Pretty much from the moment I landed that Sunday night I got the sense that Taiwanese people were extremely nice and friendly (and very interested in foreigners). I was super dressed up at the airport (leggings, nice long white button down, heels), which got me a lot of attention for 2 reasons: I looked good, and I was taller than most of the people there. When I was at Incheon airport in Korea I got a lot of looks that to me meant people were thinking, "Holy crap! Godzilla! But a good looking one!" After I went through customs in the airport in Taiwan, I sat down to wait for my friend, Greg (the high school friend now living in Taiwan). I had barely sat for 15 seconds when a nice Taiwanese middle aged man approached me, asking me where I'm from. I told him America, to which he replies, "Oh, that is interesting. You look Spanish, so I thought you were from Spain." I laughed, and told him it was quite understandable why he would think that as I am part Argentine. He started to get flirtatious, but right at that moment Greg showed up.
The next morning I did some of the more touristy things in Taipei with a guy named Juan, whom I had met in the hostel I was staying at. Juan is an interesting character. He's Colombian, and apparently works for Delta Airlines doing their payroll in Taiwan. He also makes moves on literally any breathing female within inches of him. I was no exception. Unfortunately, most women fell for it. I'm happy to say that I think I brought him down to reality with my rejection, even if it was short-lived (he went on to the next living female once he realized he wasn't going to get anything worthwhile from me).
The first thing I did was go to Taipei 101, the building formerly known as the tallest building in the world up until the unveiling of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai earlier this year.
View of Taipei 101 (or Taipei" ee-ling-ee" in Chinese)
View from the 89th floor
Then Juan took me to the Sun Yat-sen Memorial building. Sun Yat-sen is known as the father of modern China, so he is very much revered among the Chinese/Taiwanese people.
Statue of Sun Yat-sen
From outside the Sun Yat-sen memorial. You can see Taipei 101 is right behind me
Afterwards Juan and I went to get Mexican food in Taipei. We headed back to the hostel where I hung out with some of the other people I had met, and then Greg, Juan and I headed to the Shilin night market that was a short walk away from the hostel.
We tried out this fried chicken at the night market. It a big piece of chicken (bones and all) fried, and some sweet spices put on top. Very delicious!-AALA
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