I'll Be Pork

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We arrived at Lugong in the afternoon and the highest heat of the day. We'd taken a bus from the train station so we'd still been pretty sheltered from the humidity by ubiquitous air-conditioning. But as we left the bus and headed in the wrong direction from our hotel, we began to feel the heat. After asking several well meaning people we ended up in an alleyway\temple that cut through the center of the block and spat is out next to a giant brick mansion that had somehow waddled over from Victorian England. We were still lost. Gabe left us under a shady tree outside of the mansion's cast iron gates to duck back into the temple for more directions. Soon he returned, led by a man who couldn't tell us where our hotel was but offered to drive us there. We piled into his car and were once again in a comfortable freezer box, away from the heat. He drove us essentially around the corner, made sure we got into the hotel alright, and then cheerfully waved and drove away, never to be seen again. Such is the reception of foreigners to Taiwan.

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The hotel was wonderful. The woman running it spoke very good English, having lived (or despite having lived, eh?) in Toronto for years. It was clean and bright, bathed in light thanks to huge french windows surrounding the dining room. She insisted we sit down and enjoy some lemonade to beat back the heat and we happily obliged. The rooms were charmingly decorated, with some of the odd touches you might expect in Taiwan; Teddy bears on nightstands, random outlets positioned just out of reach high up on the wall. These quirkinesses were much appreciated though, as was the sharp new paint-job and spotless bathrooms. Our hostess outlined several walks we could do, though she encouraged us to relax until the heat died back a little. Wanting to use our time we declined her advice and, well hydrated, pushed back into the heat.

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Lugong is a great little town. Once a major port, the river has silted up and has left the city rather high and dry. As often happens in these places, commerce moved elsewhere, preserving much of the old architecture since there was less commercial pressure to build density. What is left is sort of rare in Taiwan, well preserved brick houses and stores from a hundred years ago, winding brick lanes and crumbly, narrow alleys. We visited most of the historic temples and explored alleys with creative names like, "Alley of Nine Turns" though it had many more than that.

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We were walking by a tattoo parlor, filled with men in undershirts who stared out at us. One of them waved tentatively and when I waved back, the rest of them waved wildly and in unison. We ate Taiwan's famous shaved ice desert, which consists of burying a great deal of tapioca blobs beneath piles of thinly shard ice, then drenching that pile in a brown sugar syrup. It was delicious and very refreshing. When dinnertime came around we opted out of eating at any of the many street stalls, they all seemed a bit sketchy, and instead located the only reputable looking sit down restaurant we could, a steak-house bearing a cannibalistic cow logo of Bessy holding a steak-knife and licking her lips. The wait-staff was dumbstruck that we wanted to order Chinese food, and I think they tried to trick us into ordering steak by making the outrageous claim that they had no more rice. No more rice! That's like an Italian joint running out of pasta. We paid them back by assaulting their American style salad bar.

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After dinner we wandered the dimly lit brick lanes of Lugong's "reservation district", feeling slightly transported back in time. The feeling would have been complete if the current residences of the houses hadn't all been watching TV. We made our way back to the hotel, drank a beer on the roof and finally went to sleep, in blissfully cool air-conditioned comfort.