Venture to Taipei!

Today, we ventured to Taipei.

From Hsinchu, we took 客運 to Taipei. A return trip costs 240 NTD. Rather costly but taking the railway would cost around the same as well. Our first stop in Taipei would have to be 西門町. So from the Taipei terminal, we took the metro. Our student ID would have acted as our 悠遊卡, but we haven't gotten it yet, so we bought the single trip ticket. Well.. a ticket it is. But in actual fact, it looks like..

西門町 is supposed to be a shopping district, and yes there are a lot of shops here. However, it is not that cheap to shop here. Maybe because it has become such a popular place to be in hence the rise in prices occur. Walked around, had our lunch, I did buy a top for 190NTD (less than SGD 10). Then we left and headed to 東區.

At 忠孝復興 metro station, there is an underground mall that leads to 忠孝敦化 station. From there, you can exit the underground mall to go to 誠品敦化店. 誠品 should not be unfamiliar to Taiwanese, as it can be found in a lot of places. Also known as Eslite, it is known as a bookshop. But other than books, it does sell nice pretty stationery and other things. Something like Kinokuniya.

東區 is another shopping district. However, the products sold here is quite expensive as well. The first thing I saw when I came out from the metro station is a dance school. This is when I wish my school was in taipei, because there are so many dance schools in taipei, and only so far two that I found in Hsinchu.

Oh. one more thing. 東區 is kind of the clubbing area. with famous clubs such as Luxy.

After that, we met up with Xinrong's friend, Bing Jen for dinner. We went to this very high class restaurant for Chinese cuisine. You wouldn't be able to imagine how happy we were. Not to be eating at a high class restaurant, but to be eating Chinese cuisine, as the three of us have not eaten any since we arrived in Taiwan. Some of the food we ate:

Minced meat with leeks. what the people there refer to as 蒼蠅頭 due to the black colour ingredient.

Some shrimp dish. Shrimp fried with 油條 you scoop a few spoonfuls of it into the cabbage and eat it.

Many should be familiar with this. 東坡肉!

A chicken dish. I forgot its name.

The restaurant we were at was situated in 誠品信義. Yes. Eslite again. The biggest Eslite in Taiwan.

Left to right: BingJen, Shirlynn, Me, Xinrong