Taipei Day 4: Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, Nanmen Market & Food Shopping

My Taiwan 2015 travelouge so far:
1. Taipei Day 1: AirAsia, Star Hostel & Ningxia Road Night Market
2. Jiufen Day 2: Jiufen Old Street
3. Beitou + Taipei Day 3: Hot Spring & Shilin Night Market

Started day 4 with breakfast at Star Hostel. This is my least favorite breakfast of all. It was rather bland. Bread with thin layer of egg salad and top with cucumber slices with fruits on the side (apple, pineapple and orange). Milk tea to brush all that down.

After breakfast, we took the MRT to Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall. Arrived at around 9.30am and the weather was pleasant. Not too warm. Admission is free for Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall.

This is the Gate of Great Centrality and Perfect Uprightness. More or less the main entrance. If you come by MRT, you’ll be entering from the left side of this photo.

Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall faces a large square with National Theater and National Concert Hall situated on the left and right of the square end and the gate (photo above) and the square end center. I’ll show you what I mean later.

National Theater. Beautiful!

The grand view of the National Theater.

National Concert Hall. Both the National Theater and National Concert Hall are use for performing arts.

Long but enjoying walk to Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall.

The sun was behind the hall, therefore it wasn’t the best time to take photos.

And as I walked nearer and nearer, I could see how beautiful the structure is.

And also how grand it is.

Standing at Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, this was the view that greeted me. Absolutely stunning!!! National Theater is the one on the left and National Concert Hall on the right and the Gate of Great Centrality and Perfect Uprightness at the far end with the long stretch of Liberty Square separating all this four structures. A tall flag pole can be seen near the far end center.

When we arrived there, we saw lots of people waiting for something. It was time for changing of the guards! Oh gosh, how lucky were we? The time was 10am.

Tsk, you can also check out the changing of the royal guard at Gyeongbokgung, Seoul if you’re interested.

I got goosebumps witnessing this special ceremony!

What a view!

Guards changing shift.

It was really interesting to watch. The guards even swayed a bit at their post. The whole changing guards ceremony lasted for about 13-15 mins. The next changing guards ceremony will be 11am. It’s on the hour from 10am to 4pm (according to official website).

I’m sure you know by now the bronze statue is Mr Chiang Kai-Shek, former President of the Republic of China aka Taiwan. I love this shot.

It’s a very beautiful statue of Mr Chiang Kai-Shek I must say. Lovely smile. I get good vibes from it.

Here’s a confession: I thought Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall was going to be boring. So glad I did not skip this place. I enjoyed the scenery, the grandeur of the statue and the changing of the guard ceremony.

Then it was a short walk to Jin Feng for our lu rou fan fix at 10.45am. Hehe. Click at the link to read what we ordered and how I feel compared to Formosa Chang.

After our early lunch, we head to an indoor market called Nanmen Market, a minute away from Jin Feng. It was an impromptu visit. Very interesting to see all sorts of food.

Fruits!!! Ohh I see liu ding there.

Nuts and dried fruits.

Cured meats. I asked them what they use it for and they said it’s for making soup. Interesting.

More cured meats and lap cheong.

Noodles.

Beans and dried mushrooms.

Side dishes… ohh so tempted to buy some but did not at the end.

Many types of bean powder.

We left the market without buying anything… especially not even my mom. Haha

Then we took subway to Zhongxiao Dunhua MRT stop. Our target is Sugar & Spice which is about 7 mins walk away.

Sugar & Spice is famous for their nougats and that was the reason for our visit. I’m not a nougat fan but my sis is. Their nougats are quite different from regular ones (compared to Australia) whereby its soft, chewy and less sweet. Really good (and yet I still can’t be converted into a nougat fan haha). So while my sis bought their nougats, I bought their tai yang bing. You can read my tai yang bing review here.

After that we took the MRT to Taipei City Hall. Our objective was Pâtisserie Sadaharu AOKI Paris at Bellavita. After lots of searching and painful walking (by this time we’re so tired!), we found out the shop had closed down. 🙁 So we went to the nearby Eslite Xinyi Store for our light lunch of TKK Fried Chicken (Taiwan fast food fried chicken shop).

After filling our tummy, we went back to our hostel to rest… on the way we detoured to Taipei City Mall for some light shopping (cloth face mask, shoes). FYI, Seoul’s underground malls are much more happening than Taipei’s ones. We rested an hour in our hostel before going out again.

Took the MRT to Zhongshan station and had a wonderful dinner at Din Tai Fung, located at Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Nanxi (click link to read the review).

I sampled some extremely heavenly warabimochi while waiting for our turn at Din Tai Fung from a stall opposite DTF called Shu Shin Bou 手信坊.

It’s also at Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Nanxi (opposite DTF) that I saw and bought Yoku Moku!!! Price at NT$1350. Very expensive but need to get it because the last time I ate it was decades ago when I was just a little girl. I can still remember the taste of the cookie up to this day. That’s how good it is.

After dinner at Din Tai Fung, we head to Pâtisserie Sadaharu AOKI Paris at Regent Galleria. This time we were not disappointed.

Our evening loots. All of these contains food! Taken at Regent Galleria.

On the way back to Zhongshan MRT station, we stopped by Daiso. Their price is NT$39 flat (about RM5.20 based on our exchange rate on November 2015). I can’t remember the price for Malaysia’s Daiso. Can anyone enlighten me? They have huge varieties of stuffs. Will definitely visit them again if I have extra time.

Stopped by the 7-11 near our hostel to get some tidbits to bring home. Bought two interesting Lays flavors: salty roasted garlic and Kyushu seaweed. If I’m not mistaken the Lays here is made in Taiwan.

As with our usual nightly feast in our hostel… this time we had warabimochi and cake, macarons and pastry from Pâtisserie Sadaharu AOKI Paris (click link for review).

Bought a box of that heavenly warabimochi 蕨餅 (NT$280) from Shu Shin Bou 手信坊.

Soft, flavorful and perfect texture. Not sure if I’ll ever find another warabimochi as good as this!

We went to bed at 12am.

That’s all for day 4. Stay tuned for the final post.