Grandma's Morning Walk

Breakfast and Journey to Grandma's a few days ago. After we ate, we walked to the train station!

Shui Jian Bao, and Luo Buo Gao!

The best pudding ever.

motorcycle.. check!

trains.. check!

I went on a morning walk with my grandma the next day. She goes to this mountain trail (at 5 am) called "18 peaks mountain" and walks for two hours or so. We saw a lot of little animals and people exercising.

packs of stray dogs! 

Pretty flowers!

lizard.. check!

click the photo to see many spiders hanging on their webs!!

People exercising below

Afterwards we had purple rice fan tuan for breakfast!

 I actually saw Super Junior Posters at the bookstore too! but did not bring my camera. More to cross off my checklist!!

A funny conversation between my mom and grandma concerning spiders:

Grandma: Spiders are so small! How do they have so much material to build their webs!
Mom: if humans had materials to build webs, I wonder how much we would have!

More Journey for Food

For lunch, we stopped by MOS Burger. They basically have burger patties made with rice and slices of meat and veggies inside. We walked by the HSR station and also by this old house. And afterwards, we had almond flavor dou hua with peanuts.  

MOS Burger, at the HSR Station

My Mos Burger

We walked by this old historically preserved home that is open to the public.

window!

the boys bathroom, Wall of logs! 

Ruins of a home made with clay! 

bamboo tunnel over sewer

Where they kept the pigs of the house

After seeing the home, we got Dou Hua! The dou hua's texture is like a really really soft tofu that dissolves in your mouth. The one I got was almond flavored and tasted nice and sweet.

Almond Flavored Dou Hua

My grandma's roof garden

More things to cross off the list! And it's only my first day!

Journey To Breakfast

Now for some real breakfast. We walked around in JhuBei, which is a newly planned residential area. It even has areas reserved for parks and pedestrian walkways! About a block away, we found a nice breakfast place and got us some nice fooood. real fooood. 

The morning view from the apartment

I was happy to see a lot of landscaping

Pretty interesting retaining wall-bench

Breakfast!!!

Luo Buo Gao- Chinese Turnip Cake 

Dan Bing (Egg Cake thing)

Shao Bing (Another cake thing)

Homemade Soy Milk 

Xiao Long Bao (Buns...)

A few things crossed off the scavenger hunt list!

Above the World

On the airplane! I kept opening the shades.. blinding everyone in the plane.. But it was so great to see the Earth from above! The different cloud shapes and landforms!!!!!!!! Beats Google Earth any day. Also, Japanese people like to fold their toilet paper like this. I tried to do the same.. But I don't think i did it very well. 

This is over the Great Lakes, me thinks

Best. Flight. Dessert.

Me thinks this is over Canada. SPOTTY 

A blanket of clouds

it's real cold up there.

rainy in Japan!

Airport!

I have arrived on the island! I had a pretty quick flight.. well it felt that way. We were still delayed in Japan because of rain..It had just rained in Taiwan too! So it is supposedly... "cooler" than it was a few days ago. Thankfully we did not arrive a few days ago.

I was very happy to see my good friend Dulles!!! How beautiful art thou.

WHAT BEAUTIFUL CURVES YOU HAVE

MY LAST CHIPOTLE OF THE MONTH!!! How I will miss thee.

Scavenger Hunt: Off to the Island!

Well, I'm flying to my favorite island tomorrow! My good friend has given me the idea of doing a photo scavenger hunt for the blog during my journey. I will try to take pictures of the things on the list and post them!

What would YOU like to see from Taiwan? Let me know, and I'll add it to the list. Give me something challenging! Or even abstract! 

• Places
• Rice Fields
• The Pacific Ocean
• The Mountains
• Night Market
• The Beach
• The Food Market
• Bamboo Forest
• Sketchy Alley
• Temples
• Incense
• Deities
• Matsu
• Tu Di Gong
• Animals
• Monkeys
• Spider
• Bihu (lizard thing)
• Butterfly
• Dragonfly
• Mosquitoes and their bites
• Pig
• Meal Food
• Zhutong Fan (Bamboo Rice Meal)
• Beef Noodle Stew
• Fan tuan (Rice.. er. ball)
• Vegetarian Food 
• Stinky Tofu
• Zhong Zi (Pyramidal Rice in Leaves) 
• Ba Wan (Meat in Glutinous Rice Dough)
• MOS Burger
• Luo Buo Gao (Radish Cake)
• Dan Bing (Egg Tortilla)
• Xiao Long Bao (Buns)
• Desserts & Drinks
• Dou Hua (Tofu Dessert)
• Bubble Tea 
• Shaved Ice
• Yang Le Duo (Yogurtish Sugary Drink)
• Pudding (it's better in Taiwan than here)
• Tea
• Fruit
• Guava
• Lychee
• Passion Fruit
• Grapes (it's better in Taiwan than here) 
• Transport
• Gao Tie (high speed rail!!!!) 
• Mossy Stairs 
• Motorcycle
• Truck
• Country Road
• City Road
• Traffic
• Cable Car
• Funny Western Things
• Similar Businesses
• Engrish
• Funny Products
• Abstract
• Heat
• Cuteness
• Misc
• Interesting Toilets
• Pop Stars
• TVXQ
• Super Junior

Taiwan Sketchbook

While in Taiwan, I'm going to be doodling/sketching/learning Chinese in this sketchbook that my good friend bought me. It's a fairly flexible book, so I made a hardcover to protect it with two-ply chipboard and some aluminum foil waterproof tape. I'm gonna try to fill up the pages! 

Front. Held together by an elastic band like the Moleskins!  

My name on the side in English and Chinese

The original sketchbook in its new hardcover

The first page

The back, lodged into the hardcover.
There is nothing more exciting than a blank sketchbook! 

Blueberry Oat Crumbs Cakemeal

This is the oatmeal I had today:

I am actually running out of ideas.. anyone have any?

-Country Choice Multigrain Oatmeal (ye...)
-Blueberry Pound Cake Crumbs (sweetness AND cakey texture AND blueberriness)
-Flax Seed (health ++)
-One Raisin (just one.)