Taiwan Trip, Day 6

Tainan was a nice town. I spent most of this day just walking around, visiting temples and the backstreets. It was a lot smaller and more rural than Taipei, and seemed really easy going. I definitely got some attention, but not in a bad way. People would occasionally shout out `Hello` to me, and so on, but were not creepy about it. There were no aggressive vendors or anything like that—the joy of going to a non-touristy country!

There were other tourists, but they all seemed to be Chinese (either Taiwanese or—once—mainlanders!) There were also quite a few Japanese tourists. I did notice the traffic seemed to get even worse once you were out of Taipei. The traffic in Taiwan is definitely 3rd-world-ish—people pay very little attention to things like pedestrians or traffic lights. You just have to start walking out in the street and hope your wits can save you. In the end, I survived just fine, although I had a few nasty moments.

I was planning on staying in Tainan for just one night, and then heading further south, maybe to Kaohsiung, but I decided I was too tired and wanted to stay one more night, and then take off for my next destination the day after. I tried to book another night at the hotel I had stayed at the night before, but they were fully booked. So I lugged my stuff over to another hotel, also recommended in the Lonely Planet book. It was also quite close to the station, and had a clear air of very faded grandeur to it. It had clearly once been a much fancier hotel, but now the rugs were worn, the paint was peeling, and it was all a bit shabby. Still, my room was really large and only cost about $20, including an en-suite shower that worked just fine. No holes in the wall this time, and a big window! So I was happy with that, in the end.

Tainan has been heavily promoted as Taiwan’s version of Kyoto—a historical city as opposed to a commercial, bustling modern city like Taipei or Tokyo. Tainan does have quite a few old temples and districts, but it is nothing compared to Kyoto. Still, I enjoyed it. Because Tainan has invested quite heavily in tourism, the city is very well sign posted in English, with periodical maps and informational signs along the main tourist ways. It was easy to find my way. They also had good maps available at the tourist stations.

That morning, the weather was sunny and pleasant. It was very warm, enough so that I wore only a T-shirt. My first stop was at a place called the Chikan Towers. I wasn’t planning to go there per se, but it looked nice from the outside. It was nice on the inside too—just a kind of quiet spot. It was apparently a fort built by the Dutch, in the 17th century—the Dutch briefly tried to colonize Tainan—and was used as an administrative area. It was also used as an army hospital by the Japanese, apparently. Now it is mainly just a tourist site and kind of functions as a temple. You can climb all around the fort—there are numerous buildings, including an old school house. The decorations are beautiful and colorful as always.



For me, though, the garden was definitely the highlight. It was calm and peaceful and full of tropical flowers. There was a crazy old tree that looked like a banyan tree.

http://picasaweb.google.com/EFSelf/TaiwanTrip?authkey=Gv1sRgCOGTrv7yhr_FQQ#5307779476397985442

Various kinds of sculptures—including one hilarious bronze sculpture of foreigners, as seen by the Chinese—are scattered around the garden. In front of the fort, there are 9 turtle statues accompanying 9 steles with inscriptions—they date from the Qing dynasty, and are a well known landmark of Tainan. It was nice.



I walked around the area a bit, checking out the stores and restaurants and eventually found a restaurant I had read about in Lonely Planet. They only served one thing, so I figured it would OK even if no one spoke English (and no one did.) The food was a kind of sticky, glutinous rice with some meat inside, wrapped in a banana leaf. It was not the most delicious thing I have ever eaten, but it was certainly authentic (a hole in the wall kind of place) and apparently quite famous. I enjoyed it.

After that, I was off to another temple, this one a Confucian Temple, and one of the best known in Tainan. It is also one of the older buildings in Taiwan, dating from the 17th century, although it has been moved and re-constructed a few times.



Again, it was a peaceful, calm place, with large gardens and a lot of trees for shade. The buildings were pretty on the outside, but less impressive inside. Still, it was interesting visiting a Confucian Temple—I had never been to one before, but only Buddhist or Shinto temples. In Confucianism, there is no god to worship, per se, so instead it is the sayings of Confucius that are enshrined in the buildings. The temple once functioned as a Confucian school, training new scholars for government work. The colors were vibrant but more understated than at the typical Buddhist temples.

I wandered through the temple and took a few pictures. In front of the main temple, a musical group of some kind was playing what sounded like traditional Chinese music, and I sat and watched for a time. At one point, a very elderly man from the crowd came up and did a number. He wasn’t exactly the greatest singer ever, but it was certainly interesting.

After leaving the temple, I wandered around the back and saw the famous shaved ice store mentioned in my guidebook. The line was huge, though, and I was not particularly interested, so I didn’t get any ice. I wandered down another alley and found a stand selling some kind of sweetened juice made of a huge squash of some kind—it looked like a gigantic zucchini. They had a few outside to demonstrate, including an interesting statue! The juice was quite tasty, very cool and refreshing, and flavored with what tasted like brown sugar.



Near the juice stand, I found another temple. It was small and in an interesting residential area. In most respects, it was a typical temple, but was very interesting. I especially liked the red flashing LCD lights on top of the temple… I’m guessing it was not that old, but it was certainly very interesting!



That was about it for my day, and I headed back to the hotel for one more night, stopping only to buy a ticket to my next destination.