One of the best ways to understand a foreign culture better is to visit their local shops: to know what they are famous for, what they are selling and how they are doing it.

And then you find out how they try to make foreigners understand them.

The very first step would be translating words from Chinese to English, in an effort to make the city more global-friendly.

Being bilingual helps because you can tell whether the translation really works. Haha.

Sometimes Samuel and I wondered, ‘Did they sometimes come up with an English name to ‘translate’ it into Chinese, or the other way round?’

After all, it’s safer to be correct in English and then sound ‘foreign’ in Chinese.

The ‘Rich’ below doesn’t mean ‘rich’ in its Chinese ‘translation’. The Chinese words that read ‘Li Qi’ mean, well, ‘Li Qi’!!

Neither does ‘Chick’ mean ‘Qi Ge’!

It’s usually wiser to have just one English word for your shop name because nothing can go wrong, unless you make a spelling mistake. When you have more than one word for your shop name, ahhh that’s risk-taking!

Without examining the words closely, the first word kind of resembles ‘bullshit’:

This doesn’t really make sense right?

After googling a bit I found out that those English words are actually different clothing brand names. The Chinese name says ‘Hundreds of bizarre’.

Qi Shi Mei Shoes.

As of today, no one is interested to ‘come’ and ‘buy’ their ‘world tea shop’ yet:

Hmm how do you pronounce this?

Emperor Hotel. In short, eh!!!!

There’s this stall that we saw in Jiu Fen that sells sausages. It’s called the ‘Invincible Sausages’.

What’s so unique about it is the way the stall owner carries her own brand!

Cute huh! No extra charges for photo-taking!

There’s even a huge sunflower hat hanging on her back.

I wonder how they came up with the brand name ‘Lobster With Big Eyes’

Did they hold a meeting and go like,

“Smiling Lobster?”

“Nah, too plain.”

“How about Smiling Lobster With Big Eyes And Glasses.”

“I like the Big Eyes part! Sounds good!”

“Let’s call it Lobster With Big Eyes then!”

…

We saw a Mario who finally shaved himself!

This looks slightly disturbing…

Sleeping bottle!

Oh! By the way, if you know typefaces that were used for Chinese Horror movie titles, you’d have noticed that they usually like to use those that look like they are written with blood. The broken and fluid-looking type.

Something like this:

Looking at titles like this makes you want to adopt a deep and eerie sounding voice to read it out isn’t it? 美容尸~~~…

Guess what we saw in Taiwan.

A SCARY BEAUTY SALON~:

A SCARY GRANDMA’S SHOP:

Hong recommends… ~~ GRANDMA’S SHOP ~~…….

Did they actually think that using this typeface makes the shop look more authentic and traditional? Turns out that all these made us think of horror movies instead. Haha!

Will you dare to go in?

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City of Men

City of Men isn’t better than City of God, but it’s not bad! Was hoping for a sad ending though, more realistic that way.

7 / 10

No man needs a vacation so much as the man who has just had one. So true huh?!

Just came back from Taiwan 2 weeks ago.

Yes, theoretically speaking the ‘just’ doesn’t really apply since it’s been 2 weeks but the memories are so fresh it feels like yesterday!

This is the hotel my friends and I checked in shortly after we touched down at Tao Yuan airport. When we booked this hotel online we had no idea this is actually quite a sleazy place! It’s kinda located near their night-life/red-light district areas.

This is how it looks at night.

For the price we’ve paid, this place exceeded my expectations in terms of its interior decorating and furnishing for its rooms. So cosy and makes you wanna lie in the bed even when you are looking at the photo!!

Oh, and they provide very good service too.

The last room you see below is actually shared by me and my friend, Samuel. Sigh two guys sleeping in the most romantic and kinky room. (We drew lots beforehand, and had no idea that all our rooms actually looked different until we opened the doors..)

Even our bathroom wall has a rose illustration.

Every room is provided with a ‘Cotton Bad’. And in Chinese it says ‘棉花棒’, which literally says ‘Cotton Good’. So who’s lying?!

…

One of the few things that we’ve all enjoyed at Taipei was laughing at looking at the signs, signboards and advertisements everywhere. Their visual information spamming is so extreme, their mayor plans to tax advertising billboards to turn the city into a more beautiful and green place. I think blatant billboard advertising is quite the norm in most urban cities everywhere except Singapore, isn’t that so?

I don’t think one entry alone is able to sum up all those interesting experiences we had during the trip. So today I’m just going to showcase some of the more interesting signs we came across!

Unlike Singapore’s MRT stations where toilets are located far far outside the baffle gate, as if trying to make life difficult for those who are urgently in need to release, Taipei’s MRT stations have toilets built-in near their boarding platforms. And that’s good because you don’t have to exit the station just to use the toilet.

The baby changing facility and disabled toilet sign (shown below) kind of illustrates the way modern society is evolving into: House-husband takes care of the child (see left). Mum goes shopping with daughter (see middle). Grandparents sent to stay at old folk’s home (see right).

There’s also a warning sign that reminds you not to lean against the escalator in this manner! Very awkward looking pose.. Hmm.

Drinking fountains that spray water in the opposite direction from the drinker.

You can have the priority seat only if you have your feet amputated, or wear white boots.

Very nice graphic with some personality injected!

No parking sign..

…fail.

Do not eat American bulls that look demonic.

Birds in Taiwan understand English, and will follow rules by not entering!

Poster of how to wear your helmet properly. Step one: Look shocked all the time.

Not really a sign, but I saw this photo hanging on the wall inside their awesome ShinYeh Japanese buffet restaurant (more on this next time) toilet. It shows the result of stuffing too much good food into one’s mouth, causing him to find it difficult to stand up and walk properly to the toilet cubicle. HE SEMI-CRAWLS INSTEAD…

Some other English-fail examples. Here’s one that tells you not to forget to go along with the goods.

Topolice right the way!

What’s that thing that you wear when you reach your goal?

Kiss someone and you may ride.

Alright, that’s all for part one of Taiwan trip series! Shall be back for part two.. three.. four.. I don’t know, up to seven maybe?

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Movies I’ve watched recently!

How To Train Your Dragon

Probably the best Dreamworks animated feature since Shrek. The cuteness factor of all those dragons didn’t really make me go AWWWW I LOVE THEM, but thankfully that wasn’t the only thing that made this movie so entertaining and enjoyable. I like the story and music. Nuff said!

8.5 / 10

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Alice in Wonderland

Halfway through the show I realised this movie is actually a bit boring. Yes, there are plenty of beautiful magical visuals to feast your eyes, but if you strip all those away it’s just a linear story where you already know the ending from the start. I liked Mad Hatter and Red Queen’s performances though.

6 / 10