Korea & Taiwan 2015 (7/10) – Eating All Day Long

Korea & Taiwan 2015

1. Out We Go Again
2. Hwaseong to Gangnam
3. Korean Fried Surf & Turf
4. The King, the Art, and the Food Stalls
5. Myeong Dong Kyoja
6. On To Taichung
7. Eating All Day Long
8. Happy 90
9. This is How We Breakfast
10. Signage & More

On the first morning in Taiwan, we went downstairs to the hotel’s front desk and asked about traditional breakfast joints.  Ooh that was a hard question.  The receptionist kind of knew one but had to reach out to her colleague for confirmation.  And it wasn’t close.  She handed me a tourism map and circled the location for us.  “It’s a 15-minute walk,” she said.  She meant for adults.

We headed out and walked by some interesting stuff.

Whoever designed this cute bear mascot (for a beverage vendor) needs to have points taken off for making it look like a trash can.

The green pathway to the Science Museum, which we planned to visit but never managed.

Dinosaur table.

Daoist temple, with people conducting some sort of ceremony.

“Toilet on sale for 1,999.  Good quality, excellent price.”

We had a great breakfast, but I’ll save the report for another day.  We walked back to the hotel and hailed a cab to grandma’s place.  Most of the family, from the US, had already gathered there.  Much of the conversation at this family reunion was in English, and grandma was puzzled.

An hour later, grandma went on to her daily lunch and nap routine, and the rest of the family reunion moved on to a local eatery that we randomly selected but turned out to be good.  Well, I do miss the Taiwanese flavors and supposed I’d appreciate any average place that sold food there.

The restaurant owner was not shy about giving us suggestions, being buddy-buddy with us, and even joining (photo bombing?) our family picture.

Between lunch and nap, we stopped by this boba place next to the hotel.  Even at 50% sugar, my drink was way too sweet.  I didn’t know that Asians had such a sugar tolerance!  Did they evolve in the past 15 years?

After lunch, we went to another local eatery and got some small dishes.
If you are curious about the string on my right arm, it was tied to the pacifier which the person behind me was sucking on.

After the brief dinner, we sat down at another place for some silky dessert tofu.
I freaked out momentarily as I realized they put shaved ice in the bowl, because Hong and I had our worst food poisoning from shaved ice from Taichung.
We survived this one, though.

Afterwards, Hong’s mom and aunt were very kind and agreed to babysit our two little ones, allowing us a few hours of freedom.  We went, with Hong’s dad and cousin, to the Feng Chia Night Market.  I did not realize this but it was the largest night market in Taiwan.  We were certainly impressed by how extensive it was.

I suppose this was the official entrance sign, but the actual market extended in all directions by at least several blocks.  The economy probably had grown?

We loved the hustle and bustle.
Moving around in such a busy part of town meant fighting cars and scooters for road space, usually without looking.
I was impressed that Hong, who did not grow up in Taiwan, was able to pull it off so naturally.

Selfie time!

Night markets are all about food.  How about some giant takoyaki?

The giant takoyaki.

Shaved ice and hot grass jelly.

On the way back to the hotel, we learned from the taxi driver that there was a big music festival in town, attracting a lot of the residents.  “That’s why this night market was so deserted today!”  He exclaimed.  We definitely thought the night market was crowded, but guess we just hadn’t seen the real thing.

Oh yeah, it was also Halloween today.  The hotel restaurant staff had very nice costumes on.