November 4, 2025

A quiet morning, although the usual debacle of restless sleep unfolded at night, given that my mattress is too hard to allow me to sleep much. It’s going to be a rough day! The day outside looks grim, heavily overcast and grey, with a considerable likelihood of a downpour, not something I am looking forward to.

I check the weather for the next week for the north coastal area of Taiwan. Continuous cloud cover and rain; I could really think of better places to go if the weather here will be so lacklustre …

En route to the subway station, an eatery beckons that seems perfect for the occasion, the Protein Box, serving bento-box style preparations with portions that fulfil the obligatory dietary obligations, protein, starch, and vegetables, the bulk of the items on the tray steamed, the chicken braised in a Szechuan peppercorn preparation, the overall impression one of healthy food, something I wish I had access to on a regular basis while traveling, but certainly hasn’t been the case.

Despite the apparently off-beat nature of my accommodation, I can see that the area the hotel is located in has a lot more to offer than was initially apparent. The unusually-named “Peter Better” coffee shop next the subway station doesn’t just have inexpensive espresso – try NT$50 for a coffee — but it is quite fantastic, with structure and an intriguing flavour profile, fruit and spice, nothing I would have expected; they also offer a host of pour-overs, but those I have to leave for another occasion.

The ride into town already seems straightforward, a notable feature of the Taipei metro being that accessing the platform as well as changing trains requires a fraction of the trek that makes taking the metro in South Korea so onerous. My destination is the Beimen station, which sits at the edge of the core area of Taipei, next to the remains of a gate and the town wall. Outside the station, I see some aged wall fragments that have been incorporated into a complex comprising a variety of historic architectural styles, a modern cement-clad building with sheer, windowless walls, a wooden, two-storied affair with lattice windows and external glass atriums, a two-story, colonial-style bungalow, the entirety surrounded by a patterned flagstone-paved concourse, with various species of trees artfully planted around the perimeter.

The building complex forms some sort of corral, centered on a courtyard that is only visible to paying visitors. Across the street, the officious four story grey (or is it taupe?) Art Deco postal museum, extravagant skyscrapers whose stylistic idiosyncrasies stand out thanks to the fact that they face no competition for their footprint in the sky; the brick chalet with landscaped terraces housing a tourist information office, and beyond the grove of gnarled hardwoods overgrown with ficus, the train station. Very few people are visible in the area; a few Caucasian tourists and no one else. What stands out in this concatenation of grandiose urban renewal projects is that they somehow don’t seem to integrate into an organic whole, and then there is the problem of the space being subdivided by traffic arteries that provide little opportunity to cross in terms of intersections, cross-walks, or over- and underpasses.

The main train station is a gargantuan affair, an amplified stylized version of a traditional palace, the hub of all rail traffic in this small country, the building somehow detached from the surrounding environment — the typical fate of gargantuan architectural projects. The station has extensive terraces with modernist detailing surprisingly bereft of people, or rather, bereft of prospective passengers. There are people on the plazas, and not the kind of people you expect to see in this cultural region; homeless, mostly elderly, camped in tents, huddled amidst their bags and carts, grouped together with peers, shaded with umbrellas, lying on sleeping bags, and so on. I have seen homeless elsewhere in Taipei, but not with such concentration.

Now: how to cross the boulevard running along the south side of the train station? I am encountering one of the prime challenges of navigating Taipei on foot, and that is a lack of appropriately positioned crossings. I spot a small house off to the side of one of the terraces, and from the underlying underground shopping mall, see that there are passages that lead under the street-level thoroughfare, although there is no signage anywhere pointing to a passage specifically for the purpose of crossing to the other side of the traffic corridor. Unlike the bleak landscape aboveground, in this below-ground subterfuge there are all manner of small bakeries and snack shops selling exquisite and tasty treats, which could be very seductive for anyone suffering hunger pangs — and enough money in their pocket.

The next destination is the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, one of the primary attractions in Taipei. I mistakenly decide to walk along one of the major north-south arteries that slices through downtown Taipei; lined with enormous institution buildings that aren’t particularly interesting and occupy large swaths of streetside real estate, they underline a particular challenge I am facing at the moment, and that is the urgent need to go to the washroom. I didn’t think it would be too much of an issue passing by the washrooms in the train station, but now the need has become much more pressing —and this is definitely not the kind of environment you find public services in. Normally, I would be enthused about an even architecturally mediocre environment — but not now!

The long trunks of the palm trees and sinuous spines of the hardwoods regularly spaced along the sidewalk make for a visually engrossing passage, but my thoughts at the moment are focused on a more immediate physical need. The stately Taipei East Gate adds welcome colour and form to the traffic circle to the northwest of the memorial hall complex, and finally, the public library across the road provides access to the much-needed facilities. A perplexing sight at the intersection is the rooftop of the Empire-style Taipei Guest House mansion occupying a huge walled lot that seems shuttered — what would be the purpose of this structure, why was it built in this style, and why does it seem abandoned?

The visitor to the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall is confronted by a vast, traditionally-styled gate in white and blue, the structure including five individual arches, the innermost one the largest and the outer two the smallest, each arch crowned with a decorative lintel and a suspended roof with a fluted blue tile shroud. Once past the gate, a vast concourse opens up, flanked on one side by the National Theatre and on the other by the National Concert Hall, and in the distance, at the back of the National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Park, the memorial hall itself. The seeming motive of the assembly is an exaggerated grandiosity that is intended to impress, the scale of the affair presumably linking the subject to his importance in the history of Taiwan. Chiang Kai-shek is a towering and complex figure in Chinese modern history, in simple terms prevailing against the communist forces and establishing and leading a nationalist bulwark against the communists established on the mainland.

The memorial sits a top a broad, terraced podium, staircases leading to the base of the structure, an archway marking the front leading to a high-ceilinged chamber centered on an oversized sculpture of the seated leader. For the diverse visitors, mostly South and East Asians, the monument is simply an excuse to take selfies, the level of respect differing considerably between the various nationalities. My only immediate concern is trying to get an unobstructed shot, an admittedly childish obsession that I am fortunately not normally beholden to, but when I am, it leads to endless frustration — because those individuals taking selfies always seem to dream of a new permutation of friends to block the view of the statue. There would lots of other photo opportunities at this site if the weather wasn’t as depressing as it currently is!

The site has visitors, but thanks to the immensity of the space, they all seem to vanish in the distance. Broad staircases lead to the upper levels of the theatres, encircled by expansive terraces styled according to ancient royal design protocols, although manufactured using contemporary pre-formed concrete. The roof support structure on these buildings also reflects strict tradition, elaborate, intricate, and on an immense scale, although free from the otherwise ubiquitous mesh covers intended to protect these decorative elements from roosting pigeons.

The lower chambers of the theatres have elegant, period restaurants and somewhat institutional facilities that seem to be typical of such cultural institutions anywhere on the planet, perhaps appealing to a particular state of mental decay resulting from age or alcohol intake prior to or following a cultural event; since these are not currently conditions I’m beholden to, I’m forced to make my way into the broad nothingness that leads to the main road.

There isn’t much left to the day — or my energy — but now that it is dark and the world around me is illuminated by nothing more than street lights, it seems more appealing than the one that was lit by the dark brooding sky. Even better, a mere block away is the impeccably landscaped Jieshou Park, which one would expect would be organically linked to the 228 Peace Memorial Park, but the challenges Taiwan seems to experience in accommodating pedestrians arises again, whereby I find myself having to walk all the way over Gongyuang road in order to cross Ketagalan boulevard. I complain bitterly to a police officer, ignoring the fact that the crosswalk I was expecting was directly in front of the Presidential Palace — perhaps there is a reason they want to limit pedestrian traffic in the area!

It may be dark and I may not be in the fullest of my capacities at the moment, but the 228 Peace Memorial park appears to be a lovely urban green space, with its balance of trees, deciduous and stately palms, broad, paved paths carving arcs around the green plots large and small enclosed by low hedges, many of the contours flowing as opposed to rectilinear and yet the entirety formed with an overarching symmetry. I am thoroughly exhausted and just want to sit down and let time pass, and the garden is certainly a very apt place to do so.

Closer to the National Museum of Taiwan on the north side of the park, intricately-detailed Buddhist pavilions float on a broad pool of water. Amazingly, despite the day having been relentlessly dour and heavily overcast, there were only traces of drizzle, but no rain, and even now the air is still quite warm. Few people wander through the park, lending it an even more serene air, although judging by the rushing stream of humans along the road running past the museum, they may be focused on getting home after work, rather than walking through the park. There certainly are no tourists to be seen here.

The last planned activity for the day is to eat in one of the restaurants recommended in the booklet on Taiwanese cuisine provided by the tourism office. There are several establishments recommended along Hengyang road that runs between the park and Ximen metro station. Given that I am now in the core of the old city, it seems strangely quiet, the numbers on the street restrained, with virtually no Caucasians in sight, despite the retail outlets and eateries on the street reflecting a sense of well-being that seems too well-mannered to be authentic in such an urban environment. I contrast the spaciousness, propriety, and sense of order of the area with the claustrophobia and roughness of the retail environment in Sanchong where I am currently staying.

The Three Coins establishment may offer an intriguing cuisine, but the posh interior visible through the glass windows and the succession of Michelin stickers displayed in the windows is an invitation to continue walking: I’m not in the mood for throwing money out the window for pretention, and so the other option will be my choice for dinner, the LongJi Qiang Guo noodle house, accessible by means of a very narrow alley opening up to a small courtyard, a group of men clad in chef’s uniforms transferring contents between a series of pots and frying pans resting on an array of gas burners, then in turn transferring the finished final dishes onto plates and into bowls.

I order a bowl of noodles with ground beef, then find a tiny table in the busy establishment. The server is convinced that I should order a small-sized bowl, but I opt for a large size, despite her protests. Here again, the pricing leads me to conclude that Taiwan is far from expensive — for example, the large bowl of ground beef noodle soup costing NT$135 (CAD $6.50), hardly something that would break the bank. While the noodles in the soup are thick in the vein of udon noodles — although not quite as thick — and the soup is built from a stock of the same type as udon soup would be in the Korean or Japanese context, this soup seems to be built from a stock made from boiling vegetables with garlic, then adding the stock derived from stewing the ground beef with some basic spicing. A Korean-style udon soup stock on the other hand would be derived from boiling beef or pork with bones with the possible addition of miso. This soup tastes like an approximation of an udon soup someone from a western society would make that knows nothing of East Asian food; ground beef just doesn’t fit into the flavour profile of regional cuisine, the net product seeming to me simply strange and gastronomically maladroit. But the food is nonetheless freshly-made, inexpensive, and the eatery busy with all tables occupied and a welcoming atmosphere.

But so it is: perhaps Taiwanese food is just weird and awkward, but that doesn’t change the beauty of other aspects of the country and the experiences that it offers. Such as taking the metro back to my hotel; despite the long trip, extremely easy, thanks to the clarity of signage, the lack of having to walk immense distances in stations when changing trains, and the frequency of trains. Never mind paying one single fare as opposed to paying another fare every time you access another train, as is the case in Japan. Then there is the low fare — NT$25, which is less than CAD $1.25.