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Travel - Taipei’s eight wonders

Understanding Taiwan’s capital to a T

Taipei: Seven million people live in and around Taiwan’s capital, which is spelled in our alphabet with six letters. Eight isn’t just a lucky number for the citizens here. It’s also the number of essential things to see, do or know about Taipei and each begins with the letter-T.

Temple

Find the cloud of incense hanging over a full city block in the Manka district and you’ll find the 265-year-old Lungshan Temple.

A welcome respite from the city’s hustle and bustle, worshippers pray before the shrines to various Buddhist and Taoist deities as tranquil music fills the air. The goddess of mercy, Kuan-in, gets the most attention for it survived allied bombing during World War II when Japan occupied Taiwan.

The adjacent Huashi Street Night Market is as chaotic as the temple is orderly. Vendors aggressively hawk a variety of items, from poodle puppies to lingerie and jewelry. Known in English as Snake Alley, camera-shy restaurateurs one-up each other by playing with dangerous snakes to the amusement of curious onlookers. The serpents become meals for customers with exotic tastes. Fear not, there is plenty of fare for the less-adventurous eater, like fried fish, ice cream or fresh Taiwan-grown pomelos and papayas.

Taipei 101

The world’s tallest office building and Taipei’s first skyscraper opens Dec. 31 with a New Year’s Eve celebration bound to grab the world’s attention.

Taipei 101 stretches 508 metres above the Xinyi district, dwarfing city hall and the convention centre. A street-level shopping mall opened last fall – complete with a Roots franchise.

Architect C.Y. Lee designed Taipei 101 to appear as a stack of eight pagodas with panes of green-blue glass. The 91st floor is a circular outdoor observation deck from which to gaze at the green ring of mountains in the Taipei basin. The last 10 storeys are telecommunications antennas inside a narrow, buttressed tower.

The 88th floor offers an indoor viewing deck where the 660-tonne, Canadian-made "tuned mass damper" is the centrepiece. The giant, golden steel ball is a pendulum that cushions the building from earthquakes and typhoon winds.

Tea

Tea is an obsession on this island shaped like a leaf. Chu Li Kuan tea house, tucked behind the Sherwood Hotel in the Songshan district, is a great place to savour the taste of the scented leaves.

More than 30 kinds of tea are served in the bamboo house, including the proprietor’s choice: locally grown Oolong. Here, tea isn’t just a warm drink. It’s used as an ingredient in all manner of dishes, from tea-marinated salmon to a gelatin tea dessert.

The National Palace Museum in the Shihlin district boasts the largest collection of Chinese artifacts anywhere and has its share of vintage teacups, pots, calligraphy and paintings reaching back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) when tea was first brewed.

Tai chi

Taipei parks are packed every morning with practitioners of the ancient, deliberate and tranquil martial art of tai chi. Taipei is the unofficial world capital where 14,603 people set a world record for simultaneous tai chi demonstration on Nov. 23, 2003 at Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall’s expansive plaza.

Ten-Ten day

Chinese lunar new year is a movable feast, but Taiwan’s national day is always Oct. 10 – the 10th day of the 10th month. Fireworks light up the Taipei sky as hundreds of thousands celebrate the Republic of China’s founding in 1912 by Dr. Sun Yat-sen. It’s a big day on the calendar for a country the size of Vancouver Island with a population equal to British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec – combined.

Tamshui

Taipei’s northern suburb is an historic fishing village where the Tamshui River meets the Taiwan Strait.

Spaniards built Fort San Domingo there in 1629. The Dutch arrived in 1642 and kicked the Spanish out. In 1661, Tamshui was liberated by Ming dynasty patriot/pirate Cheng Cheng-kung. The brick plaza outside the 105-year-old Spanish-style Red Castle offers stunning views of Mount Tatun, Mount Guanyin and the wide, winding river itself.

Canadians are beloved in Tamshui where Ontario dentist and Presbyterian missionary George Leslie Mackay is buried. Mackay brought western religion and medicine to Taiwan’s north in the 19th century. His legacy continues in Tamshui’s Mackay Hospital and Oxford College.

Two-stroke motor scooters

Taiwan is the world’s motorbike capital: there are 11 million in the nation of 23 million people. By day, Taipei streets are jammed with the two-wheeled transporters (jaywalk at your own risk). By night, they’re parked side-by-side on Taipei sidewalks.

It’s the easiest and cheapest way to get around, costing the equivalent of $6 for a weekly fill-up – about one-quarter the cost of fuelling a car. The MRT light rapid transit system is still the best way to get around for foreigners on short stays; local scooterists don’t leave much space for newcomers.

Toilet paper

Taipei is a modern metropolis with all the amenities one is accustomed to back home – except public washrooms with toilet paper. I found out by surprise in the shiny, clean facility at Chih-shan Garden on the National Palace Museum grounds. The vending machine outside should’ve been a big hint. Luckily my companion was within earshot. The vending machine was empty, so she tossed me her personal stash.

Lesson of the day: when in Taipei, bring TP.

If you go: Visit the Republic of China Tourism Bureau Web site: www.tbroc.gov.tw