Hear/Say

Another visual diary to sum up the day! I watched Chungking Express and Harold and Maude today; quite the alternative love story collection… oh, and Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams. Which I might post on later.

We visited the shadier part of Taipei today; it used to be a hub of a port back in the day (try a century ago), but now excels in cheap rent, cheap drink, cheap hos, and cheap people. Bums and bored poor old folk play chess around the metro station. There is a well-known ancient temple here; I’ve seen many Japanese tour buses stop by. The infamous Hwasi Night Market is also located here– “Snake market”– as it used to be prolific in restaurants serving fresh snake soup, among other delicacies. Now I only see three or four,with their cages of snakes and poor mice on display for gasping tourists and indifferent locals alike. You’re not actually allowed to take pictures, but I did anyway, and got called out.

What; you haven’t been to the IDEAL SHOP before?

Snakes lurk in the steel mesh cages and the glass cases

The rats to be eaten; when there’s enough of a crowd, they feed the snakes with the poor little schmucks– in one cage, there were a bunch of naked baby rats, blind and doomed! BLIND AND DOOMED!

This is a wooden penis I spied at a random store. It has nothing to do with snakes.

And true to the Asian value of freshness, your pick of the litter will be your dinner… I believe those are eels, but I will not pretend to know what the window suckers are…

On to more savory visuals…

Literally translated, “gourd and meat soup”– I guess that is the general idea, but it tastes much better– and less weirder– than it sounds.

Mochi/muaji: Sticky rice ball in sweet peanut powder

Sweet red bean soup with peanuts, tapioca balls, and mini sticky rice balls

Shaved ice dessert! Topped with: peanuts, green bean, red bean… and other stuff. You can also get it with fruity flair, like mango slices, passion fruit sauce, and fruity jello bits but my parents are traditionals. This place has been open for eighty years.

A street vendor/food stand

Agar seed jello and juice… the jello is lemony, and the juice you drink it in is sweet and slightly citrusy.

Lost white people. I admire his fanny pack.

Asia is cheap toyland

Barbies are a dollar USD and come in clear body bags

Fake baby mario

I’ve been unlucky? lucky? enough to miss typhoons this season. It doesn’t happen often– in fact, the norm is several typhoons from July to August, but this year the weather has been relatively lame and non-kick-ass. I always like typhoon weather. I feel like it kills mosquitoes.

Graceee