Taipei is a great city. It is surrounded by beautiful mountains and has a number of parks and green sp
aces in the center of the city. People are very friendly and we were impressed by how many people spoke English (many without any accents). It was very easy to get around the city using the subway system, cab, or walking. We were lucky to be in town 
for the end of the annual New Year's celebration, The Lantern Festival. The doors of homes, shops, and restaurants were accented with red new year's decorations and lanterns. We visited the famous Longshan Temple where many people were offering prayers for the new year, the year of the dog. The temple was decorated with some amazing lanterns....scluptures made from from paper and lit up from within
. Noah loved the lantern scenes with the dogs for the new year. After visiting the temple, we made a trip to Snake Alley. A night market made famous by the shops/restaurants selling dishes made from various
snake parts...snake soup for a clear complexion, snake blood for virility,etc. We did not sample any of the snake dishes. But we did have some yummy juice made from starfruit. We also had some delicious native Taiwanese fruits...wax apples and jujubi fruit. We also had a chance to visit the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial which had some enormous lantern displays and nighttime light shows.
During our day time visit to the Memorial, Noah had fun meeting a group of Taiwanese school children. There are so many more places we want to visit in Taipei and in the countryside of Taiwan that we look forward to making a longer trip back in a few months (to finalize our adoption and sightsee). Want to see more photos of our trip? Click this link to view our Kodak Easyshare Album:
http://www.kodakgallery.com/Slideshow.jsp?mode=fromshare&Uc=6n75s79.8dbk9n5l&Uy=5tg543&Ux=1
Post a Comment