Vivian's dream (one of her countless dreams) came true -- owning a nice tea set.

She picked up this set from Shanghai during her month long vacation in Asia. In supporting her money spending decision, I'd have to agree it is pretty cool to relax, sit around the table and sip on tea. The presentation is great, and it definitely portrait the aroma and the taste of fine tea much better than gulp out of a Styrofoam cup.

While in the escrow office this afternoon signing paper for the Palo Alto house we got, I had an re-occurring epiphany -- I should give Vivian the Power of Attorney so she can sign documents for me!!

It is a very logical remedy to my frequent travel and our frequent need to sign legal binding documents. This way, Vivian can sign on my behalf, and I can do my job flying around the globe without worrying that we might lose out on a deal due to my lack of presence.

Two signatures in front of the Title officer (Public Notary), that's all it took for me to give Vivian the legal rights that covers everything and anything. She can now sign all of our mutual assets away, sell all of our properties, transfer all of my IRAs and empty out all of my bank accounts, auction away my kidney on eBay, run away with another man and leave me penniless with one missing kidney, YAH! :)

Just found out today that I have to make a trip to Penang, Malaysia to give a tour of our Penang factory to one of our top customer. The date our Japanese VIPs picked was Fri 6/1, which is the day before Frank/Connie's wedding, where Vivian and I are part of the wedding party. humm... this calls for some creative trip planning.

Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz and Sidestep, I opened them all up and punched in the travel dates and searched for flights by departure/arrival time. Interesting enough, this is one result Sidestep gave me. Now, all I need to do is to convince my management to flip the bill!

(search results from Sidestep.com)

Today was one of those seldom occasions where I actually arrived at the airport well before the boarding time. I tend to be fashionably late as I detest waiting at the gate and stare at the people who I’d probably never see again for the rest of my life, it is as boring to me as watching grass grow. Anyways, I am glad I gave myself enough time today tho, as I had to go thru some interesting time consuming experiences today at the Taipei airport.

You see, I had to check-in two rather large suitcases to take back to US. “Rather large” doesn’t really describe the situation, for one of the suitcases was stuffed with books and stamp collections and more books, and I broke my back probably twice hulling it in and out of the car on the way to the airport. Naïve as I am, I thought that since I was flying business class, the lady at the check-in counter would just smile, tag my ultra-heavy luggage and send me to the lounge to sip on green tea... that didn’t happen, the heavier of the two luggage weighted in at 40kg or 8kg (~20lbs) over the weight limit (which explains my back-breaking experiences), and I was asked to “lose some weight”. I tried to play cool, flashed my frequent flier Gold card and offered to pay extra for the overweight, but she declared that the US airport luggage handlers are protected by Union and might simply refuse to move my rather large suitcases. Out of options, I proceeded to operate on the suitcase, took out the entire 1990-2000 Taiwan stamp collection I was carrying back for my soon to be father-in-law. I used to laugh at those poor idiots who have to dig out all of their underwear and strap-ons in-front of the check-in line, I have always thought them to be poor planning and thus put themselves in that rather embarrassing situations at the airport. Today I was that idiot... after removing the entire stamp collection and toss out Vivian’s sandal and my four cans of 鲁肉罐头, I made weight and wasted half hour...

Custom and security wasn’t too bad, I got thru them in less than 10 mins, I still had an hour before boarding time. That weight control incident really worked a sweat out of me, and at this point I was really looking forward to some tasty 小笼包 and porridge they have at the airline lounge.

Walking pass all the duty free shop and the Cartier store in the corner caught my eyes, “oh crap” I said, as I remembered that I needed to request VAT tax refund for the wedding ring I bought at Taipei Cartier last week. The information desk lady told me the tax refund is outside of the custom... I muttered few four letter words and approached the custom to see if they can let me go out and come back in.

This is where I really should credit Taiwan’s airport services, very impressive! The custom agent called up another custom agent Lily on the walkie-talkie, and Lily ran over to assist me by re-admitting me back into Taiwan, in another word, she pretty much void my departing custom stamp and sign a bunch of documents, took me over to security, ran my bags thru security again, signed a bunch of documents, took me to the entrance to security, signed a bunch of documents, and 20 mins later, I was standing in the main check-in lobby again, shouting distance away from the check-in lady who made me “lose weight” about an hour earlier. I refunded my VAT, got the money, and Lily took me back thru security, cutting lines at the custom check point, and another 20 mins later, I was back in the terminal section staring at the duty-free stores

Ten mins to departure, I am now dying for some 小笼包 and porridge. I limped down the terminals, hulling the entire 1990-2000 stamp collections in one hand, a bag of Taiwan sweets and treats in the other hand, and a big backpack with laptops on my back, sweat dripping down my cheek, and my eyeglasses slipping off my nose, but I didn’t care, I had my mind set on 小笼包.

Finally made it to the airline lounge five mins before boarding, the entrance lady was puzzling why I still wanted to go in as others on my flights were now leaving the lounge to head over to the gate. Two flights of stairs down, I’ve made it to the lounge’s dinning room!! I can now smell the aroma of 小笼包 by now... As luck playing joke on me, damn! there is a long line in front of the food window, seems like everyone in the lounge shared my fancy for 小笼包. I can feel the rage building up inside of me, and picture myself grabbing the steamy plate of 小笼包 the first in line fat lady who just received, and kick her all the way to the lobby’s check-in counter to have a face-to-face with the “lose weight” lady.

Needless to say, I made the decision that catching my flight was more important than the much desired food. Not eating was a big dismay, however, I was able to check in my luggages, bring back the stamp collections (brownie points with future dad-in-law), got be VAT refund, pretty lucky I should consider myself to be. And to top everything off, the gate lady swapped my seat to a window seat on the second floor where I have more storage space between the seat and the window. Not bad, not bad at all.

Taiwan streets is packed with scooters, people of all ages ride these light weight mopeds zooming around the city. In a crowded city like Taipei, major streets are jammed with buses, taxis and sedans, the countless alleys are stuffed with food stands and parked vehicles; riding a scooter really is the most convenient way to go from point A to point B.



I took this picture while in a moving taxi, quite pleased with how the pictures turned out. It gives the visual sensation that the scooter speeds down the road, sharing the road with its four-wheeled friends. Love my Leica!

We ran into some friends we met back in US here in Taipei, and they invited us to attend their wedding, on the spot. Vivian and I have never attended any wedding in Taiwan before, and since we are pulling our hair out preparing for our wedding, we thought, what the hey, let’s check out their wedding.



The wedding was interesting, fairly high class, a mix of Taiwan and western style. Unlike in the US, where the banquet usually follows the ceremony, it was combined into one event here in their wedding. The bride walked down the isle (between the banquet tables) and was handed off to her new hubby by her father, then proceed to the front of the room to undergo the “yes, I do!” ceremony. All that happens at the same time as the guests chews on their appetizers. Although sequence of events was different, but it made sense; Chinese weddings these days are mostly about the banquet, it is logically to integrate the “I do” part into the banquet.



What didn’t make sense to me was how quiet it was, as the newly wed couple went from table to table toasting, the MC actually goes around and instruct the guests not to get up during the toast. I don’t know about you guys out there, but my idea of a wedding is a good and happy time for everyone; loud and obnoxious is totally normal and wanted by my book, similar to My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Just can’t believe they actually make the effort to quiet people down.



The food was excellent tho. It was Chinese dishes but served western style. The wait staff separates the food into individual plates for the guest, quite convenient indeed and you don’t have to fight with others over food.

Interesting experience...

My flight landed five hours ago, I’ve decided to camp out at the airport and wait for Vivian’s flight instead of go to hotel and come back.

Doing what a good geek does, as soon as I walked out of the baggage claim, I took out my laptop, set it on top of my luggage cart, turned on the wireless, and went around the airport looking for hotspots...

I did the hard work finding the hotspot so for those of you planning on visiting Taipei won’t have to. As soon as you walk out of the arrival gate, head left to the end of the hall where Casa Mila Café is located, the food there is tasty, reasonablely priced, and most importantly -– they provide free wireless! I now have been sitting here in the Casa Mila Café for 4 hours, enjoyed my croissant tuna sandwich and two cups of coffee, and received abundant weird looks from the waitresses, I don’t blame them, I look like shit (and probably smell like one too) after my ATL-SFO 5 hour flight immediately followed by the 13 hours SFO-TPE flight...

Four more hours before Vivian arrives, I need to find another place to camp out.