22 things I learned in Taipei

In September 2016 I had the chance to visit a video game conference in the capital of Taiwan, Taipei. Since I’m a sucker for plane food and films — or at least I thought I was before watching Batman v Superman — I went to explore the city and look for cool new games.

What I really found was myself. Just kidding. I did however learn some more or less useful things about the country, and thought I’d let you know here so you don’t have to get a flight and watch Batman v Superman.

So here we go, 22 things I learned in Taipei (spoiler, it’s not Chinese. Believe me I tried)

Look, I live in England now. When it’s more than 20 degrees (68 degrees Fahrenheit) my friends post unsarcastic “summer is here, going for a swim” Snaps. This is probably why it just didn’t cross my mind that it could be hot in another country, but oh boy it was.

With absolutely radioactive feeling 30 degrees (86 degrees Fahrenheit) in the evening (130% humidity of course) a new local friend called Edwina took me with her to climb (okay we walked up some stairs) Elephant mountain (nope, no Elephants there if you were wondering) to check out a really great view (it was really great).

At this very point I found out what my super powers are: I am Aquaman. Or maybe Sweatman. Oh god. It was hot.

“Edwina”, I asked “what does that ancient Chinese writing on the bottom stairs of Elephant mountain say? Could it be a long forgotten saying, the title of an old fairytale or a mysterious prayer”? “Entrance”, Edwina replied.

After climbing the mighty mountain and positioning myself on a touristy photo spot rock another tourist offered to take photos of me which was nice.

Unfortunately mystery man took every single picture of me in an angle that makes it look like the famous Taipei 101 (the largest building on earth when it was built a couple of years ago) is an extension of my head.

One useful tip on a related topic: If you actually want to visit the Taipei 101 it is highly recommended to not type in “Taipei 102” into your Google Maps by accident. A friend told me that this would only lead you to an ordinary street quite far away from the landmark.

Aka the return of Aquaman.

Digital Taipei was a really great conference and it was dead interesting seeing how different the market works in Taiwan (so much mobile, so much VR) and how many young indie devs make things that are vastly different of what I usually see.

I mean it could mean anything. Probably means “Pokemaster” though.

I could try plenty of VR things at Digital Taipei. On the top left you can see me rock climbing, below having a great time on a carpet and on the right I’m riding a Dragon (chair) while shooting with cool guns (little controllers). Not much to say. Just, THAT’S THE FUTURE!!!!!

Also plenty of shops had PlayStation VR and other VR demo stations which made the topic feel much more relevant for a broader audience than here in Europe.

Pictured: sweet soup for dessert. Invention of the year.

Luckily not pictured: the one time I ordered chicken and got chicken. Like a proper chicken leg and I tried to eat it with sticks. Let’s just say my Taiwanese conference friends were well entertained.

I really don’t know what to say.

Jet lagged, tired, hungry. You come back late to your hotel. But none of this matters because you have a date with some delicious instant noodles lined up. You “cook” them, you smell them — for once the universe seems to be in balance.

Until you realise you don’t have chopsticks and there is no way to eat the noodles without them…

… well you could just eat them using two pens… the ink won’t run out… probably… but who would do that?

The lights, the smells, the food, the people; night markets are sick! And the food is so interesting. Edwina made me try loads of things without me knowing what it is and I liked most, loved some even.

I should have just never asked. I quite liked the thing on the left… then found out it’s made out of pork blood and liked it a bit less which is a bit of a shame. Thanks brain!

Other rather unsual things I tried were stinky tofu (2/10, deserves it’s name), chicken feet (4/10 okay but a bit chewy) and beer, pork, whisky, wasabi, and chili ice cream (10/10).

I was assuming the Xbox One is not doing so great in Taiwan, which is probably true for the Microsoft console in most Asian countries but they sure do invest a lot into promo materials. Many more geeky shops and malls had a surprising amount of Xbox One adverts. PlayStation was strong as well but that was rather expected for me.

Funnily enough plenty of bigger shops use the Kinect version of Just Dance do promote the game. And of course people pull of perfect team choreographies at every game station like it’s not big deal.

Lovely view, great tea houses, no cats. Name is misleading.

Eating hot pot is fun — you basically have a on-table soup and put plenty of meat and vegetables in there and fish them out once they are done and delicious.

That’s how it works in theory. In reality I was lost in conversions with my new Taipei friends who quickly figured out I just filled up our hot pot and then totally forgot about the bits I tossed in. Thanks for helping me find my food again guys!

Lights, fireworks, lasers — you name it.

Honestly, so many good shops. Especially one video game store — it was maybe the best retro game store I have been to (maybe on par with Super Potato in Tokyo).

While the one in Taipei didn’t have an insane amount of old games and consoles it had quality stuff. Besides the SNES Satellite add on it had plenty of Virtual Boy games, special editions of really old Final Fantasy games in perfect condition and a functional and fully equipped R.O.B for NES (which I nearly bought but than thought about saying “I didn’t bring any presents and needed to pay for extra luggage and btw the holiday is cancelled but look, I invested 500 pounds in a 20 year old beautiful robot toy that barely does anything” to my girlfriend could cause some tension).

19. The metro ticket is a magic coin!!!

It also makes a sound like in a video game!

Of course there are cool people everywhere but a huge thank you and so nice to get to know to all new friends I made in Taipei. You should go visit them as well.

There are also so many little gestures to learn that are different than in Europe — like the definition of hardworking is a bit different (they really really work hard), waving over a waiter at a restaurant is not rude at all and for the love of whatever god you believe in, if you meet people that you don’t know that well just wave at them or shake their hand at best. Once lost in thoughts I just went to for classic European “kiss left, kiss right” when I met someone new and think almost gave her a heart attack.

Honestly. I played it on the flight way longer than I should have as I was equally shocked and entertained by it. I mean, look at it.