Hey there folks. How have you been doing since I last posted an entry? I know you might have noticed that just like with my Argentina trip, I didn’t actually finish the entries for my Sri Lankan trip in December, but I still have my notes and eventually will get around to finishing both of those . . . Or at any rate, that’s the plan.
For this Taipei trip, I will be jumping around a bit at times, just hitting the highlights which I think that you might find to be either interesting or helpful. For my regular readers, I know many of you prefer the detailed entries, but don’t worry if I leave out something important. If there was something else you were hoping to know about, just drop a note in the comments, and I promise to give more details.
The first detail of interest was that I had booked this trip on Batik Air, an Indonesian airline, which appears to be somehow connected to Malindo Air, from Malaysia. I was a bit concerned about quality, since it’s a budget airline, and I only paid 19,000 INR ($222 USD) for a one-way ticket from Bengaluru to Taipei, with one checked bag and carry-on luggage included. However, the reason frequent flyer miles are lost on me is that I almost always just book the cheapest, reasonable looking flight . . . and that’s what I did this time as well. Unlike many online check-ins these days, I couldn’t do it until exactly 24 hours ahead of time, so that’s what I was doing at 11:16 PM on June 7th. To my pleasant surprise, I was able to choose my seats on both flights without being charged, thus securing my preferred aisle seats for free (which is of course the way it should always be). So, one point for Batik Air.
As soon as I had checked in, I had to decide how to get to the airport. Most of you know that I was an earlier adopter and big fan of BluSmart, but they have unfortunately stopped operating due to financial problems of their parent company. Using the logic that if one electrical cab company were good, then another might also be good, a few weeks ago I had booked with Shoffr for airport pickup and drop-off, being quite pleased both times. Hopefully this new company will fare better, since they are a bit more expensive, but also ONLY have very nice cars. Still, it was only 1120 INR ($12.99 USD) for the 26 km trip, which given the semi-luxury service, is still definitely a bargain.
As appears to be the norm, the fancy BYD e6 driver of the car was waiting in front of my apartment to pick me up 10 minutes before my scheduled pickup time, but I didn’t go down to the car until 7:57 PM on June 8th. Unsurprisingly, the ride was extremely comfortable and the driver excellent, with us arriving to Terminal 2 of the Bengaluru airport at 8:38 PM. Despite not having the much-pushed DigiYatra service, by 8:41 PM I was already in the door, heading straight to security, where I arrived at 8:42 PM. However, there, much to my surprise, they told me that I had to have a physical boarding pass, so would need to go to the check-in counter . . .what’s the point of an electronic boarding pass if you can’t use it?
The whole physical thing at the Malindo Air counter took much longer than anticipated, but that sort of thing frequently happens when I fly out of India, so maybe I should just change my expectations. When I finally did get my turn at the counter, they were very reticent about believing that I didn’t need a visa to visit Taiwan. They also wanted to know the next two countries I would be going to, insisting on seeing the tickets, and also insisting on seeing my ticket for my return trip to India . . . I wondered, If I hadn’t had a return ticket to India, would they still have let me have a boarding pass? I finished up there at 9:30 PM.
As I had promised to be more succinct this time around, I won’t give the full details of getting through immigration and security. If you are reading this, there is a good chance that you already know that this frequently takes a very long time in India, but despite needing to give my entire trip itinerary to the immigration officer, things still went very smoothly, and I was done with the whole process at 9:49 PM. With boarding scheduled in less than an hour, I decided to just head straight to the waiting area rather than going to the lounge.
With the new significantly discounted cost of international roaming with Airtel I was tempted to just do that this time around. I was going to be in 5 different countries over the next few weeks, and juggling the eSIMs, can get a bit daunting. If I had been able to get the 30-day package for only 3999 INR, that is probably what I would have done, but my trip was going to be a bit longer, meaning I would need the 90-day package for 5999 INR ($69.55 USD) which includes 40 GB of data across 189 countries. At this point, for most travellers who live in India, this is probably the best choice, especially if you are going to multiple countries. However, I am already used to juggling multiple eSIMs and even have a dual eSIM phone, so I took the wait time to buy a six gigabyte 6-day data only eSIM for Taiwan from Nomad for just $9.00 USD (774 INR).
My whole boarding process started at 10:40 PM, and despite having by passport and boarding pass checked three times, I was already seated on the first plane at 10:53 PM. I had two approximately 4-hour flights, with a layover in Kuala Lumpur. The seats on both flights were reasonably comfortable on both flights, being made of some sort of faux leather material, but needed just a little more padding. Furthermore, the interiors of both planes were also new looking and the flight attendants polite. As to be expected on this sort of budget flight, they didn’t even give water without paying, but the available snacks and drinks were not exorbitantly priced. Nevertheless, I decided to wait until my short layover in KL to buy a VERY hearty sandwich for 36.43 MYR ($8.58 USD). In Malaysia, I appreciated the convenience of their newer Rapiscan scanners, rather than the older ones which appear to still be the norm in India, and I was back on the next plane at 7:06 AM on June 9th. Whereas the first flight had been full, this time I had a whole row to myself, so while the seat itself was not better, at least I was not as cramped. Still, for flights less than 5 hours, I would recommend this airline.
The flight touched down in Taipei at 12:11 PM, and my Nomad eSIM immediately connected. Like many, if not most countries, before going through immigration, I had to do an arrival card, but this could be facilitated by doing it on one’s phone. As far as i could tell, that is what everyone was doing. The entire process from stepping off the plane to finishing with immigration was incredibly smooth, and I was finished with all of that at 1:00 PM. For those of you who don’t like to get fingerprinted, do note that you will get electronically fingerprinted in Taiwan, but if you are squeamish about that sort of thing in this day and age, you should probably just stay home.
Haowen had recommended me to exchange $200-$300 USD at the airport, but that seemed a bit excessive to me, so I only exchanged $100 USD for 296 NTD, right there at one of the multiple currency exchange counters. Note, unlike most other countries, if you are going to exchange cash, you should just do it at the airport. The rates are all strictly controlled by the government, and you don’t get ripped off. Of course, you can also just get money out of the ATM, but depending upon your personal bank, there might be a less favorable exchange rate. I had read online, and Haowen had also told me to expect to pay cash for pretty much everything, but I still had my doubts, which was why I didn’t exchange more right off. Spoiler alert, even though I was staying at Haowen’s apartment, a couple days into the trip I still found myself taking more money out of the ATM. Nevertheless, the bank fees also didn’t seem excessive, so don’t worry too much if you forget to bring a major currency which you can exchange.
As Haowen had offered to pick me up from the airport, I didn’t check transport options, but it seemed well-connected. Her beautiful, modern apartment which was located near Nangang MRT station was clearly very conveniently located. After sharing a nice meal together, I indicated that I would like to walk around a bit, so at 5:29 PM Haowen left me on the nearby left bank of the Keelung River, and I went walking towards Raohe night market.
The riverbank served as a sort of park and exercise path area.
After a leisurely stroll, with the sun beginning to set, I arrived at the market area at 6:13 PM. This early in the evening, and perhaps also deterred by the light drizzle, the market was not that busy, but there appeared to be all sorts of tasty looking food items. In addition, I noticed that at least here at this particular night market, claw machines and fortune tellers seemed to be in high demand.
At the end of the market, I saw Songschanciyou temple, which seemed to be an active place of worship.
I had intentionally not packed an umbrella, but at 7:01 PM I bought a tiny little automatic opening and closing umbrella which was just barely small enough to fit alright in my small messenger bag. It was laughably small by Costa Rican standards, but it was only 130 NTD ($4.34 USD) cash. Furthermore, looking around me, that seemed to be the size which most people had here, so maybe the rain usually is limited to this sort of a drizzle, which would mean that this size would be just perfect.
As I wasn’t really interested in buying anything else, I decided I could use this as an opportunity to try using the public transport system to go back to Haowen’s place. Haowen had lent me a public transport card and had said I could easily top it up as needed at any subway station. Thus, at 7:10 PM I entered the Songshan MRT station.
By 7:21 PM, within going one stop, I realized that I had evidently taken the wrong subway line. Sure enough, I was on the green line and needed to be on the blue line. This did not stress me out too much. Furthermore, to my eyes, at least for local transport, both the local train and the subway looked and seemed to operate exactly the same, but they aren’t. To add to the confusion, the local transit card also works perfectly on both the train and the subway. Getting turned around wasn’t a tragedy, since I wasn’t in a big hurry, but I realized I needed to pay closer attention to this for future trips around the city. I THINK that one time I took a local train and one time I took the subway, and the cost was similar both times, around 25 NTD ($0.85 USD). When I finally exited the train/subway station at 7:55 PM, I went to the attendant window and added 100 NTD to the card so that I would be ready for the next morning. I think you can also add money using one of the multiple machines in the station, but since there was a person there available, that’s the way I did it.
It was a short walk from there back to Haowen’s apartment, but I went ahead and grabbed a simple 49 NTD ($1.66 USD) ice cream stick at the nearby convenience store before heading into the apartment for the night.
Despite my bumbling, I was already impressed with the public transport system, and I also found the city to be very clean and orderly with many interesting sites along the way. In short, things seemed to be off to a good start. Keep reading along if you want to see how things went with my first full day in Taiwan. Finally, as always, don’t hesitate to leave your questions and comments in the section provided below.
Travels with Jay 