Some suggestions on where to go and the singers and bands you might hear. It’s a night full of surprises – the good kind. You managed to overcome your “worked-all-day, just finished-dinner” lethargy to head out into the night for a live band you’ve never seen before in a place you’ve never been. The venue…
The major city in central Taiwan has much to recommend it as a stopover for local and foreign tourists, including its architecture, museums, and – surprisingly – greenery. My first impression of Taipei City was that it was an unlivable, chaotic burg clogged with scooters, people, and exhaust fumes. That this notion was formed during…
The Mid-Autumn Festival – also known as the Moon Festival – has been one of the most important observances on the Chinese calendar since at least the Tang Dynasty (618-906 AD). But the Taiwanese have been finding new ways to celebrate the holiday. The essence of the festival has always been to get outdoors and…
Specialty coffee shops have sprung up on nearly every street corner in recent years. Can they thrive in a traditional tea-drinking culture? Nobody seems quite sure when Taipei’s love affair with specialty coffee shops began. The pioneers have been around for more than a decade: Woolloomooloo, Rufous Coffee, and of course Cama, which has more…
Most visitors to the popular southeastern county focus on either the coast or the East Rift Valley, but the area’s string of scenic mountain towns also deserves attention. One moment I was reveling in the scenery, happier than I’d been for weeks. The next, I was pushing branches aside and wondering if it was wise…
The island is a cornucopia of delights for cyclists keen for the call of the open road, mountain adventures, Pacific Ocean vistas, and myriad cultural highlights. Every Sunday Lin Kun-you gets up before dawn and puts on his spandex uniform of fitted and padded cycling shorts, short-fingered gloves, and an aerodynamic road cycling helmet. His…
Stop me if you’ve heard this one: A Westerner goes to see a psychiatrist at Tzu Chi Hospital. In reasonably fluent Mandarin, he says:“Doc, you’ve got to help me. Taiwan has become too vivid for me, too noisy. I swear I’m hearing trumpets and firecrackers even when there’s no festival at the temple next to…
Ever Rich Duty Free Shop, the biggest duty-free company in Taiwan, is dedicated to finding ways to make the duty-free shopping experience ever more convenient and efficient. In 2016, for example, the company noticed that more and more Taiwanese were traveling abroad due to the rise of budget airlines. In the same year, the number…
The Regent Taipei has long been known as one of the capital’s finest hotels and dining spots, as well as a top destination for luxury retail. Now the hotel is expanding its retail selection to provide guests with a more distinctive experience, offering everything from gourmet Hokkaido pancakes to seminars with celebrities to bespoke private…
Much of what is now downtown Taipei was once enclosed within city walls, with access through five gates. The area has a lot to tell about the city’s history. The Taipei city wall was completed by the Qing Dynasty in 1884. Although it survived for only 16 years, its influence on modern Taipei is still…
