Arrival in ROC
Trip Start
Jan 06, 2006
1
120
Trip End
Sep 02, 2008
Taipei, Taiwan
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Perhaps the reader wonders what I was up to.
About scuba diving I usually find very little to write. Unless attacked by undersea creatures, the experience is beautiful to undergo, but doesn't lend itself to being related.
In Australia, there is some problem of censorship. It's not the blocking of internet sites, like in PDR China, but speech isn't free. Internet access outside of Sydney regularly costs a small fortune ($5-10 an hour), as does everything else. Value for money in Australia is very poor. Unless you have a relative to visit, a job to do, or an absolute phobia about going to a country where everyone doesn't speak English, all but a dozen countries on the planet are better value.
In Tung Chung I visited a 19th century Chinese fort, built to try to suppress smugglers of British Opium. The cannons are still there, in concrete casements. They aim at 50 storey apartment complexes. A school was built inside the walls at one point and later abandoned. If you've read about the Opium War 1840-42 it is interesting. If you've not, it would be rather lame.
This is how I got into to Taipei. For this was the first time I've decided to go guidebook-free.
After a long day of travelling from Adelaide to Sydney to Hong Kong to Taipei, it was not difficult to catch the bus to the Taipei main station and then the metro to the station near my chosen hostel. The customs people didn't care that I was importing more than my statutorily authorized quantity of alcohol (which is just 1 L). The man who gave me a free map didn't seem to care that I wasn't staying at his hotel nor taking his private car into town. The clerk who took my T$125 ($4) in a freshly dispensed T$1000 note didn't mind giving me the change with my bus ticket. No one cared that I brought all of my enormous bag on the bus - except me when it started to make my legs numb.
Everything in the Taipei main station was wonderfully signed and it was no trouble to get to the right train. Paying for a token was easy with the Chinese/English token machines. The crowds weren't overwhelming on the train. At the stop - Guting Station - finding my exit as instructed in an email from my hostel was a breeze. Walking 150 meters along the streets I drew with my hand drawn map, and consulted by Google Maps was equally facile. While walking I noticed that the city smelled remarkably good. It was hot out but those odors of rotting gutter were conspiciously replaced by fragrant spices from nearby restaurants.
No one was at the hostel (the reception had stepped out for a moment) but even the telephones are easy to use. Throw in a few dollars (they are 29 for 1 Canadian) and dial a number. Just like at home. Someone answered and shortly the reception arrived to let me in. South Australians sometimes say "Too Easy" instead of you're welcome or the NSW "No Worries." So, when Heather, who checked me in, said thanks as I paid, it would have been too easy to say "you're welcome" the South Australian way if it wouldn't have been too confusing. The more I travel, the more my sense of humor becomes erudite and difficult to relate to others.
Eight Elephants is a small hostel and soon after arriving I'd met everyone there. Half of them are students of Chinese or somehow employed in Taiwan. The rest are itinerants like myself. Dinner was a bowl of noodles and beef soup. Shortly after, I collapsed into a 14 hour sleep, induced to such depths, no doubt, by what had been some 30 hours in transit.
