Reflections on Taiwan, Memento Style (Part 1-2)

1 - R&R - Part 2
So we commenced our R & R pretty soon, after some close shaves with the administration pple at Heng Chuan camp over missing fire extinguishers, missing metal trays, and dirty tentages (i mean.. what the!?!? who would steal metal trays!?!.. and succeed for that matter!?!)

My bus was like the VIP bus with LTCs and CPTs and well, the entertaining warrant officers.. and well, thanks to those AIs and WOs, Luke and I who came up the bus later were forced to the front, separated from the rest of the gang of Da Hua, Kaiwei, Terence, Thye Heng, Jack, Melvin, Royston, Chia Wei, Yazid, Boon Peng and Linus.. tsk tsk.. But aniwez no major harm done, cos most of us were still pretty sleep deprived and just dozed off whilst travelling on the bus.. well, until Resident Evil 2 came on screen (Milla Jorovich is KEWL!.. and I want to learn how to throw daggers!) Sadly, our tour guide was a guy, whose valiant attempts to incite excitement on us, well.. fell on deaf ears.. (Bloody Jeremy's bus got a cute female tour guide named Vivian...sigh.. how unfair)

National Aquarium-thingy
Nothing much here, just a short visit to this aquarium-ish thingy which showcases many beautiful fishes.. I was literally mesmerized at the sight of the throusands and thousands of fishes, the astounding sizes of many of them, the vibrant hues of the schools of fishes at the main gallery, with a whole glass wall for pple to view the fishies.. Kewl.. I could stay there a whole day and just glance at the fishes, sharks and so on.. The next astounding sight was when we went outside and saw the endless sparkling blue sea and the beautiful coast surrounding it spread out in front of our eyes... it reminded me of Australia.. well maybe because I first saw such scenes in Broome, Australia... maybe it's just cos we Singaporeans are too deprived in such natural majestic scenes... =( Another thing we saw was the Baby White Whales "performance", which I felt was well.. unnatural, contrived.. and well, sad.. they made the whales brush teeth, jump up, swim around like some circus acts... it's just sad... i wanted to see them in their natural glory, jumping around, looping around (maybe THAT'S unnatural too).. but well... it was disappointing..

JanFuSan Theme Park was our next stop (well, after lunch.. pretty sucky in terms of chinese cuisine.. you'll understand later) where the feckless and daring me went straight to the most terrifying roller coaster, the G5 and sat in the first row.. GULP.. The first few terseful moments whilst the roller coaster was climbing up the tracks to the top was only eclipsed by the few seconds of dreadful wait whilst we were suspended mid air, with my feet literally dangling forward and my eyes looking downward at the enormous drop. It was literally a vertical drop and when we fell... wooohooo.. it was like a neverending free fall feeling, face-down..(even turbo drop didn't feel so scary..) the feeling of leaving your stomach quite far above was well... shiok! and well, the ride was too short in the end... but luckily no side effects.. (Melvin and Yi Kiat din dare to try.. Melvin was more into the spirly-whirlies, spinning stuff which he and Boon Peng later ventured off to play by themselves when I said no more).. Next ride we took was some Floorless Rollercoaster which was probably the 2nd most fun ride outta the Taiwan trip. Aniwez, it was the first time i took such a "complex" roller coaster, with like corkscrew twirls and all the wierd variations lah.. normally my mom would just have banned me from going, citing my embarrasing Tokyo Disneyland Space Mountain dizzy experience.. (THAT was unfair cos it was due to my head being too small and not fitting into the head cushion supports nicely). Rest of the rides was nothing much lah, we all soon got pretty bored and ventured back uphill to well.. see Yi Kiat, Royston and Chia Wei shoot hoops at the basketball game machine.. (another Taiwan fascination) whilst Terence, Da Hua, Kaiwei and Kevin struggled with the bean bag game, courtesy of rich kid Kevin.

Our never-ending bus journey took us finally into GaoHsiung city late at around 7 -8pm.. where we checked in at Toong Mao Hotel. (apparently not as good as Kingdom cos Wing Comm wanted it nearer to the Liu-He-Er Street Night Market.. grr) Pretty decent still, Terence and I shared one room lah.. and it was 2 QUEEN SIZED BEDS!!! Good for all those late nite bridge and "dai-di" sessions!! But well, we went straight to the night market at Liu-He-Er Street and met up with our pals from Hotel 2. But well, this night market was pretty.. disappointing... (cos I soon realised it was yet again a tourist market) it consisting mainly of foodstalls selling similar stuff like Xiang Ji Pa and so on, as well as new additions like Ba Bao something that Yi Kiat and gang went to taste... There were also many game stalls (Chiyu won 4 stuff toys!!! and gave one to J Bay!! grrr.. I wanted a Piyo Chan!) and archade game stalls.. oh well.. There were were some cl0thing apparel stores selling imitation stuff like Hugo Boos, (gosh.. WHAT a name change) Abcdis (from adidas) and so on, as well as other more interesting shops selling trinklets, satchets of dried flowers (which Melvin mistook for as food=)), miniature puppies (WSM saw a 8888NT Shar-pei that piqued his interest), watches(Boon Peng kept haggling with the shopkeeper for a blue swatch watch look-a-like) and shades...

In the end, I bought like a pair of shades (called Baalism..wierd), and like one peanut Dou-Hua and well... that was about it.. went back to the Hotel to play bridge.. which I LOST terribly and was like the plague.. making everyone who partnered me lose... sigh... OH WELL.. slept at around 0200hrs i guess..

The next day awaits...
FrAnk