Taiwan   I am very glad I extended the Japan trip, and that I did so by going to Taiwan. It’s not mainland China, which I may try to get to one day, but let’s call it “China Lite”. I got to be in an entirely Chinese atmosphere and environment in “one of the Chinas”; including the short visit to Korea in 2005 I’ve now had at least a taste of all three East Asian cultures; I spent just the amount of time in Taiwan that I needed; and the flights (except the connecting one from Fukuoka) were free on “miles”, as was my stay at the Taipei Sheraton free on points. Although Taiwan is at about the level of Cuba, and has subtropical summers that are hot and humid, I was advised that the weather is best in the fall. As it turned out, it was overcast while I was there, and drizzled the first couple of days, but that was no problem, since it was quite comfortable.

It wasn’t even in consideration that I’d be coming here later in the year when, earlier this year we were discussing Austronesian languages having originated in Taiwan (2009/3), whereby, known as the Malayo-Polynesian family, Malaysian-type languages spread from here east to Madagascar and Polynesian languages spread across the Pacific. Taiwan has a human history going back some 30,000 years, and about 4000 years ago the ancestors of the current aborigines arrived, which remain today as about 2% of the population. Only much later, in about the 1200s CE was it settled by the Han Chinese from over the Taiwan Strait in Fujian Provence, similar to how the Americans took over the native populations of Hawaii, the Chileans Rapa Nui, the French Tahiti, the British New Zealand.

In 1544, a Portuguese ship visited and named it Ilha Formosa (Beautiful Island), and the name Formosa stuck internationally until the mid-20C. There was more outside interest here than one perhaps realizes. In 1624 the Dutch established a commercial base and a military fort until the Chinese expelled them in 1662. In 1626 the Spanish came for trading purposes, staying until 1642.

Taiwan was at first part of Fujian Province, then a separate province after 1885. But just a decade later, China was forced to cede Taiwan to Japan, who had always coveted it and who governed it from 1895 to 1945, and this Japanese influence is still felt. Japan extended the railroads and made other improvements to the infrastructure, and its rule has had long-lasting effects. For instance, Japanese pop culture remains a very strong influence.

In 1945, the Nationalist Government under Chiang Kai-shek, fleeing the mainland, settled in Taiwan resulting in the present “two Chinas”. Of the 98% of the population of Taiwan who are Han Chinese, about 84% descend from families who have lived here for centuries and 14% who came after the Communist takeover of the mainland in 1949.

This map of Taiwan (click to enlarge) shows how close it is to mainland China, only about 120 km (75 mi). Also, although roads and rail encircle the island around its center mountainous core, Taiwan essentially “faces” the mainland, a fact I wasn’t aware of before, since the bulk of the populated flatland is on the western side. Taipei is almost at the northern tip, and the second city, Kaohsiung, is at the lower end of this flatland and close to the southern tip of the island. Therefore, it’s logical that the new high-speed rail line runs down the west coast connecting these two cities.

Life in Taiwan for me was just like in Japan. Getting around was just as easy, the signs were all also in English, the Metro worked magnificently. I smiled when I saw that, although Japanese and Chinese are like apples and oranges, the writing system (Japanese kanji) being the same as Chinese hanzi, simple signs such as for an entrance or exit continued to be understandable. It was unusual to be in a Chinese environment that was just like any other place, since one’s encounters at home with Chinese people tend to be with waiters and laundrymen, the result of the fact that working class people tend to be the ones who emigrate. Walking through the elegant Mitsukoshi department store was a revelation, as was Chinese television. When buying subway tokens based on written English directions, it was fun to hear the female voice speaking sing-song-y Chinese and making believe I was following the spoken instructions in Chinese.

In Japan, the yen was close to a US penny, so calculations were easy—1000 yen were about $10 plus a bit (actually $11.54). Taiwan uses the New Taiwan Dollar (NT$), worth about 3 US cents, so the common 10 coin is roughly 30 cents and the common 100 note is about three dollars. Prices were not high.

I still have to smile that I’d gotten so used to traffic on the left after only 3 ½ weeks in Japan that it looked odd when taking the bus from the airport to see right-hand traffic. Even more difficult was to remember to stand to the right on escalators so that people could pass, having learned to force myself to keep standing to the left in Japan.

Taipei Metro   The Taipei Metro (Map by Lzmxya & Abc480528) (click) is a wonder. It’s efficient, attractive, and affordable. It began operations in 1996, and because of its efficiency and affordability, over 1.3 million trips are made on an average weekday. Only the first two phases have been built, with some 80 stations, with many more lines and extensions planned, including a line to the airport, which I would have preferred to the bus I had to take. (A high-speed rail line is also scheduled to be built to the airport.) It is one of the most expensive rapid transit systems ever constructed, with the first two phases as you see them on the map having cost some US$ 32 billion—but then you get what you pay for.

It works just like the Japanese metros do. At the ticket machines you look at a metro map where each station is marked with the fare from the station you’re at. On the machine you press the appropriate fare (it tells you in written Chinese and written English to do that, as well as that spoken voice in Chinese), then put in the coins or bills to cover it, and your ticket and any change drops into the slot below.

The fare within the downtown area was always NT$20, so it took two 10 coins, or 60 US cents for a trip. Only once was the station I was going to far enough to be NT$ 25, or 75 cents. I’ve never seen any metro so cheap. That’s why it draws people out of their cars and improves street traffic.

As in Japan, no one looks at your ticket. You go through a turnstile to enter, and on leaving at the destination station you go again through a turnstile. But in Japan they’re cardboard tickets that the turnstile reads. Taipei has made an improvement that I really like. Although they insist on calling it a ticket, you get a blue, lightweight, thick token that’s very similar to a poker chip. At the turnstile, you just wave it past the sensor, since a computer chip within your token has the fare registered on it. At your destination turnstile, just drop the token in the slot and the turnstile keeps it for reuse.

My hotel was just a couple of blocks from the Taipei Main Station (check the map again), but was located at Shandao Temple. I used the blue line east and west, as well as north on the red and brown lines. The blue line is underground, and I had occasion to use it to go east to the Taipei City Hall station. Note how wide the platform is, and how high the station is, with escalators everywhere. The red line at one point rises from the ground and becomes an elevated. This is the sleek, modern Jiantan station (remember, J=CH).

Pinyin   As you saw from the writing on the token and on the station map, everything the traveler needs is in both Chinese and English, and Chinese street and neighborhood names are all in the modern transliteration system of Chinese born on the mainland called Pinyin that replaced Wade-Giles and also replaced the short-lived home-grown system in Taiwan. Pinyin became official in Taiwan at the beginning of this year, and they are eagerly updating signs. I saw a gleaming new name plate at a station, but, on closer inspection, you could see that the old Wade-Giles spelling HS originally on the sign had been overpainted with an X to represent the same SH sound. When I went to the National Palace Museum in Taipei, I found it interesting to read this sign in the lobby entrance:

The traveler does not NEED to know the couple of odd quirks of Pinyin spelling, but what a waste it would be to be so close to being able to read signs, or names on the map, and yet so far. So many station names are totally in English, but sometimes mixed with the name of a location, and some stations are named entirely after streets or neighborhoods. Let’s do a quick review of the two main quirks, the spelling of SH and CH.

Chinese has two sounds like SH and four like CH. They are all different, but the fine differences only need be paid attention to by the Chinese and by students of the language. For the rest of us, we can just fake our way through it by always using SH or CH as appropriate, whenever we see unusual spellings. You can find these station names on the map, most in the upper downtown area.

Here are a few station names to try to pronounce. If the English voice on the PA said the name of the station, would you recognize it? If so, you might even have fun recognizing it when the Chinese voice said it first.

That last one is the trickiest, because visually, it’s the most misleading to the English speaker. Say MIN.chwan and you’re ready to visit either of the Chinas, or at least to read Pinyin place names on the map.

Day 24 (Second Half): Taipei Arrival   Arrival It drizzled on my arrival day, and was overcast during my whole visit. After I eventually got Taiwanese cash out of a willful ATM machine, I set out to take the airport bus. I’d read that there’s a half-dozen companies vying to get your business for the hour trip into town, and I first spoke to a likely candidate, but apparently they each have slightly different routes, and when I said I wasn’t going right to the Main Station, but was only a couple of blocks away at the Sheraton, she sent me over to another company. Remember that a10 coin is only 30 cents, and you’ll see that the one-way fare being a mere 90 was a bargain. But I wanted everything paid for, so I also got a return ticket, which was only 70.

The bus let me off on the side street right next to the Sheraton, which is a formidable presence outside, and has a huge atrium inside. The room was free on points, but when I checked in, they pointed out that there was an internet charge (this was no longer Japan!), and that, plus the breakfast charge, might make me interested in the upgrade package for the executive floor. It did. For a rather reasonable amount beyond the internet and breakfast charges per day (I found Taiwan in general not to be expensive) I’d get to be on the executive floor, the 16th with free internet, and have access to the executive lounge with butler service on the 17th floor, for a complete buffet breakfast, afternoon drinks and snacks from 14:00 to 16:00, an open bar from 17:00 to 20:00, including a complete hot buffet from 17:30 to 19:30. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse, and I made extensive use of it. I had to break myself away on two evenings in order to go to two restaurants I wanted to visit.

Day 25: Zhongzheng District, High-Speed Rail   Guidebooks on Taiwan are hard to come by, and the one or two I found were so over-detailed as to be useless, so while I constructed my own visit as usual, in this case I didn’t even use a book. I knew I wanted to take the train, but had nothing else out of town that attracted me. I had also found online several things I wanted to do in Taipei over my four full days. Once I did, I did Google map printouts of the neighborhoods I’d be in, although I also had a regular map of the whole city. If I were writing a guidebook, I might give Taipei only one star out of three, but I thoroughly enjoyed my time there, which was my only visit so far to any part of China.

Both my hotel and the Taipei Main Station are in the Zhongzheng District (ZH=CH), which is the downtown and is also the government center. It was easy to walk over to the 1989 station, different from Japanese stations in that it had a big, open atrium area, and buy a round-trip ticket from the English-speaking clerk. It was only a short wait, since trains leave frequently. The experience was similar to riding a Japanese Shinkansen—no surprise there.

The Taiwan high-speed rail line, standard gauge as all high-speed rail lines are internationally, is quite new, having just opened on 5 January 2007. It runs at 300 km/h (186 mph) for 345 km (214 mi) down the west side of the country between the two main cities, meaning it almost runs from the top of the island to the bottom. Nevertheless, it maintains the distinction of being the shortest high-speed rail line in the world. It was built by the Japanese, and is based on the Shinkansen system. This is yet another example of the ties between Taiwan and Japan based on the long period of Taiwan being under Japanese rule.

Note on the map that more intermediate stops are planned, and that there are three stops in Taipei, east, central, west (east is as yet unbuilt) and two in Kaohsiung, north and central (central is as yet unbuilt). Therefore the route is still a few kilometers short of the above total distance. My round trip went between Taipei and Zuoying, a suburb of Kaohsiung.

The drive by car for this distance takes 6h; the former narrow-gauge train took 4h40 minutes; the flight takes 50 minutes. The HSR will eventually have some trains going non-stop end-to-end in 80 minutes. I took advantage of both of the two present possibilities—southbound my express made only two intermediate stops in 1h36 and northbound the train made all five current intermediate stops in exactly two hours.

We need a comment on Pinyin for this rail map. Taipei in the new spelling should be Taibei (or Tai Bei), but I’ve heard that the city council doesn’t want to use the new spelling here since the old one is internationally familiar. That sounds odd, given that Beijing is no longer Pekin/Peking/Peiping and the new form has been readily accepted. (Note: while in Beijing, J=CH, that has not happened internationally, where the French J of bonjour has become commonly accepted instead. Oh, well.)

The “Second City” of Taiwan, Kaohsiung, where you still see the Wade-Giles HS, should become Gaoxiong, but I didn’t notice any big push to make the change yet. It also seems that some of the present and future intermediate stops on the rail map should be changing their spellings. I had to look these up: Hsinchu > Xinzhu; Taichung > Taichong; Changhua > Zhanghua; Chiayi > Jiayi. You can imagine the work involved to get Taiwan to catch up to the mainland, which is way ahead in Hanyu Pinyin spelling.

Back in Taipei, I walked to nearby sights in Zhongzheng in the slight drizzle (this was the only day I took an umbrella from the hotel). The regal Presidential Office Building had been the Japanese Governor General’s Building, another bit of heritage from the half-century when Taiwan was a Japanese colony (1895-1945). The attractive park across from it had palm trees, a reminder of how far south Taiwan is, although the November weather was mild.

The main sight in Zhongzheng is the Chiang Kai-shek (CKS) Memorial Hall (Photo by Ma Jien-kuo). As a matter of fact, the name Zhongzheng is based on a variation of his name (he died in 1975). Around a huge open square, the Memorial is the white building in the back, surrounded by gardens and lying directly opposite the matching white gate to the right; the two red-roofed buildings between them are the National Theater and National Concert Hall. Again, the entrance to the square is the exquisite ceremonial gate, five white arches with cobalt-blue tiled roofs. At the top of the stairs, in the memorial itself, a bronze statue of the man sits Lincoln-like above the crowd. I just happened to arrive for the last changing of the guard of the day at 17:00, and, with falling darkness afterward, the illuminations suddenly came on around the square.

Day 25 (evening): Soup Dumplings   This day was the day I decided would be one of the two special restaurant days in Taipei, and it was going to be soup dumplings, or Xiao Long Bao, shown here as served in a steaming basket at Din Tai Fung. There is a long tradition in Chinese cooking of steamed dumplings, and soup dumplings are a very special example of them. The origin of Xiao Long Bao (soup dumplings) is Shanghai, but the most famous restaurant that serves them is in Taipei, Din Tai Fung, a Taipei institution. The founder of the restaurant wasn’t even from Shanghai, but he did come over from the mainland with the Nationalist migration in the late forties and started the restaurant on Xinyi Road in 1958. In 1993 the New York Times in an article listed Din Tai Fung one of the ten best restaurants in the world. I think that’s a gross exaggeration for this simple institution, but it is outstanding and a lot of fun. It has several branches in Taiwan, and, as another example of Japanese-Taiwanese cooperation, the Takashimaya department store has the Japanese franchise, which is why I got to eat soup dumplings in both Tokyo and Kyoto at the Din Tai Fung branches inside Takashimaya.

Apparently more than a third of the business is generated by the Japanese branches. The only US branch in the Los Angeles area, in Arcadia, east of Pasadena. There are branches in Australia and around Asia, and they even opened a branch in Shanghai, where the concept originated. People warned that would be carrying coals to Newcastle, but the branch is apparently quite successful.

I thought I’d gotten the correct address of the restaurant and that it lay near CKS Hall, but when I found that location, it was wrong. I then had a lot of fun almost making believe I was speaking Chinese. I stopped in a shop and just questioned “Din Tai Fung?” and the woman had her teenage son direct me, first a short distance to Xinyi Road, which runs east out to Xinyi District. Then, walking a longer distance than I’d expected, I asked my “Chinese” question 3-4 more times, and everybody knew the name and everybody knew just where it was and pointed it out. When I got to the narrow four-story building, just what I’d read about it was right. In the street, under the arcade, a half-dozen hostesses were taking reservation numbers and giving out menus. You made your choices and marked them on a form so that service could go faster later on. I was told you’d wait 45-60 minutes for a 40-minute meal, and that’s what happened. While I was waiting, I found out that the Chinese lady next to me lived in Whitestone, Queens, not far from me. That shows it’s a small world, but also shows the popularity of Din Tai Fung.

The secret of how you get soup into the dumpling (which otherwise is filled with pork or other fillings) is that a broth made from meat stock is made into an aspic, a sort of gelatin, which is then chopped up and blended with the pork. When the dumpling is steamed, the aspic inside melts back into soup.

Din Tai Fung restaurants always have a window where you can watch the dumplings being made in the kitchen, including rolling the dough, filling it, and closing each one up with 18 tiny pleats (I never counted, but watch the guys’ hands). At the table, you lift the dumpling with your chopsticks and put it into a dipping sauce you make yourself out of soy sauce, vinegar, and ginger. You then rest it in a ceramic spoon, pierce it with your chopstick, and it’s ready to eat.