I awoke with a cold. Visions of my previous Taiwan trip, which had been hampered by a bad cold were haunting me. “No”, I cried, ” this will not happen again!” Perhaps saying this outloud the moment I awoke was an indication that fever had already set in.
The Leofoo breakfast was identical to the day before, but this time, instead of a selection of Christmas music they instead played only a muzak version of “Joy To The World” – over and over again. It was a particularly long version – perhaps 10 minutes from start to finish, and when it finally would end, it started again. It may have been the fever or it may have been the muzak, but I could feel my sanity slowly began to slide into oblivion. That was the first day that I thought I might someday be able to drive in Taipei traffic.
Once again, the weather was great, so we walked 2 miles to Sogo Department store, hoping to find Japanese books in the Kinokuniya bookstore inside. Unfortunately, they didn’t open till 11:00 and it was only about 9:30. Already I was feeling run down.
Rather than plunge on, I needed a rest, and so we stopped into a small café across the street call the Sun Merry Café. Chu-Wan made some phone calls to her friends while I sat, relaxed, drank some tea and looked through tourist literature. The Sun Merry Café is an upscale place, with tasteful decour and a unique glass door on the men’s room, allowing the people on the pay phones to watch men urinating. Culture Shock rears its ugly head in the strangest places.
It was still too early for Sogo’s, so we headed on to the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Park. A beautiful park, and a solemn memorial for the founder of the Republic of China. An honor guard is always on duty when the memorial is open. The guard remain perfectly motionless for most of the time, but at (apparently) pre-determined times, both guards change their position, very slowly and in perfect unison.
Figuring we’d waited long enough, we headed back to Sogo’s, which was now open, and up to Kinokuniya, which was, for one day only, closed until 5:30PM. Inside the bookstore they appeared to be conducting some form of staff brainwashing or motivational exercises. By now, I was loosing ground fast and we went back to the hotel, where I went to sleep for the remainder of the day.