We left our house for Taiwan at 5:30 AM. To get our bodies on Asian times, we stayed up the entire night before. I managed to stay awake until 4:45 AM. I don't know if staying up actually helped with the jetlag - but it did put me in a bad mood for most of the travel day. Our flight from Minneapolis to Chicago was brief. Out flight from Chicago to Hong Kong was not brief - about 15 hours. We traveled over 7,000 miles. The flight path took us through the Canadian Northwest Territories, over the Arctic, and down through Siberia and China. At one point, the outdoor air temperature at 33,000 feet was -77 degrees Farenheit. They showed four movies on the plain: Son of Rambow; Ghost Town; Nights of Rodanthe; and The Dutchess. I only watched The Dutchess - it was quite good. An hour or so into the flight we had lunch - salad, a roll, teriyaki chicken with noodles & carrots, and a browner - mediocre. Seven hours into the lifhgt, we had a small bowl of ramen noodles with a pecan cookie - pretty good. Our second lunch was a plate of lasagna, strawberry yogurt, and raspberry shortbread cookies - also mediocre. We had about 2 hours in Hong Kong before our flight to Taipei left. Scott was hungry, so we stopped at Starbucks. I warned Scott that we would get fed on the flight to Taipei, but he didn't believe me. He bought a puff pastry triangle filled with beef curry and a mango passionfruit frappacino. He thought they tasted fabulous. I took a bite and thought it was okay. Even thought the flight to Taipei was only 1.5 hours. Sure enough, we had a full meal despite the short flying time - gotta love non-U.S. airlines. The meal was quite tasty - cold noodles with salmon in a spicy sauce, a warm roll, fruit juice, and some kind of cake with blueberry jam. The flight attendants (who were all young and very pretty) kept coming around offering tea, coffee, and wine - all free.
Julie and John met us at the airport in Taipei. We started on a 4 hour drive to Daliao - John's hometown. Along the way, we stopped at a rest area. They had lots of food shops. We bought a fried taro cake - tasted good but not too flavorful. Scott bought an almond juice drink (he liked, I didn't). I bought CC Lemon, a lemon soda that I came to love in Taiwan. We arrived at John's house at 3 AM.
John's parents live in a rowhouse off a busy street in Daliao. When we drove up to the house, there were already people in the nearby market, preparing for the busy New Year's Eve. The house is narrow with 3 floors. There are at least 4 bedrooms. We took our shoes off outside the front door and put on plastic slippers. Mine were bright pink. The first floor had a living room, narrow kitchen, small bedroom, and bathroom where we took showers. The bathroom had a sink, toilet, and bathtub without a shower curtain. We showered using a pull-down hose. In Taiwan, people do not flush toilet paper. They put used toilet paper in a basket next to the toilet - the pipes can't handle toilet paper. The second floor had three bedrooms and a bathroom. The third floor was used for storage and as a shrine to their ancestors.
My house slippers
We bought breakfast at a local market. We had a rice ball filled with pickled vegetables, pork, dried fish powder, and fried dough (delicious); Chinese omelet - egg with scallions and ham rolled in a crepe (very good); peach juice and apple milk.
Guava juice, apple milk, peach juice, rice ball, Chinese omelet
Rice ball
Chinese Omelet
After breakfast, we watched John's family go through the traditional New Year's Eve ritual of worshipping their ancestors. John's mother set up a table on the third floor and covered it with food, paper money, and incense. The food included stick cakes, candied peanuts, tangerines, pork, a chicken with its head on, two kinds of fish rolls, smoked squid, filled squid, and rice wine. The family held incense sticks and bowed while John's mother said prayers to the ancestors. They then put the incense sticks in an empty can on the balcony and said prayers to the local gods. After the incense burned down, the family took the paper money and burned it in a kettle outside. Every house in town had a kettle set up outside and we saw many people burning money.
Traditional New Year's flowers
Everyone decorated the outside of the houses with these papers
Shrine to ancestors; see stacks of paper money (John's brother and sister-in-law)
Shrine to the ancestors
Saying prayers to the ancestors
Worshipping the ancestors
Shrine to the ancestors
Incense on the balcony
Whole chicken dedicated to the ancestors
Burning paper money
Trying to burn paper money
Me burning paper money
Scott and I burning paper money
Prior to lunch, we snacked on fried pumpkin seeds and watermelon seeds (tasty, but hard to peel). Lunch was delicious: rice balls stuffed with meat wrapped in bamboo leaves (great); smoked squid dipped in soy sauce and wasabe (very good); boiled squid (not as good); salmon fish roll (good); green fish roll; beef stew with carrots and daikon (very good); picked bamboo and pickled cabbage with pork (pretty good); cod with soy sauce (unbelievably good); sauteed cabbage (excellent); eggdrop soup with egg and tiny fish (good); jujubes and tangerines.
Stuffed rice balls
Wrapped rice balls; beef stew; cod
Rice and eggdrop soup
Beef stew; cod; sauteed cabbage
Smoked squid; green fish rolls; squid rolls; boiled squid; (back) picked bamboo and cabbage with pork; sauteed cabbage; beef stew; cod
After lunch, Scott and I went for a walk while everyone else took naps. We walked along a few streets near the house. Every residence had a table outside with food set out for the gods and the paper money kettles. We received numerous stares - there is really no reason for westerners to come to Daliao. We walked by some rice fields - the fields were flooded with water and had long strong grass sticking up. Every spare inch of land seemed to be use for rice fields. There was a small temple a few blocks from John's house that we walked around. We returned to the main shopping street and went into a 7-11. These are ubiquitous over Asia. It looked like a typical convenience store. It had candy (even M&Ms), Slurpees, magazines, drinks, etc. One of the snacks available was hard-boiled eggs soaked in soy sauce and tea. Before returning to John's house, we went into a supermarket near the house. It was more like a small K-Mart. It had food staples including peanut butter & jellow, but no fresh produce or meat. It also had lots of household items.
John's house
Rice fields
Banana tree outside John's house
The temple
Inside of the temple
Temple exterior
When we got back to the house, John's mother had the table of food set outside for the local gods and was saying prayers while waiving incense. Scott and I were a little tired, so took a short nap. Our "brief" nap turned into a long nap - John woke us up four hours later to tell us that dinner was ready.
Food for the local gods
Dinner on New Year's Even in John's family is hotpot. This is a large pot set on a single burner filled with broth and various meats, seafood, and vegetables. Throughout the meal, John's mother kept adding more food - fried tofu, raw tofu, shrimp balls, fish balls, fish dumplings, squid, whole shrimp, beef, corn on the cob, mushrooms, cabbage, spinach, rice noodles, and many other items that no one could identify. We seasoned the hotpot by dipping each item in a spicy barbecue-like sauce. It was very tasty. Dessert was Asian pears.
Hotpot
The hotpot with only some of the fillings
Scott and me with the hotpot (icky picture of me)
After dinner, Scott, John, Julie, John's brother, John's sister-in-law, and I drove to Kaohsiung - about 30 minutes from Daliao. This is the second-largest city in Taiwan, with about 1.5 million residents. Until recently, Kaohsiung was mostly known for its industrial economy and pollution. It was re-developed in an attempt to become a tourist destination. It is a harbor city - the largest port in Taiwan and the fourth or fifth largest in the world. As we drove into the city, we saw large building and fancy hotels. One large building lit up in a rainbow of neon lights had Prada and Louis Vuitton stores on the first level. We walked along the banks of the Love River, the main focus of Kaohsiung's re-development. This river was once full of pollution but is now a lovely riverwalk. Lots of people were strolling along the river bank with friends and family. Several musicians were playing on the sidewalks. The trees and bridges along the river were lit up with light and Chinese lanterns in preparation for the lantern festival starting in February. There will be a water show on the river (like the Bellagio in Las Vegas). About a dozen figurines were sticking out of the water as decoration. They resembled Teletubbies or large waterdrops with faces and were called Waterdrop Babies. They were the festival mascots. John's brother bought us all fried cakes from a sidewalk vendor. They were small pieces of fried dough in various animal shapes. I saw them all over Taiwan. They were great. We finished walking along the river and headed back to Daliao.
Upcoming Kaohsiung Lantern Festival
The Love River at Kaohsiung
Scott and I at the Love River
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