Taipei in the rain

February 2023

The lovely thing about exploring Taipei in the rain is that we have popular tourist spots to ourselves. This stroll up Elephant Mountain 象山 is quite a glute burner, and was pleasant in the drizzle. Switchbacks are for the weak. Here in Taipei, it’s a stone staircase straight up the mountain.

Brilliant idea to visit a cat cafe after the chilly wet hike. These cafes are a thing in Taipei. For the price of a mug of latte, you get to chill with the feline residents of the cafe.

Apropos of nothing, I am not a fan of squat toilets. I remember these from my childhood visits to Taiwan, and they may or may not have been the reason I avoided the entire country for years. In modern Taiwan, it seems the general population is split, because most public restrooms (which are impressively clean and available at all MRT and train stations) I’ve visited have both options, usually indicated by a picture on the door. In my cursory observational study, it seems that the women are evenly divided, with half preferring the squat, and half preferring the non-squat. I’m intrigued that the younger ladies seem to head for the squat, perhaps because of greater hip flexibility? I just can’t seem to figure out how to multitask between balancing, using both lower extremity and core strength, performing nature’s business, disposing of toilet tissue in a trash can, and also preventing anything from falling into the hole in the ground that is the toilet.

Despite the awkwardness and hilarity of being an American out of my element, I’m proud to say that my spoken language skills are coming back. My initial greeting is apparently so convincing that vendors and cashiers have been looking at me suspiciously when I follow it up with “can you please read me your sign?” Or like yesterday when the hostess at the restaurant brought over only one English menu for a mute Won and assumed I could decipher the Chinese one. We had an amusing time navigating the touchscreen ordering system, and ended up accidentally ordering enough food for a crowd.

February 23, 2023