Today after class me and several of my other classmates and MTC acquaintances went to Ximen's Modern Toilet. One of my favorite places to eat. They were very accommodating. I reserved for 6 people but when more people showed up, they immediately made room for the larger party. Being as the place was already packed, I don't know how they managed that. +1 to them. The food is great as tasty as usual. If your not familiar with Modern Toilet, there is a brief description and pictures in my earlier posts 2-3 months back. I just don't get tired of eating beef curry out of a toilet shaped bowl, sipping yellow tea out of a urinal shaped cup and eating frozen yogurt out of a miniature squat toilet.
The toilet humor was abundant. It was also the first time for a lot of classmates to eat here, so I'm privileged enough to introduce them to this. I think they'll come back :). Afterwards, we went to a bar behind Ximen red house (西門紅樓). I forgot the bar name, but it's in the middle and pink colored. There are a lot of bars back there. Tons of open tables too. All outside and some under their own umbrellas, in case it rains. They serve food too. Fortunately we grabbed a table under a huge umbrella, because it did start raining as we predicted. I would have never know this place was behind the red house. Most of the time you see the market in front, then stop when it ends. We chatted it up for a while and drank some too. I had some absinthe (Fruko TW). Tastes like peppermint menthol alcohol. It's some pretty strong stuff too at 140 proof. Here's a quote from wiki "Absinthe has been portrayed as a dangerously addictive psychoactive drug. The chemical thujone, present in small quantities, was blamed for its alleged harmful effects. By 1915, absinthe had been banned in the United States and in most European countries including France, The Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and the Austro-Hungarian Empire." The dangerously addictive psychoactive drug part has been greatly exaggerated though. Anyways, back to the evening. We talked for several hours. And I mean several. We didn't leave the bar until 3AM.
We got hungry, so we decided to head over to the now empty Ximen night market. The 24 hour McDonald's was still open. I bought some taro pies ($25NT). In America, it's normally filled with apple pie. But the taro is unique to the Taiwan market. We continued to chat a little while longer, until 4AM. Then we called separate taxies, because the buses and trains don't run past midnight. I learned about two numbers to use in order to get a 30% discount on cab fare. You dial 55178 or 55688 from your phone and person on the phone asks your location, destination, name, phone number. They then record all the information for next time. So on your second call, they greet you by your name. They assume it's the same destination, so all you have to do is give them your current location. I've taken a taxi from Ximen before and it costs around $340 NT. This time, with the discount, it cost me $210 NT. Awesome! Very useful for staying up late past the bus and MRT schedule. Well it's wayyy past my bedtime!!!
Here we are again! Gut-busting All You Can Eat hot pot at Ximending. One of my good friends here in Taipei was recently turned onto my blog. So after reading the article about Chien Yen hot pot, she really really wanted to me to revisit the place with her. According to her, mainly for the dessert/cake display not the hot pot! Well, in my original post, I only posted pictures of the cake display and not of any hot pot action. At first she was unable to decide if she wanted this much food. But at the last minute, I got a call from her stating that she was IN! Well, for gut-busting desserts perhaps. So we met up, walked in and put our names down on the waiting list. Even for a Sunday evening, it's still quite packed and thus we waited about 15 minutes. I'm sure it would have been worse had we walked in without reservations on a Friday or Saturday evening. We sat, we ate, we burped, we ate some more and then went dessert binging! yadda yadda. You get the idea from my last post about this gem of a place. Oh although they don't have froyo, they do have soft serve ice cream. In the end, she liked it so much she vowed to return with her family members when they visited. You should should visit too!
