Day 10: Takao Railway Museum...

~ 23rd March 2014 ~

Take the MRT to the first stop known as Sizihwan (西子灣). I don't remember how far we had to walk there and I think we missed out on a lot of good places for sight-seeing. Blame it all on our lack of knowledge regarding Kaohsiung. I still regretted that we didn't stay there longer. The more I look at our photos, the more I regretted for concentrating too much on Taipei. More research should have been done on Kaohsiung instead of Taipei. Can just totally forget about Taipei.

The railway museum was kinda famous from what I read. But the moment I saw the train heads of yester-years, they looked just like our train heads from Keretapi Tanah Melayu Berhad. For those Malaysians who have never taken a ride on our old 'choo choo' train, then of course one would be delighted to see old train heads at Takao. The only stark difference between our local train heads and Takao's train heads on exhibit was that the language used was different. Duh... ours used the Malay language while the ones in Takao has Chinese words printed on it. We made a quick walk across the museum and I took only a few photos. The railway did not just end there. The whole place has been turned into an eye-catching spring field.

Takao Railway Museum was where I fall in love with hibiscus. I am willing to be a hibiscus collector now but I totally have no idea where to get those hibiscus from. Not much train head photos I will show here but I will show you every hibiscus that I managed to capture. We ended up spending a lot of time at the railway museum, looking at bright and colourful flowers.

I have the exact same species of this double-layered hibiscus but bright yellow in colour. I love pink but the pink hibiscus that I have in the garden is a dirty shade of pink.

This is my precious' favourite shade of pink... light and gentle... I want this as well... I want all the hibiscus in the world~!!!

I have exactly this yellow hibiscus with a red heart in the middle. I used to have the striking pink ones but because I put those two together, I think the yellow hibiscus cursed the pink hibiscus to death. The pink one died due to loss in competition. 

 I want this as well... multiple-layered hibiscus.... awww.... where can I get this in Penang?

Orange is beautiful.... whoever says that going to a railway museum is boring? One can learn a lot from the blooming flowers in spring. So, this place is not to be missed at all.

That's the travel buddy. I'm not sure whether she loves flowers or not... will ask her the next round I see her. I don't remember both of us ever discuss about flowers.

My favourite shade of red~! I'm actually okay with any bright colours but this is so unique. I need a bigger garden. Maybe I need to redo my garden.

Day 10: The Dome of Light at Formosa Boulevard...

~ 23rd March 2014 ~

I've done my homework on the places that I wanted to visit when we were in Kaohsiung. I was adamant to see the Dome of Light at one of the MRT stations. It's the station at R10, the Formosan Boulevard station. The name itself is of upper class and when we arrived at the station, it was really mesmerizing. It's so colourful and brightly lighted up but we did not go into the station. We just admired the place from the entrance because we did not want to swipe our MRT card lest we ran out of cash again.

The man in charge was kind enough to remove the barricades that were standing in the way. I was of course, in a snapping frenzy as we were rushing to go off to another place. I can spend hours standing in one place just to take photos.

Malaysia, can we have this? I have confidence that our people are creative enough to make this happen in Kualu Lumpur Sentral :D I wish to see this soon in our country. No, we're not copycats. Maybe we can do better than this.

Day 10: Let the Journey in Kaohsiung Begin~!

~ 23rd April 2014 ~

Finally, finally... I'm writing on our day 10. What an improvement... *bravo to myself* Seriously regretted for staying in Taipei for too many days. Should have stayed in Kaohsiung for at least three or four days... *heartbroken*

Breakfast was included with our minsu but we have to walk to the cafe. They served breakfast but we were not suppose to simply grab anything we like. I would prefer those buns but sad to say... we could only have those already waiting for us.

I was almost in tears seeing that my soy bean milk was served in bowls instead of a tall glass with ice cubes. The weather was so hot yet the Taiwanese adored hot drinks. There was no ice cubes to be found. I did try for ice cubes. It's scalding hot and not drinkable but they have tongues made of heat-proof material. They can just lap up the whole bowl and I left mine untouched.

And they spoil our roti canai... that was so NOT roti canai... Never mind, I'm on holiday... I can go without food...

Our journey began with a thousand steps. I don't remember this place... but I know obviously we were on foot instead of in a car ride. Nice view...

We finally arrived at the train station. Nice building... Penang, when can we have this? Will the mammoth plan be approved?

Patty did the buying of the tickets while we just looked on. I think I only know how to use a machine that's fully operating in Malay Language or English. Any Chinese characters made me feel inferior. I don't even know how to top up the train card. Anyway, we didn't buy any day pass because we were just going to make it one way. Sounds like we're not planning to come back :o)

I'm going somewhere along those lines. I've done my research on Kaohsiung. That's why I really regretted not staying over for another extra few days. Dislike Taipei to the max~!

Day 9: Why One Should Dine in Ikki Japanese Restaurant...

~ 22nd March 2014 ~

We were hungry. We needed food and we were walking around in Kaohsiung. Kaohsiung is a big county and I had no idea where I was if I was holding a compass and also a map. We just told Patty, our sudden customized tour guide that we needed really good food. Our Kaohsiung tour guide made the best choice ever~! Please remove all the night markets plan and enjoy fantastic meals in Taiwan. If you need superb night market food, please come to Penang Island. 

We hopped into a yellow cab and Patty directed the driver to drop us in front of Ikki, a Japanese restaurant. I have no idea what sort of place is this but as long as the restaurant accepts credit card and will serve us with tables and chairs, we're going in~! In we went and we got ourselves a table just by the window. The best part was there have English menu so I do not need a translator to tell me what kinda dish is being served and how they are prepared.

While waiting, the long lost friends have a good time together. Our table was one of international citizenship, Malaysians, Taiwanese and Chinese with half of the feet planted in Australia. Excuse the terrible lighting for the photo. The place is of upper class value so the lighting is somewhat dim, not suitable for photography but good for a romantic dinner. The price of each person is fixed. It's sort of an ala-carte buffet. We don't care about the price actually. As we tell ourselves, we're wealthy people poor in cash.

One should not miss dining in Ikki when one is in Taiwan. Other places you may forget to go, but when one misses Ikki, one missed out a big chunk of the holiday. When our food arrived right under our nose, we went 'ooh-ing and aah-ing'. The food was creatively served and even if a piece of meat should cost only RM2, with the way they served, anybody would be willing to fork out RM20 for one small piece of meat. That's why I said we did not care about how much we had to pay. We felt that with a few thousand NT$ for four person is worth every cent.

For the first time, I'm baring it all of what we ate in Ikki. If we were to stay in Kaohsiung for a few more days, I wouldn't mind dining in Ikki for every meal.

My travel buddy was too hungry to even look up. Shes afraid we would rob her of her food. You couldn't imagine just how happy we were.

Dishes in Ikki were not just creatively served but the taste was exquisite. I've not tasted such fine Japanese cuisine before. Just wait till we go to Japan next. For now, I would say that Melbourne and Taiwan serve really fine Japanese cuisine. 

Oh, restaurants in Penang should follow after Ikki. Prepare a nice box for the ladies to put their handbags and shove the bag under the feet. No one would crawl to your feet to steal your bags unless for some desperate humans. But in high class restaurants, I doubt that there would be anyone crawling on all fours just to get to someone's handbag. There's nothing much in a lady's handbag actually. You will find used tissue, some empty wrappers of nuts or sweets, maybe a bottle of water and crumpled receipts.

Day 9: Love Themed Minsu in Kaohsiung...

~22nd March 2014~

We should have stayed a day or two longer in Kaohsiung. That's what I regretted. The number of days spent in Taipei should have been cut short. So, if any of you are planning your own trip, I will just say that there's nothing special in Taipei but there's more in Kaohsiung. One should explore the southern part of Taiwan instead of aiming straight at the northern part. Taipei is too commercialized. It has lost it's lustre.

Everything about this place is written in Chinese so I did not take the business card, my mistake. I can't read so I thought why bother now I don't even know how to tell you where this place is situated. It's a beautiful place with much love by the odd-looking bear. I have no idea why I did not snap the main entrance of the minsu. It's a building not like the shoplot that we stayed in in Taichung.

We were so excited when we first entered the room. There's one single bed for the travel buddy and she has a desktop all to herself. There's the sofa set facing the television. We did switch on the television to make some noise but in the end we were noisier than the TV. There's an upper bunk in this room.

That's the staircase model. She's not introducing any facial products or clothing. She's just introducing the staircase so that we will not miss it. As if we will.... I got so excited when I saw the upper bunk...

It's so beautiful. I have wanted to stay in a Japanese-style room in Alishan but since we did not have any choice, we just take everything that's served on the platter. But this looked like a bonus. Even though we could not walk properly or stand up straight, I like the midget feel of Alice in Wonderland. We crawled from the bed to the staircase so that we would knock ourselves silly. Seriously, should have stayed a day or two longer. I did not have enough of that room. Now I'm reminded that I need to do up my house to make it look so pretty.

Heehehehehehee... mi mama liked that place as well....

Finally, I found the photo for the address of this minsu. But now I'm not really sure whether that's the address. It looks like an address to me with the numbers and a hyphen. 

There's this basement parking for the building. So, that's where they store their vehicles. I have never been into such an elevator for vehicles. I wished I have gone down together with Patty and Pinky. Now I wonder when's the next time I will come across this kinda basement parking. I know I'm really outdated.

I have no idea which part of Kaohsiung I was in. But if you want to find this place, maybe you can find it. The building is sandwiched between other buildings so there's no spectacular view from the windows. I think our windows were meant to be for show only. 

That's all I can show for the entrance of the minsu. I don't find any boards or signs for this place. That's why it's a good thing that the taxi we took was able to find it. There are some minsu that's so out of the way that even the locals do not know they existed.

Day 9: I Heart Kaohsiung...

~ 22nd March 2014~

I may not like Taipei and I may not fall in love with Alishan and definitely, I have no feelings for Sun Moon Lake, but the moment we arrived in Kaohsiung, I felt such joy at that place.

We took a taxi to our minsu. If the driver has no idea where our minsu was, we were equally as blank as the driver. With the help of GPS, he found his way to drop us safely. While driving, as usual, we always have small talk with the driver. That's one friendly driver towards tourists. *I like* Kaohsiung was the second busiest city after Taipei. From what I read, Kaohsiung became developed because of its industrial background. 

While we were chatting with the driver, we asked the driver whether it was wise for us to take a stroll along Love River. The driver immediately strike that plan out of our mind and out of our sight. He drove along the Love River and asked us to wind down the window. We gagged at the smell of the river. It smelt like Sungai Pinang back at home here. The smell was so revolting I wonder whether aquatic organisms could survive in such condition. Fancy capturing the walkway which looked like the Helix Bridge in Singapore? It was really beautiful and we were thankful that the driver drove along that stretch so actually we did not miss anything at all. Instead of using our energy to walk along the smelly river, we were given the opportunity to catch a glimpse of the 'famous' river while being driven in a taxi.

Those two in front were so used to walking, mi mama and I were left far behind. I have to always remind my travel buddy that back at home, we don't walk along the streets or we would suffer from heat stroke. The travel buddy's on the left while our Kaohsiung private tour guide's on the right. We made her stay with us for the night instead of going home. We were actually walking in search of dinner. We told our private tour guide, actually my travel buddy's friend, that we have no intention to visit any night markets instead, we only want to dine in expensive restaurants because we have no cash.

It was quite a long walk as we were undecided where to go for dinner. It was getting close to 9p.m. and many places will stop taking orders at 9:30p.m. That's understandable. We were walking from one street to another but I felt so relaxed there, so unlike walking around in Taipei. I loathe every corner of Taipei especially the sight of the buildings. It's so much different in Kaohsiung. It's spiritually more relaxed in Kaohsiung, if you can understand what I mean.

So, we became those uncivilized tourists who snap photos by the roadside. One would be thinking what on earth there was to snap. When you're in a foreign land, even the rubbish truck looks adorable. The rubbish trucks in Taiwan has the 'Paddlepop' music playing all the way. When I first heard of it, I thought the ice-cream man on motorbike is the same as back home but in the end, the ice-cream man never came but the smelly rubbish truck came. Anything common to the locals become unusual and surprising to us. Okay, confirm we're from the jungle, just venturing out into a city.

You see, even the road is beautiful, according to me. There's a rectangular box for the motorists. Imagine we ask our motorbike handlers to squeeze into that one box, during peak hours, that box would be redundant. And zebra crossing was so broad and wide and the blue track's for cyclists. They're so prim and proper, makes our driver looks like hooligans~! But I still cannot understand their traffic lights rule where for turning left, it's the same as when people crossed the road. Whatever is it, I enjoy Kaohsiung the most. Wished we stayed a day or two longer.