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Given I had only booked two nights at the hostel in Shi Lin and they didn’t have any beds available for the rest of the week, I had to find another hostel to stay at for the rest of my time in Taiwan. I found one in a district not too far from the hostel I was currently staying at in a district called Xin Yi considered Taipei’s financial and city government district. So I packed my bag, hopped on the MRT (subway), and headed to the new hostel.

The hostel has more of a home feel to it since the owner and his family used to live there before he quit his job and decided to turn it into a hostel. Danny (hostel owner) gave me a tour of the place then marked up a travel map with some places he recommended visiting making it look more like a treasure map. I stuffed the map in my pocket with all the other brochures I had collected along the way (why isn’t there an app for this!!).

That afternoon I visited the Sun Yat Sen memorial which comprised of a large statue of the father of the Republic of China (Taiwan) guarded with 2 soldiers in front which performed a very elaborate “change of guards” routine that consisted of stomping, yelling, and gun twirling.

The rest of the memorial had a room devoted to the life of SYS and the founding of Taiwan as well as a room with Chinese paintings which I’m not sure if the paintings belonged to him or they were a separate art installation occupying the memorial.

Upon exiting the SYS memorial I was finally able to enjoy Taiwan’s largest building and what used to be the largest building in the world (now just the tallest eco-friendly building), Taipei 101. From the memorial entrance I got an almost full view of the building which dwarfed every single other building in Taipei’s downtown.

After taking numerous pictures of the 101 (not the highway) I made my way closer to the base of the building so I could get some better shots and check out its surrounding buildings.

The 101 definitely stands out from other buildings with its multicolored lights that illuminate the sky during the night like a big Xmas tree that the city officials neglected to take down after the holidays. With there just being one building towering the city, I would hardly call it a skyline in comparison to what can be seen in Hong Kong and San Francisco but it’s still a cool building to look at.

Later that evening I made my way over to Taipei’s software park to meet my friend and former co-worker Plasma (yes, that’s his English name) to get a tour of the Yahoo office. Plasma and I met not long after I began working at Yahoo during an integration session for a Yahoo app he was working on.

Plasma and his co-worker took me to the Ning Xia night market which was recommended by Lonely Planet not as the largest night market but as the best food selection in all of Taipei. Plasma said the goal wasn’t to fill ourselves on one dish, that way we could try many dishes throughout the evening and end the night with fruit covered shaved ice (very popular here).

I had stinky tofu (fermented tofu that actually stinks), duck blood, fried duck head, kidney, and rooster testicles. Please allow me to describe each on in detail.

Stinky Tofu: I’ve had stinky tofu twice back home and both times I swore I’d never try it again because it smells bad and tastes worse (someone I met at the hostel described the smell as bad breath combined with dog shit). But for some reason, the stinky tofu here was…well..less stinky! Stinky tofu is either served fried with cabbage on top and a dipping sauce that tastes like Sriracha or in a soup base that is generally spicy.

Duck blood: The first time I had this dish was in China so while not a first, still something I wanted to try again to add to my list of “extreme food” eaten in Taiwan. It has the texture of jello and the flavor really depends on the broth it’s floating in.

Fried duck head: At first sight I thought this would be served with the neck attached to the head and I’d eat it kind of like the large turkey legs you commonly find at fairs, but after pointing to the head I wanted, the guy preparing the food cut off the head and cut the neck into pieces and put all the parts into a fryer. The flavor was like a sweet barbecue sauce and eating it involved getting each part on a stick and gnawing around the bone until meat was found.

Kidney: rubbery, still don’t like it not because of the flavor, just annoying to eat.

Rooster testicles: ok. I saved this one for last since it was not only the strangest thing I had ate all night, but also the strangest thing I had ever eaten. The “balls” were served in a mirky soup broth so only the balls that stood on top of other balls could be seen since well..uh..balls don’t float. I grabbed one with my chopstick and just popped it in my mouth while my friends made a video of my reaction. The texture was soft like tofu, looked like tofu with veins, and the flavor was mostly from the broth they were basking in. I can’t say I’d eat it again but I CAN say I ate it.

We finished off the night with a bottle of Taiwan beer then I headed back to the hostel.

Breakfast, kind of like an omelette