Day 6: (Finally, right?)

Ton Pu - Taichung

We left the hot spring village (Ton Pu) and made our way down the mountain (like I mentioned, Taiwan is extremely mountainous). We reached our next pit stop almost 2 hours later, at the heart of Taiwan, the epicentre of Taiwan's disastrous earthquake back in the year 1999, the Sun Moon Lake.

Named the Sun Moon Lake due to the existence of an island in the middle of the lake which separated the huge lake into 2, the top half resembling the sun and the bottom half a crescent moon. However, the Japanese constructed a dam (I almost typed damn lol), causing the island to shrink to the size of 20 buses. The earthquake further shrunk the island to the size of 5 miserable TREES. Hence it no longer looks like an island.

Anyway, it's a HUGE lake (of course I don't think it's anywhere as big as Lake Toba which is reputed to be HUMONGOUS). Well, we spent some time in the toilets there (one of the cleanest public toilets I saw in Taiwan!!!), followed by some photo-taking before boarding the bus again. Too bad we didn't get the chance to cruise the lake, I thought it would have been very nice if we did but alas, we didn't.

What followed was a trip to the Peacock Garden, thus named for the sheer number and variety of peacocks they keep in there. It was there that I learnt that peacocks are horribly whiny and LOUD birds. Their shrill calls would resonant throughout the entire garden. But there were thought nice snow white peacocks though, why don't we see them around in Singapore?

We then visited Wen Wu Temple. The day we went so coincided with some HUGE temple festivity and the place was PACKED. HUGE and pretty impressive looking temple and a HUGE tianlu/pixiu. Being respectful, I did not take photos of anything under a roof but I did take some photos of the temple's exterior, as well as its HUGE tianlu. Did some praying and then skirted our way out of the vicinity. Went for lunch which was pretty good, save it for the chicken. There is something about Taiwanese chicken, their meat won't detach from the bones and their skin won't detach from the meat. o.O Weird, I know!!!

Anyway, we continued with our journey and I went strawberry picking! We ended up at a strawberry farm and I picked 8 sing dollars worth of strawberries. Expensive, considering that it wasn't a lot. We can get a good box of Australian strawberries here for a little over $2 and what I picked certainly didn't amount to 4 boxes of strawberries, so I complained a little to the tour guide who said that the supply was limited as it was still the start of the season. DAMN!!!!! But the strawberries were SWEET.

Then it was off to the Earthquake Museum, located on the premises of what used to be a school, with a field that now has a fault line running through it. The one thing they are definitely thankful for is that the quake occurred in the early hours of the morning, when no students were in school, as the quake had caused the classrooms to effectively collapse, at the same time, raising one half of the field relative to the other half. The museum was built to educate and remind the Taiwanese of the destruction caused by the quake, just so no one would forget what it did to the country back then.

From the museum, it was a short trip into Tai Chung, the 3rd largest city in the country. We spent some time in the Fong Jia Night Market, located next to the Fong Jia University. Had lots of Taiwanese snacks (their BBQ chicken steak is oh-so-good!) Walked around, bought NOTHING. Ok, I did buy something, I bought a replacement toner from the Face Shop. *Grins*

We then checked into our hotel.

Day 7:

Taichung - Taipei

This day is rather simple. We more or less just made our way back to Taipei. Got up, had breakfast and boarded the bus back to Taipei, making no stops till we reached Yang Ming Shan (very near Taipei). Saw a clock made of flowers. Turns out the authorities actually specially plant flowers in seasons like winter so tourists have something to look at other than bare trees. Lol.

Then it was off to lunch, which was DISAPPOINTING. We were supposed to get steamboat. We were supposed to try Taiwan's notoriously spicy Mala steamboat only to find that the soup bases were tasteless. My parents added so much soy sauce as seasoning that the soup tasted like SOY SAUCE. o.O

Disappointing.

Anyway, we went to the National Palace Museum which houses a collection of Chinese artefacts (the China Chinese sort). I preferred Beijing o.O Well, everything felt like a copy of what we say in China, except it was less grand. We then headed over to some government-endorsed store selling tianlu made of jade. Spent time there where it was determined that my mum gave me a bad, bad, BAD Chinese name but her craving for curry fish head (which pushed my induced birth date back by 1 day) gave me a good birthday. LOL.

Right, once we were done, we headed over to the Miramar Shopping Centre which has a Ferris Wheel. No, we didn't sit in that, and had one of the most expensive dinners in the whole of our trip there. After dinner, we headed over to a bakery that sells DELICIOUS (I cannot stress this enough) pineapple pastries. And we bought SEVEN boxes. Hahahaha. Right, and then we checked into our hotel and rested.

I shall not waste time by describing what we did on Day 8 'cause it was the day we took an afternoon flight back to Singapore.

But lemme relate one AMUSING incident on the plane. I was getting served and was getting my lunch when the male flight attendant said, "Excuse me, are you crew?".

I didn't catch what he said and replied, "What?".

And he repeated, "Are you crew? As in cabin crew on holiday?"

I FINALLY understood him and hastily explained "Oh no.. no.. sorry.. no.."

And he said "Oh, you look like one"

o.O!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My dad, being evil, then said (to me), "I think he needs glasses. You're too short."

FINE. I know I'm short, please stop stating the obvious!!! But I have a lookalike (maybe a taller clone?) walking about on board SIA flights. ROFLOL.

Oh yes, did you know that Singapore Airlines serves Haagen Dazs ice cream on board some of their flight? Yup, I had Haagen Dazs on my flight back. YUM.

P.S. I will add the photos when I actually feel like it. ;)