Heres a map of where we went
After a 2 hour drive we stop by Taichung (Taiwan Center). The third largest city in Taiwan and also home to many colleges and universities. However Taichung is also plagued with organized crime and prostitution. Click here for more information about Taichung. We stopped there at some famous street that escapes my memory to eat some lunch.
We arrive at Taichung city
More shots of Taichung
More shots...
More shots...
Inner city
More inner city shots
We found a restaurant to eat lunch at.
This is really interesting. Right outside the restaurant was a iron bowl with water in it. My uncle told me that people in the old times used to wash their face with this bowl. What they do is they dip their hands in the water. They then rub the metal handles rapidly and the water is suppose to rise. I looked at him with a puzzled look and then he tried to demostrate it. After about a minute of rubbing, it didn't look like it would work. However, about a week later when I was checking out some stores on the docks on Danshui right by Taipei, I witness this bowl phenomenon yet again. My cousin Yi San dipped her hands in the bowl and started rubbing the handles, except this time she rubbed the handles much more faster to the point where you can see her struggle and get exhausted. This continued for about 40 seconds. When I was about to walk away, a realy deep vibration started to occur and you can hear this rumbling noise. The bowl also started to vibrate rapidly and you can visually see the water vibrating and start to rise. However she got too exhausted and stopped rubbing the handles and the water became calm again. I thought this was really strange.
We ate at the place. It was some good food and surprisingly I was about to eat veggies. Something that I've never really done before without gagging.
Onwards, we proceed to Tainan!
We arrive at Tainan!
We arrive to stay a hotel, but it turns out to be a resort with a really nice bedroom, plasma screen TV, ridiculously cool bathroom (too bad I didnt get any shots of it). Inside our room I took some shots of the city from our window.
And now we're on ground again. We navigate through the city to find my aunt and my cousin Xiao Xiong/Mark that I haven't seen in 15 years. I actually forgot who he was until I looked through old photos. Also, if you notice on the right side of the photo, there is a lot of motorists. This is a trend that is more common in Nanbu(south side) people in Taiwan. In Taipei, mass transit is widely used and is far more effective. In southern Taiwan, space isn't so limited and places tend to be far with limited mass transit. So a large majority of Nanbu (south side) people use motorcycles.
We finally get to their place and I look around to reminence on the past. Then it finally hits me, its the same house that I visited the last time I came to Taiwan. The balcony thing and everything. It's just gone through some changes. We had a brief talk about coming here and everyone introduced each other. I was examining a scratch on the coffee table and then my aunt points out, "You know, you were the one who made that scratch." And then everyone started to laugh about it. I thought it was pretty funny. After meeting up and having a brief talk we then went to eat some Egyptian food that was nearby. I was still going through some culture shock and I was mostly speechless as I was in the restaurant.
This is a picture I took earlier but I'm going to post it again to explain things chronologically. Here is a picture we took in the Egyptian restaurant the night we met up with my aunt from my mom's side. She has the splitting image of my mom. If any of you wondered how my mom looks like, she looks just like her.
For those of you wondering what Egyptian food is like, here it is. Lamb Kebob $18 USD. I think the price comes from the unusual presentation and small portion.
A shot of the Egyptian restaurant outside. I guess we missed the live performance, argh! Just kidding, I hate performances.
After dinner, we returned to the resort and took a little walk outside in the back area. The back area is a lounge/bar/swimming pool. It looked absolutely marvelously. I took a few shots but a lot of them were completely blurred out, here a shot that I stabilized by mounting it on top of a "rock lamp."
More shots of the resort
The next morning, we go check the resort some more. We go to the gym to workout and then we went swimming. At noon, my family dropped me off at my other family's house and I stayed there for about 3 days. The next blog begins my Tainan adventure.
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