Dr. Fish

We decided to go to Dr. Fish one night.  It's a cafe where they have two tanks of fish to put your feet in and the fish eat off your dead skin.  You are required to buy an expensive drink, but it comes with unlimited bread.  It costs $2 extra to use the fish tanks for 15 minutes, and that was long enough for my ticklish feet!  There was one tank with very tiny fish, and one tank with bigger fish.  We went for the bigger fish tank first, but when all the fish came to the top of the water opening and closing their mouths, ready to attack our feet, we decided to start with the smaller fish.

Being tickled by the tiny fish

I was determined to try the larger fish tank, even though I am extremely ticklish and the small fish were too much to handle.  A few of us went over to the large fish for the last few minutes.  I could only handle having my feet in there for a few seconds at a time.  The fish just attacked our feet!  It didn't hurt, it just felt weird and tickled a lot at the same time.  

The fish nomming on my heel

I don't think they have these anywhere in the US, since it would probably be pretty unsanitary.  But I recommend everyone to try it once!  Once was enough for me though, I'm way too ticklish!

Taiwan

I am really feeling fortunate lately to have had the opportunity to travel this year.  While in Taiwan over summer break, I realized how lucky I am to know English and how much more accessible things are to me.  If I didn't know English, traveling the world would be so much more difficult.  I went to Taiwan with just two of my coworkers (Christine and Tristan) without much of a plan.  We had a very enjoyable time and got to experience different aspects of Taiwan.

The first night we got to Taiwan it started raining pretty hard.  We still ventured out and got some bubble tea and a beer.  The next morning the guy who ran the hostel told us we should stay in Taipei because the typhoon was coming, but we were planning on going to a small town on the East coast.  We didn't listen to the guy and went to a town called Fulong, and I'm glad we went there.  We rented bikes when we got there and rode up the coast, watching the huge waves(from the upcoming storm) crashing into the rocks.

A guy boarding up his house before the typhoon hit

A neat temple along our bike ride

The next day we took a day trip to a town called Jiufen.  It was a very cute little area on a mountain overlooking the sea.  We ate lunch on a patio with a view of the ocean down below.  It was fantastic!  There were many little shops and lots of free samples of different food.  

In Jiufen, ready to battle the storm!

We hung out at our hotel that night, and since we were the only ones in the whole (small) hotel, it seemed like everyone was leaving town because of the storm.  The next day we planned on heading out in the morning, but a Typhoon day was declared in Taiwan so most places (including the trains) shut down for the day.  The earliest train was at 6pm, so we walked around and tried to go see the beach, but the guard wouldn't let us through because the beach was closed.  It makes sense, I guess. 

Preparing for the typhoon

A beautifully intricate temple in Fulong

A man who talked to us and took our picture, so we took his picture. 

We finally got on our train headed for Taipei, and then got on an express train to Taichung.  The express train ended up taking about an hour longer than it should have because it kept stopping due to the weather, so that was a bit scary.  But, we made it so that's the important part!  An old friend from college who is living in Taichung offered to have us stay at his mom's place while we were in Taiwan, so I decided to take him up on the offer.  I'm really glad I did, because we got to actually experience more of the Taiwanese culture and food that we would have missed out on.  Plus, none of us knew the language beyond hello and thank you, so it was a welcome relief to have native speakers around.  They were all really hospitable towards us and very generous.  

The first day in Taichung we went to a place called Rainbow Village.  It's a small village that an old man spent two years painting in order to save it from being demolished.  We got to meet the painter, who was a really nice old man.  He gave us some copies of pictures that he made.  It was an interesting little place.  Then, we went to the jade market and later to a night market where I got to try some stinky tofu (a popular food item in Taiwan).  I was satisfied after that, because the one thing I really wanted to try in Taiwan was the stinky tofu.  It was actually pretty delicious, although I'm not a big fan of tofu in the first place so I didn't eat very much of it.  

Rainbow Village

The stinky tofu ladies

Night market

The next day we went to Sun Moon Lake, which is a beautiful, large lake near Taichung.  We rented bikes and rode around for a while, admiring the beautiful blue-green color of the lake.  I really wanted to go swimming, since it was a lake, but there was nowhere to swim.  Ethan's mom took us out for hot pot for dinner which was really really delicious.  It's kind of like shabu-shabu in Korea, but not crazy burn-your-insides spicy.  After that we thanked our gracious hosts and headed back to Taipei for our last night in Taiwan.  

Our tour guides outside the hot pot place

For our last night in Taiwan (it went by way too fast!), we went out to check out the nightlife.  It was a lot different than Korea, but I guess all of Taiwan is much different than Korea.  The people there seem much more laid-back and less stressed.  The women generally wear more normal shoes and not crazy high heels everywhere, and people were much more friendly and open.  While I was there, I realized that I was comparing everything with Korea.  I remember when I first got to Korea, I compared everything in Korea with the US.  Overall, it was a great trip to Taiwan and I hope to go back someday when there's not a typhoon!

Jisan music festival!

The last weekend in July was the start of our one week summer break.  A long time ago we decided to go to this Jisan music festival for the first weekend and then spend the rest of break in Taiwan.  Jisan is a ski resort about an hour east of where I live now.  We took a taxi straight from work on that Friday so we could make it in time for Radiohead.  Since we were camping out the whole weekend, we went straight to set up our tent when we got there and found out that we would be camping right on the ski slope!  It wasn't too bad, just a bit of a surprise and a bit slanted haha.  The music festival had three different stages and we were camped right in the middle.  We rushed over to see Radiohead, and I realized I didn't know much of his music.  He put on a good concert though.

We went and saw some other performances after, and when we went back to the tent all the bright ski slope lights were still on and the music was booming.  We were all like, how in the world are we going to sleep with this?  But, somehow I passed out right away anyways...and in the morning here's the view from the tent:

And yes we were sleeping on the long grass/plants/flowers.  It was decently comfortable.  Temperature -wise, the morning was unbearably hot.  I got up and drenched myself with sink water both mornings just so I could go back to sleep.

On Saturday we went to watch some Korean bands during the day.  It was super hot, and sadly they had filled in the two pools that used to be there last year.  We left the band area for a bit and found a river to cool off in which was heavenly.  

Concerts during the day.  I want his outfit.

The way Koreans do camping: no personal space.  At least they got to have flat ground in this area!

Here's the little swimming hole we found along the river.  Glorious!

To beat the heat, there was a tent giving out these white "cooling patches" you stick on.  They actually worked fairly well and made you feel cooler because they were really tingly.  Everyone was walking around with these patches on their legs.  Oh Korea, what else will you think of?

Cooling patches on a random person

Later that night, we first went to the Motion City Soundtrack concert and then Owl City.  I got up to the second row for both concerts!  It was crazy how easy it was to get up to the front.  I'm used to everyone pushing and shoving so much that I can't move, but here, everyone was giving each other space and not trying to get as close as possible.  I took advantage of that, of course!  Motion City was awesome of course, and I really enjoyed the Owl City performance.  It's much more fun to see bands when you know the songs!

Excited for Motion City!!

Motion City!

Owl City!!

The next day(Sunday) we were pretty exhausted and the only band I really wanted to see was Los Lonely Boys, but they weren't playing until about 9:30pm and we were leaving for Taiwan on Monday. So we decided to hang out for a bit and then head back to Suji.

Oh and we started our own band while we were hanging out.  No big deal or anything.

I would say it was a very successful first music festival experience.  Now I want to go to more music festivals!!