| Mention Taiwan at home and people instantly thing of cheap, inferior products. Well, I’m happy to report that this is only half true. The products on sale in Taiwan aren’t cheap anymore. In fact, I found them to be more expensive than a similar product in Japan, a country far from earning a reputation as cheap.
The food in Taipei is good, cheap and recognizable, the last being particularly rare in this part of the world. Taipei is also home to the world’s largest building, containing 101 floors. It is imaginatively named “Taipei 101” and when I was there, only the bottom ten floors were occupied. I guess the brains trust was working overtime on that one.
The largest open area in Taipei is the Chiang Kai Shek memorial hall, occupying the kind of area that only the dead seem able to command.
There is a guard outside the actual crypt. Ostensibly this is to protect the monument from vandalism, but there is a possibility it is to guard against Chiang’s rise from the dead as a flesh eating zombie. The local tourist information centre remains remarkably tight lipped on the subject.
Taipei is of course, famous for its night markets. But for a different market, why not try snake alley. The shops here are divided into two categories; snake shop and sex shop. With its exotic mix of live cobras and 14inch dildos for sale, there’s something for everyone.
A few hours out of Taiwan lies the Wulai waterfall. The waterfall is a spectacular twin cascade of pure sparkling water. Confronted with this pristine beauty, the Taiwan tourist bureau naturally decided to build a tacky theme park on the top of it….
and to populate it with a drum band from Nairobi. |
