Bad Weather Activity (and why we don't go for walks anymore)

Thankfully, our apartment here in Taiwan is fairly huge, so there is adequate space indoors to engage DS in some physical activities to burn off those extra toddler energy.

As I have probably mentioned to many, we hardly go out on weekdays anymore. On weekends, we try to do some sightseeing (if DH is up to it) or grocery shopping. There are a few playgrounds just within walking distance from our apartment block, but the current doggie craze in Taiwan means that playgrounds and pavements frequently have doggie poo on them. For those who aren't aware of the doggie craze in Taiwan, in recent years, it has been "hip" and "fashionable" to own a little doggie, probably the smaller the better. Much like the doggie craze in Japan, really. Doggie owners take great pride in accessorizing their pooches with doggie clothing, collars, hats and even doggie strollers. Yes, doggie strollers. During our early days in Taiwan, we were in search of a narrow, 3-wheeled all-terrain stroller for DD. Imagine my excitement when I saw a middle-aged lady pushing one such stroller at Taipei 101. Upon closer inspection to see what brand it was, I saw a little pooch looking back at me. Sigh.

I was also surprised to find out that the air in Taiwan is quite polluted. With a PSI of above 100 almost everyday, DS's nose acts up occasionally. He has never had problems with allergies prior to this. Those of you who live in Singapore would be familiar with what the air is like with PSI above 100 - that would be when forest fires in Indonesia send smoke blowing towards Singapore and we get a PSI update on TV every 3 hours or so. We just stay home here with the air-con on 24/7 now.

We also stay home because there are quite a few construction projects happening just around our block. On windy days, small particles get blown into our eyes and DS would want to come home even before we've walked 20 metres. On one such morning, I had barely walked 10 metres out of our block when I felt tiny, continuous splashes of water. As it couldn't have been rain (since it was so sunny and cloudless), I looked around for the source of splashing water. To my horror, the almost-completed luxury apartment block directly opposite me was being "washed". Yes, water was running from the top of the building and down the facade of the building, and because it was so windy, the water was being blown at us.

Anyhow, we have resorted to a variety of activities indoors in an attempt to entertain ourselves. In the video below, DS can't decide if he's playing golf or baseball.

Taipei 101

We finally made it up to the Observatory at Taipei 101 today. We were here at Taipei 101 previously, but it was raining then, so we decided to wait for a sunny day to get better views from the Observatory since we would have to pay NT$400 (about S$20) per adult to enter. Well, not that the views were going to be very much better since Taipei is frequently hazy. We were also hoping to go out onto the Outdoor Observatory area, which is closed when it rains. Unfortunately, when we were there today, the Outdoor Observatory area was also closed due to some renovation work.

Taipei 101 is currently the world's tallest completed building, with 101 floors above ground level and 5 floors underground. When the Burj Dubai in UAE is completed (expected date of completion is September 20o9), it will overtake Taipei 101 as the tallest building in the world. Hmm...I just realised that I don't have a picture of Taipei 101 for my blog. Well, for those who are interested, just do a google and many pictures of Taipei 101 will show up. :P

To go up to the Observatory on the 89th floor of Taipei 101, we took the fastest elevator in the world! Travelling at 1010m/min, we were up to the 89th floor in less than 40 seconds!


Here is a picture of the world's biggest passive wind damper. It serves to prevent damage to the building due to vibrations. In this case, vibrations to 101 may be caused by earthquakes or typhoons.

Here are some pictures taken from the Observatory on the 89th Floor. Although sunny, it was very hazy and visibility was very much affected.

Here are some pictures of the family while up at the Observatory. It's getting increasingly difficult to get a good family picture with everybody looking at the camera. Either one or even both of the kids will be looking away!

Here is DD, finally sound asleep in the wrap. :)

Typhoon Fong-Wong

Typhoon Fung-Wong (meaning "Phoenix" in Chinese) is our second typhoon this month. The first was Kalmaegi, which did not affect Taipei very much, but devastated Taichung, leaving 20 people dead and 6 missing.

Fung-Wong arrived on Taiwan's east coast just before 7am on Monday, 28 July, before exiting the west coast at about 2.30pm. We experienced winds of up to 140km/h and very heavy rains. Public offices and schools were closed that day, so DH had a day off. Although Fung-Wong was much stronger than Kalmaegi, the casualties from Fung-Wong (2 people dead and 6 injured) were relatively fewer due to precautionary measures taken by the Taiwan government.

We were quite prepared ourselves. We had our non-battery operated torchlights and emergency radio, which were part of our emergency equipment from Denver when we were preparing for snowstorms. We boiled a few pots of drinking water just in case the water supply got cut off and also filled DD's baby bathtub with water. DH went out and got us more bread to supplement our other foodstuff in the pantry. Thankfully, we didn't have to use any of our emergency supplies. The kids had a bad night though, because the loud howling winds and heavy rains kept them awake. April to October is typhoon season here in Taiwan, although July apparently has the most typhoons and storms are most frequent from July to October. Well, hopefully, we wouldn't see anymore typhoons before we leave Taiwan in October this year!

Here is a video taken from our living room window. You can actually see the windows rattling from the strong winds. Rain water had also seeped collected along the window sills. The heavy rains, no doubt, left our windows spotlessly clean!

Our Apartment in Taiwan

OK, here's what many of you are waiting for - pictures of our apartment here in Taiwan! :P Sorry it took me so long to get this post up. :)

Our apartment in Taiwan is pretty massive in comparison to our tiny little apartment in Singapore. Here, we have 4 bedrooms, a large dining room, an even larger living room, a kitchen and utility area. Of course, we never had the intention of getting such a big place since cleaning it is a nightmare, it just happened to be the most appropriate (read: within walking distance to DH's workplace, relatively clean, not broken-down, fairly new - 5 years old, as compared to others which are 20 to 30 years old and fairly well-maintained) one out of the 20+ apartments viewed by DH and my dad. We would have much preferred a cozy 2 bedroom apartment.

Here's our living room. It's big enough to put a big play area for the kids (as seen in the next picture).



Here's the dining room. In the background, the 4 doors lead to the bedrooms.


And lastly, not forgetting the views from our apartment! We're on the 9th floor and we get lovely, sweeping views all the way to the mountains. In this first picture below, if you can spot the tallest building (slim, rectangular building in a dark brown colour), Takeshi Kaneshiro owns a penthouse there. He probably doesn't spend a lot of time here in Taiwan because I haven't spotted him yet. Oops, now you all know the other thing I do in my free time here in Taiwan! :P

Tell Me This Isn't Dangerous!

So, we get sweeping views all the way to the mountains from our apartment here in Taipei, and interestingly enough, I see people on the roof of houses on a regular basis. Everytime I see someone on the roof, I get really terrified and worried for those guys. With every step they take, I hold my breath for a while. Yes, it is THAT stressful!

In the first picture, this looks like a father and son team on a DIY repair-our-roof mission. (Sorry, I didn't have the time to edit the picture and place a circle around the people on the roof so I hope you can spot them)

In the next picture below, those people are probably professional roof builders. Yep, a new roof was built over the old roof. The building in the picture below is actually just behind the building in the picture above, and is about double its height. I mean, just one wrong footing and won't they roll all the way down to the ground below?!? From what I can see, they don't have any safety harness on them.

OK, so now you all know what I do in my free time here in Taiwan. Haha.

We Finally Met Up!

I say "finally" because we have been trying to meet up ever since I arrived in Taiwan 2 months ago. Beverly (she used to be called Jo) and I used to be housemates back in 1996 when I was studying in Sydney. We attended the University of New South Wales' Foundation Course together and would hang out 24/7. Those were the days when my spoken Mandarin used to be quite magnificent. Hahaha.

Still a swinging single, Beverly has hardly changed one bit. She's still as pretty as ever!

We also met up with Beverly's BFF (Best Friend Forever), Fiona (the lady in striped top), and Angela, who used to be Beverly and Fiona's housemate when they attended university in Queensland. Beverly, Fiona and I are all of the same age, while Angela is a year younger than us.

Vacation Sun Moon Lake (23-24 June 2008)

Immediately after leaving Kaohsiung, we headed for Sun Moon Lake. From Kaohsiung, we took the High Speed Rail (HSR) to Taichung, the journey being slightly less than an hour. From Taichung, a car ride of 1 hour 15 minutes brought us to Sun Moon Lake.

Sun Moon Lake is the largest lake in Taiwan and located in the centre of Taiwan. It is called "Sun Moon Lake" because the eastern part of the lake is shaped round like the sun, while the western part is shaped like a crescent moon. In the middle of Sun Moon Lake is an island called Lalu Island, which separates the "sun" and the "moon" part of the Lake. Lalu Island, which used to home to the Shao tribe (one of the aboriginal tribes in Taiwan), used to be much bigger than what it is now. Unfortunately, during the building of a hydroelectric power plant in 1934, water was channeled into Sun Moon Lake from neighbouring lakes to increase the depth of the Lake from 6 to 27 metres. This made the island smaller than what it was. In addition, an earthquake in 1999 sunk the island further. Lalu island is now off-limits to the public, but regular boat trips every hour bring visitors close to the island for a better view.

Below is a picture taken at the aboriginal village at Sun Moon Lake. There were some curios, interesting teas and food items, but we didn't end up getting anything.

Here at Sun Moon Lake, we stayed at the Del Lago hotel, a relatively new hotel which opened in 2005. The rooms were beautiful and modern, but probably more suited to honeymooners or couples looking for a getaway. As you can see from the pictures below, the bathtub is of "open-concept", so one can admire the lovely view of Sun Moon Lake while taking a bath.

The rooms that we got overlooked Sun Moon Lake and the views were simply stunning.

There were separate shower and toilet cubicles with doors, but even then, the doors didn't have locks on them. Thankfully, we were given two rooms side-by-side to each other, so we could send DS off to the next room if we wanted to use the toilet or have a shower.

I couldn't resist taking a picture of the shower cubicle with the very modern shower system in it. At the touch of a knob, one could direct water to come out from either of the two shower heads, or from the holes located on the shower system panel (which sent water shooting out horizontally!). Very cool. Of course, DH had a ball of a time playing with the shower system.

DS's Shopping Cart

Don't you just love it when places have little people in mind? I'm always impressed when restaurants provide special cute cutlery, unbreakable drinking cups, and pull out the crayons and paper for little people. But this can't be beat! A shopping cart for kids! DS was elated to finally get to push the cart when we were at Jason's Supermarket (an upmarket supermarket mainly catering for expats) in Kaohsiung. He was so excited everytime we put our groceries into his little shopping cart.

And here he is at the checkout. Nevermind that the cashier could hardly see the tiny shopping cart over the counter. :P

Fo Guang Shan

While in Kaohsiung, we visited Fo Guan Shan, about a half hour cab ride from Grand Hi-Lai hotel. Fo Guan Shan, founded by Venerable Master Hsin Yun in 1967, is the largest Buddhist monastery in Taiwan with over 200 branch temples throughout the world. Its headquarters is in Kaohsiung. The grounds of Fo Guan Shan temple in Kaohsiung span more than 30 hectares. Below is a map of the temple grounds.

Here is DS posing at the Five Hundred Arhats Garden. The figures behind DS are carved out of white marble and there are really 500 of them in the garden, known as the Five Hundred Arhats. According to Fo Guang Shan's website, these 500 Arhats were "the saintly disciples of the Buddha, who followed the Buddha to become monks, cultivating the path and teaching the Dharma".
DD, as usual, was initally sound asleep when we first arrived at Fo Guang Shan. Behind us, you can see the 36 metre tall statue of Amitabha Buddha, which was built in 1975.

The Main Shrine, with a size of 3570 square metres (it can apparently house 1000 people) and 30 metres in height, was truly the most spectacular and magnificent room in the temple. Unfortunately, we couldn't take any pictures in there. There are pictures of the Main Shrine on Fo Guang Shan's website though, if anyone is interested. Within the Shrine sat three Buddha statues, each 7.8 metres tall. The interior four walls of the Shrine are lined with 14800 smaller statues of the Buddha. It really was a magnificent sight.

Vacation Kaohsiung (21-23 June 2008)

DH was able to take some time off work so we decided to take a short trip to Kaohsiung and Sun Moon Lake. Kaohsiung is 345km south of Taipei and we travelled there via Taiwan's new High Speed Rail (HSR), which began operating in January of 2007. The journey from Taipei Main Station to Kaohsiung took us only 1.5 hours, as compared to 4 hours by car in good traffic, or 8 hours in bad traffic. Here we are on board the HSR. The ride was really comfortable. The seats were wide and comfy, and the leg room is huge.

From the New Zuoying HSR station, a short car ride of 20 minutes took us to our hotel in Kaohsiung. We stayed at the Grand Hi-Lai, which is just walking distance to Kaohsiung's famous Love River. The Love River flows some 12km through Kaohsiung and ends at Kaohsiung Harbor. It is a major tourist attraction (not dissimilar to River Thames in London) with a park that runs along it in Kaohsiung city. There are boats which take tourists up and down the river and this place comes alive, especially in the evenings, with a night market and cafes. Here are pictures of the hotel room. The rooms we had were particularly spacious as we were upgraded to the executive floors.


Our room and my dad's room, on the 4oth floor and 41st floor respectively, provided really magnificent, unblocked views of Kaohsiung's Love River, Harbor, and city. The only problem is that Kaohsiung is quite a polluted city, with PSI (Pollutant Standards Index) probably above 100 most of the time. As such, the sky always looks hazy and we couldn't view as far a distance of the scenery from our hotel rooms.




There are a small number of tourist attractions to visit when in Kaohsiung. Besides the Love River, there is the Liu Ho night market. There is also apparently a hot spring location in Kaohsiung. Outside of Kaohsiung, there is Fo Guang Shan (a Buddhist temple) and some distance away, Kenting, a beach resort. We only got to go as far as Fo Guang Shan because we didn't want to tire the kids (and ourselves!) out.

Oh Where, Oh Where, Is My Internet Time?

Ever since leaving Denver, my internet time (and most of my "free" time, for that matter) has mysteriously disappeared. I wonder who stole it? Actually, I know the answer - my two kids stole it! Haha. After we left Denver, DD decided that she's a big girl now - big enough to be nosey and to participate in everything around her. So, putting her to nap has been very much more difficult. Of course, all mummies know that naptime is when we catch up on chores, surf the net or simply get some eye-shut. So less naptime equals less mummy time. DD also likes to wake up when the sun rises, which is at 5am here in Taiwan. That is perfectly fine with me. The only problem is that DS sleeps really late - averaging 10.30pm at the earliest, so I usually KO with him when I have to put him to bed.

Interestingly, the other contributing factor to my lack of internet time is something that I never realised before - the layout of an apartment! Yes, in Denver, our apartment was an open-concept one, which meant that when I was toiling in the kitchen (either cooking or washing the dishes), I had full view of the living room. That meant that I could still participate (well, sort of, anyway) in what DS was doing, be it watching TV or with playing playdough. And I could also keep an eye on DD at the same time. And on top of all that, I could also have the laptop on the kitchen counter top. How's that for multi-tasking? Haa.

Here in Taiwan, DH also brings the laptop to work, so no internet time for me during the day at all. But hopefully that might change - we got my Dad to buy us a laptop from Singapore and he'll be bringing it to us when he arrives later today. Yipee!

We're Here in Taiwan!

Wow, I think this must be the longest time that I've gone without posting on my blog.

Yes, we're now here in Taiwan and have been since 28 April. After 4 long and tiring days of house-hunting, we finally found a nice (well, it's the nicest of the 20 or so apartments that DH and my Dad viewed) apartment. We moved in on 3 May and have been trying to settle in. Things have been slow moving, or should I say, slower than when we were settling in in Denver, probably because we don't have a car here and we aren't as familiar with the language and products sold in the supermarkets here.

Internet connection was up just 2 days back, and DS is overjoyed that he gets his nightly internet time once again.

I'll try to finish up posting about our holidays in Colorado and also about our new apartment in Taiwan when I get some free time. Till then, take care!