.png)
Just so you don’t waste your time in Taiwan I thought I should complete this post before going on to more Singapore timely events.
We gave this market a miss –
Shilin Night Market Shilin is the famous night market in the capital city Taipei. However, it’s become a victim of urban regeneration and has been cleaned up and re-situated in a basement foodcourt where its become even smokier and smellier, but without it’s open-air atmosphere. By this time we were night marketed out and everyone voted to give it a miss.
This one wasn’t ready for us –
LiuHe Night Market, Liuhe Second Road (Day 5) This street is known for food, clothing and bags, and lots of Japanese cuisine. It’s a night market. The tour scheduled a visit at 11 am in the morning. What can I say? This is not a place to visit in the morning!
And you can take these or leave these as far as I’m concerned –
Danshui Historical Shopping District, Danshui, Taipei New City (Day 1) This is a pretty riverside town originally colonized by the Spanish. There are two shopping streets, one fronting the DanShui River, the other parallel to it and flanked by slightly European looking double story houses. The river view’s really good at sunset on a summer’s evening we were told, but it was dark when we got there. Perhaps it was the hour, perhaps it was the wintry rainy weather but the place had a slightly broken down and tired feel to it. I didn’t really feel compelled to come back again at a better time and in better weather, not even for the delicious yam pastry we tried.
XiMenDing Night Market , Taipei (Day 1) This is the quintessential Tai Pei night shopping district. Lots of clothes and handbags shop, a famous rice-vermicelli stall, another famous ice-cream shop, and the usual stinky tofu shops. But I found it a poor imitation of Kowloon’s Mongkok Shopping District. After hearing so much about the place, it was a disappointment.
To round off, a recommendation if you happen to be in Taichung –
Yizhong Street Night Market, TaiChung (Day 2) Its similar to XiMenDing but with a distinctive university student atmosphere and very cheap eats. The specialty here is ‘big sausage wrapped around small sausage snack’ or glutinous rice wrapped sausages. I found it nauseatingly oily but interesting. There’s also a huge selection of the oily deep fried and grilled fast food, including grilled ‘bishop’s nose’ or the fatty little backend of a chicken! Good to gawk over but not to eat. We ended up at a hot-pot place on the main road serving chicken soup, sesame oil chicken and chicken rice. Our hotpot – bitter gourd and pineapple – was something new and quite delicious.
Comments