hong Kong.  After a movie and some food, John and I tried our best to sleep in what most would know from travelling overseas as a dog box and were woken around 4am local time to eat breakfast and get ready for our arrival into Hong Kong.

Hong Kong although we only saw it from the airport was beautiful, really beautiful a place that is now on my list of cities to see.  We did some looking around, had a coffee and then headed down to our third leg of Hong Kong to Shanghai.  This flight was not as long and soon enough we were descending into Shanghai.

Shanghai airport is huge, I think bigger than Beijing which I find ridiculous as that is the largest airport I have ever been in, however the bit that kind of hits you in the face is when you turn a corner and there are two men looking at you and each has a rather large machine gun, that is intimidating.

Now we were suppose to transfer internationally for our leg to Taipei however China don't do things the way the rest of the world do things, so instead of doing the usual transfer lounge and boarding gate, we had to go through Customs, Immigration, security checks and then walk about 1km to the other terminal to catch our 4th leg flight, in a nut shell we missed the flight.  Great!

Firstly the Customs people dragged me off to a holding area and I couldn't catch John's eye to say um think perhaps I am about to have a finger inserted in places no finger should go, only to then realise that Robert, Jo and John were all joining me.  Robert explained as nicely as a fiery Italian can that we are late and trying very hard to get to our final flight, the Police man, he didn't really care, he took his time, checked all passports and boarding tickets about three times, finally wandered over and got a stamp and let us go on our way.

Then we ran like ran, 1km to try to terminal 1 from terminal 2, without the knowledge that we could have gotten a shuttle bus.  Not that it would have helped we were never making that flight as soon as we realised China treats their transfers differently to any other country in the world.

So four very tired, smelly, slightly less than impressed Australia's trudged through the airport trying to find some kind of a coffee shop to rest.

However firstly we had to go the 1km back to Terminal 1 to get our backs that had been dumped off the plane since we missed our flight.  Jo and John they are the glass is half empties on our trip, Robert and I we are the glass is half full.  So Robert and I were sure our bags would be there, Jo and John not so much.  Glass half full won out, thank god. 

So then it was another trip back on the shuttle with bags in tow and we checked in for our flight.  Finally we were called for boarding and our final leg was under way.

We arrived into Taipei around 6pm hence the 26 hours of flights and airports this post references.  We were collected by our driver and promptly taken to our hotel. 

I believe every single time I went through customs I was patted down, I had to show my passport about 20 times, I had to talk to about 5 customs and 5 immigration officers and I was hot and smelly and tired, but I didn't and still don't really care, I am extremely blessed to be on this trip, and I get to go overseas and spent time in another country with my husband, so all the little issues that happen along the way, really they are just little blips on a screen that is full of fabulous.