Day 2 - Dan Shui & Shilin Night Market

We started Day 2 early, leaving the hotel around 9.30 in the morning. But as we walked around XiMenDing area, none of the shops were open, except... The Rice Noodles stall!

We also noticed that there were no tables and chairs around, and saw how the locals ate:

Happy food hunters:

The noodles were nice, and really soft, but after a few spoonfuls of it, it's pretty much nothing special really.

The different flavourings on offer, the chilli was freaking hot!

After breakfast, we were off to Dan Shui (birthplace of Jay Chou, I might add), the train we took to Dan Shui from XiMenDing was similar to our MRT, though it was visibly older, but still very efficient!

Upon alighting, we took the ferry to the fisherman's wharf, we could even pay for the ferry ride using their Easy card (now we know where Singapore gets the name Ez-link card from -.-).

Upon alighting, we took the ferry to the fisherman's wharf, we could even pay for the ferry ride using their Easy card (now we know where Singapore gets the name Ez-link card from -.-).

Though it was a small town, we spent almost the entire day walking around and soaking up the atmosphere. Perhaps it was the weekend, the whole place was crowded everywhere we went! Only the main street felt tourist-y, most of the town was very tranquil and peaceful to a certain extent. We even found the place where Jay filmed his MV for the song 退後 ;)

Unfortunately, it was cloudy that day and we couldn't see the beautiful sunset that Dan Shui is famous for. It even drizzled at some point.

Dan Shui at night was as lively, if not more lively then it is in the day:

We didn't stick around for dinner though as we wanted to head to Shilin Night Market for dinner, the traveling time back to central Taipei took almost an hour.

We reached Shilin market around 9pm, but there was still huge crowds and the entire place was still very lively.

The first long queue were saw was the Fried Chicken Chops, it was huge, and it cost only S$2. They had a very efficient queue system where one of the stall assistants handed out the paper bag to everyone in queue, so that the moment you reach your turn, all you had to do was tell them how many you want, and pay.

I think we got served within 5 minutes.

We also tired their version of a western meal, this was their steak, which was also huge and I think it cost us less than S$4. By the time we hit our third/fourth stall, we were already bloated, which was a pity because the market is huge and there're still loads of things to eat!

By the time we were done with our food hunting, it was close to 11.30pm and we managed to catch one of the last trains back to our hotel. Eventful(l) day it was.

Day 1 - Off to Taiwan (via Hong Kong)!

Finally gotten around to journalise my travel tales from 4 months ago! And am doing so from campus speaks a lot of just how long I have been procastinating. Oops.

Anyhow, after weeks of (frustrating) planning and preparations for the trip, SY, SJ, TJ & myself were finally underway. We met early in the morning, 6 plus, at Changi Airport's Terminal One to check into our Cathay Pacific Flight CX710Q to Taiwan, en route via Hong Kong.

Checking in was a pretty smooth process. We had sometime to kill after we checked in our lagguage. So we decided to head to the newly opened Terminal 3 to look-look-see-see.

Two excited girls, SY & SJ taking a photo in front of the flight info display at Terminal One while waiting for the SkyTrain to Terminal 3:

We wanted to eat something at some restaruant in Terminal 3 for breakfast, but we couldn't find the damn restaruant and we ended up eating... of all things, MacDonald's (-.-)'''

After breakfast, we hurried back to Terminal 1 as it was approaching our flight take off.

Stitch with the girls before taking off:

Take off was pretty smooth, and approximately an hour into the flight, we were served breakfast (again) for our in-flight meal, I had fried carrot cake:

It's the first time I heard (or seen for that matter) an airline serving fried carrot cake in-flight! The rest choose to stick with (the unexciting) western omelette breakfast meal:

Enjoying breakfast while watching "I Am Legend":

I had forgotten how miserably small the in-flight entertainment screens are...

We arrived at Hong Kong's International Airport for a pitstop around noon. The weather in Hong Kong was really foggy. Us waiting at the Terminal:

We were instructed to leave the airplane while it refuels, I'd rather had stayed on the plane to sleep if given a choice:

Before long, instructions were given for us to board the plane, en route to Taiwan's CKS International Airport. The flight number is now CX564Q, but it's the same plane though.

Half an hour into the flight, we were served (again!!!) lunch. Couldn't remember what it was and I didn't snap a photo of it either. So in the space of 6 hours, we ate 3 times. Once at Changi Airport, once on the flight to HK and now on the flight to TW. Yipes...

We arrived at Taiwan around 3pm in the afternoon. I must say, the CKS airport really pales in comparison to Changi or Hong Kong airports as an International Airport. It is really worn down and small.

The customs clearing took, like, forever! And to make things even more amusing, the uncle that served me tried to strike an conversation IN ENGLISH!! Of all languages! I had a really hard time trying to make up what he was trying to convey, asking where I was from and whether am I here on holiday, etc. I mean, I am not trying to say that my command in English is far superior than he is (he was a nice guy by the way), but I appear obviously as a Chinese, or at the very least, my passport indicated my race as Chinese, so what's wrong with conversing in Mandarin? He took like 5 mins to clear me, which in turn explains the long time the flight took to clear the customs.

View of the small airport from the carpark:

The ride from the airport to the hotel was freaking long. I think it was at least an hour. There was another family traveling with us on the mini-van.

Taipei!

The driver dropped off the other family at their hotel (which was right in the middle of Ximending) before going to our hotel, which is also in Ximending.

Street view from our hotel

By the time we settled down, it was already close to 5PM and the day was pretty much gone. Our first order of business was to head to the night market at Raohe. For that, we took the Metro. The Metro system in Taipei is pretty amazing, it takes you to almost everywhere, and Taipei is a pretty huge place. There are 4-5 different operators running different lines.

Ximen Metro Station

Raohe Night Market!

There's pretty much nothing to do there except to eat, eat and eat!

And that's exactly what we did. The first thing we saw upon entering the night market was this freaking long queue at one stall located near the entrance. There were queuing for freshly baked buns, and these buns were baked in the traditional way. It's pretty crispy and it smells pretty darn good.

We also had desserts at one of the stalls near the center of the market. The stall owners first guessed we were from Malaysia, before pin-pointing that we were from Singapore. They told us they get a lot more visitors from Hong Kong and Mainland China these days compared to a few years back.

After eating to our heart's content, we took the (rather long) Metro ride back to our hotel and called it a day.

Day 10 - Zhu Hai Science and Technological Coast

We were in Zhu Hai for our last two nights in China.

The reason why Zhu Hai (The Sea of Pearl - loosely translated) was named as such is because it is famous for its Pearl harvesting.

The black line you see in the photo are actually Osyter/Clam farms which are used to make pearls! You can't really see them clearly in the photo, but the entire farm stretches across over a very wide area.

The trade coast was established in August 2001 by the central government. This is one of only eleven other trade development areas in China, the other trade development areas include Beijing, Shanghai and Shen Zhen.

The trade development area is aimed at companies who are looking for a R&D testing site. It offers a range of privileges and tax-benefits just like the other trade development areas. On top of that, there are special benefits that cater to specific businesses that are not found anywhere else in China.

The most notable observation of the trade development area is that the management sees the need to retain and find talents. With many schools and universities in the area, it even has a student area, known as the Pioneer Undertaking Park for Chinese Students studying abroad.

Aimed at young students and undergraduates looking to set up a business studying overseas returning home to set up a business in China, there are special benefits that only students can enjoy when they set up their businesses in the area.

However, the place is very much empty as well, but the difference between this site and the Torch place is that it is very much developed and ready to take in more investors.

Here's one of my favourite new friend, Eliz again! =p

Day 9 - (Yet another) Sun Yet Sen Memorial Park

When we arrived at the memorial park, all of us were waiting eagerly to enter the place as well and were desperately waiting for Xiao Deng to purchase the tickets. Because all of us wanted to use the washroom urgently.

A few of the guys were so desperate, myself included, that we actually went straight to the map and located where the washrooms were within the compound.

When we eventually entered the park, more than half of us literally ran for our lives to the washroom. So much so that...

Edward fell down, and that's Wen Song trying to help him up.

The washrooms became the first place we visited within the park compounds.

Most of us concluded that the toilets here were by far the best public toliets we've seen throughout our stay in China so far.

When we came out, we were then given a tour in the very house Sun Yet Sen stayed in, it was restored into a meusem that keeps many of Sun Yet Sen's belongings. We were not allowed to take any photos inside the buiding as the things inside the building were considered to be national tresures.

After the tour, we still had time to walk around the park.

From left: Vanessa, Yong Wei, myself, Ying Hui and Evelyn

Took a photo with Mr. Kam before we entered the other building,

The first thing we saw inside the building was a statue of Mr. Sun.

While Edward and Wen Song had other ideas;

And the ghastly looking figure in the background is Wen Song;

Ended up walking around the building with Ying Hui, Nicholas and Mr. Kam. We talked about our reservice issues and I found out that Mr. Kam still have 2 more cycles left in his reservice. Good for him! ROD loh!

Benson helped me take this picture of me with the young Sun Yet Sun.

We took another group photo at the 天下为公 wordings before leaving this place.

Day 9 - Strawberry Farm!!

This was what many of us had been waiting for. The strawberry farm! The strawberries are very fresh, and most important of all, they are fresh!

Many of us eagerly got off the bus in anticipation because we've been waiting for it ever since Xiao Deng told us about the farms and how fresh the strawberries were.



Here's a closer look!



Many of us placked the strawberries to our hearts content.



My two favourite new friends again!

Blur queen, Rong Xing


And Eliz (I swear her laughter is contagious beyond words)



While many of us were busy plucking, there was Lao Yao...

fooling around with his camera.

After spending a hour or so, we proceeded to check the weight of the berries and paid.

Look at all the contended faces. =)

While waiting for the rest to be done, I saw this sign that states that this area is a military area,

Which explains why we were pulled over when we were about to leave the village/state.

This military man came onboard and demanded us to show our Identification Cards, but after Xiao Deng explained to him who we were and what our purpose here was, he let us past without any major problems.