First order of business, I wanted to go see Chiang Kai-shek’s Memorial. Walking past the National Theatre, there were people practicing Tai Chi in the morning. What an unforgettable sight that was – to be immersed in such tradition – to finally see the things I always see in the movies in real life. To finally stand before Chiang Kai-shek’s statue himself and in front of the guards themselves made me feel really surreal. I don’t normally feel that way about many places, but I seldom have a connection such as this one.
You see, in university, I studied contemporary China a lot. I focused and paid attention to WWII and the results. Chiang Kai-shek was definitely a prominent figure in my studies. And being there just brought back so many memories of university and how far and long it’s been. I can’t believe it’s been almost four years since I graduated. I felt extremely old standing there.
Next up, I went over to the Sun Yat-sen Memorial as well. It looked a little bit older and less grand compared to the space of the Chiang Kai-shek’s memorial grounds, but this one featured the changing of the guards. This kind of brought me back to my Washington DC trip in middle school when I witnessed the changing of the guards at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It’s funny how in life, we have moments and memories that remain with us for a long time. Even though those feelings have faded, the memories still hold value from within. Moments on the road and moments traveling have made my life much deeper and refined. Staring at Sun Yat-sen’s statue gave me goosebumps. I was in Taiwan. Zomg.
The weather in Taipei was actually pretty comfortable during this time of the year. Sure, the sun was bright, but the heat was tolerable- especially in the evening. I wasn’t really sure what to eat that afternoon because I was still pretty sick from a case of food poisoning the days prior, I just opted to eat some Subway to be safe- simply because it was there and I was starving. To think about it, food in Taipei wasn’t easy to find as I thought. There were certain areas where you could get food and it wasn’t available in the streets in the afternoon or early in the morning. I had a hard time locating random restaurants near these sights. Even if there was a restaurant, a lot of the menus didn’t have a lick of English or pictures.
Another thing that many people do in Taipei is to visit the Maokong area via the Maokong Gondola or Maokong Cable Cars. The lines were line. I had to stand in the sun for quite a bit until the line progressed. People have a chance to either use a basic cabin or a crystal bottom one where the bottom of the cabin is made out of another sheet of glass so you can look down. That was pretty scary. The ride was beautiful, but I’ve been in so many cable cars that they don’t really impress me anymore. When I reached the top, there wasn’t much to do. There was some street food, including calabash candy, which was another thing I saw on TV in real life. That was pretty awesome, but gave me severe tooth pains because of how sweet it was. Trust me, I’ve never bitten into anything so sweet and sour like calabash tomatoes. Most people were walking towards a temple or something. I didn’t feel like visiting a crowded temple, so I opted to find some food. I stumbled upon a random restaurant. Pointed at some pictures. Nobody spoke English. And ate some really weird cold chicken leg thing. My waitress suddenly started speaking Vietnamese to another person, and I almost fell over. I started laughing insanely loud because we had so much trouble communicating my order. She was speaking Chinese and I was speaking Engrish. In the end, we spoke Vietnamese to each other and laughed at our situation. She married a Taiwanese man over 18 years ago and has been living in Taiwan and working there at her mother-in-law’s restaurant for that many years.
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About Me: I'm Kyle Le and I live, travel, and eat in Vietnam and many Asian countries. I'm passionate about making videos and sharing modern Asia to the world.
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