It is only my first day and i have encountered many "challenges" along the way.
I gave myself about an hour and a half to clear immigration and reach the railway station by 1430.
BUT
1. The plane landed 2mins late.
2. Waiting, walking and toilet break took 20mins.
3. Unexpected long queue at the immigration that took almost 30mins
4. Queue at the telecom shop and all the application and registration
5. Could not find the bus to Taoyuan HSR (high speed rail)
I approach the tourist information counter, their instructions are much clearer than the people asked along the way. There is this area where all the bus tickets are sold, go to counter 6 under U bus, for NT 30 dollars, they will send you to the HSR station which should take about 5-10mins to reach.
From HSR, i bought a ticket at NT 165 for Taoyuan to Taipei (20mins), waited 30mins for it.
When i reach Taipei station, it was already 1545, I MISSED MY TRAIN BIG TIME!!!I lugged my 21.5KG luggage to the counter, and with the pleading look, i told the counter guy i missed my 1430 train to Hualien (2 hours trip), and asked if they can do an exchange for me. They could not do an exchange but he offered a standing seat ticket on the next train at 1552 (in exchange for my missed train) which take a longer time of 3 hours to Hualien.
(you sure you wanna stand 3 hours? I was thinking)
I asked to pay again for the 2hours seat at 1640, and even that train is full! Left with no choice, i took the 1552 train, and really run like mad with a big luggage to catch the train in 7mins, no time to go toilet, to buy food and water at all. I was praying hard that the train would not be full. I went to the first cabin and there were quite a few empty seats. The view along the way made the train duration shorter. There were beautiful seas and lakes along the way. I am glad, my twin asked me to bring biscuits, and those were my dinner last night. Prayers were answered when i was eating my feng li shu and was feeling really thirsty at that time, a lady came in just at the right moment to sell snacks and water. And for that 3 hours, i was seated, i did not get to stand at all! Praise God!
I took a Xiao Huang ( means their cab) and head to Youzi Jia. The BnB is a family based bed and breakfast. I am there as a 小帮手 （little helper) and would be staying with a couple, Xiao Luo, YouZi, their two little gals Qingqing and Nana, and a dog, SaKinNya ( Hock Chew for hanger 衣架) as it has a imprint of a hanger on its back. The family is very friendly, the dog is very obedient and Qingqing is very cute and i thought everything would be alright since i felt my job scope would be easy at that time. Well, i was shown to my room, and got a shock. I was supposed to share room with the 管家 Fish. The room is a second floor attic room, so Fish got a bigger side and i got a smaller side, with a curtain to pull in between us for some privacy. And this smaller side, is slightly smaller than half the size of my room! Hanger usually sleep with Fish, so in other words i have them as my room mate. At that time, i felt abit...er...but after that i told myself, hey i am here to work and travel at the same time, i am not paying my accommodation so bear with it! That night, i had a tough night :(
Day 2:
I started Day 2 at 630am. Managing a BnB is not an easy task. I see the number of fruits prepared, i nearly wanted to faint. I only eat a kind of fruit in SG and that is apple or maybe pears. This morning, we prepared 7 kinds of fruits for the guests, - guava, 莲霧，apple, orange, grapes, starfruit, tomato, Kiwi and cucumber. All these were supposed to be nicely placed on lettuce. There was alot of preparation and it was just observation time with Fish today.
I had breakfast with them and had the privilege to try this dessert made by XiaoLuo, it was made of milk and it tasted really nice with the 洛神花果酱 (Roselle according to Google Translate)
And after all the breakfast preparation, i manage to snap some photos of the min su, named Youzi Jia.
After that, we started clearing the rooms, there were only two rooms to be cleared. But i only observe. I do not know why, these two rooms took up few hours. We only had a short lunch. XiaoLuo is a good cook manz, he is very fast and he cooked up a bowl of noodle soup for all of us. By the time, we finished everything, it was already 4pm plus. I quickly changed and walked to meet Mskmouse at her min su. We started talking and chatting to each other on our experience or should i say complaining? I was complaining about my room, and the super packed jobscope.
I went back immediately for dinner. I met this Singaporean Uncle and Auntie who are also staying there, and they were very very nice. Knowing that i am also from Singapore, they asked me to go with them to the Zi Qiang night market. I was treated like a daughter and actually ate pizza for dinner with them. Not only that, it was nice chatting with the uncle and auntie such that i told them i would love to have kopi session with them when i am back in SG! Things like that make me feel better, so what is a small room...
To be continued...
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