Earthshaking Tofu Rocks (Wait, It's Not the Rocks!)

 Time to rock my world at Tofu Rocks!

Actually my first real, noticeable Taiwan earthquake was a few days before Tofu Rocks. I was very confused, sitting at the kitchen table, as to why it felt like the boat was rocking, and everything was moving back and forth. But it was a minor quake, just a couple of minutes of gentle swaying.

Speaking of earthquakes, they're very common in Taiwan. All the buildings are therefore required to be quake-tolerant. This includes the power line infrastructure, whose poles are built on stilts, as shown. 

I'm so flexible! (says utility pole on a stilt)

I got this picture while checking out a cool bike/walking trail in the area. 

Following it, I discovered it went by Tofu Rocks, a local landmark!

Tofu Rocks: Named because they look like chunks of tofu.

Tofu Rocks at sunset

Tofu rocks not at sunset

Lookin' at you, Zhubei City

Mostly I just enjoyed hopping rock to rock, and went back with Teacup over the weekend, wherein she dragged me across and back twice before I got all tuckered out hopping over the uneven parts of the rocks, and had to ask for mercy (and also it was getting dark). I'll hopefully return to the biking path often, as it looks like a really nice place for a walk or bike.

If there's anything truly ground-shaking in the metaphorical sense, it's probably the pineapple. Holy cow, I never realized how sweet and flavorful pineapples could be! I don't think I can pineapple in the US anymore, and if you know me, I used to go nuts for it.

Nah, that's an exaggeration. If it's all I can get, I'll still eat the blander US version.

Dragon fruit, too, is sweeter here, and so flavorful. The red dragon fruit especially. I'm also a big fan of persimmons, which look like orange tomatoes and taste like cinnamon apples. Taiwan has got a lot of delicious fruit, in other words! I enjoyed wandering around the local fruit market quite a bit.

Speaking of wandering around, a couple of cool city features I've passed on my explorations:

These pudding cakes are super delicious, and only $4-$6 USD for an 8" cake.

Stone statue, with a lighting feature from the building behind it

Honeydew melons, apparently, from a nearby fruit market    

Bonus:

Passionfruit, and a stir fry of a local cabbage, water spinach, pineapple, pork, garlic, and soy sauce.
Verdict: Passionfruit: The seeds are a little crunchy for my tastes. Couldn't quite appreciate it fully.
 The stir fry: A waste of perfectly good pineapple. T.T I'm sorry, poor pineapple, I truly wronged you; I somehow turned you bland and flavorless. What did I do???

Fresh pineapple. Also noodles stir fried with red amaranth, pork, pineapple, thai basil, garlic, and soy sauce. 
Verdict: Much tastier. And the red amaranth made the noodles pink, which was pretty fun.

Why are you writing this post instead of petting me?!
(Ensuing deletion of much cat typing)

Crabs on the Tidal Flats

 Teacup wanted to go to the beach. So this past weekend, I searched for closest beaches, and got a cab.

We wound up at Happiness Beach, a locally-known tourist spot. It was actually more of a tidal flat than the kind of beach I'm used to (I'm more used to short sandy beaches!). I'd never been on a tidal flat before, so this was really cool to me!

Huuuuuge wide beach before you get to the sea

We got there not too long after low tide, too, so we got to see the water so far away it seemed unreal. Also unreal was how crabby the beach was. As in, herds of tiny crabs (Gemini called them blue soldier crabs) about the 1-2" across scuttled in groups over the sand, burrowing in whenever we got close. The sand itself was not at all flat, but rather scattered with tiny 'pebbles' of sand where the crabs had done their burrowing. In some areas it was just piles of mud with no flat sand visible. 

Evidence of crab burrows

Crab herd! Or, given they are soldier crabs, crab army!

We splashed around in the shallow tide pools for a couple of hours, with me keeping an eye on the water. I have never seen tides rise before, but here I could physically and literally see the water encroaching closer and closer. Teacup took off her shoes a few inches from the water line (there weren't really crashing waves, as a couple of sand bars smoothed those out before they reached us). Within a minute I had to tell her to grab them before they floated away.

Since I wasn't familiar with the area, and I know things can get dangerous fast when strong currents form behind sand bars, I kept Teacup and me above the water line and refused to let any sand bars get behind us. So, we didn't actually get down to the waves themselves. But we had a plenty fun time, and the water of the tide pools was between warm and hot, great for splashing around in. Plus there were a ton of tiny fish that nibbled at our toes. The can't-hurt-you kind of nibbles, super cute.

Toe nibbler. Very ticklish!

Bike path and stairs

Happiness Beach is along a bike pathway, so I want to return at some point and bike along it. It also has some wide, flat stairs that are apparently popular for photo purposes, though people were just using them for stairs while we were there. And there were some 4-seater motor bikes, rather like golf carts but more bike-looking, that people rent nearby and use to go down the bike path. Sometime I want to try one, as they seem like a fun way to enjoy the seashore. I really want to head back for a sunset there, too, as it is on the westward side of the island and should give us some stunning sunsets. We'll see if I get back there.

In other, non-beach asides, I took a couple of pictures of things around town:

Random sculpture of two orbs. The first is smaller than the back one, but from this angle the perspective makes them almost the same size.

Lake guy playing with metal duckies

Malay Night Heron (its mate also lives nearby)

Zhubei City waterway in a random park

A very blue and curvy office building in Zhubei City

Random pretty tree

And the bonus pictures I know y'all are really here for:

Cat! I got the automatic feeder working

Kabocha squash and water spinach over rice, stir fried with five spice blend, nutmeg, garlic, soy sauce, and a kumquat-jam I made because the green kumquats were too sour and I couldn't think of any better way to use them before they went bad. Last time I had kumquats, they were orange, and though they were lemon-sour, these green ones were more sour than that.

Verdict: Actually very tasty! I love kabocha squash, and five-spice and nutmeg bring out the nutty flavor nicely (kabocha makes me think of a smooth, creamy, nutty butternut squash). Kumquat jam really goes well the water spinach, too, giving it a citrusy kick that pairs nicely with the soy sauce. Might separate the squash and the water spinach next time, since they didn't quite complement each other, but they didn't clash badly enough to detract from each other either.

Mooncakes on a Roof and More Malls

Last weekend was the Mid-Autumn Festival (or Moon Festival) in Taiwan. Or as a local new friend joked, the BBQ Festival. We had a 4-day weekend between the holiday and a teacher work day, which was quite a lot for what my in-laws tell me is usually a pretty low-key holiday that most people don't do too much for. 

We did not have any BBQ, unfortunately. But Teacup and I did have mooncakes and pomelo! 

Mooncake with lotus seed paste
Wikimedia commons, bc we ate all ours, and in the dark

Also Wikimedia commons, because it was very messy to eat,

and I didn't want to splatter my phone with pomelo juice

These days most people apparently barbeque instead of eating mooncakes and pomelo fruit (which is like an oval grapefruit in flavor and shape, but with very little of the bitterness). But we didn't have a BBQ to attend, so we went up the rooftop to stare at the full moon, and eat our small bounty of mooncakes. Teacup LOVED it. She also loved that I let her scooter around the park after dark until it was time to go to the roof. 

Otherwise we visited a couple of malls. Big City Mall is a huge mall in Hsinchu, which I got us to by the cab service 55688, which is basically the Taiwan version of Uber (without being Uber). The idea was to find a kids play area and wander around some, but after losing a few dollars in Tom's World (an arcade chain that is reminiscent of Chuck E Cheese mixed with a token-operated casino), we couldn't find a real play area in the mall. I know there used to be one, but it appears to have since left. Ah well. So instead I let Teacup steal my camera and take some flower pictures outside, and of course we had bubble tea and a truffle donut. She got some pretty good pictures!

Astrophotography on the mall overhang

The other days we went back to Far Eastern Department Store, one day making a 'lantern' with Teacup's grandmother. Traditional lanterns are made of paper; this was more like a nightlight with a moon theme. But it was cute and fun. Bonus note, I finally figured out one of the uses for that Hakka educational area in the food court: it serves as an activity center for events.

Not a traditional Mid-Autumn lantern

Teacup, of course, modeled her clay cat after Clover.

So our Mid-Autumn festival celebration was a bit nontraditional, a bit traditional, and lot of low-key relaxing. 

Food Bonus:

Stir fry of lotus root, celery, water spinach, bok choy, and leftovers with kumquats, with soy sauce, sugar, and ginger.
Not terrible, definitely edible, not fantastic. I want to do more trials of cooking with kumquats.

Oolong tea, guava, banana, grapes. I'm not sure I love guava. Tastes kind of like a bergamot-infused apple to me. I like both flavors individually, not in love with the combo.

Zhubei Far East Department Store

The last couple of weeks have been a lot of uninteresting days, settling in and finding local stuff and trying to find the best mosquito sprays and basic bathroom cleaning products, and house sale logistics. I won't detail all that, because you're not really hear to read about the boring stuff!

However I went to the local mall a few times, Zhubei Far East Department store. Slightly over a mile walk, which is good for my exercise and Pokemon Go egg hatching (Yes, that's still a thing; Teacup likes catching Pokemon so we've revived the old accounts). In addition to some spectacular food courts, it's got the usual stuff like clothes and kids toys and trinkets. It's also got a setup for slime-making classes, which you know Teacup enjoyed.

Bunnicula looking fancy in Teacup's hairclips

Slime class

Zhubei Far East Department store has a ton restaurants. It also has a really pretty layout in the restaurant-dedicated sections. Like many of the Taiwan malls I've been to, the sit-down restaurants are on their own floor, while there's a food court with mall-style meals on another floor that also has regular shops, and in the basement level more of both fast-casual and fancier restaurants in addition to non-food stores and food stalls. 

I tried a place called Chun Shui Tang in the casual food court on the 6th floor, and had a delicious meal. I now know what sweet potato leaves are supposed to taste like, when prepared in local stylings. 

Sweet potato leaves, prepared in traditional style.
I have no hope of replicating this myself any time soon,
but it was very delicious. Also comes in vegetarian versions (not pictured).

Handcut noodles in a milky, peanut-tasting sauce, listed under

'traditional foods' section of the menu

Plus a pomelo jasmine oolong milk tea that sounded interesting

The food courts, fancy and casual, include a round-house-style section that on the outside of the mall look like a traditional round house, and on the inside look like a bunch of well-decorated restaurants.

In this casual food court section is a model of a traditional Hakka-style house. I am not a cultural expert, and there's not actually very much explanation in this section about the various things shown, so I can't really tell you much about them. Is there special meaning to the items shown? Historical context? Renowned stories? No idea! It just is a no-shop area with a Hakka-style house and some antiques, up on the 6th floor in the middle of Zhubei city, no explanation. But hey, it's cool.

Why is there a historical exhibit at the local mall? No idea, but why not?

It has an assortment of antique-style objects. Wagon, sedan (wedding sedan maybe?)

Antique Hakka-style bassinet, crib, rocking horse

Not antique night market machines on the left, antique bike on the right

The lanterns are repeated throughout the mall, in different shapes. This is at an escalator.

Upstairs with the fancier restaurants, it's decorated like a traditional Hakka street. Hakka is the name of one of the native Taiwanese peoples, as opposed to mainlander Chinese who moved to Taiwan. 

Behind the arched entry ways are various restaurants of many degrees of fancy, unrelated to the façade, all looking delicious

Among the traditional Hakka themed decorations are night-market-style games.

We tried the dim sum restaurant on the fancy-food floor, going for a set menu style meal, and it was quite good.

Stewed cabbage, dumplings, shumai, egg-custard steamed buns

mango pudding for dessert

Sweet egg custard dumplings. Not considered the main dessert for some reason.
They're delicious.

Ginger chicken rice. I could legitimately eat this stuff all day.

Chicken congee

Turnip cakes

Most of the mall is normal modern shops, not a historical exhibit. The main floors range from luxury-good stores to high-end department stores to Uniqlo-level casual styles, athletic stores and foreign imports, and your standard assortment of mall stuff. Nothing's super cheap (look for a day or night market for the real deals) but you can get everyday-priced items and not go broke.

The basement has its own small grocery store, various rotation stalls selling things from baked goods to teas to character-themed school supplies, plus more food, plus a bookstore and various shops--it's the affordable section for general purpose shopping. 

Hanlin Tea House in the basement claims to be the originator of bubble tea (not this specific shop; it's a chain)

Nice pu-erh at a tea stall in the basement, sold as part of a sampler set or large bricks

We also tried the conveyor-belt sushi shop in the basement, but I didn't get pictures. Oops. Anyway, I'm looking forward to trying more of the food in the various sections, but post-move budgeting means it'll be a bit spread out.

Unrelated, Clover is settling in well, and has decided she accepts this smaller territory as her own. She does not thank us for the work we put in getting her here.

Bonus: cat tries to become art