back from taiwan

whew! i'm back from my first overseas trip alone! haha. i've a ton to blog, though i probably wont put everything down here as it'll bore everyone to pieces, so i'll put it elsewhere. there were quite a few pictures taken but they were with my friends' cameras, so i'll have to wait till they upload them before i can post them here . :/

so the photo post will wait, and then there's the .. diary-post.. where most of it was written during taiwan itself, in my notebook. that comprises of my thoughts and such, and is pretty lenghty.. but it tracks my thoughts throughout the field camp especially. so if you wanna read them, check out http://alantaiwandiary.blogspot.com/ (will be posted later in the evening)

this post will just be.. 10 interesting facts about taiwan. =) (or 10 things you never knew about taiwan.. 10 fun facts.. whatever you call it)


1) Urinals flush before use.

Ok this is one weird phenomenon which makes no sense. In Singapore, when you stand there and pee then the red light comes on cos it detects you right? then you move away it turns green and flushes the pee away right?
In Taiwan, when you stand there, it flushes before your first drop of pee comes out. So effectively, it only washes away the previous pee when the next person comes to it. What's the rationale in doing this?


2) Taiwanese do things the right way.
You alight from the right side of the road (driver's seat is on the left side, unlike singapore's right side driver seat), vehicles keep to the right..
You keep right on escalators.


3) Their traffic lights are hella cool. (at least those in taipei)
Firstly, there are countdown timers at almost every light [road lights included, not just pedestrian lights] This way you know how long you'll be waiting for at the red light. (yes as in countdown timer for the red light, not the green pedestrian light in singapore)

Secondly, their green pedestrian light is actually a running man! yes, an animated running man! it's super cute la! if i had a camera i'll totally take a video of it. Then when the timer gets lower the man starts running faster and faster (not sure about this, could be an illusion as it is flashing.. but i'm quite sure it runs faster)

The traffic is quite hectic there though. quite scary, vehicles swerve around everywhere. which brings me to the next point.


4) The streets of Taipei are littered with motorbikes.
Seriously, yknow in Singapore when we suddenly see a group of motorbikes (group = >4) we go like 'motorbike gang!' (ok maybe it's just me) In Taiwan, they are EVERYWHERE! Alot alot alot of motorbikes. And they dont stick to lanes one, they anyhow swerve in and out of lanes. quite scary.


5) Baseball is Taiwan's favourite sport
Just as the majority of singaporeans like soccer and will watch live matches at coffeeshops and gather at friend's house to watch etcetc, that hot sport is Baseball in Taiwan. There was actually a giant TV screen outside a shopping centre and over 100 people gathered there and sat on the floor to watch a live baseball match being screened. They even had a live MC to rouse the crowd.
On the travel bus, the only channel on TV was baseball too . Imagine the boredom -_- lol


6) 'Robots' in SOGO.
Have you heard of SOGO? it's apparently some mega shopping centre franchise.. used to have in Singapore but now no more and instead got Metro.. Taka.. all these. In Taipei there are 3 SOGOs, and we went to one of them during our R&R.
Now they have this weird ritual which my mom claims Singapore has too.. but i swear in Taipei it's more robotic.

The place opens at 11 la.. all the shops and all. So from 11 to 11.10, ALL the shop owners will stand straight and still outside their shop with their hands behind their back. ALL. And yknow at the bottom of the escalator there's an escalator landing? There're about 8 stories in SOGO, so let's say there are 8 landings.
EVERY SINGLE landing there are at least 6 people (some 8) standing in 2 rows opposite each other in the same position, and whenever you pass them via your escalator, they will bow and give their customary greeting of 'huan ying guan ling' (i think it means welcome, please browse around or SOMETHING like that)

And their bow isn't like the halfhearted that, it's like 45 degree bow kind.
As for the shop owners, when you walk past their shop, they will do the full bow + greeting as well.
So the feeling of walking one round around the shopping centre feels like you're the prince of some palace. Everyone bowing to you. muahaha.

Then at main entrance there are 3 females doing this bow+greeting thing too - the freaky thing is they're EXTREMELY synchronized. Like totally in sync, when they go down and up while bowing it's exactly together.

i swear they're like robots!!!

And practically everyone has to put on pretty thick makeup. even the old aunties. I saw this old auntie with alot of makeup and it was quite gross. imagine.. your grandmother putting on as much makeup as avril lavigne.



7) Taipei Train Station resembles an airport.
When i first stepped into the station.. i was .. lost. It looked exactly like an airport.. the first thing you see is those counters like in the departure hall when you wanna check in. You know the big schedule thing that shows all flights and timings? The train station has that too.
The place was quite confusing though. Alot of different types of trains, different here and there. Had to do alot of asking to find out how to travel to our destination.

8) Permanent Sales Syndrome.
Every single thing is on sale.. as such it doesnt seem to matter whether there's a sale or not. It's like the original price was never the price.. like if i wanna sell something at 50 dollars i just claim the original price is 100 dollars and say '50% SALE!'.
i never found any shop that wasn't having a sale.

9) Lift Operator
SOGO has a lift operator! It's a pretty girl all dolled up and polite and cheerful as most sales staff in Taipei. seriously they're all super polite and nice.
I dont know if i'm lucky or what, but the people i meet all seem very nice and unselfish!
Ok let me sidetrack a bit to talk about the nice people. Ok nvm let's make that #10 cos i dont have a #10.

10) Taipei people are NICE.
This is speaking in general, obviously it's not possible for ALL of them to be nice. But when i say nice, i mean go-out-of-the-way nice. Ok for example there's this shoe shop which i bought from the previous day and i went back again. Then the uncle straight away recognized me and chatted with me. Then cos it was raining, he offered me his umbrella for temporary use! so nice can!

Then an even nicer person was this aunty i met.. cos it was raining right so my paper bag was a little wet and got torn. So stuff kept dropping out. So i was walking then one of my stuff dropped out on the floor. She just happened to be approaching from behind.. and before i could do anything she knelt down and picked it up for me.
Then after realising my predicament, she actually went into a shop ahead to ask the guy for a plastic bag for me!
So nice can! singapore where to find these kinda people?

The cab drivers are also quite chatty.. though i don't know if that's because we are foreigners. Though some can tell we're Singaporean, there was one cabbie that even praised our Mandarin. haha. All the cabbies talked to us and asked us where we were from, what were we doing.. and basically chatted the whole journey. Singapore where gotttt.


ah ok that concludes a long post. i needa go take a nap, slept only 2 hours last night. zzz. bye.