Taipei: Subway

While Seoul's subway system began operation in 1974, Taipei's MRT only came online in 1996, but has had an enormous impact on the city's liveability, easing an unbearable traffic congestion problem and making a big difference in air quality. It has also spurred urban renewal, making outlying areas more accessible.

I stayed at the Happy Family Hostel (which I can strongly recommend for no-frills accommodation), located a two-minute walk from "Taipei Main Station". On my first morning, I was concerned by the many doors, hallways and staircases/escalators of what seemed a maze of a station; however, it was well-marked, and is besides an exception to the simplicity of most MRT stations, as it is the confluence of three lines, the main bus station, a shopping mall (Qsquare) and an underground shopping center.

I was surprised and charmed at my entry point to the station by this artwork:



Artwork frequently adorns the exterior of such public spaces, but I can't remember seeing much of it on the actual subway platform before:




While coverage of the MRT is still a bit sparse, they are working on it, with the brown line opening in 2009 and the Nangang Eastern Extension being completed last year.

It is also foreigner-friendly, with English everywhere, and video screens that give the arrival times in minutes of the next train, like I noticed in Shanghai. Most routes in Seoul now have a linear picture which shows the next arrival inching along the line.




And, like any other big city, you can buy a "SmartCard" for about USD 3 and save a little bit on your fares--which are quite cheap at around 20 to 30 NT, where 30 NT (New Taiwan Dollar) is about USD 1.

Just like Seoul, the subway system is a key part of having a good experience in the city.

Taipei: Temples

Confucius Temple:
Was built during the Qing dynasty; it is dedicated to education, but on my visit there were no acolytes in evidence.






Boa-an Temple:
Located directly adjacent to the Confucius temple, it is the oldest Buddhist temple in Taipei. It stays busy, but not as busy as Longshan temple.





Guandu Temple:
Located far to the northwest of city center, get off at the Guandu stop on the red line, then take one of the frequent mini-buses the short distance to the temple. This is quite simply the must-see temple in Taipei. First of all, it exists in multiple levels, stretching to the top of the hillside, and affording nice views of the river.






Secondly, there are a pair of tunnels running through the mountainside. They are lined with icons of minor Buddhist gods and bas-reliefs of religious scenes.

Taipei: Food at Shillin Night Market

Taipei's most renown market is the Shillin Night market, but to go there, don't get off at the Shillin subway station, use Jiantian, one stop to the south.





No Seoulite will be especially impressed with Shillin, or at least no Seoulite who has been to Namdaemun or the Dongdaemun food market. Understandable as Seoul's population is three times larger



Below are some red bean cakes being assembled; the filling in these is not as tasty as what we get in Seoul, but I liked the cake part better.

Here are a couple odd choices, first some roasted cane, and below that, Wow! Frogs eggs! Okay, they aren't really frog's eggs, but some kind of green fruit beverage--frankly, I think they're oranges that haven't turned orange.

Taipei: Some History

Evidence for human settlement of Taiwan goes back 30,000 years, a history detailed in the National Taiwan Museum, the country's oldest, established in 1908. Its cases are full of artifacts like those below, detailing the natural and human history of the island.




If those totems look similar to what you might find in Polynesia, that's because they are: the indiginous tribes speak varieties of the Malayo-Polynesian languages, and many linguists think that Taiwan is the homeland of the language group, and thus the original population center from which sea-faring peoples dispersed across southeast Asia and the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Still, mostly it looks like pretty standard museum fare, though I gotta love this enormous carving:


Through the centuries, Taiwan has been claimed by many seafaring nations including the Portugese, the Spanish, the Dutch, the English and of course the Japanese, as well as the Chinese. The main reason for this is the island's strategic location. Imperial Japan ruled Taiwan from 1985 to the end of WWII when control was given to the Republic of China.



Dr Sun Yat-sen is revered on mainland China as well as in Taiwan (technically, the ROC) as the Father of the Nation--Dr. Sun Zhongshan. I visited the Zhongshan Gardens in Beijing, right beside Tiananmen Square, in Beijing back in 2009 (scroll down a bit). I arrived at the SYS Memorial in Taipei just in time for the changing of the guard. The bronze statue is 5.8 m tall and weighs 16.7 tons.




Taiwan's other "father" is Chiang Kai-shek, the ruling strongman from 1948 until his death is 1975. Well, he started out as President of the ROC, the constitutional government of mainland China, but fled to Taiwan when Mao's Red Chinese won the Chinese Civil War in 1949. With him came about 2 million people, mostly members of the Kuomintang, the political party begun by Dr Sun, soldiers and most importantly the intellectual and business elites.

The CKS Memorial includes a de rigueur giant bronze, and a selection of memorabilia, including a pair of his specially-built Caddies (one posted earlier), sedan chairs, photos with world leaders, military decorations, and a wax likeness in a replica office attending to his Presidential duties.



Before Chiang relocated to the island, administrative duties were managed, or rather mismanaged, by a provincial governor named Chen Yi. His poor treatment of the locals famously led to a revolt and an absurd, murderous overreaction that is known as the 2-28 Incident. The 2-28 Freedom Park and a well-done museum record the episode.

The people were suppressed and discontented:


A 40-year-old woman, trying to scrape by by selling cigarettes, was accosted then pistol-whipped by a government agent in February, 1947:


News of the incident spread, in part by people who took over the local radio station (the station bulding is now home to the museum). Confrontation became more and more heated, with the result that a police officer shot a bystander named Chen Wen-xi. Protests continued to mount, and in "The Suffering" unknown thousands of Taiwanese were killed, exiled, improsoned or "disappeared".


Many of the known dead are memorialized in this elegant structure at the museum:



The state of Martial Law continued all the way until 1987--though Chen Yi was recalled and later executed for unrelated excesses. Chiang Kai-shek continued the lockdown on dissent, and kept the Kuomintang as the only legal political party throughout his rule, sometimes called the White Terror.

With a new democracy begun in 1987, the 2-28 Museum and Peace Park was opened in 1995.