The picture to the left is of a giant effigy, on top of a temple in Junan, Taiwan's oldest district. If I remember correctly, there are about 5 temples with such statues on them, all of them different, and all equally stunning. The only time these statues ever bothered me was waking up early in the morning, looking out the window and seeing these huge crazy statues staring and grinning at you. Other than that, it was kind of neat, as if you had these big brothers & sisters always watching over you with a pleased look.
I would go back for Junan for that.
And perhaps the excellent shoes, cheap delicious Chinese food, and the crazy auto-advertising which was pretty much just trucks, cars, and vans driving around with neon signs, lights and music playing all day. My first time going from Taipei to Junan, I almost died from all of the excitement and even though there were some annoying times where a van would drive around at 4AM, with truly bizarre music playing, they were also good fun and something I'll always remember whenever I think of Taiwan.
There were a lot of other fun times in Taiwan, like watching Belinda getting all scary on the chicken drumstick, bicycling through the busy streets on a crazy old bike where if you went slow, you would either not get anywhere or you would be hit by a car or scooter, getting cuddles from all the cute children at school, going to the night market, picking strawberries and having a waffle & strawberry feast, even if it made us sick lol. Hell, even going to Burger King was fun, where the regular size drinks were the size of double gulps at 7/11.I was in Junan for a month and going home after that short period of time, was weird. I felt out of sorts for the first few weeks back. I had some sort of strange culture shock, even though Christchurch was and had always been my home, that one month in Junan, really screwed me up.
Which is kind of scary now, considering I've been away from home now for nearly 3 years and in those 3 years, a lot of things have changed. Me, you and them.
So, home? How are you going to feel about me when I eventually get back and more importantly, how am I going to feel about you?
We'll see I guess.