YES, I ate snake and it tastes good. Cosmic energies descended upon me, particles collided and transcended through time and I ate that very crisp pieces of snake you see here. Also ate snake stew and snake soup. I even drank snake blood, snake venom and something that I found out afterwards was based on snake dick :-S don’t wanna find out more about that, so no googling, wikiing, don’t even mention this to me, please..

The most known building in Taiwan is the Taipei 101 tower. I previously took photos of it, but now it was time to go on top. 101 floors (dooh) and 509 meters tall, it is the second tallest building in the world. It also has the second fastest elevator in the world, with 60 km/h (or 16 m/s). First places are taken by Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Inside the Taipei 101 tower, I saw the world’s largest tuned mass damper, used in reducing the movements of the building in case of strong wind. It has 660 tons, is suspended over 5 floors and cannot fit into my photo. On top, I could barely see the whole city, due to low clouds reducing visibility.

Afterwards, during a summer storm, Apple and her parents took me to the Jade Market (lots of cool and expensive or less cool, less expensive accessories or decorations) and the Flower Market (bonsai trees, carnivorous plants, pond lilies, orchids and a lot of other heat-and-moisture-loving plants, along with local fruits, garden accessories, seeds, …).

During the evening, we saw some scenic places, including the nearby mountains, with some great nightscapes over Taipei. This is where I first experienced natural coldness (not considering indoor AC) in Taiwan. Midnight caught us in Shilin Market, the biggest night market in Taipei, eating cheesy potato, stinky tofu and drinking lemon and kumquat juice.

This post was sponsored by Apple and her parents, which drove me around and took me to the cool places to see or eat at. Without their help, I couldn’t have seen so many things (and eaten so many things :D) and I thank them for the authentic Taiwanese experience 🙂