I don’t know when Din Tai Fung became Taiwan’s number one export — at least in pop culture — but I guess it’s better than all the “Made in Taiwan” jokes from thirty years ago. When we were here in September, one of Frank’s main goals was to eat at a Din Tai Fung but we thought there were only two locations and I refused to stand in the extended lines for something that I could easily eat in LA. Plus, Din Tai Fung’s thing is that it’s supposed to be precisely uber-consistent at every location. Why stand in line? However I did acquiesce to going to the Taipei 101 location in the middle of the night when nobody else was there and taking photos with the red Din Tai Fung sign.
Little did we know that there are Din Tai Fungs everywhere and if you time it correctly, the wait is only fifteen minutes or so. So Monday night was my first taste of Taiwan Din Tai Fung and my basic takeaway is that while it was pretty good — the non-dumpling stuff was a revelation — the thing I lusted for most was the cute keychain. Fun fact (found out months later): DTF employees all wear watches because they need to lint roll themselves every hour. That’s just one of the little touches that brings DTF’s customer service to the next level. Also, people who hashtag #DTF and mean it the other way…swipe left.
Speaking of, let’s talk about Interneting in Taiwan. Last time Frank and I were here, we didn’t realize that we could tether our phones. Swapping out a SIM card into your smart phone is easy but it never occurred to us that our devices could then be used to hook up our laptops. User error! So basically a lot of our time was spent trying to find Wifi in cafes. And since Frank was using his U.S. account, he didn’t have the unlimited data that I had on my temporary SIM. So thus, no deep research about Din Tai Fung was done and my main gripe post-first trip was lack of laptop Internet. If only I knew then that for $NT800 we could 3G all day, every day.
Apps I downloaded in a short time: Line as the must have communication tool. Taipei Transit for the subways of course. Waygo for the menu reading, YourBike for an English bike docking station map; the Chinese version of Yelp, iPeen; and a movie times app that was also in Chinese. The latter two were of limited use since I can't really read them, but the photos help. I eventually found Foursquare and Swarm easier for finding food. And not an app, but anyone who searches for food in Taipei comes across A Hungry Girl's Guide to Taipei. There's also an app called Old Stores, which highlights some of Taipei's well, old stores.
And then there's Tinder, which I started using out here last trip to meet locals who speak English. I made a few Tinder friends already and planned to meet them as my stay continued. Back home I never Tindered but inspired by my friend's recent trip to the Philippines, I used it here. Also it served as an interesting way to get a look at the people of Taiwan... More on that later.
After Din Tai Fung, we went to two important places: the have-everything store and the dollar store, both near Zhongshan station. The first was for eyelashes and tampons. Daisy wanted the eyelashes and we also wanted to take a look at Veronica’s brand of tampons since she’s literally responsible for bringing tampons to Taiwan. (How she got started is an interesting story in itself, for another time.) The dollar store was an endless array of useful things and I was lucky to leave with only a few plastic cups and organizational things. Oh wait, I forgot to mention that the second floor of the have-everything store contained walls full of stickers. Yes, stickers!!! I vowed to return once school started so I could bling out my supplies. And also, behind the sticker section was a rack of cheap headphones. The fear of being headphone-less in Taiwan quickly abated.
Little did we know that there are Din Tai Fungs everywhere and if you time it correctly, the wait is only fifteen minutes or so. So Monday night was my first taste of Taiwan Din Tai Fung and my basic takeaway is that while it was pretty good — the non-dumpling stuff was a revelation — the thing I lusted for most was the cute keychain. Fun fact (found out months later): DTF employees all wear watches because they need to lint roll themselves every hour. That’s just one of the little touches that brings DTF’s customer service to the next level. Also, people who hashtag #DTF and mean it the other way…swipe left.
Speaking of, let’s talk about Interneting in Taiwan. Last time Frank and I were here, we didn’t realize that we could tether our phones. Swapping out a SIM card into your smart phone is easy but it never occurred to us that our devices could then be used to hook up our laptops. User error! So basically a lot of our time was spent trying to find Wifi in cafes. And since Frank was using his U.S. account, he didn’t have the unlimited data that I had on my temporary SIM. So thus, no deep research about Din Tai Fung was done and my main gripe post-first trip was lack of laptop Internet. If only I knew then that for $NT800 we could 3G all day, every day.
Apps I downloaded in a short time: Line as the must have communication tool. Taipei Transit for the subways of course. Waygo for the menu reading, YourBike for an English bike docking station map; the Chinese version of Yelp, iPeen; and a movie times app that was also in Chinese. The latter two were of limited use since I can't really read them, but the photos help. I eventually found Foursquare and Swarm easier for finding food. And not an app, but anyone who searches for food in Taipei comes across A Hungry Girl's Guide to Taipei. There's also an app called Old Stores, which highlights some of Taipei's well, old stores.
And then there's Tinder, which I started using out here last trip to meet locals who speak English. I made a few Tinder friends already and planned to meet them as my stay continued. Back home I never Tindered but inspired by my friend's recent trip to the Philippines, I used it here. Also it served as an interesting way to get a look at the people of Taiwan... More on that later.
After Din Tai Fung, we went to two important places: the have-everything store and the dollar store, both near Zhongshan station. The first was for eyelashes and tampons. Daisy wanted the eyelashes and we also wanted to take a look at Veronica’s brand of tampons since she’s literally responsible for bringing tampons to Taiwan. (How she got started is an interesting story in itself, for another time.) The dollar store was an endless array of useful things and I was lucky to leave with only a few plastic cups and organizational things. Oh wait, I forgot to mention that the second floor of the have-everything store contained walls full of stickers. Yes, stickers!!! I vowed to return once school started so I could bling out my supplies. And also, behind the sticker section was a rack of cheap headphones. The fear of being headphone-less in Taiwan quickly abated.