Garblog: Taipei trip

I'm going to try something new this post. I'm going to try to make extensive use of my Flikr page for the photos I want to include because it is easier to upload pictures to it than it is to this blog. There will still be images here, don't worry! But just not 20 of them, hopefully. Here goes.

Tuesday I made a solo trip to Taipei to meet with two other Olmsted Scholars, one a veteran of the program from about 10 years back, and one who is a currently in the program, a year ahead of me. It was an informal meeting over lunch, just informational, but very useful to me. Anyhow, since I was making the trip all the way up the island, I decided to make a day of it and take in some of the sights along with visiting with my colleagues.

I arrived in Taipei about 9 AM. Here is a video clip I made just after my arrival laying out my goals.

When I finally decided where I was going to go before lunch and went there, I made this video.

I was blown away by the scale of this monument. Simply huge!

Many more photos and video from the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial are available here.

After that, I met with my colleagues for lunch at Din Tai Fung, a restaurant on Yongkang Jie. It was delicious. We had a variety of Shanghai-style dumplings, vegetables, and soup. While we ate, we discussed various issues surrounding the Olmsted Scholar Program and the more seasoned Scholars offered me advice, were that they in my shoes (just arrived in-country).

After lunch, it was off to Taipei 101, one of the tallest buildings in the world. For whatever reason, I like to visit very tall buildings. They fascinate me. I had been wanting to visit this building since I learned that it was in Taiwan and that I would be coming here to study. Here is the video segment I recorded upon arrival at the building.

There is a 5-level shopping mall in the building, jam-packed with high-end designer boutique shops and expensive restaurants. There seemed to be quite a few Japanese restaurants, in particular. None of these were my objectives, though - bookstore, anyone? The mall has a large bookstore called Page One. It did not disappoint. It featured a section of books that you wouldn't find in a bookstore in China:

After browsing the shelves for a while and not finding anything I couldn't live without (plus, I am trying to make the transition from traditional books to Kindle-based books and periodicals, so I didn't want to purchase more old-style books to derail that effort), it was time to head to the top of the building.

The tickets to go to the top are a tad expensive (NT$400, or about US$12), so I was glad that I was by myself. After a short wait, I was on the way to the top inside the fastest elevator in the world.

Once at the observatory on the 89th floor, I shot quite a lot of photos of the view (quite spectacular), most of which look about like this one:

Many more photos and my narrative video from inside the observatory can be found here.

There were a bunch of art displays inside the observatory. Here is one piece that jumped out at me. What do you think of it?

Then I found out I could go up 2 floors higher, to 91, and go outside. Money! More video followed. This video is entails me walking the entire circumference of the observation deck (I think it was truncated somewhat, as that its length exceeded the maximum upload parameter of 1 min 30 sec). WARNING: if your speakers are turned up, I recommend you turn them down before opening this video. The wind noise and the harmonic wind-driven vibration of the personnel safety bars (to keep nutcases from jumping off) is quite loud and is at an annoying pitch.

After my time on the 89th and 91st floors, it was time to try to get back to ground level. Not so fast! First I had to see the 730 ton (!) tuned mass damper. My photos and video don't really do it credit, so if you are interested, read more about it and see more photos here. Basically, this thing keeps the building stable in high winds and during seismic activity.

Well, back on terra firma, my objective was to find another bookstore nearby, Eslite Books (sorry, they don't have an English language website). I had heard this bookstore was very big, but I was not prepared for what I found: a 6-floor behemoth that is not a pure bookstore along the lines of Borders or my favorite, Barnes and Noble, but a hybrid between a conventional bookstore and Ikea. Seriously, they have tons of other goods for sale besides books, things that will complement your reading lifestyle, apparently. I hate to admit it, but I met my match at this store - I did not have the stamina to browse the entire store. I completely lost track of time in the building, but my aching feet and growling stomach told me it was time to move on.

A (not so) quick ride on the Taipei Metro had me back where I had started at in the city, and I recorded this video as a summary of my day.

After 2 more hours of riding the high speed rail back to Kaohsiung, my day was not over. I decided to check out the Liuhe Night Market not far from where we live. Even though it is nearby, we had not yet had a chance to check it out. I had heard it was quite the spectacle, with many choice of foods and myriad goods for purchase. I wasn't hungry nor did I want to buy anything, just take a few photos. Here is the best of them: