From the moment we landed in Taiwan it was clear that this place was going to be very different from anything we had come across so far in this globetrotting journey.

First, the weather, which although at times pleasantly sunny, is decidedly wintry, with temperatures in the teens, strong gusty winds, and quite a bit of precipitation, often just inconsequential drizzles, but sometimes real downpours. This didn't come as much of a surprise, as we had checked Taiwan's climate beforehand and knew that while December is somewhat rainy, it is in fact the driest month of the year here, for Taiwan has no truly dry season. However, it will mean that we are unlikely to visit any of the offshore islands along the Eastern or Western coast of Taiwan, as the sea is too rough for crossing during the winter.

Second, the transport system --- metro, buses, trains, taxis --- which is superb, in terms of speed, convenience, and price, making it very easy to get from place to place on one's own, once one has learned a few basics (e.g. get an EasyCard electronic wallet). No more tuk-tuk drivers and tour agencies to contend with.

Third, the prices, which are a lot higher than we had grown accustomed to in the past few months as we travelled through much poorer countries. Especially expensive is the lodging, which can easily approach and surpass the $100 a night mark, so much so that in Taipei we resorted (for the first time) to using Airbnb, securing a cramped room with a window opening onto a narrow gloomy space between two buildings for about $40 a night. We had better forget about gigantic hotel rooms with gorgeous sea views for a while.

And fourth, the extreme friendliness of the Taiwanese everywhere. It's as if the outgoing stereotype of the mainland Chinese, which is often seen as pushy and rude, had been reversed here, keeping the blunt, brusque and uncompromising nature, but harnessing it for the sake of being helpful and generous, at times uncomfortably so.

But where it felt the most different --- indeed, where we felt to have plunged into quite deep waters --- was the language barrier, for very few people here seem to know even the most basic phrases in English, and those that do (mostly teenagers and twenty-somethings) are almost never the ones we need to communicate with (e.g. bus and taxi drivers, restaurant waiters, guesthouse owners). It is quite amazing to see how little of the Latin alphabet is seen anywhere in this highly technological country (or any other language except Chinese, for that matter), outside of museum, metro stations, and some touristy night market stalls; even high-end restaurants often do not have English menus (nor pictorial representation of many of their dishes) and even convenience stores (of which there are plenty, all very efficient and sophisticated) have detailed labels of everything only in Chinese. Quite amazing, that is, until one remembers that about 60% of the tourists to Taiwan are mainland Chinese (including Hong Kong and Macau), and an additional 30% come from just three countries that are generally more comfortable with Chinese script: Japan, Korea and Singapore. Still, deep waters or not, we managed reasonably well with the help of hand gestures, guesswork, and the occasional translation app.

And so, revelling in the new and different, we availed ourselves to some magnificent urban sights in and around Taipei, including the National Palace Museum (the Chinese imperial art collection spirited by the Chinese Nationalists to Taiwan when they fled Mao's Communists), the Shilin Night Market (which puts all night markets we have seen in South East Asia to shame), the Maokong Gondola (a 4km-long cable car (with more-or-less-private glass-floor cabins), ascending 275 metres over nearly untouched forests to the village of Maokong, famous for its teahouses), Shenkeng (a suburb specialising in tofu), the 2-28 Peace Park (a pleasant city park that happened to be a couple of hundred metres from our room) and more.

And we greatly enjoyed the Taiwanese cuisine (that tiny portion of it that we as vegan and vegetarian can eat), which seems to be almost universally delicious and fresh, and astoundingly varied and inventive.

Accommodations:
- Sunny's Airbnb room at 25 Hengyang Road, Zhongzheng District, Taipei (5 nights; a bit claustrophobic, but we got used to it)

Photo captions: (a-jj) National Palace Museum; (kk-rr) Shilin Night Market; (ss-yy) views from the Maokong Gondola; (zz) a statue near the Maokong Gondola base station; (aaa-jjj) Shenkeng Old Street; (kkk-ppp) around the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall; (qqq-ttt) 2-28 Peace Park

Note: We forgot to take our camera to the National Palace Museum and ended up using our cellphone instead, which accounts for some photos appearing a bit cropped