Rebecca Heng: A Trip to Taiwan ( Day 2 )

14th December 2013

You know what excites me the most when I stay in a hotel?

Its breakfast buffet! I can't say that I'm a big eater but I can't deny that I love food a lot.

What's breakfast without bread and eggs?

If you know me well, you'll know that I'm not a morning person. One thing about joining a tour group is, you'll have to wake up really really early. Throughout the whole trip, I had to wake up at 6am every morning. I even had trouble waking up at 6.30am for school last time and during the trip, I didn't dare to press the snooze button, not even once, and I must say it was quite an achievement to me. ( Ok, probably it was also because I didn't want anyone to wait for me or else we would be behind the schedule. It was actually my first tour trip with strangers, so it would be quite embarrassing if I was late. Or probably I was just excited for breakfast. )

Checked out at around 8am and we left to 日月潭 / Sun Moon Lake at Nantou ! On the way there, we were surrounded by numerous mountains and the sky was perfect! Actually it was pretty rude of me for not listening to the local tour guide most of the time on the bus when he was busy yakking about Taiwan's history and stories. It wasn't entirely my fault because the Chinese words he used were too profound to me.. Also blame it on Mother Nature for making me awestruck by the beautiful scenery! But, I did try to listen.

Sun Moon Lake is said to be the largest lake in Taiwan. And it's home to one of the aboriginal tribes ( Thao ). We went to the hotel ( as shown in the picture above ) for a clearer view of the lake.

So breathtaking.

Can I just glue my eyes onto the binocular.

There were many shops beside the hotel selling accessories, necessities, clothes and food.

This lady has been working over there for 50 years. Wow.

Herbal eggs!

& sausages!

The herbal taste was so strong, yum.

Then, we went to 文武廟 / Wen Wu Temple which is situated opposite the hotel / the row of shops.

Notice the 5 doors at the temple. We are only allowed to enter through the 2 doors on the right and leave through the 2 doors on the left. As for the third door / middle door, we were told that it is used by the Gods only, but I've seen many people walking in and out through whichever doors they wanted.

One of the two red lions which guards the entrance of the temple. This is called the Chinese Guardian Lion. It's pretty common to see the statues of the Chinese Guardian Lions in Taiwan; in restaurants, offices, historical buildings, homes and etc. The statues are always depicted in pairs, a lion and a lioness and they are believed to be possessed with mythic spiritual power.

View from the temple.

An earthquake happened 10 over years ago in that area and the temple was destroyed. However, the cracked floor caused by the earthquake did not reach the entrance of the temple. Instead, the direction of the crack changed, away from the entrance. Weird huh.

The proof is on the first picture.

A closer view of the picture.

In the temple, we gave an amount of money and we went to the counter to get a red packet with a prayer note inside. The man chanted a while, I think it was a form of blessing being 'transferred' into the red packet.

I was also given a joss stick and a 孔子 / Confucius bookmark for school. The procedure goes like this;

1. Pray in front of Confucius with the given joss stick.

2. Place the joss stick in the incense burner.

3. Hold the red packet and make three circles clockwise above the incense burner and you're done!

Mum and I got curious about this thing and so each of us placed a TWD 10 into it and music started playing really loudly in the hall..

A doll came out from the little house with a rolled paper and was thrown into the red bin.

It's actually a written oracle stating a little about your fate. It's your choice whether to believe it! I'm quite a superstitious person, so I was actually happy with what I've gotten.

Made a wish at the wishing fountain too!

There were souvenir shops and also a drinks stall in the temple. Smart.

Bought baked sweet potatoes to snack on on the bus! One of my favourite.

I had the urge to jump into the lake.

Had our lunch here.

This fried mee hoon was superb. It tasted rather different from a normal fried mee hoon because of the water quality they used.

Prawn salad.

There were many fruit stalls along the road.

The fruits were superrrrr sweet and juicy! Mum even suspected that the fruits were soaked in sugar water but the tour guide told us otherwise. She still was not convinced.

Then it was time to have a tour on the lake by boat! I remember the last time I took a boat ride was last year in Kukup with college mates and dad was so worried because I was warned not to go near the sea. ( last year was a bad year to be at the sea where accidents were prone to happen, I supposed. ) But, the 'rebellious' side of me overlapped the superstitious side of me. When dad called, I was already surrounded by the sea, playing with fishes and having fun. I couldn't lie because he heard the engine sound coming out from the boat before I could confess. Oh well.

Anyway, I was really excited because there was no way I could miss this.

Looks like a crocodile head right?

Mountains everywhere.

Can you spot the white deer? According to the tour guide, Sun Moon Lake was discovered by the Thao people when the Thaos were chasing a white deer which led them to the lake, which is surrounded by mountains.

Then we went to Sun Link Sea which was about 1600-1800 metres above sea.

Will never get tired of the view.

Checked into Sun Link Sea Hotel.

Something embarrassing happened when we checked in. Sister and I were looking for the air-conditioner when it was 15 degree celsius outside.. The tour guide even told us personally by knocking on our door that there was a heater instead of an air-conditioner in the room, and even directed us on how to use it. Gosh.

After checking in, we went up to the mountain by this bus. So cute.

There were many types of trees preserved there.

We could actually mountain trek even higher if we had more time. Such a pity.

Waterfall, where the oxygen concentration is said to be higher than any other areas. This explains why we often see martial arts masters meditating / practicing for months under a waterfall on TV. The high oxygen concentration will clear one's mind which will make him focus easily.

And it was time to eat again. We had our dinner at the hotel.

Food was awesome, as usual.

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Went to a shop nearby the hotel to have a 'poprice'-making session. You may heard of popcorn but not poprice. Popcorn is made of corns, right? Sooo, poprice is made of rice!

The friendly boss introduced to us the poprice-making machine.

Rice was poured into it.

He asked for a volunteer to make the final step; which was to close the machine. A kid volunteered!

And a loud boom was heard.

Little poprice in the making.

Only 3-4 cups of rice was used, and this much was produced!

Caramel.

Mixing the caramel and poprice.

Dividing it equally.

And everyone lined up for his / her share.

This tasted nice! Some people even asked for more because it was that good.

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We went to a tea shop afterwards and had a really interesting activity.

There were two rows of bowls of tea on the table. Each labelled A to E and 1 to 5. We were required to taste the tea and match the same tea correctly. Quite challenging because the colour of the teas were the same and the tastes were very similar. The tour guide even offered to give a free trip package to whoever who matched correctly.

And guess who matched them correctly? The attention was overwhelming and I didn't know how to react in this kind of situation. Obviously, the tour guide didn't give me any free trip package. Another tour member who matched everything correctly was even better! She did not taste the tea at all..not even a sip. It was pure luck.