A Trip to Taipei
Last summer, when I read an announcement about a Edward Yang Retrospective scheduled for summer 2023, I told myself it was time to plan a trip to Taipei, a city I wanted to visit for a long time.
Earlier this month, I went for a short visit, 5 days only, and hope to go back again soon.
I visited the retrospective at Taipei Fine Arts Museum and visited the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute to watch 3 of his films over a weekend and see another small exhibition about it. Sadly I wasn’t there long enough to watch all of of his films, but was glad I got to see Taipei Story in Taipei! I wrote about the exhibition and films here.
I also watched a few other films in other cinemas:
Asteroid City at SPOT Huashan
Like Nothing Happened and I Love Thee for Good (Ryusuke Hamaguchi, double bill), On the Train at SPOT Taipei Film House
Barbie, The Hanting of Queen Mary at Showtime Cinemas
I stayed in Zhongshan District and spent most of my time there. The weather wasn’t perfect, but slightly better compared to sweltering summer of Dubai, so I didn’t go for as many long walks as I would’ve liked to. But I enjoyed my daily neighbourhood walk and noticing something new each day.
The city is clean and the people are friendly. To me, Taipei felt like a smaller and more chilled version of Hong Kong. Maybe it was because I could smell food everywhere I went. There’s no shortage of places to eat, and every where I ate was very affordable and delicious. I couldn’t eat enough of dim sums or drink bubble milk tea.
On my flight to Dubai, I watched The You Tube Effect (Alex Winter, 2023) and the first scene was set in Taipei, so that made me smile. It featured Steve Chen one of the co-founders of YouTube. A few days later in my hotel room, I turned on the TV and there was Steve Chen again on my screen, on The Taipei Tonight Show.
I then changed channels and found the latest Emirates ad featuring Penelope Cruz playing on CNN. I have a series of photos I call “Everywhere I Go, Dubai Follows…”, something I will write about another time.
For now, I’ll share these photos of Taipei I took with my phone:
