When I found myself googling 'Taiwan' four months ago, i could picture myself writing this blog. Honestly I am yet to read this place well but this post was long due. So here it goes...
I moved to Taipei a month ago and my take on this city has been erratic and opinionated. In a city where English is alien, getting around can be irritating/exhausting/perplexing/amusing all in the space of Taipei minute. As a brown guy, I seem to confuse the locals. To their defense, they have seen very few of 'us'. The only brown person I had met was this guy wearing fake Ray-bans at the airport who happened to ask me if I was Bangladeshi. I have nothing against Bangladeshis. I think they have remarkable fashion sense in waterproof clothing given all that rain and constant floods. I took that in my stride like the many other things over the course of my stay here.
So how is Taipei?
It is clean, the roads are big, the cabbies are nuts, every street has a 7-11 and everyone seems to carry an i-pod around. So essentially, its like any other big city right? Wrong. Taipei, at first glance, seems to be a city stuck in an identity crisis. However, we will keep this topic for another day and another post...
Back to Taipei SWOT analysis. As i look at the city through the window, I do not see a city that i would like to spend my life in. Its not the Chinese,(zhongohua) that can be learnt. Its not the vegetarian food, that can be bought. Its not the shrill girls, not surprisingly they can be bought too. I do not see a 'go-get-it' spirit in this city. I see garish night clubs, fever pitched-rush hours and malls full of window shoppers but no feel pulse in Taipei. I don't know much about much, but hey... even though this looks and feels (and even smells) like New York... this ain't New York.
But to its credit, Taipei has its own 'charm' be it the quaint Chinese breakfast places or its sit out cafes among trees. Its got a healthy arboreal cover and pollution levels are among the lowest in Asia. This in a country that manufactures more semicon-chips in a day than there are people in this country.
As i look back at Taipei, quite literally as the window is right behind me, i can see good beer-but bad bars, loose women-but independent all the same, vegetarian fried rice-but stir fried in pork fat, helpful cabbies- but playing annoying music in the cabs, no nonsense colleagues in the day- best drinking buddies at night...smoking,tai-chi, hookers, soccer moms, rickshaws, skyscrapers, glitzy clubs, neon lights,Taipei 101, pool parties, hills, mountain bikers, bbqs, temples, brothels...
Taipei has got it all... My times here will oscillate between the good and the bad but I'm sure it will settle somewhere in middle.
The more I think about Taiwan, the more it intrigues and even frustrates me. But like they say, This is Asia.. so either you're in or you're out . And by the looks of it, I think I want it!
-Best,
Srini
