Do you ever get so bored that you can’t seem to convince yourself to actually do anything productive? That has been me for the last few days. You’ll understand why towards the end of this post. I’m sorry I haven’t posted yet about Taiwan!!

My first reaction on arrival was that it will be a good transition between quiet, clean, orderly Japan and what I expect Thailand to be like. The best way I can describe it is more of everything: more people, more noise, more traffic, more lights, more shops open in the streets, more happening until the wee hours of the morning. There are food carts everywhere, busy sidewalks, people staring… These things are not usually uncomfortable for me, but after cool calm Japan it was a bit of a shock.

I’m not sure what I expected. I have been told by many people that Japan is much “easier” than China. I expected some things about Taiwan to be like what I’ve been told about the mainland but I guess I expected it to feel more Western.

All that is not to say I don’t like it here. The food is good and the people are SO friendly. My first day here, three separate people just came up to me, started talking in their beginner English, and literally asked if they could show me around, or if I could just sit and talk with them for 15 minutes. One lady toured me around Bao-an Temple in Taipei. Another older man told me I NEEDED to see the sunset from Tamsui and actually got on the correct train with me to make sure I got there. Everyone I have interacted with have been exceptionally nice, however it is bordering on my feeling of Ireland: it’s lovely to have people to talk to, but often I just want to do my own quiet wandering, thank you.

I’m so “chilled out” inside now that the amount of energy here has taken some adjusting to. But I think it is a good adjustment! I’m testing my ability to keep the inner calm while in outwardly NOT calm places. It is a skill I will need moving forward and I’ve been enjoying practicing it.

There are many things to do in and around Taipei. My first day I saw some of the temples in the city, which are strikingly different from the Japanese style. Most of these photos are of Bao-an, which is much less visited (at least on a Monday) but I think more beautiful than many of the others.

Tam-sui is a popular spot to go up the coast to escape the city proper. I was planning on spending a whole afternoon there, sampling to food along the boardwalk and walking out to the point, but I could not resist when that gentleman insisted “..today is the best day! The sunset will be good today! You must go now!” And he was right; I haven’t seen a good sunset since. I didn’t make it all the way out to the pier but joined some Australian teachers for a beer overlooking the bay.

The next day I took a local bus up to Yeliu to see the Geopark that I had stumbled upon pictures of. I only saw two other obviously Western families, but tons of what I think were Chinese tourists on tours. I walked all the way out to the end of the point and managed to get some nice pictures which hide the crowds. It is a Really cool spot.

In the afternoon I headed over to Jiu-fen. This old gold mining town has been the inspiration for multiple movies (for example, the long winding mountain boardwalk hung with red lanterns at the beginning and end of Spirited Away), and is known for its street market and tea houses.

I heard about a place called “Yin-Yang Sea” in the neighboring town of Jinguashi. This also had an active good mine which has been closed for over ten years. However the minerals that still escape into the water have died the riverbed orange and supposedly create a swirling pattern where the river meets the sea. I had a few hours before sunset so I went to the visitor center to ask which bus I could take to get there.

After a Very long and Very frustrating conversation with the employee, who was really trying her darndest to help me with no english, and after walking up to some random people afterwards with her notes in hand, I ended up on what turned out to be…. A tour bus!! Imagine my dismay as a man wearing a microphone and holding a sign with his e-mail address boarded the little shuttle and started chattering away in Taiwanese. He was apparently quite funny, but obviously I didn’t understand any of it while all of the other passengers dutifully clicked their cameras away at this non-descript hillside and that stretch of river. It was the only way to the ocean without renting a car so I didn’t mind too much… Especially since no one took any money from me at the end (and for better or worse I did not try very hard to pay anyway). The shame was that it started raining so any color differences in the choppy grey ocean were unperceptible, after all that trouble. Oh well!
“Golden Waterfall”

YinYang Sea down there somewhere…

Abandoned mining buildings

My third day in Taipei I headed to the National Museum, which houses many (“stolen?”) Chinese treasures, and is the one bright thing my Grandad remembers about Taiwan. I typically enjoy museums but it was difficult with, again, mobs of Chinese tourists. I truly do not feel negative toward then, but the culture is so different that it was a struggle for me just being there. Everyone was chattering away Loudly, literally pushing me out of the way so they could see the displays closer, completely oblivious to where other people were walking or looking. Some of the displays were very interesting; it is a wonderful museum of jade, calligraphy and pottery work, but I couldn’t even stand in one place long enough to read most of the signs. This was the first time that I consciously said to myself “okay, lets learn how to separate my inner state from my outer experience.” This will be an invaluable skill to master, but I have a long way to go.

After that I headed a few hours by train down the coast to Hualien City, where I had found a volunteer position at a hostel under renovation. I am here now, the place is very nice and comfortable and the city has tons of good food. The difficult thing is that I have not been doing much work. Every day I wake up early (there are no curtains yet), go to the cafe on the block for some breakfast (an omelette and coffee for about $1.25), then come back and wait until everyone else wakes up for the hour or so of cleaning work. When that is done it is usually too late to make an afternoon excursion somewhere, or it’s raining, so my days mostly consist of some quick yoga sessions, short walks in the rain, reading Hemingway and watching episodes of “Project Runway.” Again, I am challenging myself to take this is a learning experience and not freak out by my lack of productivity. Supposedly tomorrow will be a big demo day, which will help. I originally planned to do a lot of volunteering on this trip and now I am forming opinions on this style of travel and meeting people who do it. All good things. I’m now off to the night market to eat some street food with a fellow volunteer.

I don’t have a clever segue, but I shall deliver my second lesson of this trip.
Lesson #2: Don’t do anything just because someone told you to. This is another way to say “Don’t do anything you don’t want to,” which sounds childish to me. This more adult point was made to me long ago, and most poignantly by LiLi in Hawaii whose life motto includes “If it’s not fun, don’t do it. If you really have to do it, make it fun!”

After 7 months of traveling, the urge to see everything has subsided. There is no possible way to see everything. And finally I have started making decisions based on what I think will make me most happy and stick with me, not based on what the guidebooks’s Top Picks are, or what other travelers loved. For example, the day I chose to hike the pilgrimage Choishi-michi path down the mountain, I also decided to skip Nara, a place that most people say was one of their favorites. It is home to the well fed herd of “mercenary deer,” so named because they will mob you for the expected hand fed biscuits they sell there. I love animals, and that would have been fun, but I knew the hike was something that would make me happy in a deeper way. So I just gave the other options up and didn’t look back. It is a difficult lesson in listening to my heart. I recommend it.