My Feet Are My Only Carriage...

I haven't posted in a few days so I thought I would share with you where I was etc.

Right now I am in Tainan staying with my friend Josh in his killer apartment. Luckily he had an extra room for me to stay in so I am saving money by not paying rent. Money itself was a little problem because for some reason the ATM's here in Tainan wouldn't let me take out money for a few days...I managed to find one that spit out a few dollars today though.

Tainan is in the South of Taiwan, to get here I took a 6 hour train ride a couple days ago. You can take a 2 hour train ride but it was three times the price. So far in Tainan I have seen a couple temples and eaten some great food, especially at one of the night markets here.

Night markets are fantastic. Its a blend of clothes, food, carnival games, and even a pet store. They get PACKED as well but the food is cheap and well worth being sandwiched between a thousand people. I wonder if they would work in Toronto??

The best (of 2...haha) night market I have seen so far has been one in Taipei called Shilin. Its in a maze of a dozen different streets and you could get anything you want there (as long as its either really small clothing or food on a stick). Like I said, the food is absolutely the highlight...they have candied cherry tomatoes!! Delicious. There are also these little illegal (I think) carts that set up shop in the middle of the street (creating pedestrian traffic jams like you wouldn't believe). These shops are interesting because they all have little walkie talkies...on the other end are their buddies on the lookout for the cops. Whenever the cops are close by they all hustle their carts (and run into people in the process...apparently I don't know the word for "Get the hell out of the way" in mandarin yet) into another spot in the market. Anyway, I have realised that I didn't bring enough shirts (5 only) so i need to get one at a night market. I am trying to find a tee shirt that has the worst written english ever....something along the lines of "Good thing yes baseball"

I managed to do one of the day trips I was thinking about doing. It's difficult without my own transport (more on this later...) so I was happy to go to a town called Wulai. Wulai about a 40 minute bus ride outside of Taipei. Finding this bus was not the easiest thing in the world, but luckily for me I am relatively smart (relative to whom you might ask...) and I figured it out eventually. I met a really nice couple on the bus (which was an adventure in itself) and ended up seeing them around town and actually eating lunch with them! Anyway, this town's top draw is a gorgeous waterfall...you can take a small little log train from the downtown to the waterfall and then there is a gondola ride to the waterfall! Absolutely stunning, so green and full of fresh air and friendly people. I loved it, I wish I could show pictures on this thing but I haven't figured that out yet so I will just post a link to my pictures here.

I mentioned my own transport...so Josh has a scooter here and I have just been sitting on the back of it riding around. Unfortunately, from what I have learned getting around the East Coast and West Coast (which is where I really want to go) is a lot easier with your own transport. With Josh going to be working during the weeks I am not going to have any way of getting around other than my own two feet. "Not to worry", I think to myself I can just rent a scooter. The problem is, however, that I am absolutely useless on anything with two wheels, a seat, and a motor (even if it didn't have a motor I would probably be lost as to how to groove on it). The only other time I tried renting a scooter I was in Bali, Indonesia and I drove the scooter straight off the lot into a parked car (hahahahahaha, hindsight makes it pretty funny actually). A little nervous, Josh has offered to lend me his to go around the parking lot in his building...I went today for a little and I think a few more times and I'll be able to get it...or not. We shall see. Until then like Bob Nesta said "My feet is my only carriage, so I've got to push on through....and while I am gone, everything's gonna be alright, everything's gonna be alright..."

I think that's it for now, later team.

Ari

ps - I've been listening to a pretty good Dead tune recently and I wanted to share some poignant lyrics from it that mean a lot to me and what I am doing these days:

Well, I sure don't know
What I'm goin' for
But I'm gonna go for it,
That's for sure.
- Saint of Circumstance

indeed.