Taiwan trip Pt 2

Some interesting things about Taiwan:

When buying things at Watsons or 7-11, plastic bags would not be provided. You have to pay NT20 for a bag, which is usually unnecessary unless you buy many big items. The reason? To save the environment and I'm all for it.

All the dustbins I saw comes in two, one for recycling and the other for normal garbage.



People actually queue orderly for the MRT, unlike here in Singapore.

The sales staff are really friendly and nice and will go out of the way to serve you. I could really feel the warmth and friendliness

I love their milk tea! I had at least three cups a day, bought from either 7-11 or the tea stalls which can be found almost everywhere! I love the Oolong Milk Tea, Red Milk Tea, Green Milk Tea, Jasmine Green Milk Tea and I so miss them so much! There's nothing like that here in Singapore! (Or if there is, please let me know where!)

Taiwanese boys, I feel are cuter and they give me this feeling of being more cultured, more courteous. They dress waaaaay better too!

Some memorable things which happened:

We attended a local LGBT film festival on the weekend. Films shown were Formula 17, Kinsey, Spider Lilies and Transamerica. We chose to watch the local one instead, as I was curious to see what the local independent gay films would be like.

The entrance to the LGBT film festival.

However, I didn't manage to stay long enough to watch. There were 2 short films before the main one and when the time came for the main item, I had to leave for dinner with my ex-manager.

The two short films I watched, I would say they were quite interesting and managed to grab my attention, though I didn't understand 90% of the dialogue. One was about this guy from Taichung, who is an insurance agent by day but an opera performer at night. He talks about his life with his boyfriend and his mom, whom he is out too. Quite a charming short film, and it helps that the main character was quite cute ;P

The second was a condensed version of an upcoming Taiwanese film, which the title I can't recall. It's basically about how a guy whose boyfriend was away, started to organise sex parties at their shared apartment. The film snippet ended with the boyfriend walking in amidst a sex party. It seemed interesting too, but I felt it was more titillating than an experiential film.

By the way, all the films including the 12-minute trailer shown on that day, were by the same director.

I also noticed quite a few lesbians and I don't mean just at the film festival. Lesbians don't usually fall within my area of err ... view (sorry to lesbians!). Anyway, I don't really notice them in Singapore as I suspect it is because they are less conspicuous. There was the time I was on the on the bus and there were only so many people I can look at and it was not too difficult to not notice. Not just the bus, I saw a number of lesbian couples on the streets too.

Of course, I think most of my readers aren't too bothered about lesbians, so I shall mention the few incidences of gay sightings. On our trips to the outskirts of Taipei, we had to take buses. Three guys boarded together and right away my gaydar was ringing. Two of them were quite cute. One of them was wearing his jeans so low that one third of his butt was showing. The unfortunate thing is that I couldn't join the previous two sentences with AND.

But at last, my Mandarin sucks big time. Need my dear to start speaking to me in Mandarin already, like QueerR and Apollo. Haha ...

Taiwan trip Pt 1

I apologize for the lack of updates for I have been away to Taiwan from 17th till the 24th. It was a very enjoyable occasion with 3 other friends, LP, EU and SM.

I didn't plan to go to Taiwan, but since the three of them were going and there was a promotional airfare, so I just bought the ticket. It cost only S$280.

My flight touched Taiwan soil at 5.40 p.m. and it was already very dark outside. I thought a heavy downpour was coming but it was not. Apparently, it is normal to be as dark as 8 p.m. over here when it is just 6 p.m. I find this quite unsettling as later that evening when I was out at the night market, it felt like 11 when it was only 9 p.m.

As we stepped out of the airport, the weather was just perfect at 23 degrees. It was just comfortable enough, not too cold. Just like Goldilock's.

We headed straight to the hotel to check in, which was located in the Ximending area. Our hotel is called Neijiang and I was told that it a popular choice for Singaporeans and gays. For what reason, I am not sure. The receptionist Selina is really hilarious though.

SM's friend, KT, was supposed to bring us to the famous night market called Shilin, which according to my friend who is working in Taipei, is too touristy and lack the local flavours and feel.

Taiwan is famous for their snack stalls. We tried the famous large fried chicken (which I didn't find that special, there was too much breaded crumbs than actual meat), hor jien / oyster in eggs (not recommended, as some starchy stuff is added to the eggs) and herbal pork ribs (similar to KL's, but less herbal taste, milder but still very nice).

The famous fried large chicken stall in Shilin Night Market.

A snapshot of the Shilin night market.

After that, we went to a 24-hour book store. Ninety-nine percent of the books are in Chinese, so that didn't leave me many choices to browse. The only thing that caught my eye was that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows were sold at NT649, which is like S$30 / RM70. Of course I grabbed that along with a gay magazine, Genre. There were quite a few other gay magazines sold like Attitude and AXM and they were displayed just like any other magazines; they were not hidden at all.

Absolutely kawaii ATM machines and with little pigs in pink to boot! We saw this on the way to the 24 hr book store.

As we ventured out of the hotel to explore the surrounding area the next day, we realised that we were staying very near to a row of gay bars and pubs. And you ask how do I know that?
With names such as G-Paradise, G-Bar, Q's Place, Bears Beer, one did not need to be a genius to know. I was thinking, just say the word gay already!

Speaking of which, Taiwan has a 24-hour straight porn channel, which was one on of the channels in the hotel room's TV. It was pretty tame though, no explicit images of pussy, just breasts and more breasts, a lot of humping and moaning, that's all. Slightly above soft core, I would say.

But could you guess what's this channel called? Irony of ironies, it is called the Rainbow Channel. Yeah, go figure.

The nearby gay area, called the Red Theatre Plaza. The row of bars and pubs are just behind this building/

The plan for the day was to visit the tallest building on Earth, the Taipei 101. The cost of the ticket is a bit expensive, at NT350 (S$16) just to go to the observatory on the 88th floor. But riding on the world's fastest elevator was amazing; we reached the 88th floor in about 40 seconds! It was really fast and quiet.

The structure of the Taipei 101 building on the ground floor.

A view from the observatory on the 88th floor of Taipei 101.

In the evening, KT brought us to a hot spring. I am not sure where it was as he gave instructions to the taxi driver, but I think it was in the Beitou area. It was in a mountainous area and there were many restaurants cum hot springs establishments.

It was quite affordable though at NT200. It is cheap because the spa doesn't offer anything else, not even drinking water or towels. As such, we have to bring our own.

The hot spring is sex differentiated. There was a cold water pool, another with jacuzzi and there was a steam room. Of course the biggest pool was the hot spring. The temperature was 42 degrees. I couldn't stay in there for than 5 minutes straight, I had to get out and then go in again.

Also, at such a temperature which is higher than the body's, the water doesn't feel like it become less warmer, no matter how many times I went in or stay in the water. There were some tips for hot spring virgins, like not staying in there for more than 5 minutes the first time and getting out if one can't take the heat and drinking lots of water after that.

Something which I learnt is to bring a bigger towel (and no, it's not to cover one's modesty) but to dry up after that. There is no point in covering up because hey, all guys have the same tools!

KT told us earlier that a hot spring is just that; it's not a cruising area or a gay exclusive place.

Anyway, it was quite fun. My skin indeed felt smoother after that!

We headed back into town to club at this place called Funky. It might sound like a cool place but my first impression was that it looked a bit dingy from the outside. In addition, the club was at the basement, which gave a sense of the gay scene being "underground" and somewhat illegal.

On the inside, it was OK though. In fact it was quite huge and well-lit. I say well-lit because I can actually see the faces of the patrons quite clearly, unlike here in Singapore where I usually can't.

We were there less than 15 minutes when the all the lights were turned on. The police was paying us a visit, which was my first time. It was more like a charade as the whole police checking for IDs only lasted about 20 minutes.

I wasn't high enough to boogie, so I waited for the happy hour to start which was from half past midnight till half past one. One can buy one-for-one drink coupons which could be used for the rest of the night. And it was cheap, only NT150! SM bought 6 coupons, which meant 12 glasses!

I had two glasses and they were enough to get me high, as I drank them quite fast and my last meal was more than four hours ago. I managed to dance with a 19 year old Taiwanese, trying to make conversation with him with my terrible Mandarin. He left after he found out that 1) I was not a student and 2) I am from not from Taiwan.

Not long after, things took a downhill turn. SM and EU got really drunk. I hadn't realised it till I playfully slapped SM on the face softly and he actually fell backwards on the dance floor! When I pulled him back up, he asked me why had I pushed him, which obviously I did not and I told him so.

SM was drunk but did not admit it and insisted on staying instead of going back to the hotel. We had to placate him and waited for him to change his mind. He was being taken cared of by LP and KT but still, there were a couple more times he fell on the floor before they managed to get him to sit down quietly. I was given the task of keeping an eye on EU, who was slightly easier to handle though he has a habit of walking around on his own and not letting other people touch him.

Finally, SM agreed to leave and we reached the hotel at 4 a.m. and we went straight to bed.