Taipei, Day 2: Rainy Day

Today marks my second day in Taipei, and the last day that I'm going to be counting. After all, I will be here for a long time. I know what you're thinking: how is Ryan going to come up with titles for his blog entries without his standard "Day #: Description" to fall back on? I guess I'll just have to be creative.

Today I went out for a little bit with my Swedish roommate. We visited some electronics malls (Taipei is famous for those) and had some la mian [拉面]. Unfortunately, the weather here has gotten no better since yesterday, so I did not feel up to any exciting journeys to any picturesque places. Sorry! There will be plenty of time for those in the future, and I have all the places I want to see marked on a map.

Impressions: Taipei has proven to be infinitely more Western and Japanese influenced than I had imagined. Many restaurants and stores have some signs in Japanese kana, and more than once I heard Japanese being spoken by salespeople. As for the Western influence: I found milk. Taiwanese seem to love the stuff. In fact, our hostel is located next to a "Taiwan Milk King" restaurant/milkateria. Additionally, there are numerous pastry shops and bakeries here, which is something I really didn't see very often in Xiamen.

Prices: As I have said before, prices in Taipei are between those of Xiamen and those in the United States. A good benchmark I like to use is the price of bottled sodas. Here's a little list comparing them.

Chapel Hill, N.C., USA: $1.00
Xiamen, China: 3 yuan = $0.44
Tokyo, Japan: 150 yen = $1.66
Taipei, Taiwan: 25 TD = $0.78

So at least when it comes to my favorite bottled drinks, my first impression was correct! Yay! Food seems to be similar. A meal here (including a drink) costs from 100 Taiwan Dollars, or about $3. In the US, I think I usually spend at least $5.

Speaking of food, I think it's no secret that I LOVE Chinese food. And by that I mean the real stuff, not the watered-down-for-Americans version at 35 Chinese or PF Changs (which are still good occasionally). This evening I had my first actual Chinese meal, stir-fried cabbage in a brown sauce and corn-and-carrot dumplings. Delicious! And all that food cost a mere 80 TD!

Note on currency: Taiwan uses the Taiwan dollar, and the current exchange rate is 1 USD = 32.055 TWD. Not an easy number to do mental math with :-\