Taipei - nonstop eating...

Wow it sure has been a whirlwind, super busy trip so far. After we all arrived in Taipei - mom first, then my brother, then me, and then dad - all arriving on different days and from different cities - our crazy days of meeting with friends and family, constant eating began and continued for what I feared might be never ending. Now, you might think - eating - Tammy loves to eat so she must love that. Well, I do love to eat, and while in the US, I usually say "I eat anything". Well, that's not totally true. In the US, I am pretty comfortable eating anything "American" or international foods that are "Americanized"; but I know myself well enough to know that in Asia, I definitely do not eat everything - in fact, far from it. In Taiwan, it's always hard because we're constantly meeting up with family and friends who tend to invite us to "nicer" meals - meaning, no beef and broccoli or general tso's chicken, but fancier seafood dishes - some of which are quite normal and really nothing to be afraid of, but I'm quite strange when it comes to certain sea creatures, and well, also some body parts hailing from some land creatures as well.

Anyhow, in an effort to not look like a totally uncultured Chinese-American kid, I try my best to try as much as I can, but quite frankly, some of it just makes me gag. Over the years, I have learned to discretely sneak food from my plate to my brother sitting next to me, but that can only get you so far. Strangely, eating can be quite a tiring and stressful times.

But anyhow, literally, our schedule everyday for a few days was: wake up, eat breakfast, head out to town, meet with some family friend for a nice lunch, hang out in the city, snack more, meet with another family friend for dinner, hang out, maybe hit the night market for some more food, head home, sleep... repeat the same the next day.

Lots of eating... lots of walking... very tiring...

Oh... don't get me wrong... there's awesome food here too. I love the street food here, and the pastries, and the coffee and milk tea and interesting fun drinks like bubble tea... it's just the "complicated" stuff I'm a bit tired of.