taipei, taiwan — orchids, night markets, natural history | gap travels ep. 5

Hellooooo dear viewers! According to my parents I've been in Taiwan before, but I remember nothing except a bout of food poisoning and vomit on a windy bus. Thus, I decided to go to Taipei as part of my solo travels during my gap year. I was so happy to meet up with not one, but two people I knew when I was in Taipei, eat such delicious food including grilled oyster mushrooms, pork meat over rice, and glutinous black sesame rice balls over shaved ice. I also went to a natural history museum by accident when I was intending to go to the national history museum instead... happy accidents. I didn't know that Japan had colonized Taipei before, so suddenly the somewhat Japanese aesthetics of some Taiwanese friends I met in the US make sense now. I'm also happy to say that I employed some of my chopped Mandarin in this leg of the journey :) All the service workers I interacted with were so warm - especially the volunteer at the memorial hall and the woman who checked me into my hotel. Enjoy! Best, Emily #taiwan #taipei #nightmarket #taiwanesefood #solotravel #gapyear