Taipei with Mom

After landing right on time last night, Mom picked me up from TPE and we went home, snacked on Brazilian cheese bread (they sell it at Costco here!), and just caught up. It was a nice, chill evening.

This morning, Mom made me a coffee and Brazilian cheese bread. She tried to show me her new Mr. Brown milk warmer/frother but it didn't work! So, after breakfast, we went to Carrefour in Zhongli to return it. We went to the woman at the Mr. Brown kiosk and the saleswoman remembered Mom. When she took the frother out of the box to take a look, her first response was "I bet you washed the part that going inside." Mom immediately started laughing and said "Yes! And I forgot to put it in!" So that solved the mystery of the frother. We bought a pack of wax apples (莲雾 lián wù) and went home to drop everything back off inside.

We walked to the new MRT station that just opened in the Spring, after approx 6 years of being told it would open soon. Mom's station (Taoyuan Sports Park) is on the Taoyuan MRT (which is inexplicably operated separately from the Taipei MRT). This station only has commuter trains which are super slow since they make every stop. We switched to the express when we got to the airport. Still, it took us about an hour to get into city and cost NT$150 or so. The terminal station is supposedly at the Taipei Main Station, but it's really a long walk to get to the transfer lines on the Taipei MRT. A really, really long walk. 

Shǎguā Gān Miàn at 南門福州傻瓜乾麵

We went to Nanmen Market (南門市場 Nán mén shìchǎng) to eat dry noodles with pork chop at Shagua Gan Mian (南門福州傻瓜乾麵 Nán mén Fúzhōu Shǎguā Gān Miàn) and bought "tamales" (粽子 zòngzi) at the Nanmen Market since we were there. It was a shop (called 逸湘齋 Yì xiāng zhāi) specializing in Huzhou-style zongzi (湖州 Húzhōu).

Buying zongzi at 逸湘齋

Then we took the MRT to SOGO, being careful to pick the right SOGO. There are two, across the street from one another, and apparently Mom often picks the wrong one first. We looked at gold which Mom needs for an upcoming gift, but didn't end up buying any; the sale was not as advertised. We did take a break in the food court, though, and each got a douhua (豆花 dòuhuā), so the trip wasn't a total loss.

Back on the MRT! This time, to the Jiannan (劍南 Jiàn nán) station to go prepay (NT$1000/person) for our Thanksgiving dinner reservation. From the station, to get to Tairroir, we randomly passed a fruit market's grand opening and got two free oranges. Free fruit is a nice giveaway!

As we were starting to head home, James called to ask if we had dinner plans. Since the reverse MRT route would take us at least an hour, we decided to just take the MRT to the Banqiao station where we could get the HSR back home to Taoyuan where James picked up us. 

We swung by the condo to pick up Jiang jiejie and her husband, Zhuang dage, and headed to dinner at Yang Liu Tang (陽柳塘 Yáng liǔ táng) near the Costco. Since I'm pregnant, we couldn't order the most popular option. We got the black chicken with bitter veggie (苦菜 kǔ cài) pot and added lots of items like yellow yam (地瓜 dìguā) and beef balls.

Mom's a total local

Hot pot at 陽柳塘

While I'm on the topic of pregnancy in Taiwan, I want to mention something pretty interesting. There's a Chinese tradition of postnatal care, literally called "sitting the month" (坐月子 zuò yuè zi), during which the "weakened" new mom is taken care of by someone (usually her mom) who cooks particular immune-boosting foods. It can also be considered "postnatal confinement", since the woman is traditionally meant to stay home (away from the cold, wind, and rain, as well as lots of potentially contagious strangers), but, as with most traditions and superstitions, a lot of modern life/understanding has crept in and most women don't really lie around with their feet up at home. For instance, during this time, women are meant to avoid anything that might cause illness or weaken her more, so rules included no showering, no being cold, no crying, no cold liquids. Nobody follows those rules anymore. Now people focus on the foods, and Taiwanese women, Mom and I have learned, are really particular and have tons of fascinating foods tied to sitting the month and postnatal recovery. Jiang jiejie was super nice and went to some particular old lady she knew of to buy this special medicinally dried ginger for Mom to use when she comes to 坐月子 for me. She keeps giving tips and telling Mom, who has never done this before, all the rules/foods that are good or bad. I'm much more excited to try all these new, unusual foods than I am about any other part of the labor and recovery process. I think about the food when I get scared hearing horror stories.

After dinner, we had tea in Jiang jiejie and Zhuang da ge's new place on the 3rd floor, just chatting and playing with their massage chair. They moved into the building a few months ago, but their real estate business has been in one of the downstairs offices for years. I met Serena, the shy girl that is learning English from Mom. She lives with them and is Zhuang da ge's niece. She's a college kid, studying Japanese, and works part-time at the real estate business. It was a great way to wind down the day and keep myself awake for a little longer. I'm fighting the jetlag by just forcing myself to be on the right sleep schedule with no naps.