Meat the American...

---

Sleeping in another morning before packing my things and checking out. I go out to grab a quick bite before meeting Judy around noon. She is also packed and ready to accompany me to Taipei for a few days. We get the tickets at a small Free Go Bus office, their green buses being painted with big dalmatians, an amusing case of Greyhound ripoff. It turns out the sevice is not as express as last time, making a few stops along the way, but it is a daylight trip and much more interesting.

We finally arrive at Taipei main railway sation sometime after four pm in a chaotic mess of traffic and bad air. I'm happy to have some local expertise to help me navigate the confusion. We go to check in our bags at the Golden China Hotel. The room is ok but is rather cold and damp and we consider moving out elsewhere. As we go out in the evening to look around the neighbourhood my first discovery about Taipei is reinforced; the air is really quite bad. The fumes of cars are clearly felt with every breath and I wonder how many days of my life the city will have on its consciousness. There is a buddhist temple just a block down the street from the hotel full of people burning incense and offering fruits and flowers. Judy then introduces me to the Taipei metro and we go north to a large foodcourt and very crowded nightmarket. People are lining up outside food stalls offering lots of different animal parts and vegetables. Going back downtown to start looking for another hotel we stumble right into a burning building, the roof having collapsed into the attic. The fire brigade appears to be on site rather fast, every time I've seen an ambulance stuck in a Bangkok gridlock or Manila rush hour I can't help but wonder at the dangers of becoming ill in a city this size.

Its been a long day and we make inquiries for a room at the Gloria Prince Hotel, a few blocks from where we stay right now and make reservations for the coming night. We have a late night supper at a near empty side street buffet style restaurant. As I mainly go for the vegetables the owner becomes curious and starts to question Judy a lot about what is going on; he's dead certain that I am an American, and we all know that Americans only eat meat, so what's the deal?

---

Photos

Big signs and small trucks...
...it is the flavour of Asia.