As I sit in my hotel room, the streets are exploding with fireworks and fire crackers.
Having arrived at 6AM yesterday, to my hotel with no vacancies until 3PM, I took my tired body to the Metro system, bought a one day unlimited travel pass for about $3CDN and rode the rails. The Metro system is amazing, efficient and clean. The receptionist had suggested I might like to go to the Flora Expo, so I decided that this would take care of a few hours and I would get to see some interesting gardening.
I was starving hungry, and made a stop in one of the many long line-ups to get something to eat. I ended up picking up what looked like a wrap with onion bread and bacon stuffed inside. I went past the drink counter and saw lots of milk. Having been caught before with the variety of milk in Asia, I managed to NOT buy one of the many fruit milks. Basically milk flavoured with Mediterranean fruit, or oranges or apples. I have also learned that the term lemon is very interchangeable in Asia, and may mean lemon, lime or orange. But always a citrus drink, so I settled for a carton with pictures of oranges and the word lemon. It had a taste that was not like a lemon or an orange, but it was citrus, so I was pleased. I bit into my breakfast sandwich, which is cold, and discovered that further in the bread was lettuce, a cream dressing, a fried cold egg and the partially cooked bacon. Not a dish I will try to recreate, but it was food.
I took the Metro and managed to easily find my way around. The signage and staff are all very helpful, considering I know no mandarin, and I easily navigated my way to the Expo. I should have learned from my time of living in Vancouver during Expo 86, that arriving at 830, when it opens at 900 is not a good idea. From the elevated platform, I looked out to a mass of thousands of people all lining up in various queues, with loud speakers and people in uniforms walking around with large placards. I decided that it would not get much better, so down I went to join the crowds. Initially I had managed to get lined up in a tour group, and the tour manager spotted my line jumping and without a word of English managed to dispatch me to the line that wove around the stadium and to the bus loop. At 9AM precisely, suddenly the crowd surged, taking me along, as the gates had opened and people were running to get to their chosen exhibit. In the time I had been standing in line, I saw we were directly under the approach to the Taiwan international airport. A bit disconcerning, when you are in the middle fo a few thoudand people and can see the underside of a 767 at 1000 feet, or tjose big lumbering military bombers.
Today on the Metro I see they are announcing that the 4 millionth visitor had passed through the turnstile. Seeing as there were no fireworks or period costume dancers running up to me to pass me a red envelope and flowers, I can safely assume that I was not the magic number 4-Million. I am a bit confused as they consider the number 4 to be very bad luck here and a harbinger of death. So I assumed they would announce 3,999,999 or 5,000,000.
The Expo is HUGE. It covers a vast piece of land and a number of adjacent park spaces, with roadways and freeway exit ramps closed down to facilitate foot traffic. Many displays of various plants and trees. An aromatic tea tree garden, and pavilions of many countries with floral displays native to their country. By far I though that the Netherlands did a very good job. Canada's was a bit of a fright though. Two what appeared to be sea going Haida style sea kayaks, painted a strange shade between flesh tone and orange, with blue and white Haida whale motifs, with very little in the way of flora of Canada. Given the large variety of plants and flowers we grow there, I thought it was pretty pathetic. I also got to see a model of a traditional Thai garden and teak house. Again, little imagination or variety, although they did have some nice orchids in a glass house, but nothing compared to those grown in Chaing Mai or on display at the flower show in Phuket town. But walk I did for close to 5 hours and still had not covered the site. But my body was giving in and I needed sleep. I also noticed that the crowds had gotten even larger and now the entire site was a sea of people. Starbucks even had a booth there, crammed between the steamed buns and noodle shops. I did however appreciate that the Starbucks actually tells you that it will be 15-20 minutes wait for your coffee. While it is not unusual to wait, it is unusual to be told how long it will be, and then they apologize for it taking that long.
I made my way back to my hotel where I was fortunate enough to find my room was ready ahead of schedule, where I took a long hot shower, snuggled into my bed for a nap and awoke 6 hours later, wide awake.
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