Time to explore the island of Taiwan. This was my first time flying solo with the kiddos – even better – in Asia. Flew to Taiwan to visit a good friend from home and C’s best friend. Flight was uneventful until we landed in Taiwan. Apparently you have to fill out an immigration form. Found that out in line so had to quickly fill out 3 forms after we reached the front. Usually they give that out on the airplane. Lessons learned.
Our awesome friend met us at the airport and waited for awhile since our flight was delayed and even bought us a bus ticket back to our hotel. C and K really enjoyed being back together again!! Like REALLY enjoyed it. I think everyone else saw the love exuberating from these boys. And excitement was in the air and you could hear it! Just picture that. On a bus. (2) 5 year olds chanting TAIPEI 1.0.1. So much energy escaping these boys in the back row of the bus. I loved it. Not sure others may have felt the same.
My friend got me a goody bag with a metro card, an umbrella (which we used quite a bit) and so many other goodies from the US. Felt just like home… in Taiwan. But honestly, this vacation wasn’t for me. It was all about C and him visiting K and it only took us 2 hours to accomplish compared to travelling for 24 hours (which they did).
First day was raining but that didn’t stop us from exploring. We ended up at Baby Boss. It’s a role playing place for kids where you can pretend to be anything from a police officer to a soy sauce producer AND you get paid for each role AND you get a job card. But man, you are competing with other experienced moms to get your kids into the “best roles” since they have limited slots at various times. Some kids have to patiently wait for 30 min just for their next role. We were running around like wild animals to get our first job. But after our first job, we had it down. Highlighted the next roles, labeled the next job 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice just in case the job was full. We totally had a system and the kids waited patiently. I was highly impressed. Good job for bringing a highlighter CD! Kids did the pizza maker job (which they had to use their hard earned fake money for), security guard, astronaut, gold miner and army job. For the army job they were instructed to yell “tsa” upon command of the sergeant. Here I am thinking they are so adorable until I learned that “sha” meant “kill”.
We also went to the Taipei Zoo where it cost a whopping 60 TWD which is less than 2 USD. So before we left a Taiwanese friend told me to take the train for 5 TWD (which was like a quarter) all the way to the back of the zoo and walk our way to the entrance. Since they had a gondola, or a sky bucket, at the top of the zoo we didn’t opt to take the train so we could take the gondola from the back to the entrance of the zoo. Ummmm. My friend forgot to inform me the zoo was on some type of Himalayan mountain where we would have to trek uphill at a 60 degree angle from start to finish. Let alone having 3 kids and 2 strollers. AND it was mega hot and humid. But we did it. Saw the pandas, hippopotamus (X’s pick), elephants (C’s pick) and the Penguins (K’s pick). And boy did we pay for it. Physically. Kids were taking turns in the stroller and we were getting a leg workout. When we finally got to the top, or the back of the zoo, we had NO energy to do the gondolas so we took the train back to the entrance. Yes. Yes. We took the train to go downhill. I still haven’t told my friend we didn’t listen to her wonderful advice.
Next day we went to the Chiang Kai-Shek memorial hall. Kids had the best time chasing pigeons. Yeah. We were in Taipei and the most memorable thing for that day was playing with pigeons. Close second was watching the changing of the guards. I thought the guards would just like tap the guards shoulder informing them it’s time to change. Nope. They did this whole march and a few moves before they changed positions which took approximately 15 minutes. Everyone was so quiet and listened to the boots on the tile floors. It was hypnotizing. Inside the memorial, in wonderful AC, the kids were mesmerized by all the small military scenes and vehicles. Maybe it reminded them of saying “sha” at baby boss.
CD’s mom graciously volunteered to watch the boys while we visited the Raohe night market. I tried some street food and had totoro waffles. Loved seeing all the cute stationary shops, the food, the people and just hanging out without having to chase around 3 boys!
Another fun memory was eating at ice monster and having the mango dessert. It was so delicious. I could have easily eaten 5 of them. And the boys could have eaten 10. It’s what you need while outside in the hot and humid weather. Wish I had a picture of it! Kids ate it before I could get my camera out.
We had an great time in Taiwan seeing our dear friends. Boys just had their first international play date.
We also got to see them in Shanghai where the boys got to swim at their hotel on the 21st floor overlooking The Bund while we did a quick shopping trip! And I got to hang out with CD in Xintiandi and we had a 99 yuan night out. We also experienced a dumb taxi driver who wanted to charge us 100 yuan to go 0.5 miles. Thank goodness for Uber.
Can’t wait to see you all again in July!!! Good times ahead.