wonderboy416
Active Member
I was in Taipei from the 24th to 28th this year. It was a great deal, $350/round trip from Seoul and $12/night for a private room hostel downtown.
I'll let the pictures do the talking but here are my impressions... It seemed tiny compared to Seoul (and even Toronto), at approx 200 square km there's not a lot of land... amazingly it's got one of the highest population densities in the world despite having very few high-rises and not many mid-rises. The air quality is downright awful, it smells like a go-kart track 24/7 thanks to all the mopeds... It's really hard to describe just how many old, polluting mopeds are on these roads... strangely the cars are all fairly new and there's no shortage of really nice cars. There's a tremendous selection of asian cuisine at rock bottom prices. There's enough markets, temples, memorials etc to keep one busy for 3-4 days, but I wouldn't want to stay any longer than that. Also the night life is quite poor for a major city, there's no real entertainment hub, I was lucky to find a few places that were quite jumping at night. The cost of living is really low here, you can buy a can of beer and a pack of smokes for about $1.25 CDN from the 7/11. Much of the city is incredibly generic and run-down and quite dirty, but this I'm told is very typical of a lage Chinese city (even though Taipei is in the Republic of China its culturally very similar to mainland Chinese Cities I was told). That said there's a few stops that MUST be visited, the areas around Shilla and Xinem stand out as world-class in every way... the area around Taipei 101 is quite boring but full of life. Also I was shocked to find out how much more electronics cost in Korea than in Canada, well Taiwan is no different. Cheap LCD's? No where to be found, the no name brands still charge a premium. North America has a lot of buying power and is the largest market for these manufacturers hence it gets the lowest prices anywhere... I just kind of assumed since most of our electronics come from asia it would be cheaper there. You can still get some ipod knock-offs really cheap, but any quality electronic is generally more expensive in asia...
This was my second major asian city (Seoul being the first). Seoul is so big, clean and modern it's impossible to compare it to Taipei which is really nitty gritty, has a very outdated infastructure (except for a high speed rail system) and is very different culturally. It was a real eye opening experience and if you're looking for something to compliment your travels to the big 3 asian mega-cities (HK, Tokyo and Seoul) I'd strongly recommend it.
Nothing like cheap Taiwanese beer after just arriving at the airport:
I took the next 3 walking to my hostel, yes that's a Lambo.
I thought this was quite funny...
Smile!
Huge amounts of prime real estate are devoted to memorials, this type of thing would never fly in a North American city.
Taipei Normal University... I never found out why it's called "normal"
Typical mid-rise in Taipei, old and ready to implode. It's a good thing these buildings aren't in Toronto as the UT forums would be full of threads demanding their demise.
The subway is above street level in parts:
Some very rare, nice high-rises:
Market:
They're really proud of this thing here and refuse to call it anything but the world's tallest...
Was quite smoggy the day we went up...
Now that's a huge damper!
City hall... and no those guys aren't strapped in to anything, and it was raining lightly at the time!
Notice the crazy workers on the left:
Night market near my hostel:
Shilla station area:
Tree's are a very rare sight... well healthy ones at least.
I'll let the pictures do the talking for this restaurant
Need any electronics?
Xinem station area... hey look it's TLS!!! oh wait...
Similar to Myeon Dong in Seoul, very alive at night.
Cool rooftop batting cage:
Many Japanese boutiques are in this area:
Up in the mountains...
Taipei 101 truly dominates the skyline, the only other major skyscraper is several km away.
Me and some peeps at the hostel:
Nice message in the airport (which looks like it's from MASH)
I'll let the pictures do the talking but here are my impressions... It seemed tiny compared to Seoul (and even Toronto), at approx 200 square km there's not a lot of land... amazingly it's got one of the highest population densities in the world despite having very few high-rises and not many mid-rises. The air quality is downright awful, it smells like a go-kart track 24/7 thanks to all the mopeds... It's really hard to describe just how many old, polluting mopeds are on these roads... strangely the cars are all fairly new and there's no shortage of really nice cars. There's a tremendous selection of asian cuisine at rock bottom prices. There's enough markets, temples, memorials etc to keep one busy for 3-4 days, but I wouldn't want to stay any longer than that. Also the night life is quite poor for a major city, there's no real entertainment hub, I was lucky to find a few places that were quite jumping at night. The cost of living is really low here, you can buy a can of beer and a pack of smokes for about $1.25 CDN from the 7/11. Much of the city is incredibly generic and run-down and quite dirty, but this I'm told is very typical of a lage Chinese city (even though Taipei is in the Republic of China its culturally very similar to mainland Chinese Cities I was told). That said there's a few stops that MUST be visited, the areas around Shilla and Xinem stand out as world-class in every way... the area around Taipei 101 is quite boring but full of life. Also I was shocked to find out how much more electronics cost in Korea than in Canada, well Taiwan is no different. Cheap LCD's? No where to be found, the no name brands still charge a premium. North America has a lot of buying power and is the largest market for these manufacturers hence it gets the lowest prices anywhere... I just kind of assumed since most of our electronics come from asia it would be cheaper there. You can still get some ipod knock-offs really cheap, but any quality electronic is generally more expensive in asia...
This was my second major asian city (Seoul being the first). Seoul is so big, clean and modern it's impossible to compare it to Taipei which is really nitty gritty, has a very outdated infastructure (except for a high speed rail system) and is very different culturally. It was a real eye opening experience and if you're looking for something to compliment your travels to the big 3 asian mega-cities (HK, Tokyo and Seoul) I'd strongly recommend it.
Nothing like cheap Taiwanese beer after just arriving at the airport:
I took the next 3 walking to my hostel, yes that's a Lambo.
I thought this was quite funny...
Smile!
Huge amounts of prime real estate are devoted to memorials, this type of thing would never fly in a North American city.
Taipei Normal University... I never found out why it's called "normal"
Typical mid-rise in Taipei, old and ready to implode. It's a good thing these buildings aren't in Toronto as the UT forums would be full of threads demanding their demise.
The subway is above street level in parts:
Some very rare, nice high-rises:
Market:
They're really proud of this thing here and refuse to call it anything but the world's tallest...
Was quite smoggy the day we went up...
Now that's a huge damper!
City hall... and no those guys aren't strapped in to anything, and it was raining lightly at the time!
Notice the crazy workers on the left:
Night market near my hostel:
Shilla station area:
Tree's are a very rare sight... well healthy ones at least.
I'll let the pictures do the talking for this restaurant
Need any electronics?
Xinem station area... hey look it's TLS!!! oh wait...
Similar to Myeon Dong in Seoul, very alive at night.
Cool rooftop batting cage:
Many Japanese boutiques are in this area:
Up in the mountains...
Taipei 101 truly dominates the skyline, the only other major skyscraper is several km away.
Me and some peeps at the hostel:
Nice message in the airport (which looks like it's from MASH)
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