I won the Taiwanderful award 2010!

I'm Best Taiwan Blog 2010 by popular vote

Ladies and Gents, we won the Best Taiwan Blog Award 2010 hosted by Taiwanderful.com! Yes, we actually did it. And believe it or not, we won 3 awards by popular vote: The Best Overall Taiwan Blog, Best General Taiwan Blog and Best Northern Taiwan Blog. Woohoo! Thank you so much for every vote you have cast for me. I am almost lost for words.

But I still have to say something to all of you. I really don't know where to start and who to thank, because so many of you have voted and spread the word to your friends, who have voted as well, be it Taiwanese, Slovenian or from all over the world. So thank you and I mean all of you. Amazing, how it all went viral so fast. With that said, I really need to dedicate a special thank you to my lovely girlfriend Lily, who helped me win this one, because she fired up so many of her friends. I would not win this one without her - she's truly gold. And combined with my own friends and readers, we reached the incredible number of 619 votes, 115 more than the blog that made it to second place. I would love to mention everyone of you, but the list would be endless, so I'll only mention few, who went out of their way to help me get more votes, namely Saša, Fui Fa, Ade, Roni, Stefanie and Joanne, thanks a lot guys and girls. This competition showed how many friends I have and how many people appreciate the effort I put in this blog. I really felt that every vote was cast with love and appreciation and that's truly the best Christmas present I ever got. You guys are my Santa this year, everyone of you. Thanks for spreading the love and you can be sure that I'll return it whenever I can. Really really thank you! 謝謝! This award is yours and mine, we won it together. We're awesome ;-)

And since the whole idea behind the competition was to highlight some great English language blogs about Taiwan, I want to share my favorite 3 here. I actually don't follow that many Taiwan bloggers, but the few I do are really top notch, if you ask me. These are my personal winners this year:

1. Steven Vigar photography: He's just purely amazing. If I'm ever half the photographer he is, then I'm already a photography god. His portraits are amazing, you have to check them out. Steven is extremely talented and nice and I think he would equally deserve to win the top award this year. Follow him, you'll love his pics.
   
   
2. Yellow Fever, Foreign Moons: This blog features multiple writers, who share stories about relationships between foreigners and Taiwanese. Sometimes the stories are weird, sometimes funny, but always very blunt. And every post is translated in Chinese. The debates can get heated up, but it's definitely a good read. Please follow, that blog deserves more comments and readers.
   
   
3. Josh in Taiwan: Another awesome photographer, who makes incredible phots. Sadly, I'll never be able to make them as good as he does, but luckily that's not something I aspire. Josh sees so much beauty in every detail, his photos are truly magical. He could easily win a peer-judged award, had he been more visible these days.

You can also follow David's and Fili's blog, they're the ones that organized the Taiwanderful Blog Award 2010. Thank you guys for bringing together so many great bloggers, who are passionate about Taiwan. I hope 2011 will be a great year for all of us and for the R.O.C., that'll turn 100 years. Looking forward to many great articles and blog posts. If you're interested in following some other Taiwan blogs, go here and check the blog directory.

So what can you expect from me in 2011? As far as Taiwan goes (and I'm not only gonna blog about that), I plan to visit every bigger night market in and around Taipei and introduce them. I'll make tons of pics, write reviews, recommend the best food and then make a list. Another thing I plan to do is to visit every museum in Taipei (and elsewhere if given the chance) and then blog about that, too. The third thing I plan are my travelogues. I wanna visit so many places I haven't seen yet, such as Tainan (I've only been there 2 hours at night), Hualien, Chiayi, Miaoli, Nantou, Taitung, Yilan and many more... Expect pics, tips and funny stories. Besides all that, I'll explore the Taiwanese pop culture, introduce models, singers and other fun stuff. No idea what's in store for me next year, but if everything goes right, my blog will be one of the best resources on Taiwan by the end of 2011. Looking forward to that :) I hope you do, too.

Happy holidays, everybody!

Read also: Taiwanese flooded my blog>>

Gayke, Ximending's craziest food stall

This snack gives the word »foodgasm« a whole new meaning

By clicking on the photos you can see their uncensored versions, but by doing so, you claim to be above 18 years and solely responsible for the consequences of that action. Some photos may be NSFW, especially if you live in a highly prudish society.

Just when I thought Taiwanese couldn't get wackier or crazier, I was once again proved wrong. My girlfriend and her friend went to Ximending today and tried a very unique "cake". The thing is, it's not really a cake, it's a hot dog. A special "hot dog". Special, because it has a shape of a phallus (to put it nicely). First of all, I want to know what was going on in that person's head, who came up with this cuckoo idea? Secondly, wtf? Maybe he was brainstorming with his friends and then suddenly came up with this question. Actually I have no idea and I don't really wanna know. I heard the initial idea was making a dish popular with gays, but now it seems that the most common customers are girls. I wonder why ;-)

Ximending, Taipei's popular district, where mostly young people frequent, is famous for wacky bars and shops, but this one is probably crazier than all of them combined. I think only a sandwigina shop could top that. The small stall is relatively new (it opened in February 2010) and is not really as known as the Modern Toilet restaurant, because not a lot was written about them so far (I'm probably the first English post).

Their main dish is called gayke (combination of gay and cake). In Chinese they call it 大雕燒 (Dàdiāoshāo) roughly translated as baked big bird, ("big bird" is Chinese nickname for the organ). They advertise it as "大雕燒 a piece of gayke", you can't miss their very graphic signboard. In case you want to find them, there's a map below.

People waiting for their phallic shaped dish (Click on pic for NSFW version).

You can choose various flavors to pamper you taste buds.

This is the mold, where the gayke is shaped and made.

Two gaykes are displayed in front of the stall (Click on pic for NSFW version).

The gayke from close, before being topped with a sauce (Click on pic for NSFW version).

The gayke topped with ketchup (Click on pic for NSFW version).

And that's how it looks like when you bit off the head top.

View Larger Map

Now the 100 million New Taiwanese Dollars question is: How does the gayke taste? Well, according to my girlfriend it tastes great! The ingredients are simple. The bun is made of a common Taiwanese egg cake (雞蛋糕) and filled with a German sausage, then baked and topped with ketchup at the end. So it's not really like a classic hot dog, that uses bread, but figuratively that dog is hot. It's so hot that I would not eat it in public, that's for sure. But my girlfriend did it. She and her friend made a few very funny photos. In fact they were so funny, that I won't post them here. How about you go and try a hot succulent gayke yourself. Would you?

The funniest thing about having a gayke are the conversations you have with your friends while eating it:

My girlfriend to friend: »How's yours? Mine is a bit soft, but stands well.«
Friend replies: »Mine's harder than yours.« LOL!

Or when I asked her how much does one gayke cost, she replied: »One di*k is 50NTD.«

Hahaha.. That always cracks me up.

So what do you think about this unique dish? Would you try it? Is it cool and fun or is it a bit too crazy for your taste?

For more photos and info, check their blog wretch.cc/blog/big2010gayke>>

[My TAIPEI page][TAIPEI food][西門町][All photos by LilyChen, 2010]

Cosplay in Taipei, 2010

Check my girlfriend's photos

Ok, I have to admit that she probably isn't an MKL fan. I used a team of very skilled photoshoppers to put that logo in there. Doesn't she look cool? :-)

In case you're interested in cosplay, check my girlfriend's awesome photos. She went to a recent gathering of cosplayers in Taipei and took plenty of pics. The cosplay subculture is in recent years very popular in Taiwan and the Taiwanese teens are as good as Japanese, when it comes to dress up like their favorite manga characters. You can also see what the girl above really held in her hand. Have fun browsing pics. More here:

✰ Cosplay in Taipei, 2010 via Flickr by LilyChen>>

[My TAIPEI page][Photo by LilyChen, 2010]

Lovers in Seoul

»You don't love a woman because she is beautiful,

but she is beautiful because you love her« by Unknown

송희 woke up pretty late and had to rush to town. She was very troubled, didn't know where her head was. Not only did she have a major assignment at school, she also had a very important date with a certain someone at 1 o'clock. It was already 11. She found her watch, put it on and realized she only had few minutes to find the second stiletto as well as some untorn stockings. Her skirt was thoroughly crumpled, so she quickly ironed it with her hands. Her hair was messy, she tied it in a bun and soon after began cursing while frantically putting on the the only undamaged tights she had found. She uttered »How did I end up like that« when her uncut razor sharp toenail pierced through the fabric like a hot knife through a piece of butter. She instantly lost it. She pulled everything off and decided to go bare legged. By going over her the skin with the hand, she realized that she hadn't shaved her legs for a while, which made her utter another »damn«, but she didn't have time to even think about that. She just grabbed her purse, put on the shoes and rushed off, nearly jumping down the stairs, stumbling several times. She soon felt something was wrong with her shoes and by looking down she recognized that she put on two different ones, one with a visibly shorter heel. She could not return, because the bus on the other side of the road was already letting people in and she had to speed up her pace to catch it. She was lucky that day, the driver seemed to be in good mood, because he waited for her. All sweaty and messed up she started walking up the aisle trying to find an empty seat. There was none. So she stood there all by herself, with old women giving her mean stares, seemingly gossiping about her. She had no time to think about that either, all she cared about in that moment was that dreaded assignment. The bus suddenly stopped and her purse fell down, with a lipstick rolling down the aisle. Everyone stared. She blushed a little, but gracefully walked out. However once she had left the bus, she realized she had made a terrible mistake. She took the wrong bus and ended up in a totally wrong direction. She sat down on a bench at the station and started crying. She knew she can forget the assignment and she didn't feel like going on the date. She felt terrible and out of place. But somehow the thought of him calmed her, soothed her, gave her hope. She knew she had to meet him in that café that day, because she didn't have his number, nor his address. If she didn't meet him that day, she would probably never get another chance again. After all, Seoul is a big city. She decided to find her way back. She spotted the main road and hoped to get a better overview of the whole area. She could not walk well, so her pace was slow. It was 11.47 when she suddenly saw a subway station on the horizon. She knew she'll have to walk a long way, before she can ride that train to the guy, that made her heart flutter upon a mere thought. Her mind was wandering. And the train was, too. After seemingly endless 53 minutes she finally reached at Yeouinaru. She knew she was late and was nearly convinced that he had left already. But she wanted to be sure, she wanted to see, if that seat at the café is really empty. Half limping to the entrance, she saw someone through the door glass. Could that possibly be him? She wasn't sure. Maybe someone else took the spot, since it was already 27 minutes after 1 o'clock. She opened the door and slowly approached that famous table from the popular TV drama. It was him! She stopped for a second, took a deep breath and then voiced out a gentle »hello«. A hello with a trembling underlip, colored with fear and despair. She felt ugly and dirty, messy and lost. And in that moment she stood there like that in front of the man of her dreams.

»Hello 송희«, he said with a smile, stood up and offered her the seat. She sat down.
»You look beautiful today« he added, widened his smile and gently touched her hand.
She smiled, too. And then they had coffee.

[Photo by MKL, 2010, from Yeouido]

Trip to Graz/Gradec, Austria

The second biggest Austrian city

Click the photo below to see the map of our Slovenia tour 2010.

Graz (Slovenian Gradec, with around 260.000 inhabitants) is the second biggest Austrian town and the last destination of our Slovenia tour 2010. I thought it would be great, if my girlfriend, who saw towns like Piran, Trieste, Bled and Maribor, also sees another medieval gem in this part of Europe. Graz is not only the hometown of the actor and soon to be former governator Arnold Alois Schwarzenegger, it's also one of the European cities with the best preserved medieval centers, which is even protected by the UNESCO. From the 12th to the early 20th century Graz used to be the capital city of Styria, a duchy within the Austrian monarchy (German Steiermark, Slovenian Štajerska), which included big parts of today's northeastern Slovenia, including my hometown Maribor. For a long time Graz was the economic and cultural center of this part of the world. It also had one of the first universities in the area and many famous Slovenians in the past (and even today) got their education in Graz, that's why the city is also important for the history of Slovenians (more info about Graz here).

FUN FACT: The name "Graz" originates from Old Slovenian "Gradec" (pronounced Grah·dets), which means "Small castle". Interestingly, "Maribor" (my hometown) originates from Old German "Marchburg", which means "Castle in the border region". We should've swapped the names or something. Well, this just proves that in the past Slovenians and Germans used to live on the both sides of the border.

Now you know, why I had to bring my girlfriend there. I'm sorry, this post is photo intensive, but I really like Graz's old town and want to show you all the beautiful spots. See my 4o photos of Graz, Austria's second biggest city:

Our trip started near Maribor and lead us over the border to Austria.

We needed about 35min and we reached the suburbs.

We were lucky to find an empty parking spot. A bit far from the center, but still ok.

We had to walk like 15min along this road, where many immigrants live.

On a Bosnian restaurant. She's a singer and she surely has a lot to offer.

The river Mur that flows through Graz also flows through Slovenia, we call it Mura.

The Franciscan church originates from the 13th/14th century.

That's where we enter the center of Graz.

I knew where I wanted to bring my girlfriend: To the Town hall building.

But we got hungry and wanted to try a hot dog. The lady was very slow, but really friendly. It felt like my grandmother made the dog for me. And it tasted really good.

And this is one of the most impressive buildings in Graz: The Town hall or Rathaus.

My girlfriend and her cute skirt waving in the morning breeze.

The Hauptplatz or Main square in Graz.

The famous Herrengasse, which is the most popular street in the center if Graz.

That's how the tram looks like in Graz.

And then we went to have a nice dessert. It was getting hot and we saw a big queue of people in front of an ice cream shop called Charly Temmel. The common sense says, if there are many people around a certain shop, it has to be good. So we gave it a try.

The ice cream was really yummy! I highly recommend.

A view on the Herrengasse (literally Gentleman street).

The Mariensäule (Mary column) with a fountain.

The Stadtpfarrkirche church from the 18th century looks nice.

We left the Herrengasse and explored some other parts.

This part had a Mediterranean atmosphere.

I love cities, where people hang out and fill up the restaurants on the streets.

She's Taiwanese, yes. But I was the one who incited her to do this :P

Walking to the northern part of Graz, I wanted us to go atop the castle hill.

This part is lovely as well, but we went the wrong way.

Ehm... do you love yours? :P

Judging by the accent, this girl with the gnarly hairdo was American.

And we finally reached the stairways to the Schloßberg (Castle hill).

I had fears that my (usually) clumsy girlfriend will trip, that's why I had to escort her up like a bodyguard. I'm not really comfortable climbing such stairs, but it was really worth it.

The view was getting better and better.

And then: Ta-dah! The Town hall building.

And finally we were above the Graz old town.

She totally owned Graz, woohoo!

This is the Urhturm (Clock tower) located atop of Schloßberg (Castle hill).

The name Castle hill indicates a castle, which doesn't stand here for over 2 centuries. When Napoleon's army came to Graz in the early 19th century, they destroyed the old castle, but the citizens offered money in exchange to keep the Clock tower and Glockenturm (Bell tower) intact. The French invaders agreed and today the two towers are famous landmarks of the city.

A nice garden on top of the hill.

The whole area was lovely, however we couldn't stay here too long, the sky was getting gray and I suggested that we leave the top and go back down and home. I feared a storm.

It's gotten really gray, but luckily we weren't caught in the rain.

We passed by the Murinsel (Mur island), a floating platform, built in 2003.

The view on the Castle hill.

And then we came back and most of the cars were gone. Luckily ours wasn't.

Graz is definitely worth a visit. Even if your main destination is Slovenia, go for a day trip to Austria and visit this city. It's clean and very beautiful. Compared to Maribor, it attracts a lot of foreign immigrants, be it from ex Yugoslavia, Turkey, Africa or Asia. It will give you the feeling of being in a big cosmopolitan city, but with a small town atmosphere. However, compared to Vienna, Graz is a small town, so don't expect too much. Compared to Maribor, Graz is a big city.

My rating of Graz:

Great place for photos ✰✰✰✰✰

Well preserved and clean ✰✰✰✰✰

Toilets, parking, souvenirs ✰✰✰✰✰

Friendly to tourists ✰✰✰✰✰

Maribor: City of towers :Before [Slovenia Tour 2010] The tour ends here.

[My MARIBOR page][All photos by MKL, 2010]