There’s one thing I especially like when I live in Taipei: It’s one of the best destinations in Asia where you can find art and design wherever you walk or stay. Usually any kinds of guidance tables or signs are enriched with cartoons or other funny characters giving guidance in laid-back manner. It’s quite often a case for advertising or interior in coffee shops, too, restaurants are more traditional if they aren’t theme seasoned like Hello Kitty hot pot. In the contrary this is an old city with aged buildings and traditional architecture. The city is changing and more new construction is going-on, for sure the prices are rising, too.
Last weekend I went to Museum of Contemporary Art which is centrally located and usually concentrates into interesting art works and world-famous artists. This time the exhibition was by a Japanese artist Mika Ninagawa and another video animation outside the museum by Cyriak Harris from UK. Mika Ninagawa has made some music videos, designed clothes and accessories, but I guess the most famous part is her photography on famous Asian pop stars and people. Her “selfies” however are a bit different, but I also looked them during the visit. I’m more into moving or performing arts which means I preferred the outside video screen and animation by Harris. It’s called Hyperplasia – Mutation and it was lovely to see teddybears eating and playing among traffic or see cows changing into bigger or smaller ones letting you think what is that.
Sometimes I visit Museum of Fine Arts which is located both in Taipei and Kaohsiung the second biggest city in Taiwan. They have static exhibitions, class rooms for students and mostly changing exhibitions by Taiwanese or Chinese artists. Some are really cool, so it’s truly a place to visit if you come to Taiwan.
There are areas with smaller galleries, but I haven’t had enough time to visit them very often. Just sometimes if I hear someone or a friend is having an opening or such, I visit these. After all I enjoy seeing beautiful things, clever posters around the metro stations guiding me not to perform harassment or inappropriate behavior to others but doing it in a funny, less serious way. You may also find barriers on the parks or streets which look like an animal, just because they are better in colors, not only red and yellow. I also really like the road or other construction cuts when they put the moving robot to show you this road is closed.
I usually cook at home because I got used to it in Finland and Taiwanese food isn't so healthy in my opinion. But there are some great food here which I really like. Many of them came from China, for example dumplings and noodles (the fried noodles are excellent in Taiwan). Actually it's a bit difficult to find very local food, almost any western foods are available with reasonable prices with a Taiwanese twist.
Now that I got a job in Taiwan and been living awhile in the same place, I decided to make some decorations to my home. For me it takes some time to make it feel like a home but this place feels very nice to live in, except MRT station could a bit closer. Dongmen, the area I live, is in Da'an district which is quite central locations and in Taipei to closer to Taipei 101 you are, the more expensive it is. Also the world famous Michelin star dumpling restaurant Ding Tai Fong opened its first restaurant here, every night it gets very busy. The same food isavailable nowadays in all major shopping malls and other busy locations. Yongkang street is maybe the most touristic restaurant street in Taipei, I rather take a lane from it and find a local place which are for sure cheaper and authentic.
It's been awhile I wrote any updates to my website, so I decided to post a story of my trip and meet-ups in Japan. I stayed around one week in Osaka, Tokyo and Kyoto this spring after visiting South Korea. After seeing quite many places, meeting Japanese and seeing how they do Eurotrips, I have to say it was something different I explorer there.
