jour dix

Tis the end of the weekend and predictably, it was full of shopping and consumerism with a tinge of appreciation for the arts. I was feeling a bit lazy the last two days to blog about my shopping ventures. It was quite delightful to be by myself for a few hours on Friday after my mom left on the High Speed Rail to the south of Taiwan. I did quite a bit of shopping in 4 hours time and even managed to read a short story in my Alice Munro book, Too Much Happiness.

I've been in Taipei for over a week now, and I don't get that same feeling as I did during my prior visits. I don't see myself identifying myself with Taipei as much as I did before. Sometime in the last two years, there was a turning point - a transition - that made me identify with North America more than ever. It's ironic because during that time, I was longing to visit Asia but now that I'm here, I feel like a foreigner in my native country. Maybe it's too soon to feel "at home" here. There has been a lot of lifestyle adjustments within the last month and it's seemingly hard for me to make up my mind to what I'm used to.

Another factor is that Taipei has changed a lot in the last two years both physically and culturally. The youth have become much less naive and are open about a lot of topics that were more hush hush. They've also slathered on a lot more makeup and care a bit too much on their appearances in my opinion. The planning nerd in me of course, has noticed new MRT (metro/subway) lines, bike-sharing, more HOV/bus only lanes, new architectural development, and somewhat innovative ways of mitigating on-going building construction. I'll discuss the planning pros and cons another day once I have more material to write about. :)

Anyway, onto some of the things I've been doing the last few days and it can be summed up in the following sequence: Shop. Eat. Shop. Eat. Shop. Eat. Cook. Museum. Eat. Shop. Eat. Cook. :P

The visit to the National Palace Museum today was just alright. I always go there whenever I'm back so we just went to see the special exhibit today. The exhibit was called, The Body Beautiful in Ancient Greece. There were Greek sculptures and pottery visiting from The British Museum. It was just really crowded and stuffy in there, which makes the experience a bit less enjoyable. The marble sculptures were really amazing though.

Anyway, here are some photos from the last few days :)

  Chinese Ikea haha..

National Palace Museum

I cooked.

I ate out (a lot)