Sun Yat Sen Memorial, Confucius Temple (again), Foot Massage, and CKS Memorial at night

Wednesday, July 18^th

It’s funny when you travel, you do things that you normally wouldn’t do at home.  I have become a master at hand washing my clothes and stretching the life of my clothes before they become too smelly to wear.  At home, I would immediately throw my dirty clothes in a hamper to wash, but here febreeze is my best friend and I can stretch out the life of a shirt, shorts, or shirt for several days.  I did some more handwashing this morning, so at this point in the trip I have washed all my clothes at least once through handwashing or at the washing machine here at the hotel.  I think I should be good for the rest of my trip except for a handwashing at one of my next stops. 

This morning I planned on getting up early to go the Presidential Office Building and Xiao Nanmen, but I read last night on Trip Advisor that it really wasn’t worth it, but I still set my alarm and thought if I was motivated I would attempt to go.  Let’s just say, I hit snooze several times and enjoyed sleeping in this morning.

I met Kelly & Jackie #2 at 11:00am to head over to the Sun Yat Sen Memorial.  The sky was overcast, so I put on my dragon pendant again in the hopes that it would bring up good weather again.  I really didn’t want to strike out in our attempts to the see the Memorial.  Fortunately, the rain held off, even though a couple of drops fell, it never rained and the pendant worked again.  J 

We made it over to the memorial just before 12noon to experience the changing of the guard at the Sun Yat Sen Memorial.  The Memorial complex reminds me of the Kennedy Center in that the facility houses several educational and cultural events and activities. 

 

One interesting detail of our visit to the Memorial is the fact that many youngsters use the terrace of the Memorial to practice their dancing.  It was very striking to us that people would be allowed to use that space to hang out and dance.  Furthermore, during all my trips on the MRT today, we even say young people dancing in open space of the one of the MRT stations. 

This leads me to a whole other discussion on the MRT system in Taipei.  The MRT train system is very much like the D.C. metro system except for the fact that MRT has nice bathrooms in every station, mini-malls in most stations, and over 4 exits in every station.  Every station is a maze, but fortunately it is very well marked so it is easy to navigate.  You could spend hours underground though with all the stores and food places in the various stations.  I even got a food massage in the Banqaio station today! 

After lunch, I went back to the Confucius Temple with Kelly since she wanted to go since Jackie #2 and I had raved about it. On our way there, we say some bamboo stalks on the street.  They were so tall! 

And check out the freshly peeled bamboo! 

 I really enjoyed the temple and didn’t mind at all going back a second time to see it again.  I realized I missed the inscription the first time that hangs on the uppermost beam in the Hall of Great Achievement written by Chiang-Kai- Shek that reads, “Education for All,” so I was happy to go back and see it for myself and document it. 

Education for All

Plus, I saw the future Taiwanese Eminem at the temple.  Check out how adorable this little boy is!

 

After the Confucius Temple, we headed to Banqiao to meet Kelly’s host family from there for dinner.  We stopped off at the Banqiao MRT shopping mall for a foot massage.  It cost me 300 NTD for a 30 minute foot and calf massage which is $20 U.S. dollars.  What a deal!  My feet definitely appreciated the massage since we have been walking a ton since we got to Taipei City. 

We meet the Kao family - Cynthia, Ester, and Mrs. Kao (unfortunately Principal Kao couldn’t join us), Kelly’s host family, for dinner at a hot pot restaurant.  It was my first time having hot pot so I wasn’t really sure what to expect, but I really enjoyed it and definitely tried something way outside my comfort zone – duck blood! 

Don't I look a little scared?!

 

Duck blood has a tofu like consistency and takes like rare meat, but not as chewy.  The hot pot was delicious!  Our hot pot had corn, tofu, taro, duck blood, mushrooms, cabbage, meat, seafood, mystery meatball, and who knows what else!  All I know was that it was spicy but good! 

Cynthia & Mrs. Kao

After dinner, we head back to our hotel to meet up with Kelly’s sister who arrived this evening. Kelly and her sister are heading to Cambodia on Friday. 

Kelly and I really wanted to see the CKS Memorial at night after seeing a picture of the Memorial lit up at night so we went back to check it out and we were not disappointed.

 

Our original plan included a stop at the Shilin Night Market but just before we were about to aboard the MRT, I checked by handy dandy Taiwan guide book and saw that the market closes at 9pm.  It was already 9:30pm so we decided to call it a night. 

Tomorrow is our last full day in Taiwan…..Time has flown. 

Fortunately, we have a farewell dinner with all our new friends from Taiwan tomorrow evening so we can celebrate our time here and thank all of our wonderful hosts and new friends.