Vegetarian Travel - Taipei: Around Longshan temple 龙山寺

Longshan temple 龙山寺


Probably because of the presence of a Buddhist temple, there are many vegetarian eateries in the vicinity of Longshan temple(龙山寺).

Most of the eateries are along Xichang Street (西昌街) next to the Longshan temple park, just by the MRT station named after the temple. There are 2 eateries in the small Sanshui St (三水街) off Xichang Street.

If you come here in the morning of afternoon, get your vegetarian food at the eateries along Xichang Street or Sanshui Street. If you come here at night, you can look for more vegetarian food along Xichang Street night market or Guangzhou Street night market.



Sanshui Street 三水街

Probably because I do not know where to look, I found it difficult to get decent breakfast in Taipei. Most of the vegetarian stalls were not yet open before 9am. Thus, I was quite delighted to find Sanshui Street.

Walk in from the Longshan Temple Park and you will find that Sanshui Street is quite a bustling little alley. At the other end of it, there is the Sanshui Market 三水市场. If you like to visit local markets, it's worth taking a look. I found many stalls selling vegetarian ingredients in the market.

There are 2 vegetarian eateries here. One is Hefeng Vegetarian Restaurant （和风素食）. From its name, I think it is Japanese style vegetarian restaurant. It's on the second floor.

Where I ate was the Shangding Huangjia Vegetarian Fried Buns, the green signboard in the picture. It's name sounds real grand (it's something like Supreme Royal Vegetarian Fried Buns), but it's really a street eatery. Most of the customers take away their orders. But there are a few seats inside the restaurants. So you can eat inside there.


The specialty of this stall is fried buns. Buns with bamboo shoots fillings and cabbage fillings are NT$10 each. Buns with vegetables 雪里红 are NT$20. There are fried dumplings 水煎饺 selling for 10 for NT$40 or 5 for NT$20. When I was there for breakfast, there was soy milk as well (NT$10 a bowl). I ordered a portion of fried dumplings, a cabbage bun, a bamboo shoot bun as well as a bowl of soy milk (see picture above). It was a very hearty and satisfying breakfast for NT$70. I preferred the bamboo shoot buns over the cabbage buns though.

The last day I was in Taipei, I came here again for the hot and sour soup, and packed a few buns to eat on the flight. The hot and sour soup was Sichuan style. But I found it strange because I was asked if I wanted it hot (spicy) or sweet. I wanted it hot and they added chilli. The taste was nothing special, but it had a lot of ingredients in the soup. It was not hot and sour enough for me and I had to add a lot more pepper and vinegar to it. But at NT$30, I still thought it was a good deal.

Xichang Street 西昌街

Along the Xichang Street next to the park, I spotted 3 vegetarian eateries and 1 vegetarian pastry shop.

I ate at the Yangshengfugu Vegetarian Restaurant. (养生复古素食馆, see picture below)












The restaurant is on the second floor. It is a "buffet" restaurant. The dishes were laid out at the counter and I picked the dishes I want onto a plate. It was up to the owner's "judgement" how much the food was worth. The plateful I picked in the picture above cost me NT$60, which was quite reasonable. The plate of noodles was NT$40. The soup was free.


There were 2 other restaurants/eateries (see picture on the left) along the same stretch of the street. But I did not try there.

Across the Guangzhou Street, also along Xichang Street, there is another eatery （老牌龙山素菜部） opposite the Dizhang temple (marked 4 on the map above). I had a mushroom soup noodle for dinner there (NT$40), but found it less than satisfying.


Xichang Street night market 西昌街

Most people coming here at night would head to the Huaxi Night Market (Snake Alley) or the Guangzhou Street Night Market and would missed Xichang Street on the other side of the temple.

For those who like porridge and dishes(清粥小菜), I found a road-side stall set up in front of a bank just at the junction of Xichang Street and Guangzhou Street. It is not a pure vegetarian stall, but it has one section with quite a number of vegetarian dishes.

There is a night market along Xichang Street. At the end of the street (marked 5 on the map above) , there is a vegetarian street stall. I had soup noodles for NT$30 and stewed tofu for NT$40.

Guangzhou Street Night Market 广州街夜市

The Snake Alley (Huaxi Night Market) is well known for snake stews. Most of the food stores are seafood stalls. There is nothing much for vegetarians in there.

Towards the end of Guangzhou Street Night Market away from the Longshan temple (labelled 6 on the map), I found a few stalls serving vegetarian food. One of the stall is the usual local food stall selling noodles and stewed tofu and gluten. There is another one selling vegetarian stinking tofu and another stall selling vegetarian crispy fried mushroom (酥炸菇).

Vegetarian Travel - Shilin Night Market, Taipei

士林夜市

One of the highlights of visiting Taipei is to visit the night markets. Among the many night markets, Shilin is probably the biggest and most popular.

Night markets are the places where people indulge in various street eats. However, options for vegetarians are pretty limited.

Fret not. At Shilin, you get to try the various vegetarian version of street eats.

In the covered Shilin Night Market next to the Jiantan MRT station (the big red star next in the map), I counted 4 vegetarian stalls.

There is a stall selling spaghetti and baked rice. For those traveling alone, you get can get your fix of hot pots here as there is a stall that serve personal hot pots.

There are 2 stalls which serve local Taiwanese fare near the back of the market. However, one of the stall was deserted. The other had more patrons. Of course, I went to the one that had more customers. There is probably a reason why the other one is deserted.

I ordered fried stinking tofu(臭豆腐). Initially, I was a little hesitant about ordering this. But my Taiwanese friend said he would eat it if I won't. It turned out to be quite palatable as it did not stink too much.

I also ordered fried oyster omelete （蚵仔煎). There is no "oyster" in it. It is made from soy sheets (豆包)and seaweed, fried with sweet potato starch and some vegetables. Egg was optional. This was a lot nicer than the one I tried at a stall near the Yuanshan MRT.

I also ordered fried wontan (炸馄饨）, which was nothing special, and Taiwanese tempura （甜不辣). Taiwanese "tempura" is really fried fish paste, totally unlikely Japanese tempura which is prawns or vegetables fried in a crispy batter. I found the tempura a little too salty, but otherwise quite tasty. I am not sure what is it made of.

The price of each dish ranges from NT$30 to NT$80.

Besides the covered market next to the MRT, there is a big section of open street market further up along Dadong street (大东路) and Danang street (大南路). I did not find any specific vegetarian food stalls, except for one stall selling fried buns (生煎包) at the junction of Danang street with the main street (Wenlin Street). The stall sells only one flavour -- cabbage fillings. NT$10 each. Near it, there is a stall selling crispy onion pancake (葱油饼), it looked good, but the queue for it was really long. I was not inclined to queue up for it. There is another stall near by selling Indian wraps. It was nan wrapped with curry stuffings. There were three options, chicken, mutton and vegetarian (potato). But I thought it was quite expensive as it was NT$80 each.

Vegetarian in Taipei

Vegetarian food is easily available in Taipei. For those who know Chinese, there should not be any problem finding vegetarian food.

For the English speaker who can't read Chinese, it may be difficult to identify them. There are very few English signs.

Lonely Planet says to look for the Buddhist swastika sign, (卍) usually in red. But I found that few vegetarian restaurants actually have that sign.

Thus, the most important way to to identify vegetarian food, the important Chinese character to recognize is the word su 素 (see the picture if you can see this word on your computer) , its pronunciation is similar to "shoo".

However, do note that some stall or restaurants have the word "可素食", meaning "vegetarian available" or "suitable for vegetarian". In most cases, that means the food may not be pure vegetarian, but can be made without meat upon request.

As milk is normally not used in Chinese cooking, vegans should not have any problems too. I was a little surprised that eggs was used in some vegetarian places where I ate, they will always asked if it is alright to use egg. However, there are a few vegetarian restaurants selling Italian fare like pasta and spaghetti. Milk and cheese would be used in those restaurants.

As most people are vegetarian for religious reason, onion and garlic are normally not used in vegetarian food. Some snacks food such as the onion pancake (葱抓饼)do not contain any meat, but as it contains onion, it is not labeled as "su" 素.

For cheap vegetarian eats, vegetarian noodles can be had for NT$30 to NT$40 at road side stalls or small eateries.

There are also "buffets". These simple restaurants have many dishes laid out at the counter and you help yourself to the dishes you want. The price of the food is either based on weight or based on the owners "discretion".

Then there are the type of buffets in which you pay a single price and you eat all your can. Those are more expensive and nicer restaurants. Prices starts from NT$200 per person. I had an all-you-can-eat hot pot buffet which worked out to be NT$400 per person. That's about S$20, which is quite alright.

台北游之书乡书香

说台北是书乡，一点也不过分。

书局到处都是。出版刊物也多得目不暇给。

晶晶书局是慕名已久的书局。第一天抵台，就马上往晶晶跑一趟。书局比印象中还要小。书籍刊物也没想象中的多。但是，新加坡毕竟没有同志专门书局，我还是第一次看到这么多中文同志书刊。我很自制地、有选择性地选书，但结帐时，还是超出预算了。

重庆南路果然是名不虚传的书街。短短一段路里，不知道有多少间书局。我根本无法每间都逛。因为我有其中两间的优惠卡，所以就只专攻这两间。三小时后我背着满满的背包，提着一大袋的书刊离开。

中山捷运站和双莲捷运站之间的地下书街是看到捷运站中的广告才知道的。一整条地下街，尽是书局。不过，这里的书局都是小型的，卖的多数是流行文化、奇趣、食谱、消闲书刊。这里多数书都有85折，有些是倾销书，十分便宜。

原来并无意去诚品买书，因为诚品书局没有折扣。但是诚品这么出名，不买也得看看。到了诚品旗舰店逛了一下，还是买了几本书。这书局有够大的。好几层楼都是书。地方宽敞，又有桌椅，可以坐下慢慢看。相比，重庆南路的书局虽然起码都有九折，但是地方狭窄，人多时并不容易找书。慢慢看着，看见几本喜欢的，还是买了下来。因为懒得跑回重庆南路找。其中，《张先生。曹先生》是六年前出版的，之前在重庆南路找不到，竟在诚品这里看到了。诚品的畅销榜的书有85折，所以我也买了上榜的《柜子里的彩虹》。

逛旧书店的的乐趣就是无法预料能找到什么书，所以找到喜欢的书时，确实是有种惊喜。

在公馆夜市附近看到几间旧书书局，进去逛逛，却没收获。或许是靠近大学的关系，这里的书多数是学术性的。反而是在士林夜市有意外的收获。剑潭捷运站旁的士林临时市场里有一间旧书书局。这里意外找到几本同志文学，一些书3本才NT$100。在这里找到了《盛夏光年》。虽然我家里已有了一本，但我还是买下来了，因为想捐一本给Pelangi Pride Centre。

在九分，我意外地找到九份乐伯二手书店（地址，九份佛堂街31号，基山街221号旁）。这间书店的小说散文集还真多。书价是标价打五折，再来85折，真的很便宜。这里的惊喜还真不少。

我进来第一眼就看到了席慕蓉的《七里香》。我两天前才在重庆南路以NT$190买了新的，这本像新一样才NT$105。我买下了，如果遇到喜欢席慕蓉的诗的，可以送人。 在二楼的旧书堆里，我找到了安克强的《我恋你依然如昔》。这可是十多年前我在图书馆借过的一本书，是早期接触到的同志文学之一，印象挺深。买！还有找到了许佑生的《男婚男嫁》和《最佳单恋得主》，李月华的《红颜男子》，蔡康永的《那些男孩教我的事》。

离开九份，我带走的不是游客的手信，而是一袋的书。

离开台北前，我又去了一趟晶晶书局，因为要为朋友买一本杜达雄的摄影集。这次发现了安克强主编的世纪同志爱读本系列。之前没看到。三本《青春放歌》、《爱恋无悔》和《第三者》都买下。同时，也买下张曼娟主编的《同辈》。我也买了《亲爱的爸妈，我是同志》，打算看完后捐给Pelangi Pride Centre。

若不是行李重量有限制，我可以买很多的书。但是超额的附加费太贵，加上去就不划算。因此，只能有选择的买一些新加坡找不到的书。

最后一天在台北，从中正纪念堂走到历史博物院时，看到了一间挺大的书局，全面85折，真想进去。最后还是打消念头，因为行李真的已经太重了。

这次，从台北带回来的，除了回忆，就是书了。

华健的歌

每个人心中都有一首华健的歌。
每一首华健的歌
都有一个我的故事。

取自《伤心的歌》MV

今天，天气特别阴冷。

今天，天气特别阴冷。
回想起来，我的青春岁月也多半和这种天气型态相去不远。
很晚启蒙，不像你。
不够自信，不像你。
不过，我仍会很努力活着的。
因为我知道还有很多值得追求的幸福。
除了那些璀璨的水男孩，和梦幻派对及健身房里，看得见却永远无法认识的男孩之外，我知道，还有还有很多值得追求的幸福。

《男湾》 垦丁男孩

一开始我们是简单的

一开始我们是简单的。

简单的高中制服跟白色内裤... ... 简单的书包放着他写给我那一堆密密麻麻丑丑的字... ...简单的毕业典礼送完礼物分道扬镳... ...简单的争风吃醋还有我曾经为你哭。

一开始我们是简单的，后来事情有了些变化... ...

取自《男湾》 推荐序二