{Taiwan & Hong Kong}: Our Graduation trip!

Prior to the start of this blog post, I was pondering, what would be a better way to organize my travel logs? I decided to organize the blog posts by blogging on each individual activity on our itinerary, instead of updating day by day, as I do not want each posts to be too content-heavy and cluttered. 

I went for this Graduation trip with two of my Secondary school good friends! To be honest, I was really worried that conflicts will occur when we are there, not because of the lack of confidence in our friendship, but because, it takes a lot to be able to get along with someone for 24 hours, let alone for many 24 hours. But, I am glad nothing happened there! :) Our friendship is still intact, and we had lots of fun there!

Just some note for myself and for those who might be considering a trip.

1) Stopovers are not advisable.

For this trip, our air tickets actually consist of a stopover in Hong Kong too, as we thought that the price was actually more worth it as compared to just going to Taiwan alone. The reason why I really regret this act is because, we were all so drained out on our last day in Taipei, imagine us still having to fly to another country next! We also have to organize the space well for the stuffs that we are going to get in TWO countries. Thank god that we were only in Hong Kong for 2 days.

2) Do not rush through your itinerary.

One of the reason why we were so tired for this trip was the fact that we only had 4 days in Taipei, and thus we sort of have to rush through our planned itinerary. Sometimes I wished we can take a break when we are tired, but it is just not physically possible, as we do not want to miss any activities! I think a week is actually the optimal time to explore Taipei (just Taipei alone), yes it takes a toll on the pocket due to increased accomodation costs and travel allowance, but it definitely beats having to be on the rushing mode every minute.

3) Explore areas that are not so tourists-dominated.

I realised that the places I enjoyed most in this trip are mostly not tourists-dominated. You may like to consider googling for places that are less likely to have large groups of tourists flocking in *Rolls eye at National Palace Museum*. With that, you will be able to get nearer to the locals and see their way of life too. For my next trip, I'd like to explore little nooks and crannies in Taiwan!

4) Be firm wherever you are.

This applies to most situations. On a particular day, we were approached by a teenager, asking us to buy pens (2 for NTD200 which is equivalent to SGD8) to raise fund for their school fees.We rejected him, abeit not too firmly and with a pinch of awkwardness. Prior to that, we were warned by an old auntie that there is a group of teenagers cheating money through selling pens. (Thank god for her!) Looking at the boy's appearance (dyed golden hair and Ah beng's clothes), it really doesn't seem like he'll be using the money for his school fees. I know it's bad to judge one by their appearance, but in this case, it is applicable!

That's all for now!