I thought it would be good to pen some of the things we have done throughout our 8D7N trip in Taiwan before they begin to slip off from my memory.. but before that..
HEY! I'M BACK FROM TAIWAN!
alrights, first of all.. we went there for 8D7N from 13th May 2009 to 20th May 2009 (21st May 2009).. why i bracket "21st May 2009" is because, by right, our flight is supposed to reach Singapore at 2345h (20th May 2009).. but due to flight delay (we boarded the plane at only 1930h, instead of the initial 1910h), we only touched onto Singapore grounds past 12.
so.. who went for the trip? There's Elizabeth (E), Gaik Choon (GC), Glenda (G), Josie (J) and of course, Alina (A) a.k.a. ME! so here's the flow of our whole trip, with what i had remembered..
13th May 2009- A took a cab down to meet GC to go to the airport at 1045h, while J cabbed down to fetch G to the airport. E had her parents to send her there.
- Met at the airport at 1130h, checked in at around 1150h.. cos E had to wait for her lugguage lock to arrive.. hahahaha..
- Lunch at Popeye's
- Flight at 1350h onboard JetStar Asia Airways 3K 521
- Reached Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport at 1620h, 10mins ahead of the scheduled time
- Board bus to Taipei HSR
- Took HSR from Taipei to Taichung
- Board taxi at Taichung HSR Station and got ripped off NT$120 by the taxi drivers -.-"
- Checked in at Zaw-Jung Business Hotel. A small and pretty old hotel, but still well-kept. Except that the air-con is the old type that we have in the 1990s, and the windows and curtains can't be closed fully, and these resulted in glaring sunlight and air-con that isn't cold.. nono, or rather, air-con that goes cold, warm, cold, warm.. lols.
- Dinner at the nearby shopping centre (can't remember the name). I had seafood spaghetti and a cup of coke from Mac! and for our "dessert", all of us except E had red pearl milk tea from what-i-cannot-remember-again.. LOL.
- Bought some food and drinks at the Carrefour in the same shopping centre.. including mineral water, chips, ice lemon tea, ice peach tea, chewing gum, candies...
- Went to 7-eleven to buy the Taiwan version of Yakult (Big bottle), and to enquire about the international calling card that E and GC wanted..
- Back to hotel to shower, afterwhich, watched Kang Xi Lai Le and Yu Le Bai Fen Bai!
14th May 2009- Woke up at 4am.. slept back, woke up, slept back, woke up, slept back and finally woke at 5am.. tsktsk. I can never sleep well when I reach a new place for the first night.. hahaha.. anyway, the rest of the girls woke up one after another.. and by 6am i think, all were up!
- After some washing up, we had our breakfast, which was delivered to our room.. the breakfast consists of a packet of drink plus a sandwich/bread roll..
- We then set off to go to Sun-Moon Lake.. the initial plan was to board a bus/train (which i can't remember again.. only could remember it was supposed to be a public transport).. but as we were walking, we were stopped by a taxi driver, who offered to drive us there.. NT$400 per person (as compared to NT$350 per person by public transport).. he also offered to be our "chauffeur" for the whole Sun-Moon Lake trip if we pay him NT$1200 (as a group), in addition to the NT$400/person.. and yupps, we took the offer, which was good, cos it saved us time, plus he gave us some information about the places we were visiting.. and and and.. with him, we can take group photos without worries! (okay la.. actually only two photos.. hahaha!)
- We reached Sun-Moon Lake at about 0910h, and the first place we visited was the Wen Wu Temple, whereby we prayed to the gods for good wishes such as safety (as in having a safe trip), health, family, love, and most importantly... is our STUDIES! why? simply because our results will be out soon. oh shyt. haha.
- Also at the Wen Wu Temple, the taxi driver bought us each a tea-egg (Cha Ye Dan) cos he said the tea-egg there is famous.. and indeed, the tea-egg was delicious! not that I have tried tea-egg before.. yes, not even in Singapore, but that one was simply yummy! G and GC who had eaten tea-egg before said those that were treated by the taxi driver were much better than the one they had.. in terms of taste, it's less bitter and more flavourful.. and in terms of peeling difficulty, it's difficulty is almost zero!
- After that, we moved on to the Peacock Garden where there displays quite a few varieties of birds, with the peacocks (especially the white peacocks) being in the limelight..
- We then move on to this small trail-walk, where it leads us to this "fountain" that keeps providing water to the lake. this is not nature, rather, it was actually a tunnel/pipe that was dug by the Japanese (i think) many years back..
- With a little of these small walks comes the powerful one.. and that is, walking 570m to the pagoda at the top of a hill or i-dunno-what-you-call-it.. and then many, countless steps to the top of the pagoda, so as to hit the big bell and make a wish! yupps, tiring it is, but the scenery sight at the top of the pagoda sort of compensated our perspiration, cos the scenery there was pretty breath-taking.. it would be better if the weather was better though, as in not as hazy..
- Then, we went to the temple to see the "She Li Zi" of a well-respected monk (I think).. "She Li Zi" was something that was found in the bones/ashes of a dead person after cremation, and was thought to be only seen in those who had done many good deeds in the past.
- With all the walking, we had lunch at this restaurant known as the "Queen Restaurant", which does not have any customers! but still, we had our lunch there since it was recommended by the taxi driver.. well, the food there wasn't too bad, with the "long xu cai" and "san bei ji" being yummmmmmmmy! however, the lady boss brought us large portions, when we told her we wanted small portions.. and she charged us with the price of the large portions too! grrr. and because the portions were so big, we couldn't finish, and the taxi driver said we were wasting food and we should have ordered lesser.. and he also said that we were so rich to pay for so much for the meal (which cost about SGD$60 i think).. and that made me kindda angry.. first got overcharged, secondly got "maligned" because the lady boss took her own initiative.. hais.
- After a super full meal, we then went to the "town area" of Sun-Moon Lake, where there are shops selling souvenirs and performance by the tribal group there.. there is also where we were closest to the lake (other than that, we hardly got close to it lor!) and we took several photos there..
- Wanting to leave Sun-Moon Lake for some shopping, we told the taxi driver we wanted to leave.. but he asked us if we wanted to have tea before we go.. and that we could take a few photos of the Aboriginal Culture Village (Jiu Zu Wen Hua Chun).. so, being nice people (HAHAHA!), we had tea with him and the other taxi uncle.. all was fine as they were recommending us places to visit until this third taxi uncle came and started sprouting nonsense.. -.-", and so we left after about 20min or so..
- Instead of heading back to hotel, we asked the taxi driver to take us to the place where he could recommend the best Tai Yang Bing.. and so we alighted the taxi, and gave him extra NT$300 tips for his good service and went off to buy the Tai Yang Bing, which is a famous local goods of Taichung/Taiwan.
- After that, we went to Family Mart and there, E and GC asked about the purchase of international calling card again, while J and I bought the Play magazine that features my hyun joong and the other F3 from Kkotboda Namja.. Wahahahahas!
- We then went back to hotel for a short rest before going to Taichung's Fei Jia Ye Shi (Feng Jia Night Market).
(to be continued...)
