Asia – Upcoming Destination

Taiwan: “The Most Beautiful Scenery in Taiwan is People”

May 7, 2017 Ngilee Comments 1 comment

Continuing with stories of one of my favorite countries, this part of my travel is filled with soaking in hot springs, biking around the country side, eating good food, and meeting people along the way. Tough life ;p

From Taichung, I took the train all the way to Hualian in East Taiwan. After getting recommendations from the tourist bureau, I went with the hop on hop off buses from Taiwan Trip (http://en.taiwantrip.com.tw/) in combination with taking trains all around the Eastern and Northern parts of Taiwan. Here are some highlights:

Taroko Gorge

Taroko Gorge is very close to Hualian, it is perhaps the most visited tourist spot in the East part of Taiwan. It reminded me of some Chinese poems I read in school describing dark green trees and inky water. I never grasped the image until I went to Taroko.

ChiShang （池上）

ChiShang is famous for it’s rice fields made famous by a coffee commercial starring Takeshi Kaneshiro. I rode around the golden rice fields on a bike and had rice bento for lunch.

Beitou (北投)

Beitou is the hotspring paradise in northern Taipei, it has many options for hotsprings starting from $5. Going during non-peak times (M-F before 5) means I got to enjoy all the pools by myself! Also near the area is an old street (九份老街） packed with snack stalls.

Yilan (宜兰）

One of the nice surprises I found was Jimmy’s park in Yilan. Life size displays of book characters were everywhere, great place to take pictures 🙂

People in Taiwan

People I met in Taiwan were very warm and friendly. When I visited cafes and small restaurants, the owners or wait staff usually took the time to chat with me. An old couple running a cafe in ChiShang learned that I was travelling alone and they immediately worried about me getting lost.

While I was staying at a hostel in Taidong, I met Leo from Taichung, he was going on a solo motorcycle trip around Taiwan. His goal is to backpack around Europe and he was using the motorcycle trip to get over his shyness. He set up a goal to meet 100 people during his trip and he took polaroid pictures with each person he met on the road. I was glad to be one of his new friends.

Another cool person I met was Mr. Wong, a retired teacher from Guandong, we both took the Taiwan Trip bus and when we chatted, I felt like I had a personal philosopher and history teacher! Mr. Wong was young at heart and a lifelong educator. He enthusiastically showed me pictures of his family and told me I was the same age as his son. He called me “Little Lee” (小李), and insisted to buy me ice cream lol. When we visited the train museum, he told me history stories and recited a few poems. He also asked me to take pictures of him walking on the train tracks so that he could send the photos to his family. He told me that life was like the four seasons, if the first 30 years was spring, the next 30 years would be summer, and now he was in his autumn years. To him, he liked the liveliness of his summer years, but he liked his autumn years better because of the maturity and harvest of hard work. Before we part, he gave me a round pebble that he picked up from the lake and told me to think about how every drop of water channeled to the lake and how our worries were so small compared to all the big things happening around us.

Taiwan Part 1- Kenting and Taichung

March 2, 2017 Ngilee Comments 0 Comment

Four months later, I finally got back to updating this blog. I’ll backlog my travels from Taiwan to DC, Iceland, and New Zealand. I guess this is called later-blog?

Taiwan is one of my favorite places to visit as there are many things to do and the people are very friendly and nice. I highly recommend Taiwan as this treasure island has mountains, lakes, coasts, hot springs, amazing food, cultural history. Better yet, a dollar goes a long way here, transportation, food, and accommodation are all cheap. Because things are affordable here, I ended up doing a lot and drinking milk tea every day!

I stayed in Taiwan for three weeks which was plenty of time for me to go around the whole island. I first traveled south and from Kenting, I worked my way up to Taichung (central), Taitung (east), and then Taipei (north). The high speed rail was very convenient, it took about 2.5 hours from one end of the island to the other.

Kenting

Kenting is a small surf town located in the Southern tip of Taiwan, there you can enjoy the beach and a variety of water activities. Natalie, my best friend from Hong Kong, joined me in Kenting. Our agenda consisted of eating through the Kenting Night Market (垦丁大街) , surfing and diving. Time to reminiscence the days when we were in the swimming team! But first, we need a lot of food and beer…

Every night, our mission was to eat as much food as we could. We particularly like the fried mushrooms and hanging out at one of the many roadside bars 🙂

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Of course, we had to surf while in Kenting. We went to Ah Fei Surf (阿飞冲浪店), I was lucky that the head coach 飞哥 got time to teach me that day. All the instructors from Ah Fei Surf were very passionate about surfing, and they had many other talents as well! Including but not limited to tattoo designs and playing live music. I highly recommend taking a class with Ah Fei Surf. Here’s Natalie standing up on her board 🙂

The next day, we went back again to take one on one lessons. 飞哥 thought I could use some training on my turns, so he took me out to chase some waves. Incoming:

Next day we went scuba diving, overall, it wasn’t great visibility 🙁

After three days of sunshine, Typhoon Haima hit the Southern part of Taiwan, as the weather station described, Haima was both fat and big, so Natalie and I had to leave Kenting a day early to escape the Typhoon.

TaiChung

A decade ago, Taichung might not be a popular destination for tourists, however, the city made tremendous effort in making Taichung one of the art hubs in Taiwan. TaiChung is now full of cool cafes, art studios, and amazing restaurants. My favorite part was visiting the Alishan (阿里山) National Forest.

I found an amazing Airbnb in Taichung, the owners- Sherry and Jason put a lot of effort into designing the place, and their place was super comfortable. Sherry made me breakfast every morning and we ended up having a few long chatting sessions. Sherry and Jason were such wonderful hosts! Here’s a view of the first floor common area:

There are quite a few cool places around the Taichung train station such as- 宫原眼科 and the cultural and creativity industries park. Buy the best pineapple cakes and sun cakes from Taichung, they make great souvenirs!

Random display around the cultural and creativity industries park:

One of the roof top areas in the Fantasy district:

Fengjia Sweet Potato Ball is possibly the most memorable street snack I had in Taiwan. This store in Fengjia Night Market existed for 30 years, and they sell hand-made sweet potato balls that are chewy inside and crunchy outside. The store owner mushed sweet potatoes with sheer strength, look at those muscles!

Having some iced Oolong tea before going to Alishan, great with green bean cake:

Alishan National Forest

Don’t miss Alishan if you are visiting TaiChung, Alishan is one of the most famous mountains in Taiwan, and tea grown from Alishan is the best in class. If you like trains, you can take one up the mountains. If you are travelling solo and don’t like driving, I recommend going with Taiwan Trip (台湾好行), they have scheduled buses going to and from Chiayi every day, more info here: http://en.taiwantrip.com.tw/

Xitou (溪头）and the Monster Village （妖怪村）

Another cool forest area that I liked quite a bit was Xitou and the Monster Village . The hiking in Xitou was beautiful and the rain added some mystery to the scenery:

The Monster village was a themed village right next to Xitou. The whole village was decorated with Japanese-style monsters.It was a ton of fun looking through the houses and shops. Great place to take pictures!

Kansamida South Korea Part 2- Seoul and Seoraksan

November 7, 2016 Ngilee Comments 0 Comment

I was so glad to wear long sleeves and pants in Seoul! At least I wasn’t carrying them in vain. Even then, the coldest it got was 10 Degree Celsius- kind of like summer in San Francisco.

Seoul

My airbnb host Jenny brought me to a Ssam (wrap) restaurant nearby her house, the restaurant is a local favorite because it makes really good seafood sauce. The key to eating Ssam is to wrap bite size amount of meat, side dish, and seafood sauce inside two big vegetable leaves then eat the wrap all in one bite.

A friend I met in Busan told me about the international fireworks festival next to the Han river. People brought bento boxes, blankets, drinks, and poker cards while watching the fireworks go up in the air. There were many people though, so I escaped the scene early to avoid the crowd.

The next day I went to Gyeongbakgong, there was a full day of traditional music and dance performances right in front of the giant statue. The backdrop made the performances even more dramatic.

Anyone could rent traditional clothes to tour the palace area, and if you dress up, your admission to the place is free.

While I enjoy the historical buildings and lovely parks, I also appreciate Seoul’s busy streets. Areas such as the Hongik University area, Ewha Women University, Myeongdong are full of life. You can find stores after stores lining up along the street with food stalls in between. In Hongik area, artists take spots in busy streets for busking. After visiting Seoul, I strongly believe that Seoul has the highest number of cafés per street. Koreans really drink coffee like water! I have also spotted the 100 won (10 usd cent) coffee machine! If you put a coin in the machine, it gives you a 3- sip size hot coffee in a paper cup.

I highly recommend visiting the national museum in Seoul, it’s free! I felt like I had taken a crash course in the history of Korea after walking around the museum for a couple of hours.

Seoraksan

Nature inspired a lot of aspects of the Korean culture, Korean’s love of using wood in their living space, fresh local ingredients from nearby farms, and their love for hiking were just a few examples.

I experienced the Korean hiking culture first hand in Seoraksan National Park which is a few hours northeast of Seoul. I took the bus there early in the morning and stayed overnight in the mountains in a guest house.

First, Koreans are decked out with their hiking outfits. It looks like they are prepared for any mountain or weather:

Second, temples and Buda statues are delightful finds high up in the mountains. Most likely, you would also find inscriptions on stone walls near the temples. I hiked the most popular Ulsanbawi Rock trail and found all of the above. The tress, architectures and mountains are harmoniously situated next to each other.

Third, Koreans build stairs to the top of mountains, I don’t think they like switch backs that much. Though at times it seemed like the stairs were endless while I was hiking Seoraksan, I got very good views from every part of the stairs.

The whole hike took about 4 hours total, the nice part was restaurants and cafes waiting at the bottom of the mountain. Enjoying a cup of coffee after a good hike always lifts my spirits.

Kansamida South Korea Part 1- Busan, Gyeongju, and Andong

October 23, 2016 Ngilee Comments 1 comment

It’s my first time to visit South Korea and it will not be my last. I think South Korea has done a fantastic job developing their tourism. While it is one of Asian people’s favorite holiday destinations (thanks to Song Jong Ki, k-pop,Korean drama, and cosmetics), South Korea remains a hidden gem to Westerners. Actually, it is super easy to travel around South Korea without knowing Korean. Most transportation systems and stations have directions in English, Chinese, and Japanese in addition to Korean. South Korea is very affordable, you can have a meal anywhere from 2USD to 10USD. A ride on the local subway is about 1-2 USD. I would say South Korea is a great place for solo female travelers as it is very safe and scam-free.

I flew into Seoul from Okinawa and took the KTX (express train) to Busan which is in the Southern part of Korea. My ride took about 2.5 hours only. My airbnb hosts were very friendly and we all hung out for the long weekend since it was S. Korea’s national holiday. We had a BBQ, went to the beach, and had a few drinking sessions. It was nice to have a few non-touristy days after running around so much.

Busan

Busan is a rather quiet place except around their beaches- Haeundae beach and Gwangali beach. Haeundae beach got destroyed during the tsunami caused by one of the super typhoons that hit Busan. I escaped the storm as I was on a short trip to Andong that day. But I did get to visit both beaches before the storm:

The place I liked the most in Busan was Gamcheong Village, the whole district was revitalized as an art district to combat poverty. After world war II, there was a huge influx of people to Busan. The demand for housing was so tight that poor people had to move up the hills. The Gamcheong village area was a slum to begin with, but the residents wanted to revitalize the district by adding in art installations. As you can see in the photos, the whole area is very colorful. You can feel the effort being put in as you walk along the crooked stairways and narrow alleys.

The little prince and the fox was my favorite art installation:

Colorful fish shape art boards everywhere:

Artist at work:

Art everywhere:

Besides Gamcheong village, I also enjoyed spending time in Jagalchi market and seeing Beomeosa Temple (>1,000 year old temple, mostly burned down during Japanese invasion, but rebuilt again).

Gyeongju and Andong

Just an hour and a half away from Busan is Gyeongju, the historical capital of South Korea. Walking in Gyeongju made me feel like walking in a historical amusement park with old buildings and huge gardens. Everywhere is walkable and you can stop any time to have snacks. A lot of visitors enjoy dressing up in traditional Korean attire taking pictures around Gyeongju. This is a picture of the Anapji pond:

My friend Eva told me that if I went to Gyeongju then I must go to Andong. Andong Hanok village is a world heritage site, it is also the place where spiritual masks are made. Andong is two bus rides away from Gyeongju, though it is a bit out of the way, it is totally worth visiting.

Hanok village means “the village that the river wraps around”, most residents of the village are farmers. They are very friendly people, an old man on a scooter asked me to help him carry a huge pumpkin to his house. He didn’t speak English and I didn’t speak Korean, but he gave me a high five after I completed the task.

I took a boat over to the cliff to hike up the mountain:

Andong is a very peaceful place, next time I visit, I want to do a home stay in Andong 🙂 I also met another Chinese female solo traveler while I was in Andong, and we took pictures of each other posing in the medical museum with traditional Korean outfits.

This part of my solo trip turned out to be full of new friends!

Haisai Okinawa- Diving, Bitter Melon, and Wedding

October 12, 2016 Ngilee Comments 0 Comment

The Okinawa prefecture is made up of thousands of Ryukyu islands, with sandy beaches and clear blue water, Okinawa is a place where people unwind and relax. The reason I came to Okinawa was to attend Ruby and Chi’s wedding, not knowing what to expect, I was pleasantly surprised by the uniqueness of Okinawa. While its very chill, there’s also a lot of history behind this area from the Ryukyu kingdom era as well as world war II.

Diving

The first thing that excited me was diving in Okinawa, the clear blue water and 150 feet of visibility gave me the feeling that I was diving in an aquarium. The water was so warm that I didn’t need to wear a wet suit. The pictures were from Kerema Island with underwater valleys and coral reef mountains.

Beaches and Cape Maeda

There were many beaches and snorkeling areas in Okinawa, my airbnb host, Taka took me to Cape Maeda for snorkeling. On my second week here, Mishy joined me and we went to Zanpa beach near Yomitan. Getting to the beaches without a car was challenging, we managed none the less. On a good day, you could see many marine animals in the Cape Maeda snorkeling area, Michelle and I spent the whole morning watching them.

Foooooood

Okinawans are famous for their longevity, I think it has to do with their healthy diet, sunshine, and their relaxed attitude. Every meal I had while I was in Okinawa was very tasty, I tried almost all recommended local cuisines- bitter melon, purple yam, sea grapes, agu pork, soba and sea salt ice cream 🙂 Here’s a picture from a small restaurant on international street in Naha, it was so good that I went back with Mishy to enjoy their bitter melon stir fry and roast pork.

Another favorite meal of mine was from a Japanese restaurant with set lunches, look at the variety and presentation!

If you are in Okinawa, you must try their Awamori (rice wine). It is especially refreshing when you drink it on the rocks in a hot summer day.

Sightseeing

I think the best way to spend time in Okinawa is to relax by the beach and eat delicious food. But there are a few sightseeing spots that I think are must-sees.

Chumauri Aquarium (up north)- Whale sharks! Also an extremely dreamy green house near the aquarium.

International Street (Koukusai): One of the busiest streets in Naha, the street is packed with restaurants, shops, and entertainment. Mii-chan (picture below) is the shopkeeper of a towel shop, he was taking a nap when I visited.

Shuri-jo Castle: Probably the most traditional style building you’ll see in Okinawa, it’s strikingly red and situated on a hill. A Japanese grandpa flagged me down in Shurijo park, he spoke to me in Japanese for 20 mins and gave me a cold beer.

The wedding!

The most exciting part about my Okinawa trip was Ruby and Chi’s wedding, frankly speaking I had been anticipating this event for a few years since I knew Ruby and Chi for over ten years now. It was a gorgeous day at a gorgeous venue. Ruby was stunning in her wedding dress and I definitely cried a little during the ceremony 🙂 Congratulations Ruby and Chi!!

I was also very happy to have spent a couple of days in Okinawa with Vinci, Jeff, Katie and Lucus. Katie, the two year old darling, was quite the adventurer! I can’t wait till the day I can go surfing with her! I admire Vinci and Jeff for their parenting skills and stamina!

Hong Kong- thus many Food Pictures

September 21, 2016 Ngilee Comments 0 Comment

This is my third trip to Hong Kong within a twelve month period, and this has been a longer stay compared to the previous two times. Hong Kong still feels like home after all these years, my two weeks in Hong Kong flew by between eating good food and hanging out with family and friends.

I notice I haven’t been taking that many pictures, this is under representing Hong Kong’s entertainment reputation! Nonetheless, here are some highlights:

點心代表 (in Central district, MTR exit D)

This dim sum place is pretty special, all the dim sums are characters and have faces on them. Some of the buns are kinda gross- they either vomit cream or poop chocolate. It’s oddly satisfying to play with your food.

La Espana

Marvel at this waffle tower with ice-cream, brownie bites, and caramelized banana!! It also comes with five different toppings. I caught up with Andy and Mavis over dinner and this magnificent dessert. I came back to Hong Kong last time for their wedding and it warmed my heart to visit their home this time. Their home was well thought out and reminded me of the transformer homes I saw on TV.

Fashion events

Thanks to Mishy and Chris, I went to two fashion events during my short stay. The Lane Crawford launch party was full of snacks and food, I was sure my motif going there was different than most people at the event. I also got to sit in the first row of a fashion show (thanks to Chris for the tickets). My impression was, tall slippers would be very popular this season in Hong Kong.

Catching up with my best friend

Meet my best friend- Natalie. Natalie and I spent a lot of time in cafes playing board games and looking for cute stuff. So glad we found the Totoro shop in Causeway Bay!! I stayed with Natalie for a week and was so glad to meet her cute fluffy cats- Tasha and Mochi. I think I made pretty good friends with both of them 🙂 I didn’t get a good picture of Mochi, so here’s a photo of Tasha.

Family Time!

I spent mid-autumn festival with my family in Hong Kong this year. Instead of eating traditional moon cake, we ate normal mini cakes. We didn’t see much of the moon as a typhoon was lurking near Hong Kong bringing us lots of rain. I stayed with Mishy for a week, the two of us went to the Escape the Room game room and took on a puzzle challenge fit for six people. I thought we made really good progress trying to break out of the “elevator”. In the end, we didn’t solved all the puzzles within 45 mins. We got lost as a team! Since both of us love cats, we went to some cat cafes. Featuring in the image was a cat that bit me after luring me to hug her…

I am in Okinawa now and will be going to Seoul and Taiwan soon. If any of you would like a postcard, leave a comment or send me your address through private message!