Taiwan: Taipei

On Saturday, we toured Taipei. Our first destination was the National Palace Museum. Over the centuries, the Chinese Emperors amassed a large collection of artifacts from all over China for their private collection in the Forbidden City in mainland China. After the last emperor, the collection was put on display and the Forbidden City as known as the National Palace Museum. When the communists began taking over China, the nationalists took the collection with them to Taiwan. As a result, the current National Palace Museum has the largest collection of Chinese artifacts in the world and is considered one of best museums in the world. We arrived at the museum a few minutes past ten in the morning, and saw the morning tour in english just leaving the lobby. To allow the people on the tour to hear better, the tour guide spoke into a microphone and each tour member had an earpiece. By the time we paid our entrance fee and got our earphones, the group had entered the display area away from sight. We first tried to see them, but after a while we put the earphones on and searched by going where we could find a signal. We went from room to room on the second floor and could hear snippets of the tour guide talking about ceramics, but there were ceramics everywhere. We finally found a room where we could hear her clearly but could not see her. Christy had the idea to go up to the third floor where she finally found the group. It was a memorable detective game of find the tour guide. Once we caught up, we finally got a chance to look at the exhibits. They had large bowls and bells festooned with Chinese characters dating 8,000 years ago. There were many items made of jade, from pottery to weapons. One of their popular items is a celery stalk finely crafted out of jade. They also had intricately carved ivory that included detail so small it required a magnifying glass to appreciate. They had lots of ceramics, from pure white to ornate dragon designs. There was also a room filled with buddhas and another with rare books. Only a small portion of the collection is ever on display, but we enjoyed the exhibits. I've studied more western history than Chinese history so when I have visited museums like the Louvre or British Museum I recognize a lot more of the objects, but the NPM had a very interesting collection and it was well worth the trip.

After leaving the museum we took the MRT to the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial, a large square marble memorial on top of a large stone platform with a distinctive Chinese roof. The front is open and the statue of CKS is sitting in the middle. It looks a lot like the Lincoln Memorial. We arrived at the Memorial just in time for the changing of the guards. Two guards stand at attention on both ends of the Memorial and periodically two new guards replace them as the old ones march out the front of the memorial (surrounded by tourists like us taking pictures). The CKS Memorial is in a large square park not unlike the Mall in Washington. Near the Memorial are two large performance halls, the National Theater and National Concert Hall, that are traditional Chinese architecture. At the end of the rectangular park opposite the Memorial is a large multi-tiered gate that we walked through and then headed back to the MRT.

Next stop was the Lungshan Temple, a Buddhist Temple dedicated to the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy Kuan-in. We entered while there were many people worshipping, chanting in song and prayer. Incense permeated the air as there was large incense pots and each worshiper had sticks of incense and incorporated it into their prayers. We entered through the fore hall and walked into the main hall where we stayed on the edges and watched the prayers. The building in the center of the main hall contained a large statue of Kuan-in and surrounding it were monks banging on drums in rhythm with the chanting. We could move freely around the edges of the hall with other observers. In the rear hall, there were other statutes of deities, including the goddesses of marine voyage, literature, and war. While I have been in many churches, I had never witnesses such a religious service.

The next stop was a twilight trip to Taipei 101, the current tallest building in the world. It reaches 1,671 feet tall and has 101 floors. As it extends upwards it also extends out in little flourishes giving it a definite Chinese architecture style. Before leaving Palau, I watched an informative television show on the building of Taipei 101 and learned such things as to combat wind they put a massive counterweight pendulum in the interior of the top of the building to reduce swaying. We walked into the four level shopping mall at the base of the tower. They have all the high-end Western stores and signs in English. For the first time since leaving the states I felt like I was back in U.S. It had grown dark and none of wanted to pay the fee to go to the observation deck, so we just walked around the mall before heading back to the hotel via the MRT.

After dinner, we went to the Fuzhong Night Market. These are glorified alleyways packed with all kinds of small stores and shops selling anything from clothes to keepsakes. I bought a microphone headset for my computer to make chatting easier. We didn't do any clothes shopping because all the clothes were too warm for Palau. The night market also had a large food section with dozens of vendors selling all types of Taiwanese food. Some were very normal, others rather abnormal, and some looked totally inedible. We looked, but did not eat. Exhausted from a long day of walking, we returned to the hotel to sleep.

On Sunday, LB and I got up early to visit two more temples before we had to leave Taipei. Being earlier in the morning, there were no worshippers. We first went to the Confucius Temple. The main buildings were similar to the Lungshan Temple, but it was less ornate. It did have pretty gardens surrounding it. Across the street was the Pao-an Temple, a far more ornate and elaborately decorated temple. There were numerous decorated dragon pillars and murals. Nearby was a small park where they had a dragon fountain. All very interesting architecture.

After checking out of the hotel we took the bus back to the airport for an early afternoon flight back to Palau. With our vacation over, it was time to return to our tropical island. Most people travel from big cities to tropical islands, we travelled from a tropical island to visit a big city. It is still a bit strange calling Palau home, so returning to our "home" Palau was a little odd. Nonetheless, it was nice to be back and get a chance to rest and recuperate from the fun trip.

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