Sunday, March 20, 2011
Friends who know me well, know I love Xiao Ding Dang. (During my time, it was known as Xiao Ding Dang. Many years later, it become Doreamon. I insisted naming it as Xiao Ding Dang, as it has my dream.) It has always be my childhood favourite cartoon character. Hello Kitty fans love the Hello Kitty Hotel, and theme park in Japan, but I never heard of any Xiao Ding Dang hotel or theme park.I was overjoyed when the 小人国 theme park actually have exhibition of Xiao Ding Dang in it. it's like a dream come true all these years. All the characters are right in front of me, and I can see them in the living room just like what I seen in the comic books.
Can't have enough of it.
We went to 3 different Night Market (夜市) , 2 in Taipei (士林夜市，通化夜市), 1 in Taizhong (逢甲夜市).
Out of the 3, 逢甲夜市 was considered completely new to me. I had been to Taipei 3 times, but I had never travelled out of Taipei. So this night market is highly anticipated. It was the last night market we went, considered the last stop before we travelled back to Taipei in Taizhong. We arrived at the night market at 4pm like that, and we already see shops opened for business. Though it was a very short stop, we managed to but shoes and bags. Things are considered cheap, and they can still offer discounts. Nope, we never buy clothes, because it's winter, and we could not possibly buy winter clothing for Singapore.
士林夜市and 通化夜市 were no stranger to me. I have been there a few times, shopping and eating. Frankly speaking, 士林夜市changed quite a bit, so it's like a new place for me to see. However, these 2 places never failed me. i still get to see a lot of interesting things, like shoes and bags and other accessories.
I think if Singapore will have night market like this, it will be very popular. There are always new things to see and shop, and I believe night owls will be delightful to have a place to go to. Too bad...
观星园 was another home stay we went during the 'out of Taipei' trip. It was located at the top of the mountain in 清境. It was one of the best experience, based on my previous blog on 情景. We travelled all the way up to the top of the mountain, where it was only 4 degree. Freezing like standing inside a fridge, I had the winter experience that I never have before.
Arrived just in time to watch the sunset, and we made it a point to watch the sunrise the next morning. The home stay was managed by 李大哥and his wife, we called her 李大嫂. They have a very beautiful dog called Toby, which it has 1 blue eye and 1 green eye.
Really very cozy place to stay in despite of the temperature, and the host prepared steamboat for dinner, as they know we will love the hot soup to keep our body warm. Everywhere is dark and we could only see the lights of the houses down the mountain, however we found our enjoyment by playing with firework. First experience again, we can not play with firework back home. Haha.
My first sunrise, and I could see it in another way. My friends told me, everywhere is dark, and slowly the first ray of the sun will show. After that, the sun will rise up slowly. This is Sunrise. On the other hand, I experience like wise. We set our alarm to wake up early to see the sunrise. We had a shock when we woke up the next morning, the whole sky was bright. We all thought we missed it, but when we went downstairs to the open space, an uncle told us, the sun has not rise up yet. As our location was at the top of the morning, we will see the ray of sunshine first, before we see the sun. This is the first time we heard about it, and we continue to wait despite of the cold weather. All of us went into the tent to hide ourselves from the cold wind blowing on our bodies.
When the sun rise, I knew I will not regret waking up so early and bracing the cold wind. It was something that I would never experience, and I do not know if I would have the strength to do that again in the future as I grow older. Haha.
This is the place I would like to recommend to all of you, if you consider going up to 清境. You will have different experience as the others.
MPP suggested we can stayed in Home stay (民宿), during our 'out of Taipei' trip, as it would be so much cheaper than staying in a hotel. Furthermore, the experience will be quite nice, as most of them are family business.In Sun Moon Lake, we stayed in 水社海, which is allocated quite near the lake. According to 黄先生, he said we picked the right home stay to stay in because the boss worked well with the other attraction of the place, so we can get tickets at the cheaper price. Anyway, everywhere is walking distance, so I think the location is quite good.
The home stay is very nicely decorated, very cozy homely feel. We booked a room for 4 people and we were quite comfortable. The only bad experience was hearing noise throughout the night. We heard people walking to and fro up stair and it went out till morning. Maybe we were too tired, so it did not affect us a lot. I found out from 黄先生that he also heard the same thing in his room, which was just a level above us.
Set aside this issue, the stay was quite good, and comfortable. I would like to recommend this place for all to stay if you go to Sun Moon Lake.
Franking speaking, I have never heard of 清境before until MPP suggested visiting it. To me, it was a new place and I thought why not? Since we all agreed to travel out of Taipei for 2 nights.
Before the trip, I went to ask my friends, and most of them said it is a 'relaxing' place, meaning there is nothing to do there, but they said something that interest me, 'It's Nature.'
And I really saw nature! Different structure of mountains up and down, with lakes and streams along the way, I really love seeing them as we do not really get to see them in Singapore. All these which I see from pictures in magazines, all come up close and personal to me. Though the weather was really freezing at that point of time, I felt so relax and fresh, maybe because the air is fresh up in the mountain too. I watched the best sunset and sunrise, though it was my first experience.
Of course, I visited farm and stayed in 民宿in 清境, that will be blogged about in the next entry.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Ate a lot of food during this trip. The 4 of us tried not only ate our favourite snacks in Night Market, we also went to Theme restaurants to try out.
The first one we went was Hello Kitty Restaurant. It was located around Dun Hua road (apologies, I just can not remember the exact address.) The whole place is decorated by Hello Kitty pictures and toys. If you are a Kitty fan, I believe you will love this place. From the wall, to window pane, to the food and dessert served, as long as it can dough into a kitty icon, you will have a full exposure of Hello Kitty.
The food was quite delicious (maybe we are too hungry...), the place is very clean and beautiful. However, I think I will only go again, if my friends want to go.
Actually I am a fan of Xiao Ding Dang. Hahaha!!!
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