Taipei Part 2

My second presentation was a bit better I think, I tried to speak slower. I still got a lot of blank stares and no questions but I can't say that was abnormal. I had the late afternoon and evening free and went to the Taipei 101 building which was very cool. I was impressed and thought they made a typical tall building tourist attraction pretty interesting. Free audio tour, bits of information about the building, and a big exposed wind damper - a really big ball that helps prevent building vibration or something.



Then I hit up another night market. Night markets were really cool. Lots of locals eating at food stalls. Lots of weird things to eat that I didn't attempt. But did get a fried dough with chicken thingy, delicious pastries, and hand-rolled egg rolls. I had Thursday morning free before my flight back so I went to the National Palace Museum. I really liked it, interesting exhibits of lots of really old stuff. ;) Pottery, jade, bronze buddha statues, paintings and calligraphy... I took the time to read a lot of the explanations so learned quite a bit. It sparked a new interest to learn more about Chinese history which I may or may not follow through on. All in all, cool museum though. It was actually recently redesigned and renovated. I quite enjoyed Taipei. Maybe I'll get to go back sometime with a travel companion or someone who knows more about where to go.

I flew China Airlines which I have to say is one of my new favorites. Large plane with really spacious seating in Economy. Decent meal service including wine. And a lot of polite flight attendants to help out, more per person than on other airlines. Temperature was also at a decent level. The only bad thing was the entertainment. Movie on the way to Taipei was Flickr, some horse movie, which I didn't bother to watch. No movie on the return flight because it was much shorter I guess.

I'm back at the Tokyo office today but being Friday makes it a lot easier. When I get back to Tokyo after travelling from another Asian city (ok, I've only done it twice so far), I am finding a feeling a relief. Or that feeling of comfort to come home. I thought that was interesting. I'm comfortable in Tokyo now, at least in comparison to other cities. I keep realizing how easy it really is to live here.

I'll post pics from Taipei soon.