on top of Taipei 101, extreme-hiking and partyparty!

It's time for an other post!

So last Friday we had some pretty awesome sunny weather, so Anker and me thought it to be a good idea to make a biketour to the citycenter. There, catching sight of Taipei 101's gigantic architecture we spontaneously decided, "yeah ... lets go up!!!"
And it was extremely cool on top. Up to a few years ago it was still the tallest building on earth - and you know my motto: the taller, the better ;-)
Check out the pictures:

on top of the world!

Babam!

the wind blowing through this metal fance actually made a pretty fancy melodious tone. What a cool little feature!

I'll definitely go up again before leaving Taiwan. Sooo impressive!

An other evening, Anker and me did some random sightseeing - just taking the metro to a random station and walking around at night. At some point around midnight, we decided to take a taxi back to the dorm and trying to fnd one, we managed to walk over a 1km long bridge instead^^
And on the other side, we had ended up at the probably single place in Taipei, where there were no taxis coming by... huge fail!

waiting at this pleasant bench about 15min for a taxi :D

However after walking some more and finally getting a driver I had an other of these situations that make me love the Taiwanese people:
During our ride home, we noticed that the taxi driver had accidentally taken a wrong way. Anker and me where already a bit annoyed that this would make us pay more and that we could hardly complain about it because of our lacking Chinese skills. However when we arrived, the driver apologized from his own initiative and gave us about 40% discount on the price, what left us way better off, than if he had taken the right way in the first place! Taiwanese taxidrivers are the best! :D

Last week with a Taiwanese friend I have also been to Danshui, a coastal town close to Taipei. My favorite thing there was one of these Turkish ice-cream places where the vendor is playing pranks with the people when they want to take the waffle from his hand. He had the most whimsical grin you could imagine. His mouth was a bit skewed from the 20 years of grinning while doing those pranks (thats what I guessed at least :D ) Here I found him on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xu8kN-jHBl8

In Danshui with my Taiwanese friend Polly

An other highlight of last week was a pretty extreme hike on Sunday - definitely the most intense I've ever done.

my Taiwanese friend Lee Johann Gemüsemann - awesome name!

it was recommended to wear gloves because of all the ropes there

rockriding

However, I had slept rather bad the night before and after the 5h hike I was completely dead. Even though the hike is about 1h away from Taipei city I was seriously considering to take a taxi back to my dorm (instead of public transport) jut to get in bed quicker^^

some more impressions:

rainbow!

And I've finally been partying again twice in the last days! To two pretty fancy clubs, Luxy and Myst. One had a 20€ cover charge but they had quite a lasershow there.
The next morning though I woke up with a mild hearing damage... Why does the music in clubs always have to be so fucking loud?! I'll probably buy one of those special earplugs for concerts that just decrease the overall loudness before going out next time... :-/

Lastly some stuff about my courses. to be upfront, the current situation is pretty disappointing (This here might sound like an other episode of "Lino klagt" ;-) ).
So, apart from my Chinese class by now I'm only left with one other economics class. I had started with 3 more classes but had to drop one after an other for various good reasons. And there were just no decent alternatives because there are not too many graduate classes offered in English.
So besides Chinese, the only course left is Applied Macroeconomics and now I am extremely close to dropping this as well -.-

We had a midterm assignment due to last Wednesday and were supposed to use the program Matlab to simulate a macroeconomic economy. The problem beeing however that I've never worked with this program let alone any other comparable program and that the professor had only given us a supershort introduction in the first lecture like how to calculate plus and minus. After the professors email support beeing a one-sentence answer to a 4-question email, massively frustrated I had finally written the professor an email about my frustration about the midterm (in a quite dimplomatic tone though of course) only to find out in the next lecture that he had taken this as a personal insult and was kindof attacking me what my problem is... yay
I guess this won't have a very positive influence on my final grade...
Now also take into account that from about 12 people that had started the course, we are by now only 6 left with an other girl in exact the same situation as me. This might be due to the hard to top dullness of the lecture style. The professor just writing complicated formulas on the board for 3h straight (and in a 6 people class, you have to pretend attention of course -.-). And lastly regarding the contents I could hardly be less interested. Its again one of those completely unworldy mathematic model courses that make me too often think that I sometimes really hate economics. I feel that I'm learning nothing about how the real world economy works and instead loose with every single lecture just 3 more hours of my life.
On the other hand though, if I drop that class, I could focus 100% on studying chinese, what I would have planned to do anyway sometime in the near future...
But well, I'll decide on this matter in the next days when we hopefully get the midterm results.
And on this bombshell... ;-)

Buddhism/meditation, ice skating and hiking around Taipei

A few posts ago I mentioned that I had been to a meditation class, where a guy told me about a German Buddhist nun around Taipei that I could met up with if I would be interested to learn more about Buddhism.
So two weeks ago I managed to do just that:
After getting in touch via email with "Simplicity", she invited me to the monastery where she's living, up in the mountains around Taipei. It took quite a while to get there - including a good hike where I got to see some nice nature. There, as all Buddhist nuns shave their head, to be honest it was a bit weird for me at first to talk to a woman with a bald head. But she was very nice and told me a lot about the general philosophy of Buddhism and answered my questions. I was also invited for lunch and got a book about Buddhism from her and finally she also invited me to some other upcoming events at that monastery that are free for visitors - a meditation class and a meditation retreat.
So I decided to sign up for the meditation class, where I've been last Sunday. Together with about 100 other people we meditated together and then heard a lecture by the abbess about Buddhism. All in all it was a very interesting experience - only the abbess 2h lecture was a bit lenghty ;-)
So after these experiences and also some reading in the book, I came to some conclusions about Buddhism for me. As you can take Buddhism as something between a life philosophy and a religion, I'd say that I definitely find some of the philosophical ideas very appealing, for instance that you are not your ego, that most cravings ultimately lead to suffering and the practice of learning to control your mind through meditation. However some of the religious elements seem quite bizarre to me, like the rebirth cycle (including ghosts, gods and heaven/hell) and some other elements that seem to me a bit dogmatic.
I will definitely read and think some more about Buddhism and will probably also visit Simplicity again in the next time but it seems I'll have to stay an Agnostic-Atheist ;-)

And besides the Buddhism aspect, some of you might wonder, why I've actually started getting into meditation after all...
So for a good while I'm following a bunch of interesting/inspiring blogs and websites (namely this, this, this and this) and by the time beeing, all of them have brought forward the practice of meditation as a means to cultivate well-being, health, self-awareness and mindfulness (like this post). So I came to think I should give it a try sometime. As I'm still a beginner I find it hard to write about my experiences so far, but I might write about this in upcoming posts. So far the crosslegged sitting fucks me up - I'm horribly unstretched...

However after that meditation event, as I had already been in the mountains, I thought I should go for some hiking there. And there I saw a snake! First I've ever seen in wildlife - and to spice it up, the snake had a big frog in its mouth! :D

there's a snake hidden somewhere in this picture! Unfortunately even I can't find it now -.-

Unfortunately this was the queue for the bus I needed to get back to Taipei. I had to wait for more than an hour -.-

On Sunday I did some more sightseeing with a Taiwanese friend. We went hiking on the Elephant Mountain which is close to the city center and offers a nice view over the city. Later together with an other friend we drove to a cool place at the coast. Here are some pictures:

Taipei - babam!

These cute girls are actually praying for finding a boyfriend/partner. That temple is famous for this matter :D

Chinese tourist group. And yes, they are following a guy in a suit carrying a Spongebob :D
#Spongebobrulz

Cape Yehliu!

my Taiwanese friends that took me around

this "queen" is a very famous sight

Whatsmore on Thursday I went Ice-skating with Jiaxiasha and some of his friends which was really fun! I haven't been for years...
Later that day, Sascha and me went to the bar/club Brass Monkey. We had been warned that there would only be old western guys looking for Taiwanese girls but thought that it could not be that bad. However, when we arrived there were in total only about 5 girls and around 30 old (and probably horny) guys. After first thinking about leaving right away we decided to stay a bit longer and luckily, as it was ladies night, the male/female ratio improved gradually and after all it was quite a fun night there.
By now I've already been to three clubs here in only about 2 months - I'm such a party beast!^^

Ice-Skating with Sascha, full-geared :D

Lihong demonstrating his grace!

Asian style desert: green-tea-ice with beans on crushed ice (yes, beans is a thing for desert here)

Brotzeit! I'd call this a feast! :D

lots of sushi! mjumjumjum! And surprisingly the choice of vegetarian stuff was very satisfying.

Some last things:
Yesterday I somehow managed to not notice a major earthquake -.- (here's a news post about it). I'd been in a park and when I got back to the dorms, everyone was excited about the earthquake that I had somehow missed -.- I hope another one is coming soon ;-) wanna see how it feels like.

My Chinese is getting better and better. Had Chinese midterms this week and it went quite well.

During the last weeks I had become addicted to the tablet mini game of candy crush on Ankers Tablet and last week I've successfully managed to overcome my addiction by fixing 2000NT$ (~50€) on my wall and telling Anker those are his if I'd ever play that game again :D
(I was a bit inspired by this)

Singapore!!!

This weekend I have been to Singapore for 5 days! The flight was 4-5 hours - so this plus all the wasted time to and at the airport it took almost two whole days to get there and get back to Taipei, but at least I had 3 full days there together with my German friends Tientien, Jiaxiasha and Anker:

First some general impressions about Singapore:
As some of you might have heard, the Singaporian government is very strict about things. The fine for drinking or eating in the subway is 500-1000$, chewing gums are basically completely banned and owning drugs results in capital punishment. These are the downsides, the upsides beeing a highly organized and clean city with one of the lowest crime rates in the world.

friendly warning sign!

The second thing that is very special about Singapore is that it is probably the most culturally diverse place I've seen so far in my life. There are lots of Chinese people, Indians, Malayans, Westerners and a bunch of other ethnicities. A subway ride turns to a multicultural experience there. Whats also interesting is that there are culturally concentrated neighborhoods: a Chinatown, a Little India and a Muslim hood. We were especially fond of Little India which was close to our hostel and implied a supply of super-delicious and cheap Indian food for us. Especially those Banana Pratas! I had at least two of them every day!

Indian Banana Prata!

Indian food!

I have been wondering if the cultural diversity in that extent is the inevitable trend for the future for most huge cities as a result of globalisation and increasing emigration and travelling. I think I'd like that.

Oh and as Singapore is nearly lying on the equator, all year round there are around 30° and if there wasn't the city - there would be a massive jungle! The city is also extremely green and offers some stunning nature.

one of the coolest buildings I've ever seen! Smoothly integrated into the surrounding jungle ;-)

詹立宏認為他是一隻猴子

First day:
On our first day we went to Singapores central shopping street packed with stores of exclusive brands in fancy buildings. This wasn't too special though - just one of those strongholds of capitalism.
From there we checked out a nearby park where we saw something that I'd describe as a one-tree-forest!

All this is seriously one single tree! How cool is that!?
I'm seriously considering to kick palm trees from the pole position in my my favorite trees list and to put these first!

Later we met up with a friend of Anker who happened to spent his exchange semester in Singapore and all together we checked out a local beach.

unfortunately the Ocean view was impaired through lots of cargo-ships ... but well, a beach is a beach!

Second day:
After starting our day with a massive meal in Little India (as usual) we went to the Muslim hood where we also visited a mosque. This was especially interesting for me as I've actually never been in one before. There were also a bunch of guys inside telling us ethusiastically the basics about Islam and the Koran.

Mosque

From there we walked quite a distance to the Sigapore harbor area where we saw my personal highlight - Marina Bay! Pretty damn cool architecture - I said to Karl that for a travel guide I'd give 5 of 5 stars for the architecture!

The Marina Bay Sands hotel - probably Singapores most famous landmark!

following the advice from my friend Tobi, whom I met the next day, we managed to slip on top of the Marina Bay Sands hotel to get a fancy view

pretty cool light and water show!

On the third day we went to the Gardens by the bay in the morning. Its a pretty fancy "park" right behind the Marina Bay Sands hotel. Unfortunately we didn't have too much time there as we had planned to meet up with Karls friend again to go for a hike to a nearby nature preserve.

huge baby - only the hand is touching the ground

hiking at the MacRitchie Reservoir

unfortunately we got into a heavy rain shower and except Tiantian no one had thouht of bringing an umbrella

But all the hiking through the rain was totally worth it
because...
we got to see MONKEYS! Or rather a monkey-gang!

Here they are robbing an Indian couple :D the plastic bags lying on the ground were theirs.
After the monkeys found out that those bags were not containing anything to eat, we could observe how they followed the Indian couple that had moved on. Going after them we found that they had succeeded in stealing an other plastic bag with this big loaf of cake.

He's the king! After snacking for a while, he caught sight of a monkey lady that was walking past and taking the cake in one hand, he started some sexual interaction still holding his cake in one hand :D

Badass monkey!

Rather tired after the hike, we moved back to our hostel and on the way back checked out some more of Little India where some kind of festival took place.

we also visited this Indian temple, which was extremely cool with Indian style chaotic activity everywhere: people selling stuff; a three people procession around a Indian god statue - one of them holding a banana in his hand; women preparing food as sacrificial offering; a sign saying "Please don't pour milk over Sri Nagar" :D

...and then this goddess :D

Later in the evening, after relaxing at our hotel for a bit and haning out in our hostels Jacuzzi (yes our hostel had a Jucuzzi on the roof!) I finally met up with my old friend Tobi that I knew since school from 5th grade. He is also spending in exchange semester in Singapore.

and some more impressions:

foooood! Mjammjamjam!

This was seriously the best Mango Lassi I ever had (Anker agreed to this)! Sooo good!

fresh coconut juice!

I gave the coconuts last sip as a gift to Anker so that he would have to trash it instead of me :D Not consenting with my ingenious plan he threw the coconet to me and as I refused to catch it, it crashed on the escalator... whoopsy! Fortunately we didn't get a 1000$ish fine^^

How am I supposed to eat it?

Yeah - this way!

Goods in Little India:
This is the perfume a real man needs! (~1,10€)
"We don't need a brand - Let's just call it Men's!"

On last bad thing about Singapore though:
... Airconditioning ... WTF?!
Of course, if there is something like 35-40° outside, then airconditioning is a blessing and I don't know how I would have survived some days back in Japan and also in the beginning here in Taipei without using my rooms airconditioning. BUT why the fuck would you use airconditioning during a decent 30-28° to bring down the temperature to 18° - so that you freeze?!
But thats exactly what Singaporians like to do it seems >8-(
So whenever we entered a subway or a local store, I had to put on my sweater (implying that I had to carry it around for exactly and only this reason all the time). Now also take into account that airconditioning firstly eats up tons of energy (which is obviously scarce, polluting and expensive), secondly that the colder it is inside, the harder it is to adapt to a hot temperature outside and thirdly that many airconditioners are not properly maintained and therefore spread out germs.
Sooo stupid! And I thought airconditioning use in Taiwan was annoying.
Maybe I should consider, writing my master thesis about "welfare loss through excessive airconditioning use in Singapore"...

... its time to end.