We Give a Damn: Scooter Madness, Getting Cozy with Beijing, and Dinner at the Night Market

We are just back from the annual Taipei International Cycle show in beautiful downtown Taipei, Taiwan. I've got two words for you: Scooter Madness! If you’ve been you know. There are 25 million people and likely 250 million scooters. Or so it seems. The math doesn’t add up though, as every other scooter has three people on it.

The show closed on the eve of presidential elections on the island, the outcome of which could have far reaching impact for Formosans, all cyclists and climate change as we know it. In the Election the KMT pulled of a stunning victory. Depending on your world view, its either a good or a bad thing. Bicycle Retailer and Industry News called it this way “Ma Ying-jeou’s landslide victory Saturday in Taiwan's presidential election should ease tensions between the island nation and mainland China, which claims Taiwanas its own.And that, analysts say, should be good news for Taiwan's faltering economy and for the thousands of Taiwancompanies that have invested heavily in the mainland, including much of Taiwan’s world-leading bicycle industry.” See the rest of the story http://www.bicycleretailer.com/news/newsDetail/1103.html .

I am less upbeat about the result, similar to several friends who live in Taiwan I am not impressed with mainland China’s record on human rights, environmental responsibility, economics, geo-political ambitions and general openness. The KMT’s Ma looks to “improve” relations with Beijing by, from the way I read it, letting the Peoples’ Republic have their way with the little island that could. Time will tell, but I view it as a giant step backward for the cultural and national progress the Taiwanese have made, especially in the last twenty years.

All that political talk made me hungry and there is no better place to satisfy your hunger for almost anything than one of Taiwan’s night markets. Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimern have both filed episodes for their respective Travel network shows from the island recently, so it was nice to go grazing after seeing their suggestions. While Bourdain seeks to discover true native and pop cuisine where he travels, Zimern usually looks to turn the stomach with a little more “shock and awe.”

If you make it across the intersection without getting flattened Warner Bros. style by the Moto GP that commences with each green light, then you will enter the night market that is packed with scores of vendors and bustling hungry locals, consuming delicacies ranging from pork dumplings to Bar-B-Q duck necks, to chicken testicles. Delish! We stuck to the dumplings and washed them down with reasonable quantities of the not-too-bad national barley pop aptly named Taiwan Beer.