The re-sightseeing of Taiwan

We arrived safely in Taiwan after a grueling 18+ hour plane ride. Our layover was in Anchorage, Alaska. Unfortunately, we arrived there in the middle of the night so we weren't able to see Russia. Maybe next time.

We basically hit the Taiwanese ground running and have been seeing (or in my case, re-seeing) the sights non-stop since we got here. I don't know about H&M, but I am exhausted. This isn't my usual leisurely eating, shopping and laying about with my relatives. We went to the folk art village again and saw a kung fu demo, wedding procession and photo op with people dressed up as gods. Then we hit up a harbor town for some lunch and visited some temples. We also had a huge dinner with relatives and went back to their place to drink some Macallan scotch and marvel at their fancy toilet with automatic rising seat cover and a control panel with more buttons than my TV remote (sorry, no photos.)



































Yesterday we came to Taipei and we went to my dad's temple to pay our respects and then up to the town of DanShui to see the shops and walk along the boardwalk. Taiwan is a country of street food and the stalls range from cuttlefish on a stick (gross) to these hot red bean filled cakes and the best of the best, the scallion pancake cart. It's the stuff dreams are made of.























Today we went to the Palace Musuem for a little culture and then to Taipei 101, the tallest building in the world. It is 508 meters tall and has the fastest (1010 m/s) elevators at a cost of $2.5 million per elevator. We had to admit it was quite a smooth ride up. Taipei 101 also has the world's largest passive wind damper, a 660 metric ton steel pendulum that sways to offset movements in the building caused by strong gusts. Thus their big marketing ploy/mascot is the Damper Baby. In fact, they have 4 different damper baby characters, each with its own charming personality traits.