Our Trip to Taiwan - Day 7

The next morning we woke up refreshed and ready to jump back into touring the sights. Well, at lease I thought we were. The family headed downstairs for breakfast where Abby was just not acting her happy self. She didn't want to eat, wanted me to hold her, then didn't, and was just generally in a grumpalumpigous mood. Eventually I gave him to her desire to sit on the floor as I was getting more and more frustrated with her behavior and she was getting louder and louder with her desire to be down. At home Nate and I are pretty particular about her not getting on the floor when we're at restaurants because for a time we didn't mind, which turned into her always wanting to be on the floor. We eventually agreed that no floor sitting would happen. So I totally gave in on this one and admit it. As soon as she got on the floor she became very calm and just sat there. Then she went into the child's pose and began to talk to the floor. After a few minutes I realized that I wasn't hearing her chatting away but figured she was just happily pretending or what-not. A few minutes later I realized I was hearing an unexpected sound. Abby snoring! She'd literally been up an hour after having a fantastic night of sleep (she slept straight from 10pm until 7am without waking up - her best night of sleep since we'd arrived in Taiwan so Nate and I figured she was finally getting the hang of the time change). I'm guessing now that my poor baby was just exhausted and even a good night's sleep wasn't enough to catch her up. After we finished breakfast Nate picked her and took her upstairs without her waking up, then proceeded to lay her on the bed (poopy diaper and all, which normally would bother her enough to wake her up), covered her with the down blanket, and out like a light she was. The adults conversed and it was decided that Nate (who had been in Taiwan for two plus weeks and was feeling a little run down) would stay behind at the hotel with Abby while the rest of us continued onto the travel plans for the day.

My poor baby is all tuckered out. 

Our first stop was at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial. Wow! Talk about a grand entrance. The grounds of the memorial were comprised of four separate buildings. To enter the grounds you first had to pass through the Entrance Gate which was a gate on steroids. Once through the gate there were two large buildings on either side of the walk-way in the shape of temples. These buildings were the National Performance Hall and National Theatre where concerts, plays, and operas were held. Directly in front of us was the memorial itself.

We walked through this gate and then I walked and walked and walked until I could get back far enough to get the entire gate in the picture.

The National Performance Hall. The National Theatre was an exact copy just on the other side of the main grounds.

Chiang Kai-shek's Memorial. As we got closer we could see that there was a huge statue of Chiang Kai-shek sitting on a chair (located in that block oval in the middle of the memorial). It really reminded me of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. Both ivory statues of somber faced men sitting in hard-lined chairs. I don't know if this was intentional (as the Lincoln Memorial was built first) or just an interesting coincidence.

The group in front of the memorial. Gives some perspective on how big the memorial really was!

Unfortunately for us there was restoration work being done on the steps leading up to the statue of Chiang Kai-shek so we weren't able to get a closer view. We were able to go inside the memorial hall (basically the green fence behind us in the picture above is actually the outside wall of the exhibition inside) and learn more about what Chiang Kai-shek did for the people of Taiwan as well as see actual articles of clothing, weaponry, and documents from this life. One of the interesting things was that there was no mention of his first two wives or his concubine. Madame Chiang-Kai shek was the only wife mentioned in any of the pictures or descriptions of artifacts in the entire hall. I know that the people of Taiwan (at least in her time) had a great love for her, but I thought it was interesting that this love basically erased the historical truth of earlier wives. We also got to see a different version of the Changing of the Guard at the memorial. 

Same slow step routine, but these men were from the Air Force as indicated by their blue uniforms.

After the memorial is was time for our second adventure of the day. Souvenir shopping!!! Both Mom and I wanted to pick up various items to bring back to family members as well as get our own travel gifts. Many years ago Mom began the tradition of buying Christmas ornaments from every place she visited. While my Dad was still active-duty in the Marine Corps they traveled to a lot of places in a little time and she wanted something tangible to remember those fun days. There was a dry spell of traveling after Dad became a Reservist, but once I was out of college and able to save up my own money for trips we began to travel frequently again. I so loved this Christmas ornament tradition that I continued it with my own travels (beginning once I got my own little Christmas tree for my apartment). Since we had only stopped at the gift shops associated with the place we were seeing (and many did not have even a small gift shop) we were sadly lacking on gifts to bring home. Jane brought us to 'her' gift shop. Basically all the small business owners try to help each other out by giving kick backs to the store that sends customers to other stores. In Jane's case she gives out voucher cards to people that visit her shop so that when they visit the local souvenir shop around the corner these people get a small discount and Jane gets a percentage of their sales. The souvenir shops do the same so people visit Jane's juice shop. I was impressed at the size of the shop when I first walked in, but then I learned I was only on the first of four floors and was blown away. Imagine any type of souvenir item you might want to buy and this shop had that and then some. Dad quickly found a chair (followed shortly by Jane and Jen) while Mom and I browsed, and shopped, and browsed some more.

Scooter parking lot. If you look towards the back of the picture you can see that some scooters are parked up on the sidewalk on the right side as they ran out of room on the left! 

A local McDonald's. The McDonald's that we saw were much more upscale quick eating restaurants than the kid focused ones we have. While there were still plenty of kids their the tables, atmosphere, and general feel just seemed more "kids are welcome but aren't our marketed customer". 

A Christian church! I wasn't able to get close enough to see which denomination and, unfortunately, the symbols I did see don't really help. The cross on the left looks like a Presbyterian cross, but then they have a Crucified Jesus on the cross on the green panel indicating Catholic, the small cross at the top of the building indicates another form of Protestant denomination, while the Alpha and Omega Greek letters seem to correspond to everyone.

Once we completed our shopping we headed back to the hotel to pick up Nate and Abby and head downstairs for lunch. I'd like to say that I was able to enjoy the festive atmosphere and yummy food, but instead I have to say that I spent the little time I was at the table wrangling a small toddler who had no desire to sit, wanted nothing to do with the food, and couldn't be made to be happy for anything. So shortly after food arrived I grabbed Abby and we headed back to our room to feast on peanut butter crackers and apple juice.

Desperately trying to keep Abby happy. The wait staff was so nice to us! They brought Abby her own special plastic plate, cup, and spoon as well as cooled rice. 

After the rest of the crew finished eating we regrouped and then decided what to do with the rest of our afternoon. Nate still hadn't seen Jane's juice shop and really wanted to stop by there while Dad's leg was hurting again so he was more inclined to hang out at the hotel and people watch from his room while working. You can take the job away from Dad, but not Dad away from the job. :-) Then Jane and Jen thought it's be fun to take us to Tamsui, which is the northern most part of Taiwan that the MRT will take you too. They thought it would give us an idea of what the night markets were like, but with having Abby with us, a more family-friendly version. 

After finishing lunch but before Jane and Jen picked us up for our afternoon excursion I decided to try and begin packing up our suitcases since Nate would be leaving us right after breakfast the following morning. We almost didn't fit everything! Nate had brought over three suitcases with him (one with clothes, one containing gifts for his students, and one containing his teaching materials) so we thought he'd pretty much be coming home with two empty suitcases that we would fill with our gifts. Little did we know how generous the Kuo family would be! We filled all of Nate's extra suitcases then ended up using a suitcase from the Kuo's that they never used. 

Back to Jane's shop we went! Here's a view of her shop standing on the edge of the sidewalk in front. Most of the shops spilled out a bit onto the sidewalk and were also very tiny when compared to America's strip malls. 

Here's a better view of the size of Jane's shop. The fruit stand was just outside the front wall and the "Fruit Juice" sign is the back wall of her shop. Literally just enough room for four tables.

Mom trying Bubble Tea. Basically it's tea, milk, and tapioca balls. Mom took one sip and promptly passed the glass to me. :-) I tried it and it wasn't so bad once you got used to sucking up a chewy, round thing. I actually ended up liking it so much that it became my second favorite drink.

Here's a view of the riders of a tour bus that parked right in front of the shop to let its passengers debark to head to the souvenir shop around the corner. Yep, Jane and the tour company are "partners". We would literally go from us being the only customers to suddenly there being 20+ drink orders to fill.

After having our fill of yummy juice it was time to get back on the MRT and head up North. I will admit that I'm glad I didn't know how long the trip would take or I might have balked a bit about taking Abby. It turned out that the ride would be over a half hour and we didn't have a stroller or carrier to help contain her. So I sang lots of songs, passed her off to Nate then got her back a lot, pointed out all the kids on the MRT that she could wave/talk to, pointed out the sights we were quickly passing by, etc, etc. Finally, we arrived! 

Mom working that turn style like a pro. :-)

This little girl saw Abby and immediately ran over and asked to have their picture taken together. Abby wasn't too receptive so that's why I'm in the picture holding her down. :-) After the picture was taken the little girl got her camera back and then proceeded to take candid snap shots of Abs as she walked along the boardwalk. Too cute!

Tamsui is like a mini Atlantic City boardwalk. On one side was the sea and on the other were various food, game, and amusement shops. Lots of lights, people, and a general fun atmosphere. Abby had a great time watching birds, looking at the ships, talking about how the water "pooped" as it was stinky salt-water, and playing with the kids that would interact with her. 

Nate is holding a famous chicken patty here on the boardwalk. It's a fried slab of chicken that has hints of cinnamon. Jane said it was the most popular food item to buy. I'm holding squid. No, I'm not eating it. Jane wanted Nate to try some as there was a shop that literally sold freshly skewered squid and octopus. Abby's thought the chicken tasted pretty good once it was cool enough for her to handle.

Jane in front of the squid shop.

Mom saw a girl walking by with this and jumped up to buy one herself. It's fresh potato chips! The shop take a potato and puts it into some machine that cuts it spiral cuts the potato, then they put it on a stick and deep fat fry it. You could get it plain or flavored. We tried plain and cheese and decided that plain was preferred.

We were enjoying our walk along the boardwalk when the path took a turn and then a 180 and we found ourselves one street up from the sea. Since it automatically dropped us off facing the direction to go back to the MRT, and it was already 8pm, we decided to being our walk back.

Notice Abby's hat. As we were walking by a shop that happened to have little kid's hats in a bin outside Abby reached over from Nate's shoulders, grabbed the hat, put it on her head, turned to me and said "My hat. I so pretty". And just like that we bought Abby the hat. :-) How could you turn down something so precious?

On our way back to the MRT it started to rain a little bit. We figured we all (but Nate who didn't mind) had some type of outer layer and would survive just fine through the drizzle until we made it back to the station. Little did we know that the drizzle would soon turn into...

A horrendous downpour! See how soaked my coat is, how wet-plastered Mom's hair is, and how wet-shiny Nate's face is? We were still blocks away from the MRT station when the skies opened and we experienced a real Taiwanese rain storm. No wonder people carry umbrellas with them wherever they go even if it's not raining. As quick as it turned from clear skies to a downpour I wouldn't want to be caught empty-handed either.

We made it to the station safe and sound!

 

Abby showing off her train riding skills on our way back to the hotel.

We got back to the hotel and found out that Grace was stopping by to say goodbye as we were leaving the next day while she was at work. Plus, she'd been promising Mom a chance to sit on her scooter and hadn't had an opportunity to have that happen yet!

The girls of the trip! Jane, Jen, Abby, Me, Grace, and Mom. Iris was missing but we would be seeing her the next day as she wanted to see us off at the airport.

Abby talking on the phone base. She started out talking on the phone but that soon grew to boring, so onto the phone base it was! She's just so precious!

After learning that Nate still hadn't tried Stinky Tofu Jane and Grace (Jen had left to go home by this time) grabbed Nate to go around the block to an eatery nearby. After a while of him being gone I decided I wanted to see what he was up to and asked Mom and Dad to watch Abby for me so I could run out and meet up with him. Here he is eating Stinky Tofu. Yep, that's actually it's name. Yes, it stinks. But Nate said that the taste was pretty good. Once the tofu is cooked it looses whatever property makes it smell so bad, so it's really only the fresh tofu that's the stinky tofu.

When the four of us returned to the hotel it was time for Mom to get a chance to sit on Grace's scooter. Originally Grace was going to take Mom for a spin but the rain made both of them a little uncomfortable with having a newbie on board so they were both happy and satisfied to have a stationary experience. 

Grace and Jane heading home! 

Whew! What a day. By the time everyone had left and we had Abby down, Nate and I just collapsed into bed. We had had an AMAZING trip but we were both ready to admit that we were tired and missing home.  But as this had been our last day in Taiwan we were both glad it ended on such a great note.