Off to find 十分幸福….

Decided to head out to Shi Fen on the second day. In order to get to Shi Fen, we had to take a train from Taipei Station to Rui Fang before transferring to another train which would bring us to Shi Fen and Pingxi. The train ride was kinda enjoyable, comfy seats, accompanied with beautiful sceneries along the way. However, there were certain timings for these 2 trains, therefore we have to take note of the time every now and then in order not to miss a train, else, we got to wait for at least 40mins for the next train.

Raohe St. Night Market

The place that you MUST visit when in Taiwan is the night markets.. You can get lots of 小吃s (especially my smelly tofu :D), and at some night markets, you can to do lots of shopping for clothes, accessories, bags, etc.

First night market for our trip was Raohe St. Night Market. It was a walkable distance from Wu Fen Pu (五分埔), where we spent hours shopping. Unfortunately for us, it was raining heavily on the first day of our trip, and we had to find our way around in the rain with an umbrella in hand.. The longer we walk, the heavier the rain got.. But… I guess it was kinda “a blessing in disguise”? Cos when we reached Raohe Night Market, it wasn’t crowded.. 😀 And since it was raining extremely heavy, we decided to buy the food back to the hotel and slowly enjoy it instead of eating it in the rain.. Well, with the exception of my smelly tofu… I wouldn’t want to stink the cab with it..

Off to Taipei 101

Speaking of our hotel choice, I guess I can say that our hotel was conveniently located near the heart of the shopping district – Ximending. With lots of yummy food choices around our hotel and with the train station just a 2 mins walk away.

Our first meal of our trip was Beef noodles just round the corner of our hotel. We heard that it was a rather famous stall with the locals around there, and it was one of the “original” stalls. The beef noodles are really awesome, the beef would melt away the moment you eat it. It’s very tender, and not as fatty as the ones we have in Singapore.

Mission accomplished in Taiwan

I gave myself a mission to complete during my trip to Taiwan.. That mission was – to eat smelly tofu every single day.. And I managed to accomplished it and I was a happy gal.. Wherever I went, I kept my nose wide open for the wonderful smell of Smelly Tofu.. 😀 And like what people have been saying, the more it stinks,  it means it’s more delicious..

Different from Singapore’s night markets, they have different types of Smelly tofu – Grilled Smelly Tofu (I personally don’t find it nice, it wasn’t smelly enough), Smelly Tofu in Spicy soup (didn’t try it as I didn’t wanna risk getting a tummy ache from the spiciness), and finally fried Smelly Tofu (the best version and also the version that we have in Singapore). Perhaps there are more variations of Smelly Tofu that I didn’t come across…

Fried Smelly Tofu

Grilled Smelly Tofu

Oh… Apparently, Smelly Tofu is supposed to be good for digestion as it’s fermented.. Well, that’s what some stall owners said.. Whether it’s true anot, I’m not too sure.. But I guess it does makes sense, just like how people assume Yakult is good for digestion.. Both are fermented too, aren’t they? *wonders*

A cosy little hotel in Taipei….

I’m finally back from my 5 day trip to a beautiful city called Taipei.. The weather had been a great help to us.. It was rather cooling for the first few days, with continuous rain.. Towards the end of our trip, we rather grateful for the rain that came pouring down during the first few days, as the weather on the 4th and last day was HOT, with temperatures soaring to 31 and 34 degrees… Luckily for us, the itinerary for those 2 days were mainly shopping and not sight seeing, else, I guess we would have been roasted there and then..

During the trip, we stayed in a relatively new hotel called Cityinn Plus which is located in Ximending. While reading reviews of this hotel before our trip, the friendliness of the staffs were specifically highlighted in all of the reviews.. And those reviews were telling the truth.. ALL of the hotel staffs were extremely friendly and cheerful. While we were discussing among ourselves on what we should have for breakfast, (I guess the staff overheard us) they gave us suggestions on what were the delicious foods available around the hotel.. But what stood out most about this hotel was, they even made an overseas call a day before our trip, to confirm our booking, enquiring on what time we would reach, letting us know the check-in time, what we could do while waiting to check-in, etc etc.. I believe there aren’t many hotels who would bother to call you and welcome you to their country..

Greetings….

Greetings Earthlings….

My source of information tells me that there are gonna be some visitors from Taiwan who will be visiting this blog soon..

So…. Stay Tuned… 😀