After breakfast, we bought some movie vouchers from a drug? store. What some places will do is buy large amounts of tickets to take advantage of the group discount, and then resell them to people at a higher price, but one still lower than going directly to the theater. Interesting.

Seems like an odd place to buy tickets eh?

We then traveled to the Beitou area, where the the Guandu temple is. The Guandu temple is built into the side of a mountain and faces a river, which I found pretty cool. The inside of the temple was very intricately designed.

We went through a tunnel that led to a small courtyard. The tunnel had statue representations of some buddhas/deities along the sides.

We continued up the mountain temple for a bit and rested before heading back down. The Guandu temple was a lot less populated than the Longshan temple, and prolly mostly due to accessibility reasons. The Longshan temple was nestled in a densely populated area, while this temple is… well, in a mountain. What I also learned is that volunteers maintain these temples and make sure everything is in working order. I would have thought that these places be government subsidized, but I think each temple has to find the means to support itself.

Red lanterns! Yay!

Here’s a decent wide shot of the river area:

We went to Danshui to grab something to eat. The area of Danshui is known for it’s seafood dishes and was also lined with small game stands and other sources of entertainment. We walked along the river, taking in the sights.

A massage parlor. I would not want to be massaged by this man. Seems a bit creepy.

Forgot to take a picture, but with my suggestion, we stopped by at a balloon-popping stand and played a round. With our collective efforts, we were able to win this fabulous panda hammer:

After our victory, we went to a local restaurant, 阿給老店 (a gei lao dian) to take in some of the local flavor. We had some 阿給 and 貢丸湯.

貢丸湯 is the bowl of white fish meat balls in the clear broth. A bit chewier than a sausage meatball, and wasn’t as fishy tasting as I would have imagined it to be. The 阿給 was interesting. From what I still remember, (this was over a month ago!) the 阿給 is a tofu skin (don’t know if it was fried or anything) stuffed with noodles and some fish thing. The sauce was slightly spicy and sweet, and went well with the dish. Both were good. I’d definitely try the 阿給 again.

After the restaurant, we picked up a few of these cripsy rolls. I believe they were stuffed with shrimp and pork. Two sauces were available that you would apply yourself, one on the spicier side, the other a garlicky soy one. Muy yum. Didn’t linger in the area much longer, as we needed to head back to Tianmu.

Snoopy land!

When we arrived back in Tianmu, we went over to the movie theater to redeem our tickets. In Taiwan, you get assigned seats so that you don’t have to fight to grab your friends a seat. So even if you get to the theater late, if you’ve already bought the tickets, you and your friends don’t have to worry about seats. Quite nifty. I like the Taiwan system better.

Went to a Japanese drink/dessert shop afterwards. Bought a green tea drink. It was really green. Came with a scoop of ice cream on top. Taste wasn’t quite what I was looking for. Not bad though. Afterwards, we roamed a park in Tianmu for a little while. We didn’t stay too long, as the temperature was pretty high and there wasn’t much cover from the sun.

More later, end part 1

Technorati Tags: Taiwan, taipei, movies, theater, tea, food, seafood, guandu, temple, danshui, beitou, chinese

Well well, moving on, the 2nd day of our trip began. We met up at Daphu’s place for some breakfast, before heading over to the Zhishan MRT station. We took the MRT to the Longshan temple (龍山寺). A wiki search reveals that there are multiple temples in Taiwan with the name Longshan, but we went to the one in Taipei City.

The temple surroundings were pretty urban, so it wasn’t like a trip to a remote monastery in the mountains. Longshan temple was sitting across the street from a park, with high density housing complexes as it’s neighbors. The architecture is quite noteworthy and when you look at the temple for the first time, the contrast between the temple and it’s surroundings are quite entertaining.

When we passed under the entrance, we entered a big courtyard. Many people were running back and forth, and lines to purchase incense were seen. There was a small waterfall with a pond on one side of the temple, and I quickly took my obligatory, “throw up the horns in front of the waterfall” photo.

Koi!

Once you pass under the 2nd entrance, we could clearly see that this was a popular temple to visit. It was pretty much shoulder to shoulder for this main worship area. Everybody was holding incense so you can imagine what the area smelled like.

According to what Daphu told me, the routine went like this: Recieve/Buy incense, light incense, pray/pay respects, place some incense into fire basin, and move on to next altar to do it again. (Minus the incense part) Many Taiwanese come here everyday to wish for good fortune, health, and etc.

Offerings of food for the gods were placed on tables, but I was told that people eventually do take them back to eat. Reason being, it’s lot of food if people keep adding to the pile. It will have to be cleaned/put away and end up wasted.

It appears offerings have come a long way, as shown by the can of Calpis.

Once we left the main hall, there was a little bit more dancing room. After we had made our rounds, we took some happy happy memory photos before leaving.

On our way back to the MRT station, we passed by a Cosplay cafe. Taiwan, (or at least Taipei) did have some maid cafes, but I did not know if this was one of them. We didn’t go in, so you’ll have to be satisfied with the storefront. Maybe I’ll return one day. hah

There’s a bit more to write about concerning the day’s events, so I’ll add to this post later today or make a new one sometime later.