Today we had breakfast at the hotel. They have a small section of english breakfast and another section for porridge and some side dishes to go with the porridge. I lovey the beef meat floss... yummy yummy....
This is only the first serving... I went back for seconds for the meat floss =D
After breakfast we headed to Taipei Main Station which is only one stop away from Xi Men Station. See our hotel is really convenient =D and got nice breakfast some more =P Anyway, we took a train to Rueifang. Then from Rueifang we took a bus to Jiufen. The bus stop is just opposite the train station.
Jiufen is a small town on a hill and is a popular tourist attraction. I read from Wiki that Jiufen got its name because during the Qing Dynasty, the village have 9 families staying there and they asked everything for 9 portions and hence it became the name of the village – Jiufen which means nine portions!! The scenery in Jiufen is really a sight to behold. You can see endless mountains one after another! Also the houses are built all along the hill slopes. Their houses are also those traditional types of houses. This small town mostly relies on tourism as their main activity!
At a scenic point in Jiufen
Honeydrew, me and mountains after mountains.
Jiufen township
Before we started walking along the streets we had a light lunch at the first shop which is famous for their beef noodles 'niu rou mien'. We only ordered one bowl to share because we wanted to try a bit of everything =)
Beef noodles - I really liked the soup =)
Ice shaving dessert with yam and sweet potato 'fen yuan'. It’s something like mochi but a bit harder. You can see a lot of shops selling this fen yuan and mochi everywhere. I bought a lot of mochi back for my family and my colleagues. I lovey the black sesame and peanut mochi =D
Jiufen has narrow lanes of tea houses, shops and stores selling souvenirs and food. They have really interesting snacks, tidbits, local delicacies, desserts and etc that we have never seen before!! One thing about Jiufen is that even if you don't buy anything, you can get full by walking along the lane of shops =D Almost every shop will ask you to try whatever it is that they are selling!! See. I told you Taiwanese are generous!! *haha*
Me at the lane of shops =D
Because we were Hello Kitty struck yesterday at Hello Kitty Sweets, Honeydrew insists I need to take a picture with all the Hello Kitty sweets!.
Jiufen is also famous for fishballs!!
This is something like mochi as well but make into layers!!
This is grilled mushroom but its no ordinary mushroom. According to the signboard, it is 'tian xia di yi gu' - the world's no.1 mushroom!! We are only eating the mushroom stems and its damn huge lor.... After grilling the mushroom she will slice it.
Honeydrew with the world's no.1 mushroom =P
Then there is this stall that sells squid balls and squid sausages. As you can see from the picture above, there is a photo of Jolin Tsai visiting that store =D
If Jolin Tsai ate here before then I also wanna eat here lar!! *kaka* But I must say the squid sausage is really good!! It has some tiny balls inside that will burst when you bite on it!! *haha* Something like the japanese tobiko (flying fish roe) but those inside the sausage is a bit bigger and a bit harder.... (don't know what is it and how to describe but its yummy!!)
Honeydrew buying another bowl of ice shavings with fen yuan.
At the entrance of the famous tea house in Jiufen which has beautiful scenery of Jiufen's surroundings.
At another cute teahouse =D
By walking up the lane of shops, we finally reached another scenic point to take photos.
Us @ Jiufen
Then while walking back down the narrow lane, we decided to try this really weird looking big red dumpling like thingy (don't know what it’s called!!) Quite a few people were queuing for it and also they have some staff sitting at the side mass producing this 'thingy'.
Don't know what is it but we both didn't quite liked it!! It has some marinated meat inside the dumpling thingy along with other unidentified thingy!! *haha*
Then we saw this shop that has load and loads of pictures of celebrities that has visited the shop!! I spotted Jolin Tsai again!! =D So I want to go try =D
Jolin Tsai with the owner of the shop.
While walking into the shop, I realised that towards the end, the photos are shots of just the aunty alone and not with any celebrity!! Hhhmmm... so wierd one... but maybe she is a celebrity herself but just that I don't know who she is.... Hence I asked one of the worker if this lady is a celebrity.... and the worker said no….it is their ‘lau pan niang' (shop owner) HUH!!!! WHY THE SHOP OWNER SO LEBIH ONE??? Put so many self portrait of herself.... some more she is aunty eh!!! Not like some pretty hot chick or what!!! *hehe* Yeah I know its her shop lar.... but but but need to put all her self portrait there meh?? some more some lie on the grass lar... some holding flower lar.... all posing posing one..... ish....... she is like my mimi's age lor.... and I can't imagine my mimi take these type of photos!!! *hehe*
See her photos.... lebih or not?? *hehe* and this is just part of it... all the four walls also photos like these one..... except the front few columns are with celebrities one....
BUT, I must say her fishballs are quite yummy lor..... some of it are super huge as well.... we ordered the mixture one where we can try different types of fish balls. One is even made from sharks meat!! But I don't know which one!! *haha* They also have like pork + fish or squid +fish and etc lar....
Yummy Yummy fish balls - and see the backdrop - the walls all got her photos one....
After that, we decided to go back to Taipei.... We actually wanted to cover Yehliu as well (another town) but the staff at our hotel advises us not to since we are going on our own as it is quite far away....
At Rueifang station waiting for the train back to Taipei.
Us at the train....
Back in Taipei Main Station, we decided to go back to our hotel to unload all the mochis, pineapple cakes and other snacks and souvenirs that we bought since it is quite heavy and our hotel is nearby. On the way out of the Xi Men station, we saw a crowd nearby and being the kpc (keh poh chee) me, I went to check it out!! Guess what I saw?? *hehe* Elva Xiao is having an autograph session there!! Unlike Malaysia, there were no security guards there one lor.... so we just walk close to the stage and take photo of her.... Since we have an itinerary to follow *keke* we didn't queue for autograph..... But she is damn pretty lor!!!
Me with Elva (being blocked!!) ISH!!
Anyway, next on our itinerary is to visit the National Palace Museum *boring* hehe but have to go cause Honeydrew wants!! *keke* Anyway, the National Palace Museum holds treasures of eight thousand years!!!!!! *huh* - but I’m still not interested *hehe* WHY AM I SO UNINTELLECTUAL LIKE THIS?? *hehe*
Us at the entrance to the museum
The only thing I know and went to see at the museum is this jade crafted into a vegetable (I don't know lar... I don't know how to appreciate it) Apparently the craftmanship is soooo good (thats why its a treasure lar) because he uses the white and green colour of the jade to craft it like a real piece of bak choy or some vege.... I only know about this vege treasure cause the gift shop has a lot of that vege souvenirs and they even have a vege soft toy!! *kaka*
Anyway we were there at about 5.30pm (btw I found out from their website that entrance is free at 5-8pm every Saturday *hehe* of course go then lar cause it will be so not worth it to pay for my ticket!! *kaka*) and I told honeydrew that I will be having tea in the teahouse while he walk around admiring the treasures... we will meet at 7pm... but he seems to be not too happy that I wasn't going to walk with him and also one and a half hours doesn’t seems enough too... hence to make him happier I told him to walk as long as he wants (it closes at 8pm anyway!! *kaka*). I went to have tea at San-hsi-t'ang Teahouse.... a very nice and classy place for tea.... but the tea were not cheap eh!! RM 22 for a pot!!
I also had this soya jelly which was recommended by the waitress there.... Very yummy and not too sweet =D Its like agar agar but softer and it tasted more like mung beans and sweet potatoes rather than soya!!
After about an hour I started to get bored and also felt bad for asking my honeydrew to walk alone.... and hence decided to meet my honeydrew to accompany him.... I tried calling his handphone but I couldn't get through and sms him also no reply.... Hence I just tried my luck and went to the 3rd floor which is the last level of exhibition as I guessed he should be finishing soon too.... There were quite a few exhibition halls at Level 3 and I decided to try the one closest to the lift. Do you know, the minute I turned the corner into that exhibition hall, I almost bump into someone and when I looked up, its honeydrew!!!!!!!!!!!!! I quickly hugged him because I was worried that I couldn't find him and he just appeared infront of me!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Made me so happy =D
Then I found out that Honeydrew had actually bought a book about all the treasures in the museum!!!! ISH now I know got people really buy these books one!! To me its waste of money cause it’s not cheap!! *hehe* Anyway he was actually collecting stamps on the front page of the book! They have this corner outside every exhibition hall with stamps of the most popular few treasures of that hall..... I suddenly got so excited when I found out about that and decided to help him collect all the stamps..... As the museum was about to close soon... I was running (walking very fast) trying to collect all the stamps.... but I didn't know how many stamps are there in total and I have no time to go to every floor to check if I have already have that stamp. Hence I asked the security guard how many stamps they have in total and he was so helpful.... He told me where to go to get those that I don't have yet!! See taiwanese people are so helpful!! He was giving me directions like take this lift to level 2 and it’s on your right and bla bla bla..... It made me feels like I am playing some treasure hunt game and my time is up soon..... so fun!! *haha* Finally I am able to collect all 18 stamps for my honeydrew!! *yeay* =D And when we were about to leave, the security guard came to us and told us that there is one more huge stamp at the entrance!! *haha* so nice of him!!
me playing ‘treasure hunt’ or shall I say stamp hunt =P
After that, we went to Shinlin Night Market (which is nearby) for dinner and more shopping!! =D They has this whole area like a food court selling all types of snacks and food..... They also have a lot of fun fair games outside the food court area..... The first stall we went to was the XXL chicken!! The queue was sooooo long..... about 20-30 people in front of me.... But the queue move rather quickly.... they have one staff distributing plastic bag to everyone queuing and we were asked to open up the plastic bag so that when it is our turn they will just put the chicken into the opened plastic bag!!
Him putting the XXL Chicken into my opened plastic bag
Me infront of the XXL chicken shop with my XXL chicken - Actually it tasted almost the same as those you see in our pasar malam but this one is much bigger!! Its yummy and its crispy but not dry =D
While I was queueing for the XXL chicken, Honeydrew went and buy 'da bing bao xiao bing' (big biscuit wrapped small biscuit) - its actually a popiah like wrap around some crispy biscuits (like kuih ka-pet kinda biscuit but thicker). I think it tasted ok only.....
da bing bao xiao bing
Then we had 'o-a jian' (oysters omellet) - unlike the one we have here, this one is more gooey.... they put a lot of that starchy thing and I don't like anything starchy one.... so I think it is ok only.... but the o-a jian also came with this gravy which was quite nice.....
o-a jian.... those are gravy not tomato or chili sauce!! *hehe*
The grilled squid is super yummy!!!!!!
Ai-yu bing - fig jelly - yummy and refreshing
We also ordered this thing called 'guan cai ban' (coffin bread) - Its really really weird but interesting..... Its actually a thick bread that is fried and they open up the top crust of the bread (which look like a casket/coffin and hence its name) and then they fill the hollow of the bread with meat, vege and pineapple?? in a creamy sauce.... you can choose what type of meat you want.... with choices of tuna, chicken and seafood (I think). We ordered the mixed one....
guan cai ban - honeydrew thinks it tasted weird like cantonese fried noodles kind of gravy but eat with bread and it’s a bit sweet, but I think it was quite nice.... not to say I love it but its an unique combination.....
honeydrew at the guan cai ban stall
After dinner, we went shopping at the other side of Shinlin!! =D Those stalls selling by the roadside are quite cheap and reasonable but those selling inside the shops are more pricey. Again you can't try the clothes here so I don't dare to buy too many as well..... Then I went to this shoe shop which I bought 4 pairs of shoes and the weird thing is I can't wear 2 pairs of it now cause its too small!!!!! Either my feet grew bigger or the lady cheated me and gave me a smaller size =(((((( Cause when I tried it there it was ok.... but then I remembered I did take a size smaller cause my normal size was a bit too big but the weird thing is I could wear it there but I can't wear it now!!!!!! Did my feet also become fat??? =((((((((((((((((((((((
I was walking into almost every shop and honeydrew got kinda pissed off cause he was quite tired..... hence in the end we left without finish walking the whole stretch of road..... I felt very unsatisfied and was again secretly planning when to go back to Shinlin!! Also, when I went back to the hotel to try on the clothes that I bought I quite like some of it and more the reason to go back and get more!! =D
2 comments:
buy mochi for ur family and colleagues oni arr? how bout ur 14 years known fren arr??
hehe amanda i bought a small souvenir for u lar!!! but didn't see you lar!! how to give u lehhhh my dear 14 years known fren!!! hehe
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