Leofoo Taipei

... streets closer to Daniels and found a place that was still open at 10pm. In fact, I walked past at least half a dozen who were all still open ... god I love Taiwan! I needed to get dinner so I went in search of some street food. The best I could come up with was fried dumplings so I got that and went back and watched Project Runway which happened to be on at the time and during our trip I've become slightly addicted to it. Oh dear ...<br>

... and they pointed me toward the elevators. At floor 14, I wandered around for a bit before finding an office full of monks, who automatically started on paperwork for my bus pass- passpo0rt, NT$300, "have you eaten yet?" I hadn't, so I was told to go wait on floor 12 for further instruction. I was promptly guided to a table with another backpacker, who was also a part of the program- and also named Lauren. We chatted as I was presented with the regular dish- rice ...

... of my clothing as a kid, but did have a strange curiousity about this place. So, here I am! And, back to my side of the road (the right). Not as clean as Japan, but getting up there, I arrived in Taipei. Again...another airport a billion miles away from the city center. Geez, friggin, Louise! Taipei is a zoo, but a nice zoo, with more 7-Eleven stores than you can shake a stick at, and Star****s friggin everywhere. How convenient was it tho to have the Youth ...

... green salad. The main course that we chose was filet mignon with Yukon mashed potatoes and green and yellow beans. Desert was Belgian Chocolate Cheesecake.  (Thanks to the United menu for the details of that meal!) One note: why do they take away all our "weapons" and then give us 2 dinner knives each at our meal???  There were sandwiches and noodles mid-way thru the flight, and another meal / snack ...

... event including entertainment by the employees. We sat in the front near all of the action. The menu included traditional Chinese fare sushi, shark fin soup, black chicken, "Buddha jumps over the wall" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha_ju mps_over_the_wall), among other things which we could not decipher. There are also pictures of the Dihua Street Market. Part of the Chinese New Year festivities there is a street market ...

... we were not too concerned. We checked in to one of the hotels and asked for a map of the hiking trails. After paying for two nights the staff cordially informed us that all trails but one (easy 1.3 mile stroll) were closed. Now it made more sense why the place was deserted... I guess with the amount of rainstorms, rock slides and river damage that has occurred most paths were deemed too dangerous to go on. As we drove up to the gorge I often thought that even the ...

... The policeman recommends to us one place with small huts and a hot spring pool area and tells the lao ban ( boss ) " Pien Yi " or cheap. So we get a hut with bath and TV and free use of hot spring pool and spa for 1000 a night. We thell them that we just arrived and wanted a look around the village first. We see a very cute restaurant which has won prices for it's creative cooking ( see photo of garden ). Other places are more expensive and it is now ...

... I know from home where everyone " Pssst " the other if he/she speaks a word, more a village gathering. The same experience I had in the Sheng Shi Bao Presbyterian church some other time. By the way, most of the sermon and singing is done in the tribal language. The texts are printed in Romanized letters, meaning you and me can read it. The romanization of the aboriginal languages was brought there by the priests and missionaries ...

while sitting on the plane waiting to take off for bangkok, I sat back and watched a video mantage (sp?) of scenes from North Pole, Alaska, to the tune of "I'll be home for Christmas." I'm pretty sure they wanted to see me cry. But nonetheless, I perservered. Off to Bangkok, oriental setting.