17th mar 13

Happy birthday to me!

my ootd! hehe bought the hello kitty leggings from the night market; pink flats & dress from shida night market! super cute hello kitty! too bad, sg is so hot, i seldom wear leggings out. hahaha!

went to nearby for breakfast. thou there are many options, we still decided to opt for local food! hehe. i dont quite rem the middle dish is what.. but the other two is 滷肉飯 & 冬粉湯!

then we went to Agnes B Cafe at 京站店. i've been wanting to try it when i was in hkg then but didnt get the chance to.. so i had it specially plan into my taiwan itinerary. and what better day to enjoy nice cakes on my bday! hehe.

after that, we went to 忠孝復興. shopped a little while then walked to the famous Hello Kitty Sweets (yes, i picked my bday for it as well! haha!) but it was on a full house then, so i make a resv at a later time, took some pictures & went off!

without any plans, we just walk along the street on the super hot day. heh heh. then we came across this striking cafe!! BARBIE CAFE! the top left pic is the 1st floor. the cafe is on the 2nd floor. this cafe is soooooo beautiful & pinkish!!! the interior of it totally wins hello kitty sweets hands down!! some of the chairs had tutu skirts tied to it! so cute!!!

they also had a variety of desserts, in pretty color tones!! it was yet another full restaurant.. the next slot was hours later & they couldnt guarantee my resv.. so i had no choice but to skip it!! one day, i will be back!! and make sure i make reservation for it!!!

 with not much places to go, we went for mcdonalds lunch. hahahaha!! well, it's our tradition to try diff countries mcdonalds.. so not that bad! they had red bean pie & corn soup!

after that, we walked over to sogo where i purchase my laneige products. so far so good! really lived up to its name! hehe. what makes me change my skincare line is that i heard tt one shouldnt stick to a particular brand for long bcos our skin will get accustom to it & we will not have a better effect. ahah. dont quite buy it la.. but i think mainly is also bcos we are aging, so our skin needs something else too. hahaha. excuses la~ okie. i bought & im happy with it. LOL. anw, im alternating btn my ettusais and laneige. etuusais still hv better oil control for me. so i still use it before my makeup and their makeup is still by far the best for me!

ok i digressed. >_<

wen back to the hello kitty sweets at abt 4ish! was given a 2nd floor seat!

pictures at all corners!! haha! initially, i wanted to have my photoshoot here. but i hesitated bcos the interior isnt tt beautiful, and there are only a few couch that have the hello kitty shape & bow. besides, background will def appear in the pictures..& my photoshoot day will be on a sunday.. so with all these considerations, tt is how i decided to google for another cafe. hahaha!!

the food that we ordered! my bf said the creme brulee (top right) was terrible, and so is his chocolate milkshake which taste powdery. i had some cake that comes with crepe skin (bottom left) and it was ok. i had some apple fizz or something and it was ok also. haha. some juice + soda la. the (shd be) mango pudding (top left) comes free. the best option was the ice cream sundae (bottom right) but that pink hello kitty apparently was terrible. haha. i didnt eat it but the bf had a bite & said it taste like wax. LOL! in short, just go and camwhore like nuts. dont expect any delicious food. haha. oh! they had min spending! 300twd per pax. u are safe when u order one set of dessert per pax. heh.

their ladies! haha!

after that, we went back to our hotel to put down my shopping loot (all the heavy stuff like skincare, nail polishes etc) & was given a surprise by the hotel! pictures up in next entry!

15th mar 2013

day tour! paid 4,000twd for a driver to bring us around the nantou area! did a random search online & found this company offering the cheapest price. the driver they sent was a young chap. he was not bad~ friendly.. but it wld be good that he was a guide as well. i thot i was engaging a guide service.. but it was all good la. def worth the price i paid for! he brought us to places we wanted to go (he huan shan - lushan hotspring - sun moon lake - taichung) and he waited at all the stops.

rise & shine! as the driver will pick us up at 9am.. we decided to just bring our bag down for breakfast.. so that we dont hv to climb all the way back for it. haha! it was soooooo nice having breakfast by the patio! fresh air, cooling weather with sunlight to keep us warm & a good view! love it!

first stop of the day was He Huan Shan 合歡山. it was really on top of the hill. i was sooooo dizzy with the turns. maybe we went at a bad timing, it was so foggy that we couldnt see a thing. it was merely an experience for a 4°C weather (not like we nv been to any places with this weather.. haha but still deeply deprive of it... sg is tooooo hot!!!). anyway, i know he huan shan is famous for watching the sunrise.. we couldnt bear to part with our sleep, thus we came at this time. lol. and i heard that it is one of the few places in taiwan that snow during winter.. so lotsa ppl came here for it. i went in mar, so obviously there was no snow thou i saw a post abt it few weeks back that it snowed in late mar/early apr for like 30min. hahaha!

then he sent us to a nearby hot spring town - Lushan 蘆山. i didnt research on any resorts.. so purely asked him to bring us to somewhere clean & a place that provides private room. thou i've been to (public) onsen in japan, im still quite shy about it. haha plus it wasnt really public then bcos the resort was quite empty & it was my sister & i inside. so yeap. hahaha!

anyway, i read about their hotspring places mainly still need you to wear swimming costumes. so i brought along mine. haha! the guide brought us to 名盧假期大飯店. if my memory never fails me, i paid 1300TWD for 1.5hrs for this private hotspring! this can prolly fits at least 3-4 pax! super duper love it!! p.s. the place is totally like pictured. minus the mist + wine. hahaha!

next is lunch! he brought us to Puli 埔里, a town nearest to Lushan. Apparently, you gotta trfs bus or whatsoever here if you are heading to Cingjing & Sun Moon Lake etc. Anyway, this is recommended by his colleague, the one that i first contacted to arrange for my services. This is a hakka restaurant! We invited the driver to join us for lunch as well.. and i think we kinda over ordered. haha! mostly recommended by the service staffs~~ we had some chicken, bee hon (she said it is famous in puli - which i really love it since im a beehon lover!), fried silver fishes, pork that is like char siew.. and i dont recall if we ordered veggies. hahaha! 

Last stop of the tour was Sun Moon Lake 日月潭. Alright~ everyone was saying how beautiful this place is.. but maybe i was at the wrong side of the lake.. it wasnt tt fantastic to me. People told me you gotta take boat ride here (or do cycling), so i was imagining it to be like Lake Ashi of Hakone. So it was like a disappointment to me. I saw the boat ride is like our batam ferry services, even smaller. Being a seasick person, it totally puts me off when i see the ferry moving here & there near the dock.. and it doesnt help that we went right after lunch! hahaha! so i decided to opt out for it (i know most of the famous tourist spots of sun moon lake is only accessible via the ferry).

So we walked ard, saw someone selling fruits.. and we bought Apple Banana 蘋果蕉 to eat. Bcos two days before, while we were on the tour bus from Taipei to Cingjing, the guide said that Banana is a famous export fruit from Taiwan & that they had a variety of it.. Apple Banana or Banana Apple, is one of the rare bananas & she said is a must eat. Why this name? Bcos it taste a bit like apple, which i think she lied. I googled & most said it is bcos of the color of the skin - red (you can see from the picture, behind me, or from the link). ANYWAY, SO WE BOUGHT IT! it was 2 for 50TWD! quite exp for banana. and it taste like banana to me. LOL LOL! damnit! we literally got ripped off..

After that, we decided to sit down & have a rest. Settle by Starbucks again. When in doubt, always go back to the familiar names. Hahaha! Ordered Chocolate Strawberry Cake & Tea Latte. Wooooo it was good!! LOVE IT!!!

Sun Moon Lake - obligatory shot.

After Starbucking... the driver pick us up again and sent us to Taichung City, where we will spend a night at!

Presenting the room that we stayed in! It is not a hotel nor minsu. It was like rental appt & this "chain" had a few units in this block (and other appt too). They have different theme rooms and i decided to booked the Tiffany room! Absolutely love the design of the room!! Super pretty (minus off their wooden closet haha!) Anyway, this is near the famous Feng Jia Night Market, about 10min walk. But it gets really dark at night.. so i dont recommend ladies to stayover. Read my review here on Tripadvisor! 

Oh btw, this place is called Feng Cha Beauty 逢甲美學院. Their facebook page is more updated with pictures of rooms etc. Overall, I'll still be back for the themed rooms la. hehe.

So after we rest for awhile, we headed to the famous night market! Feng Jia Night Market 逢甲夜市. I rem reading it somewhere that it is the biggest night market in Taiwan. Indeed, it was really big. rows and rows of street snacks & SHOPPING! i didnt buy anything thou. ahaha! we purely eat thru! lol!

This particular stall attracted us. It sells 炒麵麵包 - literally, fried (instant) noodle in toasted bread! There was a super long line to it & we joined in of cos. hahaha i think we q for like 20-30min for it! it was really good thou! very unique taste & somehow, it jus blends well. hahaha!

ate a couple of other food.. like the strawberries with chocolate. the guide told us strawberry is in season or famous there.. dont quite rem.. so we ate it. it was really sweet!!!! mad love!!! after that, we shopped & walked ard the night market while we digest the food.. we went for foot massages & he went for a haircut... haha!

then we decided to buy more food! ate the oysters on the spot & bought onigiri & mee sua & bubble tea back to the room for supper! i think there's more. haha!

the day ended pretty badly bcos we were lost. hahaha! my phone was totally dead which i cant use my gps.. then i left my physical map in the room. my bad my bad! i kinda rem the way.. and we managed to make it all the way back to the roadside. however, we forgot one of the turns, thus we didnt manage to walk right bck in. it was soooooo dark.. after we took the wrong turn, we came right back to the main road.. we saw the right lane but it was so dark, so we thot it was a dead end (there's another turn into the appt there ) we asked a few ppl and all told us diff directions. really at lost, i told the bf tt we will walk bck to the night market & cab back from there since there's more cabs there. but before we cld make a decision, a cab came by. i asked the nice taxi driver, a lady, for directions. she told us it was jus round the corner. seriously, we had make enough turns ard all the lanes there.. so we told her we will pay her.. just sent us back. lol! she took us to the same place where we went in the first place and pointed the route out. hahaha. like 30sec drive over. and she was so nice that she nv accept any money from us. lol lol lol!!

that marks the day of the day. i am soooooo glad that taiwanese are such friendly ppl!!

14th mar 13

cingjing part one!!!

woke up really early to buy breakfast on the go. mcdonalds seems like the right choice. haha! there's just one outlet opp our hotel. anyway, went to the train station for our pickup at 650am!

after about 5hrs of journey (with rest stations in btn), we finally arrived at cingjing 凊境!! beautiful!!

as the minsu is not ready for check in yet, we went for lunch. we obviously over ordered! hur hur. but we finished it.

walked ard the nearby places... there's this carton king that sells all paper products, little swiss garden & 7-11. then we walked over to our minsu, which a short steep walk up!

arrived! rest a little while at the patio~~ which hv a view of their withering sakura. haha! and that's their pet dog.. i think it's called niu niu? haha!

walked 3 levels of stairs up (it was really tiring walking up i swear!) for our room. requested for the pink room & am extremely satisfied with it! hehe.

here's the view from our balcony. totally worth the walk up! breathtaking!

p.s. this minsu is called misty villa. i've been contemplating btn this misty villa or another famous one called starry minsu.. and another one which blogger fidelis had stayed in before.. in the end, i decided on misty bcos a lot said tt it is conveniently located near the 7-11 (haha! im afraid tt there's nth we cn do at night.. or gt really hungry...) and most impt is tat my fren stayed here before & she said it was not bad. hahaha. nv regret at all! the location is really gd! 7-11, restaurant (cheap MOS burger to more expensive choices avail) to starbucks~ all within 5-10min walk...

this is outside the room. haha. rest awhile in the room before we took the minsu transport to the 青青草原. pictures for this will be in the next post! hehe.

after walking thru the whole area of 青青草原, we headed back to hv a rest. initially wanted to go to the little swiss garden but we were too tired to go. so thot of having some drinks at the lovely patio. who knows they dont provide any high tea sets nor any coffee/cokes etc. no choice, we sat there with ice water & their pet dog accompanying us for awhile before we went bck to the room to rest. he was saying we must go to the room to rest more bcos it was so beautiful~~ lol. excuses la. if i had known that they dont hv high tea sets, i'll def buy some snacks from 7-11!

came for dinner at 6pm... that's me really looking forward for the home cooked meal. hehe.

the food that we hv! wooooo~ it was GOOD!!! esp the pumpkin soup!! their pumpkin is sooooo sweet la!!! i tried to cook the almost-the-same soup bck in sg but just doesnt taste the same. haha. their veggies is also fresh & sweet! love these kinda country lifestyle once in a while~ away from the hectic city!

after that, we walked out to walk ard the shops & had a cuppa by the starbucks! hehe. the weather is like 10ish °C! perfect~~!!! sg is tooooooo hot la!!!

ended the day chilling in my comfy bedroom socks, watching tw variety, eating snacks in a natural aircon room! hehe. it was so cold that we just left a little gap from our balcony door open! hehe.

12th mar 13

went back to taipei 101 again! really hard to take a picture with 101!!!

went for din tai fung! reached there at abt 12pm.. and manage to get a seat! there was a long line after we finished! anyway, as we were still pretty full from our hotel breakfast, so we jus had some simple dishes.. which of cos includes the famous xiao long bao! it was gd but i think sg one is equally good. haha! maybe we shd try out the 1st branch ba!

after walking ard the area.. cab to wu fen pu 五分埔 for shopping! maybe i came with the wrong person, maybe it is the season, maybe i went to the wrong st or maybe i love bkk shopping too much that i bought just one romper here. shopping is not as fantastic as the first time i went! went there a couple yrs back during summer with my sister & i bought a whole lot! so i was pretty disappointed this time round!

after shopping ard, we walked bck to the hotel, picked up our luggage & took the train to my nxt hotel at taipei main station!

stayed in city inn branch 3 and it was awesome!!! very very value for money! the snacks and coffe/tea is free in room... packaging for the amenities is so cute & there's a pantry with popcorn dispenser, coffee dispenser, microwave & oven, fridge to use.... they also hv washing machine provided FOC!

there's diff themes for the fashion room and this is what i got! i super love the shower/toilet that is separated. the room is indeed small but it is cosy. having been to hotels in hong kong & japan, this is nothing! in fact, much better!! if im going back to taipei again, this will w/o doubt be my first choice again!

rest for awhile and we head to shilin night market! head straight to the new basement food street to eat first, before the crowd comes in. it was my first time to the new basement... and it was not that bad! much cleaner than before~ haha!

bought the 大大雞排 & 大腸包小腸 to eat. the chicken cutlet had some sauce to it.. slightly diff from the fried ones! anw, there are sooooo many branches of this chicken cutlet.. is this like the franchise? is the one outside the original & that it is the must eat?? im so confused! bcos i rem i had the one outside in the past & i thot it moved down.. til i went out & saw it again.. only then i realise i went to the "wrong" one...

we also ate a couple of diff things like the orh ah jian... soy beancurd with red bean! their soy beancurd is super nice!! so smooth!! ahhhh typing this makes me really hungry!!! walked ard the whole night market, basically eating & eating. haha. didnt buy anything. lol!

after that, headed bck to hotel. then i saw this mega poster at the station!! muhahahaha senzaki!!! everyone looked at me like a weirdo when im posing for this pic. hahaha!! i wonder will sg be bringing it in!! def will go and watch thou i've watched it! lol!

anyway, rest for awhile before we head out for a nearby night market - ningxia night market 寧夏夜市. there's tons of food but we were tooooo full to eat anything. so we bought a pack of my fav mango to eat. while walking back... we came across this super long q stall... being singaporean, we decided to queue for it. hahaha! anw, it was fried taro balls. ermmm it was good but i dunno how fantastic it was. it jus taste normal to me. lol lol!

and that pretty much sums up my day. i literally eat thru the whole of my taiwan trip. hahahahaha!!!

So as previous entry stated... i went to taiwan for my pre-shoot~~ and a holiday for us! hehe. it was my 3rd trip to taiwan so i'm not that excited... the bf was pretty excited thou! it was his first trip to taiwan! keke.

9th mar 2013

arrived at about 6am!! freaking early.. so we took the first bus to the nearest metro station to my hotel. initially wanted to cab to hotel to place our luggage but realise there's a locker.. so put our luggage inside & roam ard the street.. looking for breakfast!! was kinda looking for mcdee since it is prolly the only place that opens for breakfast at 7am. hahaha. this is at the 市政府站.

in the end, we settled by this place called n.y. bagels as it is just above the bus station and the only place that opens. ok starbucks also but this place seems to offer a much better (&expensive) breakfast options. the portion is huge & i really cant finish it. anw, i realise that this n.y. bagels is apparently quite a famous brunch place & they have a couple of outlets!

 after that, we went straight to the doraemon exhibition. went at abt 9ish (their opening time) & there's a crowd already!

this is the exhibition where they exhibits the 100 doraemon! it was sooooo crowded that i didn't really get a chance to see & take picture....

here's some more.....

they also have other exhibits on doraemon & friends! that bottom left is the last night where doraemon had to leave... awwww so poor thing!

and various picture taking spots! i super duper love the drawer (i didnt know that it was the drawer.. i just went to q for photo taking! haha!) & the 竹蜻蜓!

we were done at abt 11ish & they hv a even longer q outside!! glad tt we went early!! anw, walked to taipei 101 after... thinking of having din tai fung for lunch but there was a q too... so decided to eat at their food court... didnt had a gd sleep on the plane so i dont hv much appetite... heh.

after that, took the shuttle back to the metro station and headed to the hotel. as the room was not ready yet, so we went for my gown fitting first....

everything's done at abt 4ish... finally manage to check in to Hope City Sungshan 豪城松山. Very old hotel but still acceptable la (provided foc by the bridal studio). Near both the bridal studio and 饒河夜市. about 10min walk to Song Shan Train Station too. So it's not really that inconvenient. Anw, we literally KO bcos we were toooooo tired! Nap for about an hour (insisted on waking up so that we can sleep well at night!) and went out for dinner!

of cos, 饒河夜市 is the only option. hahaha. he had a few light snacks before we decided to go for teppanyaki. we (I) dont really wanna risk my vulnerable tummy eating street snacks one day before my shoot.. so decided to eat something that we know will be fully cooked. LOL.

after that, we went for the final gown fitting & went back to sleep!