Taipei 2011 (Day 1)-17 Sep 2011

It's my first overseas trip(other than Malaysia;my relatives are over there & I used to go back every year when my grandmother is still around,so that doesnt count)& on a airplane!It's also L's 21st birthday trip!I hope that girl had fun to the max for the entire trip & I'm sure she does,by the amount of clothes she has bought :D

Anyway I'm creating a new blog for my travel experience although I dont travel a lot.It's gonna be something that I can look back on when I want to remember things from the trip. (:

& I've to warn,this is gonna consist of long & lengthy blog posts,mostly meant for ME & my friends plus people who might want to go to Taipei could refer to some places which we have gone to! :D

Met up with L early in the morning before cabbing to Changi Airport T3 to check in!It feels so exciting but damn unreal at the same time!Decided to go on Singapore Airlines due to the little price difference as compared to Jetstar.L's mum also said that SIA is safer.Plus it's my first overseas trip!So I dont mind going on one of the world's best for that extra $100+ :D SIA was $600+ & Jetstar was $500+ Hehe.

Thank goodness we reached early cause there's a little problem with our Etickets & the names involved.But ohwell,there's nothing we can do about that so L had to pay $30/pax for the names changed to write a feedback later on to see how we can solve the problem.

Got another shock when we finally checked in & realised that L's luggage already weighed 15kg while mine was 11kg!Thus for the entire trip I keep worrying about the luggage weight's problems as excess baggage is gonna be expensive! 0.0 (prior experience from charging people for excess baggage;haha)

& yes,being back at the airport def brings back memories,good & bad as I remember days from intern,together with Eunice (:

Feeling hungry,we had dimsum for breakfast at the transit area after check in plus berries I bought from home. (The food ins Changi,while not excellent,is much better than the food at Taoyuan Intl Airport)

Found some internet kiosks just next to our boarding gate(which is not ready yet at that point of time) thus L & I went to go online first (Twitter/Facebook).

The view on the airplane is really AWESOME.I wanna live in the sky!!I really love the feeling of being up high high in the sky.& I'm really fascinated by the view,so much I could just watch the view for the majority of the flight time.

Our seafood meal came much earlier than the others,so much that we were already finishing before some of the other's food arrived.I'm only gonna special meals next time just so it can come earlier (:

My earpieces were faulty so I could not go on my original plans of watching movies on the plane,so I ended up with a tutorial lessons on flights instead.It's just as interesting & I learnt some fun facts as well! (Do you know that a plane does not need both its engines to fly?Even with one faulty engine,it could fly & work normally with the one working engine.Meaning Engine A has 100% power,Engine B has 100% power,so it only needs the power of 1 engine to fly and complete the journey)

We headed to buy our SIM cards so that we could call back to SG and also call each other if we get lost,then headed to get transport(Feigo) to city area.As there's not enough people for the bus to drop us at our hotel,we had to stop at Taipei city hall(?) and cab from there.Met fellow singaporeans who helped us hail a cab as we were a bit lost as to what to do.I'm actually a bit shocked as it's close to autumn thus the sky will become dark earlier.It's something which I did not expect.The 7pm sky looks like 9pm!

The taxi uncle put us down at some side road cause there's no car access at certain lanes at 西门町after certain timings,which I think is good cause if not it would be hard for people to walk around,constantly looking out for cars/bikes.L was still saying that we need to try to 融入 cause we dont want to be seen as very touristy & get cheated.But we stood out like a sore thumb with our luggage & accent.Haha.Put our luaggage at the hotel before heading out again.The receptionist was nice;they even called L's phone several times thinking that we might be lost.

Our first meal at Taipei;卤肉饭!But it's not as awesome as I had expected,despite the number of people in the eatery.Oh & 西门町 was not as crowded as I thought it would be,for a Saturday.Sure,there were a lot of people but it's not as bad as Bugis.Get what I mean?Although there's lots of people around but we could still walk without squeezing & brushing shoulders with people.

L's first bubbletea in Taipei!That girl is a fan of bubbletea,really.But for this entire trip she only drank like...3 cups for the entire 5days4nights,which was surprising.LOL.She's very amazed at the "smaller than usual" pearls in this cup of bubbletea.

& this is our first official dinner at Taipei,steamboat buffet with free flow of Haggen Dazs + Movenpick ice cream & this is easily my highlight of the day.While eating the ice cream I was already regretting eating 卤肉饭.LOL.This restaurant is opened til 5am in the morning if I remember correctly & they keep replenishing the food including seafood!So unlike the ones in SG including this 5star hotel who stops refilling expensive food at 8pm(saw it in a angry review).I'm really very impressed cause they serve these old packaging of sprite/coke,provide variety of desserts & also have these pots of tea which you could brew!How cool is that?!The service is also top-notch.They keep coming to clear our empty plates(btw I didnt eat a lot due to the small meal I had earlier but I believe I ate anough ice cream to make the meal worth it) & to refill the soup as well.This is the kind of service you would not find in SG for this price.Btw the meal only cost around $20/pax.

& that's day 1. (:

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