Taipei


Taipei City is a level of administration directly under the central government of the Republic of China, while Taipei County and Keelung City are part of  Taiwan Province. Taipei generally refers to the entire metropolitan area, while the “Taipei City” refers only to the administrative-territorial center of the city. Based on the census of July 2006, the total population of Taipei City (excluding Taipei County) is 2,625,757 inhabitants. The city’s main industries are electrical and electronic equipment, textiles, metallurgy and motorcycles.


Taipei city was originally built as a rectangular fortress, four massive walls to the east and west. Japan colonized Taiwan in 1895, continuing the development of the city and in time Taipei has become the administrative, economic and cultural center of the country. Surrounded by mountains and crossed by rivers, Taipei has a subtropical climate, being affected by monsoons from April to September. Winters are short, but quite cold, while summers are hot and humid, average temperature is 30 degrees Celsius and is often raining.

Taipei is the cultural center of the country, but also an important industrial center, especially in the field of electronic and home appliances, steel industry, textile, shipping and automotive. The main problem facing the city and that will certainly bring plenty of trouble if you decide to visit Taipei for the transport, crowded and often chaotic, which makes the pollution level high enough. Even if officials try to expand the infrastructure in Taipei, there are still many problems to solve. You can travel by underground, bus or taxi, but expect the congestion and wasted time.


It’s a pretty expensive city, as you can see, very well developed on the services and trade. You can find just about anything here, from exotic food to quality clothing, but also clubs, restaurants, pubs various schools and universities and it is a destination that has something to offer to everyone. A mixture of tradition and modernity, Taipei City is a  paradise for shopping enthusiasts. Here you will find the world’s tallest building, Taipei 101, which is below the floors of a giant mall. Another mall, smaller, Sogo, both is quite expensive. With the coming of night markets in Taipei are open at night, very crowded and full of life, affordable, best known as Shilin.

Grand Hyatt, Taipei

No culture is neglected in Taipei city with many museums: National Museum,  Taipei Gallery, National Museum of History Museum in Taiwan clip. The most prominent is the National Palace Museum, which many regard as China’s best museum, with more than 7,000,000 pieces of the collection – paintings, historical relics, calligraphy, jade objects, engravings and wood carvings, works in bronze, books and documents. Nature lovers can visit the Yangmingshan National Park, where you will find not only plants and trees, but also various animals, especially birds of all kinds.

In Taipei there are two important monuments dedicated to personalities in the history of Taiwan, Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek. Sun Yat-sen was a famous Chinese revolutionary, who managed to overthrow the Qing Dynasty. It was then the founder of the Kuomintang and the first provisional president of Taiwan, and wanted the union between China and Taiwan. The monument dedicated to Sun Yat-sen includes a museum, a statue and beautiful gardens. Chiang Kai-shek was a powerful political and military leader, who succeeded Sun Yat-sen, became the leader of China, and was defeated in the Civil Chinese War by the communist forces. Here you will find a concert hall and a national theater; the complex is situated in a park in Zhongzheng District. During the official festivities here have been many shows.


 Buddhism and Taoism followers will surely want to visit the Longshan Temple. Built in 1738 by Han settlers who came from China, it is the meeting place for centuries of prayer for the faithful. Oriented to the south, it is built as a market with a vast interior space, being guarded by six sculptures depicting dragons, both outside the entrance. Artistic creations are delicate, painstakingly made, very realistic. But the main sculpture, which attracts believers and tourists alike, portrays Buddha and is located in the center of the main hall. In small shops you usually find traditional Chinese medicines and treatments.

Taipei By Night

Even if the long history of Longshan temple was marked by numerous conflicts and natural disasters, the temple miraculously managed to overcome them. In the first two weeks of each month countless believers come on a pilgrimage to the temple, both residents of Taiwan and foreign tourists. Taipei is  Taiwan‘s largest city, and the political, economic and cultural center. It is a cosmopolitan metropolis with a lively atmosphere and diverse, full of exuberance. It represents the diversity of its buildings, and visitors who love the old streets and ancient sites should not miss the traditional masters exhibited works in the area on Dadaocheng Dihua Street, or the Longshan Temple Wanhus District and other places.

World-renowned National Palace Museum has an endless collection of art objects and precious artifacts dating from historic times to the Chinese. There are other museums in Taipei: Museum of Art, National Museum of History and Postal Museum. Yangmingshan National Park on the outskirts of the city has a unique volcanic terrain, a wide variety of forest vegetation and a large network of trails. Here you can enjoy a hot water bath, or go to the hot springs of Beitou or Wulai. Taipei has the largest zoo in Taiwan, where you can see black bears, koala bears and king penguins. Moreover, Taipei is a bustling city full of people, cars and pollution. However, people are very friendly and the food is excellent. Taipei weather is warm all year round, and occasionally appear increased typhoons.


The city of Taipei in northern Taiwan has an area of 272 square kilometers, being the largest on the island. With a population of 2.7 million inhabitants, it comprises one-eighth of the islanders. Taipei City is the industrial and commercial center of Taiwan Province. Taipei city center with the region and counties including Taipei, Taoyuan Jilong is the largest city, industrial and commercial area in Taiwan. Taipei City is the cultural and educational center of the province of Taiwan.



Taipei Is A Very Crowded City

Here are 24 institutes of higher education, including Taiwan University, Taiwan Political University and Pedagogical University Taiwan. Also, the area is the most important center of the press, publishing, broadcasting, and the greatest libraries and museums in the province. Taipei City is one of the rail and road transport hubs of the province of Taiwan. Jilong ports and the zone Danshui, Taipei and the airport is the second largest in  Taiwan.

Taipei 101 is a skyscraper in Taipei, Taiwan (China). Planned by C.Y. Lee & Partners and built by KTRT Joint Venture, Taipei 101 is currently the second highest building in the world after Burj Dubai. Its original name is the Taipei Financial Center, based on its official name in Chinese (Taipei International Financial Center). The block is called Taipei 101 because it has 101 floors. What remains if you remove the grandeur of high buildings? Nothing. It can not reflect the essence of a culture or a lifestyle.  We all know how cold it can be the gray creatures with its technology, which are either miniature or are huge resembling a postmodern Babylon lacks, however, any trace of humanity.

And as the West, the capital of technology, every year dictates the market trends, has not been able to humanize the artificial and give a mystical sense of this world who do not know but we need to expand the East has shown here, and this time that such a culture could not give birth to single offspring than either they made of meat and bone, or steel and glass.

Although  Taipei 101 is the tallest building in the world, ranked second with 508 m, after the Sears Towers in Chicago, 519 m, the building manages to kneel any viewer. Imagine that you are in front of a giant diamond, in thousands of colors, with eight sections, the Chinese symbol of unity, symmetry and perfection, and that what you see before your eyes is a wonder of nature, but man knew how to create a lighting system that crosses between two glass surfaces (interior and exterior windows) to create a perfect optical illusion.

Taipei Nightlife







Taipei nightlife has come a long way since the early 1990s when it was mostly ripoff hostess clubs set up to stroke the egoes of boorish businessmen and cramped little karaoke boxes in which young people drank themselves silly. In those days the island was emerging from several decades of Kuomongtang bivouac mentality, and new money was in desperate search of status and validation. Today the money isn't so new and it knows how to pay a fair price for a good time without overpaying for provincial pretention.

Today a visitor has no trouble finding lively, well-appointed clubs and pubs in which free-spirited natives drink, dance and mingle pretty much the way they do in other international cities of five million prosperous people. Taipei isn't exactly a megalopolis on the order of Tokyo, Shanghai or Seoul, but it does have the critical mass to generate hormonal crowds with an eye for style and some folding money in its collective pockets. One big difference is that people in Taipei seem sincerely appreciative of foreign visitors, especially if they aren't elderly letches chasing vintage sexual fantasies.

The Taipei area is divided into a half-dozen districts. Sure, like any visitor you will want to devote half an afternoon to checking out the historic entertainment area known as Ximending. It's where the Japanese colonists decided to sanction evening entertainment a century ago. Even today it has more movie houses per block than anywhere in the city. More recently, its inexpensive cafes and restaurants have become a hangout for local teens.


Taipei Shopping


Known as the ‘Emporium without End’, Taipei has endless shopping options and the best of it located right downtown trading quality products at a pretty price. There is also a good amount of shopping to be had in out of the way boutiques.

Markets are also a big part of the shopping in Taipei, as with any Asian center, and they lie side by side with the modern malls. The Shilin Night Market is very popular and is an attraction in its own right.

Clothing, jewelry and cosmetics are the best buys in Taipei, plus it is also big into handicrafts and pottery. The street markets often have the best choice of handicrafts items, with hand-painted lanterns, lacquer-ware and handmade shoes being particularly popular.

Xinyi District

A popular area of town for both shopping and sightseeing, Xinyi is home to New York Shopping Mall and the Mitsukoshi shopping center, along with landmarks like Taipei 101 and the Sun Yat-sen Memorial. The area is both cosmopolitan and modern and tends to get busy in the afternoon.

Shilin



Best known for the Shilin Night Market, Shilin is a fun place to shop for souvenirs and cheap tack any time of day. It is best to get here around 20:00, or perhaps a bit earlier if you are not into crowds. You can also eat here and some shops and eateries even stay open past midnight.

Station Front Area




This area in downtown Taipei is near Taipei Railway Station and is especially of interest to computer geeks and bookworms. There are many bookstores and computer hardware and software outlets here where items can be bargained for.

Ximending



Popular with students, Ximending, in western Taipei, is fairly hip and is a nice place to wander even if you’re not buying. It is one of traffic-free streets and modern stores and is best seen at night when the billboards are all lit up. The MRT Blue Line runs here.

Zhongshan North Road

Zhongshan North Road is a fairly upscale boulevard, featuring the likes of Louis Vuitton and Gucci items along with suave local brands. The second section (Section 2) is particularly popular and has many boutiques.

Taipei shopping tips

East Taipei is one of tree-lined boulevards and large shopping malls and is consequently the busiest area to shop. Those not into crowds and preferring smaller outlets should head for the historic, western part of town. Bargain hard at the markets and be prepared for the heat March through October.
In Taipei is located the world’s highest building, Taipei 101. Taipei is divided into 12 districts. The Metro in Taipei known as Metro Taipei or MRT often refers to the urban rail system serving the metropolitan Taipei area. The system, which was opened on 28 March 1996, was built at a cost of over $ 18 million, among the most expensive metro systems in the world. Taipei Metro has seven lines, 67 stations and a total length of 77 km.

If you have money and are quiet in this regard,  Hong Kong should be a priority. Wherever you turn your head you find everything: modern and ancient, rich and poor. But “Wall Street of Asia,” as it was called, has some prices that give you the chills. So, is you have less money, go to Taiwan. You will not have a problem with the money if you walk and stop in this country’s capital, Taipei. Taipei has a bit of the old world charm of Hong Kong, but also has modern elements. Taipei is a city that is growing rapidly, even faster than you can imagine. Restaurants, bars and clubs offer everything you want at a price of nothing.

On the place we find today Taiwan’s capital was once a lake, and the entire region was covered with marshes and low vegetation areas, but everything has changed now. In the place where once lived the indigenous tribes came once to expand the  Chinese empire. The first Chinese came to agriculture, fishing and later for trade. Chen Lai-Chang, an important name in the history of Taiwan, has built a farm in the region and then rapidly increased the number of immigrants. Most were established near the rivers and Taipei was quickly divided according to place of origin of the new-comers, and conflicts were not missing.

Taipei Railway Station

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