Ni-hao Everybody!
Bill and I had a great adventure last weekend - we went to Taipei, Taiwan to see one of Bill's oldest friend's get married. When we got the invite in February of this year, we didn't hesitate to accept - though we initially thought Taiwan was closer to Sydney then it actually is...but I digress.
After unpacking enough boxes to make it seem like we live in our new home, we re-packed up our suitcases and took an overnight flight to Taipei (via Kuala Lumpur). In the end, the amount of time we spent traveling could have taken us to LA - but that trip is for next month. We arrived into Taipei in the afternoon on Thursday and had just an hour or 2 to kill before our first wedding event. The groom had planned a small, family and out of town friends reception at his aunt's place with yummy food and drink and time to get caught up with everyone who had come into town. Turns out they had gotten married officially earlier in the week - so the video of the ceremony and all its parts was playing for us to enjoy. After the party, we headed out for a night on the town, with the boys and girls splitting up around midnight to hold respective bachelor/bachelorette parties. I opted out, as we had been going since the day before (flying and the like) but Bill made a good showing by lasting another few hours with the guys.
On Friday there was a planned outing to the Presidential palace (which we missed - sleep was too good to miss) but we ended up getting a late breakfast and heading out to Taipei 101. Many of you probably know that for a period of time in the 2000's Taipei 101 was the tallest building in the world. It is a beautiful structure in person, and offers amazing views of the basin that Taipei sites in and the mountains surrounding the city. Once we had toured the views and saw the only visible tuned mass damper in the world (I think) we headed out to the Sun Yat-sen memorial. The gardens surrounding it were beautiful and we happened to catch the changing of the guard ceremony. If we only could read Chinese or Taiwanese - we could have learned a lot more in the exhibits.
Friday night was the wedding reception/pseudo ceremony at Le Meridian - it was a pretty major event, complete with big name celebrities. We arrived just about on time (admittedly we took a taxi from our hotel around the corner due to the rain that was pouring out of the sky) which is good - as they eventually closed and locked the doors. The reason? The former president of Taiwan as a guest of the wedding. Yes I said the "former President of the country" - can you believe it? I didn't at first - but when the Minister of Foreign Affairs gave a speech and referenced the President, I had to ask someone. As if that wasn't enough - a former Vice-President (a woman nonetheless) was also present and gave a speech. You could have knocked me over.
Other notable features of the party - the bride and groom change clothes throughout the night and provide entertainment for their guests during the meal (a 12 or so course of food, some good, some great, some I passed on :-p). There was a really cool "mask dance" (for lack of a better title) where a guy dances in traditional clothing while changing the mask covering his face without using his hands. It was pretty darn cool. The same gentleman came back out to do some magic tricks - with the best one being the one Bill was recruited to help with. It wasn't really a magic trick, but he did get 4 guys to create a table structure with their bodies without any support other than their legs. We all got a good laugh about it - the guys felt the effort in their legs long after they escaped the stage though. Once the party at the hotel ended, the younger half of the wedding guests went out on the town for several more hours. No one was moving quickly the next day.
More sightseeing was planned for our last full day in town. Most of the out of towners (and some of the groom's cousin's) caught up for lunch and then went around town in a bus (it was raining, again) stopping at the Chiang Kai-shek memorial, Longshan Temple and the poorly named Snake Market (there were only 5 total snakes in 2 blocks of market, not that I am complaining).
As the sun was setting we headed into the mountains on a mystery adventure. The groom hadn't told us where we were going, and as night fell it started to rain a bit. Once the bus had gone as far as it was able, we had to walk the rest of the way (we still had no idea where we were going) but it was very worth it. We crested the hill and in front of us was the Taipei basin, all lite up. It was beautiful!! There is a restaurant built into the hillside, which is where we went for dinner - amazing atmosphere. We had a great time!
Sunday some of us felt better than others (I went to bed by midnight...) so packing and breakfast was as much as we could muster. Our flight left Taipei at 3:00 in the afternoon and we were back home to rainy Sydney by 9:00 am Monday morning. The change in temp was a bit tough - Taipei was hot, humid and muggy while Sydney was been wet, wet wet and cold since we got back. The rain is predicted to last through the weekend, goodie :-p
It is definitely winter here - we had to buy an electric blanket to keep the bed reasonable at night and have plans to buy at least 1 space heater this weekend. Something tells me our electric bill this winter will be brutal. I have probably carried on enough for now. To our friends enjoying summer right now - we envy you!! Til next time, cheers mates!
