Mom in Taiwan! | 媽媽來到台灣！

November 19, 2022

I spent the last week touring Taipei with mom! As soon as it looked like the Taiwan borders would open, she booked a plane ticket and started counting down the days. Recently, I’ve been missing a lot of people from home, so it was refreshing to spend time with one of the people who knows me best! We packed a lot into our time together and had a week of amazing weather…here’s what we were up to!

I met mom at the airport and ended up walking into the arrival hall just as she was leaving from the baggage claim! Perfect timing! After taking the MRT back into Taipei, she settled into her Airbnb after being greeted by our lovely host. At this point, it was getting kind of late, but we were hungry. Our host recommended a 24 hour breakfast shop 7 minutes from the Airbnb. The shop was very traditional and served all the famous breakfast foods and classic Taiwanese favorites. We enjoyed some Xiaolongbao along with some regular boiled dumplings and a vegetable bing. The aunties at the restaurant also gave us a free cup of soymilk as a welcome to Taiwan gift for mom! As someone who isn’t a massive soy milk fan, I still really enjoyed it.

At the airport

First meal- Xiaolongbao

Happy reunion!

I should pause before diving into the week to mention two things: first, Mom was an absolute champ with the jet lag. When first coming to Taiwan, you usually wake up in the wee hours of the morning, can’t fall back asleep, and crash at about 3 in the afternoon. She did amazing! Second, this week posed a lot of linguistic challenges for me, and I felt very competent in meeting them and communicating our needs. When I needed to communicate for both of us, it wasn’t always enough to smile and nod. I found myself being more intentional about understanding what was being said so that I could translate for mom. These experiences were very exciting for me, because I could see tangible improvement in my Chinese!

On Monday, we attended a tour of the National Concert Hall and watched the changing of the guard at Chiang Kai-Shek memorial hall at the Liberal Democracy Square. I’ve been to the square a few times before, but every time I go, I am once again struck by the massive scale. The concert hall, opera house, and memorial hall are absolutely massive…it’s quite breathtaking. I found some really great postcards and a Beethoven boba carrier that I ended up buying (I couldn’t resist, it was perfect!). After walking around the plaza, we enjoyed (more) xiaolongbao for lunch before heading back for a short afternoon rest.

In the national concert hall

Liberal Democracy Square (CKS memorial hall)

Xiaolongbao for lunch!

In the evening, we went to Haidilao hotpot. This restaurant is so popular that even on a Monday night, we had a two hour wait time. Mom found a place called Indulge Experimental Bistro in her guidebook, and we went there to enjoy drinks while we waited. The cocktails were beautiful, tasty, and served in a lovely space. We also had a really great bartender named Stanly who helped us pick our drinks. Soon enough, we went back to Haidilao and enjoyed our lovely hotpot dinner.

Out for drinks at Indulge Experimental Bistro

Special dessert at Haidilao

Hotpot spread

On Tuesday, we had a lovely brunch at Wendy’s apartment. It was so fun to introduce mom to my “Taiwan mom”. We enjoyed an amazing spread of danbing and fruit. We also shared some gifts with Wendy, the highlight of which were the pop tarts! Wendy’s favorite/sentimental food from her childhood in the United States is pop tarts. She still has a package from the last time she was in the US before the pandemic. It was great to help her restock! In the afternoon, we visited the Confucius temple and the Bao’an temple, both places that Hannah and I went during our self-health management period. At this point, I’ve spent enough time in Taiwan/China that temples are sort of old news. It was fun to go there with mom who had never seen one of these temples and appreciate it with fresh eyes. For dinner, we did my go-to noodle place near my dorm and topped off the meal with some ice cream before I attended my evening class.

Mom with Taipei 101

Wendy with her poptart stash

Brunch spread

On Wednesday, we met up with my friend Lauren and her mom who was also in town and took a guided tour of Dihua old street with our guide, Helen. She was the guide who provided the Fullbright cultural tour I attended back in September. We started from a different part of the street that I hadn’t seen before and learned a lot about the history of the area. I also learned a lot about Taoism and how it has been practiced historically as well as today. We ended our tour with a lovely lunch and boba!

Lunch after the tour

At the beginning of Dihua Old Street

A 7-11 in one of the restored traditional shophouse buildings

After parting ways with Lauren and her mom, we took the gondola to Maokong and enjoyed tea overlooking a tea field on the mountainside. We caught part of the sunset while sipping tea and saw the last bits of it as we went down the gondola. Maokong was one of the places that I really wanted to take mom to, and the weather was absolutely perfect that day. After an early evening rest, we went to the Gongguan night market near NTU. This is a very small night market, and not representative of all night markets in Taiwan. However, it’s a good way to ease into night market culture because of its small scale…everything is just a little more chill. My first night market experience was so overwhelming that I walked around and then didn’t buy anything, so I figured we’d ease into it. We enjoyed fresh fruit, scallion pancakes, and sweet potato balls.

At the gondola station

Overlooking a tea field where we enjoyed some tea

Sweet potato balls at gongguan night market

On Thursday, I skipped my morning classes and we went (with Lauren’s mom and our guide Helen) to the National Palace Museum. This was the first place we’d been to that I hadn’t seen yet, and it was fascinating. I’m not a huge museum person, but I ended up really enjoying the tour that Helen provided. The museum holds thousands of Chinese artifacts that Chiang Kai-Shek brought over to Taiwan as the communist party was taking over China. It was designed and built as a storage space and hasn’t been renovated since. As a result, the layout doesn’t feel very museum-ey and it’s not a very intuitive space, making Helen’s guidance all the more useful. The most famous artifacts are the jadeite cabbage and the meat-shaped stone. Both of these food items were carved into jade and given as gifts during the Qing dynasty. Considering how difficult it is to carve jade, these food items are a testament to the importance of food in Chinese culture. Outside of the museum, there is a beautiful garden with small trails and ponds. It was a lovely end to the time at the museum. In the afternoon, we went and found pineapple cakes at Sunny Hills—my favorite, before having dinner at my favorite cafe near my dorm.

Jadite cabbage

"Meat-shaped stone"

Seals stammped onto a famous work of calligraphy

Outside the National Palace Museum

Fish in the gardens near the museum

Also in the gardens- beautiful scenery

At SunnyHills for pineapple cakes

Mom with YouBike

On Friday I had a morning class, but we were very busy in the afternoon. We ended up going to Dintaifung, Taiwan’s most famous chain restaurant. They’re most famous for their Xiaolongbao. We also enjoyed their chocolate Xiaolongbao for dessert which was amazing! Imagine a chocolate lava cake inside of a dumpling. We met up with Hannah and biked along the river to the Bitan bridge. Last time I went, I didn’t get to explore the other side of the river, so we took some time and went across. We found the Taiping temple, easily the most impressive temple I’ve ever seen. It was four stories tall and incredibly intricate…it will be hard to top this one. In the evening, we went to the Shilin night market and tried all kinds of different things. The highlight for me was the shaved snow ice (recommended by Wendy) and mom really enjoyed a Korean cheese dog on a stick.

Outside Dintaifung

Chocolate Xiaolongbao

With the Dintaifung sign

Biking along the river path

Scenery from Bitan bridge

Bitan suspension bridge

Front of Taiping temple

Taiping temple from above

Intricacies of Taiping temple

Shilin night market sign

Roasted king oyster mushrooms

Strawberry snow ice

On Saturday, we visited the Lin family garden—it was beautiful. It’s hard to describe, but feels a little like a small-scale version of the Japanese garden in Chicago. After walking around the gardens and getting bitten by mosquitoes, we went to Ximen which is sort of like the Times Square of Taipei. There, we enjoyed some baked goods and boba, and walked around for a while to kill some time before heading over to Wendy’s for afternoon tea. In the evening, we enjoyed Xiaolongbao with Wendy, Allen, and Hannah in the night market.

At the Lin garden

Lotus flower

Moon viewing platform in the garden

Beautifully painted series of doors

After dinner tea with Wendy and Allen

Taipei 101 at night

Before we knew it, Sunday had arrived! We started the morning by visiting the weekend flower market with Hannah, as well as the jade and art markets nearby. The first time I went to the flower market, I knew mom would have a field day, and I was right! After exploring the flower market, we met up with Wendy and Allen for beef noodle soup at one of Taipei’s most famous shops: Yong-Kang Beef Noodle. It certainly lived up to the hype…the soup was incredible. We found a drink shop nearby and enjoyed some refreshing lime fruit tea before saying goodbye to Wendy and Allen and heading back to the Airbnb for a small rest. I had to finish an assignment, but after doing that, we went out for a light dinner/dessert at a cafe Wendy recommended. They had these amazing mochi waffles…I’ll have to go back and try more flavors! After the cafe, we met up with Hannah and went out to Blue Note Jazz, a very famous jazz club in Taipei that has been around for a very long time. We stayed for the first set, but ended up going back to get to bed before mom’s early flight the next morning.

Yongkang Beef Noodle shop

Beef noodle soup- a Taiwan signature

Mochi filled waffles with chocolate and blueberry

At the cafe where we got the waffles

Blue Note Jazz

Live music!

After a quick breakfast, I went with mom to the airport to say goodbye. Somehow this one was harder than when I left for Taiwan, probably because the excitement of coming to a new country has worn off. Although it was hard to say goodbye, I am so glad for the time we got to spend together exploring Taipei. It is so grounding to have someone from home understand my day-to-day life in Taipei—I think this will be a comfort when I come back and am reacclimating to the United States.

While mom was here, we ate lots of tasty food—all my favorites! Feel free to check out the food page for a few updates. As always, I’d love to hear from you!