Taiwan. To be honest, i'd never really thought about going to Taiwan, it had never grabbed me as a destination, i'd never really met or heard of anyone who had travelled there, and so I felt no major need to visit. I had already seen and lived in China so wasn't it the same anyway?
And thats how I felt up until the day we flew into Taiwan.
How wrong I was.
The only reason we went there at all was to work. Robyn had been offered a great opportunity to teach in a bushiban ( cram school) and as Robyn's partner I was going to go over on a spouse visa and get some under the table work.
We flew into Taipei and stayed with our good friend Katia whom we had met diving in Pulah Weh the year before. Taiwan being such a tiny country, we decided to spend a couple of nights at Katia's in Taipei and commute down to Jhudong each day until we found ourselves a home. Upon our arrival in Jhudong we were greeted by the super nice agent who had found Robyn the job, and he spent hours and hours showing us around the town, introducing us to the school, taking us out to lunch, and, of course, patiently taking us on a massive search for accommodation. After looking at some not-so-nice rooms, some massive rooms and some super-tiny rooms we finally settled on a 3 bedroom, fully furnished, split-level unit for the small sum of AU$200 a month! And so Jhudong; pronounced “dew-don” a small town of population 20,000, nestled against the foothills of several mountain passes with a beautiful river passing through the edge of town, in an area know for its farming, bamboo, and cold springs; became our home.
Mission 2 was to meet Robyn's boss, and hope that she was as nice as she had sounded on the phone... mission successful... she greeted us with hugs and a loaf of her favourite bread!
Mission 3... get house-hold stuff to set up our new apartment, find food, a market, shops, alcohol, and to try to do all of it with our very limited mandarin …....mission complete, after all, the apartment was directly above a supermarket, next door to a bread shop and around the corner from KFC, Maccas, heaps of funky little restaurants and more shops.
Robyn's boss helped us out with translations, and with communicating with the landlord, getting the internet connected and we were set to go.
And that really is the essence of taiwan. EASY! Everything simply makes sense. The people will go out of their way to help you and speak just enough English to do so, and it is just a perfect mixture of crazy Asia-with street food and scooters, and modern Asia-with supermarkets and cleanliness.
So for all those people who say it too difficult, I have now proved you wrong.
For those of you who have never thought of visiting Taiwan, please keep reading-we believe you will soon change your minds.
Robyn started her daily job (a grand total of 5 hours a day) a couple of days after we moved our stuff down to Jhudong, and I was offered a few temping jobs straight away in some of the surrounding towns. After a couple of weeks, I found a really good school that saw me work in the mornings at a kindergarten and in the afternoons at a cram school (total of 3 to 4 hours a day five days a week) with a great boss who even threw in a free scooter!! Our working life was a dream and we were so happy. Even though there were only around 6 other westerners in the town we still managed to make some good friends and had many good nights out at the only bar in the town. We could finally cook our own food, and even un-pack our back pack! It was all very surreal for a while but it was something we both needed to do. We even took on a flat mate, (we miss you Chelsea) and found ourselves a pet cockatiel (we literally found him on the side of the road) who flew around the house and was generally noisy and wanted way too much attention but who was adorable and cute at the same time.
We had an amazing time and could not have been happier. Taiwan is simply a beautiful country.
Even though we were working full-time ( 20- 25 hours a week full time, lol) we had plenty of time to explore the stunning countryside on our little scooter, and on weekends or when we had holidays we had plenty of time to travel around and even do some great diving, or just go for a nice drive into the surrounding mountains to some random and funky cafe we found along the way, or for a BBQ in (literally in) the local river.
Taiwan is a really small country and on a reasonable scooter it is quite easy to do a complete lap of it in a couple of weeks! We went to a lot of the “must-see” places like “Sun-Moon Lake” and were amazed that, even though there were lots of local tourists there, the place was actually tourist-destination worthy! Unlike mainland China where people go just to say they have been, places in Taiwan are actually really really beautiful and really well looked-after.
One holiday we even rode our scooter from the west coast over the highest mountain in Taiwan (2300m), well actually we pushed it most of the way up the mountain as the full camping kit, tent, sleeping bags, mattress and the two of us on it was a little too much for the little 125cc beast. We then rode it down the other side and all the way through the simply stunning Taroko Gorge. We can't even begin to describe this place. It is just amazing. It is at least 100 times nicer than the 3 gorges in China that everyone raves about but that you can't actually see for the pollution. After Taroko we then rode south down the entire east coast of the country along highway11, and then back up again along the inland road (highway 9). The coast road is stunning with deep blue oceans washing up over black volcanic rocks and endless farms, small little villages going up into the hills and mountains, and awesome little restaurants and bars made entirely out of driftwood. The camping was fantastic, with great sites, hot showers and raised platforms, sometimes even with roofs, that you set your tent up inside of.
One weekend we even rode our trusty scooter to an awesome Taiwanese Indie festival called “love-stock” which was held in an abandoned and overgrown amusement park, with the main stage set up above an empty swimming pool. Some of the rides could even still be operated and the whole place was like something out of a movie, an eerie empty amusement park taken over by jungle and weeds. Awesome!
We met some fantastic people in Taiwan, and we never found one single person to be rude, or too good to try to talk to us. The stigmata that I had that China and Taiwan were the same could not have been more wrong.
Our original plan was to stay for a full year and to really get to know the country, but sometimes even the best laid plans can fall to the side. After 4 months we received news of a family illness and decided that as much as we loved our lives living in a backpack, and as happy as we were in Taiwan, we needed to return home. We told our bosses we had to leave and they were soooo amazing and understanding – in such a typical, loving, friendly Taiwanese way; we said speedy goodbyes to friends and promised to return as soon as possible. We left our apartment and our noisy cockatiel,Tobu with our flat mate, and home we went.
And so this ended our time in Taiwan for this time, but to be honest, we loved every minute we were there! For a place I had never known about or had any yearning to visit, it really made us sad to leave.
And thats how I felt up until the day we flew into Taiwan.
How wrong I was.
The only reason we went there at all was to work. Robyn had been offered a great opportunity to teach in a bushiban ( cram school) and as Robyn's partner I was going to go over on a spouse visa and get some under the table work.
We flew into Taipei and stayed with our good friend Katia whom we had met diving in Pulah Weh the year before. Taiwan being such a tiny country, we decided to spend a couple of nights at Katia's in Taipei and commute down to Jhudong each day until we found ourselves a home. Upon our arrival in Jhudong we were greeted by the super nice agent who had found Robyn the job, and he spent hours and hours showing us around the town, introducing us to the school, taking us out to lunch, and, of course, patiently taking us on a massive search for accommodation. After looking at some not-so-nice rooms, some massive rooms and some super-tiny rooms we finally settled on a 3 bedroom, fully furnished, split-level unit for the small sum of AU$200 a month! And so Jhudong; pronounced “dew-don” a small town of population 20,000, nestled against the foothills of several mountain passes with a beautiful river passing through the edge of town, in an area know for its farming, bamboo, and cold springs; became our home.
Mission 2 was to meet Robyn's boss, and hope that she was as nice as she had sounded on the phone... mission successful... she greeted us with hugs and a loaf of her favourite bread!
Mission 3... get house-hold stuff to set up our new apartment, find food, a market, shops, alcohol, and to try to do all of it with our very limited mandarin …....mission complete, after all, the apartment was directly above a supermarket, next door to a bread shop and around the corner from KFC, Maccas, heaps of funky little restaurants and more shops.
Robyn's boss helped us out with translations, and with communicating with the landlord, getting the internet connected and we were set to go.
And that really is the essence of taiwan. EASY! Everything simply makes sense. The people will go out of their way to help you and speak just enough English to do so, and it is just a perfect mixture of crazy Asia-with street food and scooters, and modern Asia-with supermarkets and cleanliness.
So for all those people who say it too difficult, I have now proved you wrong.
For those of you who have never thought of visiting Taiwan, please keep reading-we believe you will soon change your minds.
Robyn started her daily job (a grand total of 5 hours a day) a couple of days after we moved our stuff down to Jhudong, and I was offered a few temping jobs straight away in some of the surrounding towns. After a couple of weeks, I found a really good school that saw me work in the mornings at a kindergarten and in the afternoons at a cram school (total of 3 to 4 hours a day five days a week) with a great boss who even threw in a free scooter!! Our working life was a dream and we were so happy. Even though there were only around 6 other westerners in the town we still managed to make some good friends and had many good nights out at the only bar in the town. We could finally cook our own food, and even un-pack our back pack! It was all very surreal for a while but it was something we both needed to do. We even took on a flat mate, (we miss you Chelsea) and found ourselves a pet cockatiel (we literally found him on the side of the road) who flew around the house and was generally noisy and wanted way too much attention but who was adorable and cute at the same time.
We had an amazing time and could not have been happier. Taiwan is simply a beautiful country.
Even though we were working full-time ( 20- 25 hours a week full time, lol) we had plenty of time to explore the stunning countryside on our little scooter, and on weekends or when we had holidays we had plenty of time to travel around and even do some great diving, or just go for a nice drive into the surrounding mountains to some random and funky cafe we found along the way, or for a BBQ in (literally in) the local river.
Taiwan is a really small country and on a reasonable scooter it is quite easy to do a complete lap of it in a couple of weeks! We went to a lot of the “must-see” places like “Sun-Moon Lake” and were amazed that, even though there were lots of local tourists there, the place was actually tourist-destination worthy! Unlike mainland China where people go just to say they have been, places in Taiwan are actually really really beautiful and really well looked-after.
One holiday we even rode our scooter from the west coast over the highest mountain in Taiwan (2300m), well actually we pushed it most of the way up the mountain as the full camping kit, tent, sleeping bags, mattress and the two of us on it was a little too much for the little 125cc beast. We then rode it down the other side and all the way through the simply stunning Taroko Gorge. We can't even begin to describe this place. It is just amazing. It is at least 100 times nicer than the 3 gorges in China that everyone raves about but that you can't actually see for the pollution. After Taroko we then rode south down the entire east coast of the country along highway11, and then back up again along the inland road (highway 9). The coast road is stunning with deep blue oceans washing up over black volcanic rocks and endless farms, small little villages going up into the hills and mountains, and awesome little restaurants and bars made entirely out of driftwood. The camping was fantastic, with great sites, hot showers and raised platforms, sometimes even with roofs, that you set your tent up inside of.
One weekend we even rode our trusty scooter to an awesome Taiwanese Indie festival called “love-stock” which was held in an abandoned and overgrown amusement park, with the main stage set up above an empty swimming pool. Some of the rides could even still be operated and the whole place was like something out of a movie, an eerie empty amusement park taken over by jungle and weeds. Awesome!
We met some fantastic people in Taiwan, and we never found one single person to be rude, or too good to try to talk to us. The stigmata that I had that China and Taiwan were the same could not have been more wrong.
Our original plan was to stay for a full year and to really get to know the country, but sometimes even the best laid plans can fall to the side. After 4 months we received news of a family illness and decided that as much as we loved our lives living in a backpack, and as happy as we were in Taiwan, we needed to return home. We told our bosses we had to leave and they were soooo amazing and understanding – in such a typical, loving, friendly Taiwanese way; we said speedy goodbyes to friends and promised to return as soon as possible. We left our apartment and our noisy cockatiel,Tobu with our flat mate, and home we went.
And so this ended our time in Taiwan for this time, but to be honest, we loved every minute we were there! For a place I had never known about or had any yearning to visit, it really made us sad to leave.
