It's All a Big CARTay!: Osaka, Kobe, Taipei!

We've been packing a lot into our days in Japan so I'm just going to give a rundown of everything we've been doing instead of trying to remember each day.

Things we're seeing

This is Meriken Park in Kobe. Kobe might be my favorite city in all of Japan. This park is huge, on the water, has a lot of shopping malls and very pretty. We ate pretty good Indian food here and walked around!

We went to a Hanshin Tigers baseball game! Everyone in my family and in Japan seemed really nervous about us doing this? My grandfather has been a fan for practically forever and has never actually been to a game. Despite the HUGE crowds at the game everyone insisted that no one goes to see the Hanshin Tigers.

We had a great time. The woman next to us lent us balloons so we could participate in the 7th inning stretch activities and the end of game celebration. The couple on the other side of us explained to us who the players were and who was a closer and stuff. It was very nice of all of them. And the Tigers won! They beat the Giants, their biggest rivals! Wooooo!

We went to the Osaka Castle. It was hot as hell that day. Which explains Zack's sweatspot. But, when we went inside the castle, it was air conditioned! So much for keeping things traditional...

Right before we went to the Castle we went to Osaka Kaiyukan Aquarium. It was maybe the most crowded place I've ever been. In retrospect, we probably picked the worst day ever to go--it was the Sunday of a long weekend, so no duh there were a ton of people there! We saw some cool stuff, but kind of agreed that people never enjoy your pictures of aquariums. It never looks that cool in pictures.

We were going to go to the Umeda Sky building after the Osaka Castle since we were in Osaka that day, but it was way too freaking hot, so we went home. In the end if was the right decision because we were able to go back a few days later and see it.

So here's some crap. The Sky Building is this huge sky scraper and you're supposed to go up to see the "Floating Garden" as the sign above indicates. BUT when you get there this is all you see:

THERE ARE NO FLOWERS OR NATURE IN THE FLOATING GARDEN. Granted, I did think that we got a particularly bad day because it was raining pretty steadily and was super gray out. But for real. This is not a garden. AND they don't let you carry umbrellas up at the top because they're afraid it will blow away. So you just have to walk around in the rain if it's raining. What crap.

This is in Taiwan. Zack is afraid I won't differentiate enough between Taiwan and Japan. This is the Chiang Kai-Sheck Memorial. Chiang Kai-Sheck is a former Taiwanese president. His memorial included a lot of anti-Japanese propaganda inside. That was kind of cool to look at, but I don't really know enough about Taiwanese or Japanese history to get the significance of their words and descriptions.

It's very pretty, but we also went there in the rain, so I don't think we got the optimal experience. I was also very nervous I was going to slip and re-shatter a kneecap. Also I was a little crabby because we woke up at 4:45am, took a train, a bus, a plane, and another bus before we actually got to Taiwan.

This is the inside of that memorial. Very beautiful!

This is what you see if you stand of the steps of the memorial and look out. Yes, I did use a filter.

This is the 228 Peace Park. On 2/28/1947 there was a huge antigovernment uprising that resulted in many deaths, a lot of destruction and the beginning of 50 years of martial law. Taiwan has a very interesting history and we saw a lot of propaganda and there is certainly a lot of contentious point in history. I don't pretend to know much about it, but if you need someone to go more in depth, tweet at @Zackymatthews.

This is the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial. He was Taiwan's first president and is like the father of the nation. We spent extra time in his memorial because he was a cool guy, but also because it was pouring outside and big dumb Bert didn't bring his umbrella.

Also there was a mini sculpture exhibit inside and a bunch of dancers outside. So we chilled there.

After it stopped raining we met Zack's friend Gino at a night market! Taiwan is famous for night markets. It's like if a farmers market, flea market, and a carnival all met up and joined forces every night. Lots of food, games, and trinkets for sale everywhere.

This is a wind damper at the 101. I didn't know what one was until I went to the 101. I still don't super get what it does, other than help buildings not collapse during earthquakes, but you should know, this is a huge wind damper. So I've been told.

This is the 101 from afar. We went up to the top if it. This is the world's second tallest building, but still has the world's fastest elevators! It was a beautiful view from up there. It was a little crowded and kind of expensive, but I'd say worth it! Also you get to walk through a bonus coral museum no one tells you about until you there.

This is the ticket for the metro! It's a plastic coin! Weird.

This is the National Palace Museum! It's HUGE and has a ton of artifacts, that some people would argue are stolen from China. We saw a lot of cool pottery, weapons, jade, and historical documents. We did not look at the Jade that is shaped like a cabbage though. Because there was like an hour long line to do that. We were not feeling it.

This is Chiang Kai-Sheck's presidential residence.

This is also the presidential residence. It was also HUGE and very elaborate. Definitely did not feel like it belonged to a single person, even if that person was the president.

Zack's other friend, Laurent, paid for us to get 45 minute massages. We were kind of nervous since that's kind of a long time to have a stranger you can't really talk to touch you. My massage was kind of rough and was definitely sore the next day. I do think my feet hurt less though. For reference, in the past week we've walked 59.5 miles. So I guess we earned a massage.

We went to Tamsui, which is at the end of the metro line in Taipei. It was beautiful but so freaking hot. There was a British fort there. That was surprising.

After going to Tamsui, we went to the a Beitou Hot Springs. Remember how I said it was hot? It was even hotter at the hot spring.

People we're meeting

This and the picture below it are of my cousin Karin. She's 12, and was born in America. She's been going to "English camp" with us. She's pretty shy, but I definitely think she's understanding more and more English. She's very sweet and is very excited to go to Universal Studios Japan with us.

So I didn't actually meet this guy--I just made him take a picture with me because he's wearing a Princeton football shirt and I used to work with a guy that played football at Princeton. He was uncomfortable.

This is Laurent. He used to work with Zack's organization in DC. Now he lives in Taiwan again. He was very nice to us. He bought our tickets to the National Palace Museum, our lunch, our massages, and our dinner! He got us very drunk and took us to places we wouldn't have seen otherwise!

This is Gino. He's hilarious. He speaks amazingly good English for someone who has never been to the US. He's sort of YouTube star in Taiwan and apparently had a small role in a movie! There was a billboard for his movie in our metro station so we took a picture of him with his billboard self! He also took us around, helped us order food and made sure we had a good time.

We're also obviously seeing my grandparents, aunt and uncle a lot. They aren't so much into pictures though. They never want to take selfies. Rude.

Things we're eating

Most of this does not need an explanation. It's all delicious.

There was $5 beer at the tigers game! Too good! Also, it said you weren't allowed to bring cans or bottles into the stadium. Which we took to mean, you can't bring beer. NOPE. There was a line where they took your bottles or cans of beer and poured it into paper cups and you're allowed to have that! Can you imagine how insane that would be in the US?

My grandmother was super worried that we wouldn't have enough to eat so she packed us hard boiled eggs. As we were leaving she told us "It's hot, so be careful!" "There are crazy people so be careful!" "You're cute, so be careful!" And then "Sometimes eggs make you cough! So be careful!" What? So I ran that by my mom. And she was like "yeah! eggs do make you cough! You should be careful!" Is that a thing?

We didn't actually eat this. But it's very realistic penis ice cream in Taiwan. Why.

This is the dinner Laurent got us. It was SO good.

We both super liked octopus mouth. I guess I'm more surprised octopus mouth is a thing you can eat that I am that I like it? How do you even get the mouth like separated?