Preliminary Thoughts Following a Visit to Taiwan

It is crowded, warm, and humid.  Traffic is impressive, mostly because of the scooters.   They're everywhere - in the crosswalk, on the sidewalk, in your lap if you're not careful.  Come to think of it, some of you guys would probably have a fun vacation just renting scooters and driving around Taipei like maniacs.  

The National Palace Museum is the greatest repository of Chinese cultural artifacts in the world, most of which are kept in a bomb shelter.  The tiny sliver you can look at still overwhelms the senses.  Museum fatigue sets in faster than any place I've ever been.  If you're ever flying to Asia for any reason, it's worth booking the trip through Taipei - even just a one day layover - to go check this place out.
 

The other big tourist attractions are generally a bust, for various reasons.

• Sun Yat Sen Memorial Hall is beautiful, and it's worth going to see the changing of the guard, but it really functions more as a civic center.  
• Taipei 101 deserves its own blog post, but for now let's settle for "hey, how about Architecture 101?"  Awkward and insectoid, it fails even as a phallic symbol.
• Then there is 228 Peace Memorial Park.  Certainly the White Terror should be memorialized.  After World War II the Nationalists sent corrupt bureaucrats to replace the Japanese administration.  Complaints and unrest ensued, leading Chiang Kai-shek to suspect that the Taiwanese elites needed some mainland-style attitude adjustment.   This was achieved via the imposition of martial law, as well as a policy of knocking on doors and shooting whomever opened them.  After order had been restored, martial law was lifted - in 1987. 
• To assuage both local and mainland sensitivities, Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall was, for a while, renamed Democracy Memorial Hall, but the name has since reverted back to honor the Generalissimo.  We didn't go. I'd already resolved to ignore anything relating to, or named after, Chiang Kai-shek.  

Enough on the negatives - this is one of the best places to hang out on earth, especially if you have some Mandarin speakers in your group.  It is safe and very walkable, with many neighborhoods still based on the old shophouse logic.  Other good things:

• The city never sleeps, really.  After dinner they open the night markets, and you can shop and eat hawker food there until 6 in the morning if you want to.  
• Taxis are cheap, and after a major reform effort, safe and honest.  Go wherever you want for about three bucks.
• The people are great.  We kicked around Taipei for two weeks and never met a jerk.  
• The food is great.  12 course vegetarian meal?  Yes sir, right away, best you've ever had, $30.
• Taipei has a thriving boutique design industry, which has led to an outbreak of nice coffee shops and little lunch places in Zhongshan.  The restaurant at the Taipei Film House (formerly the U.S. consulate) is a nice example.  I could spend another month there just hanging out in these places.  More coffee, please!
• English bookstores are a little tough to find, but the Page One bookstore at Taipei 101 has everything you'd want.  Your Kindle works fine in Taipei, too, and Amazon lets you use their web browser for free.
• Starbucks is everywhere.
• Since 1997 Anchorage, Alaska has been Taipei's Partner City.  I don't know what that means, but it may prove useful when you go there.

 It's a good secret.  Go to Taipei if you get the chance.