Some interesting facts about Taiwan

So we are completely exhausted from training but Ems still found the energy to go party. I'm having a great chilled out night and enjoying the free wireless internet;)

Talking about the internet..this is a definite plus point in Taiwan. Free and readily available, which compared to SA is just amazing. On the downside though, the pipes leading to the sewage in most old buildings in the country can get blocked easily. So you might think that this means that the toilets get blocked often, well no...thats because people do not flush their toilet paper down the toilet but instead throw it in the bin next to the toilet..YUK! But don't worry if you plan on visiting us our apartment will have toilets that flush:) that was a requirement of the place. LoL.

On the other hand, they are very good with their recycling here because landfills are getting too full and so people are very conscious about that. Also, eventhough the buildings are quite dirty looking from the outside in Taipei (because of the humidty mixed with the air pollution) the inside of the buildings are beautiful and the streets are relatively clean.

Well having said that..here's another contradiction...there are these red splatters on the pavement...these come from people who chew a thing called Beetle nut. Its not actually a beetle but a nut or something like that and its a legal drug in Taiwan! When you chew it your mouth and teeth turn red, your mouth also gos numb and your face becomes extremely hot! Truck drivers are well known to chew it. It's readily available and usually sold by very scantily-dressed women!!

Also you can buy alcohol (beer, alcopops, wiskey, etc) at your local 7/11. Well actually the stores stay open later than 11pm and you find one on each street corner! Then once you buy our alcohol you can just walk in the street and drink it! You could even sit in front of the police station and drink...

People here have all been so friendly and helpful to us. They will go that extra mile to try and speak english or explain a certain type of food to us. Our mandarin is slowly improving though and today we actually ordered using some mandarin (ok so we can greet and say noodles in mandarin:).

When it comes to food you need to have an open mind and be prepared to try things you wouldn't usually! There are so many restaurants and vendors here the choice of Asian food is endless! Today we wanted noodles badly and so we finally found one down this dodgy looking alley but the food was soooo good and the people so friendly! And best part is that we got two huge bowls of noodles with chicken for only R25! Yes thats 2 bowls...so we have balanced out spending 300 taiwanese dollars on the peaches:)

Speaking about the fruit here, the local goods are so big in size! Really good but do look slightly different from SA and taste different too. Less sweet I would say.

But talking about sweet...the people here love to eat things sweet! Most of their fruit juice is only 20% fruit and the rest is sugar! There cakes and sweet things are also VERY sweet.

On the other hand, when you go to Burger King and order a meal (yes we had our first Western meal since getting here!) all the places in SA would only have a choice of fizzy drinks, like Cola or sprite, to go with the meal but here you can have ice tea from the soda fountain!!! The ice teas are so popular here, most people buy that in bottles instead of fizzy drinks and the variety is crazy!
One of my favourite is milk tea. Its basically iced coffee but in tea form! Its heavenly:)

Ok, one more interesting food fact...people eat salad here for breakfast. Yes, you read right. They eat lettuce, carrots, etc.. for breakfast. Pasta or noodles are also big and cooked vegetables. I'll stick to cereal or egg for now!

We'll definitely put up some more interesting things as we experience them! We're going to look at apartments tomorrow in Taoyuan...so excited:)