Tackling Taiwan



Taiwan, like Singapore , is an island.

Unlike Singapore however , it is leaf-shaped and a much bigger one with 36 000 sq km of land covered by steep mountains covered by tropical and subtropical vegetation. It's highest peak is Jade Mountain with an elevation of 3952 meters.

Singapore in comparison is has only 682.7 sq km of land. Standing at 166 meters is Singapore's highest point, Bukit Timah Hill.

It is a laugh then that in 4 days, my family and I were supposed to travel the whole of Taiwan when we haven't covered every inch in Singapore which is about 50 times smaller. Starting out from Taipei we were to travel by coach in a clockwise direction all the way along the coast of Taiwan and land back at Taipei on day 4.

The adventure started for me on the plane.



Flying by Jetstar Asia was a culture shock for me as I endured 4 hours of nothing but the view outside and the advertisement infront of me. It drove me crazy enough to get me started on massaging my belly.



For someone is used to spending the hours on an SIA plane either playing old games like Mario or watching movies, sleep was not an option. Moreover, I was high on adrenaline. Plane travel does that to me. To future customers of Jetstar on pretty long flights, well used to SIA treatment, I say rent the Video player already.

I had the misfortune to not do it.

We landed in the Chiang Kai Shek International Airport at about 8 plus and was promptly transported to a hotel in Taipei.

That was my first contact with traffic in Taiwan. Drivers in general are quite considerate. There are times black sheep, as always on any roads, I am sure went to a different driving school altogether.

I have to say though that I totally dig Taiwan's traffic lights in the more well-to do cities. They have the same red, amber and green for cars and a red and green man for pedestrians. Like some Singaporean traffic lights, the pedestrians have a countdown box thrown in for good measure.

The cool thing about the traffic lights for pedestrians is that the green man, which indicates it is all clear to walk, is actually walking. But that's not all, in the last ten seconds, when time is running out, the walking man morphs into a running man.

Watch video of walking man here

Er...I think this traffic light was faulty.

Traffic signs in Taiwan, where they are not pictures, are mostly in Chinese. Here's one instructing drivers to "yield".



As you can see, old chinese is still quite common place. Most of the time, it is still readable. The problem becomes evident on longer signs like the one below.



Does it mean give way to pedestrians from 0900 to 0000 only?

Answers anyone?