* Btw, I love the Taiwanese

Today I left my mobile phone in a basket attached to one of the city bikes, and eventually realized after a few hours that I lost it. In the evening I asked the receptionists at the dorm, what would they do in such a situation. As we couldn't communicate, one local student immediately joined the converstion, of course willing to help. Guess what? As the ladies called the city bikes office, the phone was already there given back by somebody who used the bike right after me.

Yet another reason to love the Taiwanese. Today I went alone for a walk combined with some sightseeing. During around 2 hours I was approached 5 times by some random people asking if I didn't need some help, I was out of sudden given a metro map by a girl standing next to me, not to mention many smiles that I was given back while strolling around in a park.

How not to love the Taiwanese?

Lobsters' weekend around Taipei

My second weekend in Taiwan has been pretty intense - Saturday in a hot-spring resort Beitou and Sunday at a hiking trip in Yanmingshan National Park. Well, it's still weekend, though, as my Monday Chinese classes start at 6:30 pm.

All around Beitou one can smell the peculiar sulphurous odour, which is somewhat a fragnance in comparison to the stinky tofu's aroma at night markets in the city. The public outdoor baths that we visited are located at the far end of a metro line, but still within the city. It's rather recommended to wear a swimming suit than a bikini, as the local ladies would have put on complete bathing suits, whearas us the "white women" were commented by a smiling Taiwanese old gentlemen to wear "litte clothing". The waters are very hot, so we ended up red like lobsters.

Beitou Library

Copyrights: Rene. The author himself captured here.

?

Yanmingshan National Park is a nice hiking spot, complete with vulcanic mountains, forests of bamboo and tall grasses, view on the ocean and the basin in which Taipei is located, and its tallest peak at 1120 m. That's where we got on Sunday. At the end of the day of hiking & picknicks some people got even more lobster alike. In Chinese there is actually a more intresting expression for that: looking like a monkey's butt...

* The nicer pictures below orginate form Ania Grenda's professional photo collection.

In the shuttle bus around the park, I was offered a nice place, close to the driver. The Budda picture is somewhat resembling the religious symbols in many Polish cars.

fot. Agathe Flichy

While at a night market

Visiting night markets seems to be quite a popular activity in Taiwan. These are the places all about food, where one can try delicacies ranging from local fried chicken asses to sushi. Yesterday I went with Kitty, Sascha, Audry and Richard to one of such places, this time I was actually all happy with the food I had. It wasn't much of a challenge though, as the latter two friends are local students, who would introduce us to all the snacks around.

Meanwhile the classes started too. The first week is a so called "shopping" one, when every student can visit classes that they like, while still not being registered. As in my case SGH is fine with me not taking classes offered by the College of Management (that's the one we're all assigned to), I'm gonna mainly take ones offered by the College of Social Science.

As for now, enjoy some food pictures. By the end of June I'm planning to agree with the common opinion here, that Taiwan is a food paradise :)

The black thing is made of pig's blood.

Chicken heartes and livers.

The... chicken asses!

Audrey and me sharing an Asian omelette. The red souce isn't katchup alike, but rather sweet flavoured cream. Alongside the great passion friut tee with no bubbles.

Mango and strawberry "shaved" icecream, truly delicious.

The whole group in The Ice Hause, which is said to be one of the two best ice- cream parlours in Taipei.

Some random stuff #1

AAAAAA a group picture- the Taiwanese claim there must always be a one!

Well, I'm not sure if it really is something, but I bet my sister would love them. I do.

So far that's the best thing I`ve eaten inTaipei- it's a sort of a pancake-cookie served at a night market.

Right on the NTU Campus!

It's Mi (fake name, she simply agreed I may call her Mi as I wasn't able to pronounce her name properly) having sth alike kebab. It turned out to be far different from our "local" one- again sweet flavoured...

So far the cutest eatable thing I've seen.

Some pens? in a cafeteria on the campus.

Introduction Day at NTU

Becky's grup at the Campus Tour. The NTU Campus is actually huge, without a bike it seems tough to get around.

A Korean dish: pork, sausage, some flower-gelly-thing, noodles

A lovely bus station

City bikes

Pierwszy dzień

Mój pierwszy dzień zaczął się porą popołudniową od małych chińskich pierożków, na które zaprosiły mnie koleżanki z Francji- to ich drugi semestr i są już niemalże lokalsami. Niestety o blogu i zdjęciach przypomniałam sobie dopiero w kawiarni, która w porównaniu z pierogarnią, niczym się nie różni od europejskich miejsc, no może poza dużo niższymi cenami. 

Tymczasem powoli urządzam się w akademiku- kupiłam materac (najważniejsza sprawa! łóżko w pokoju to tylko rama), pościel i kabel do internetu. Potrzebuję jeszcze parasola, bo na dworze zimo i deszczowo :>

matrioszki na półce w kawiarni

Warszawa -> Amsterdam -> Guangzhou -> Taipei

Pierwsze chińskie śniadanko: nudle w zupie? :) 

Guangzhou podczas 23-godzinnej podróży.