trip to taipei - day 2 taipei city

i slept most of the day. only managed to leave the room at about 3pm.

i did a visual scan of the people around me in grindr and noted there were loads and loads of gaymen around the area. eye candies most of them but of cos, for this uncle here, i have no market value and thus could only ogle at the sweet young things in grindr. haha... but this was not gonna stop me from exploring gay taipei. did i google again of gay taipei and noted quite a few areas that gaymen frequent and decided to visit them.

so on this day, i walked all over the taipei city. and for once in my many 30-over times in taiwan, i did not enter any major shopping centers. instead, i decided i explored the areas less explored by tourists - gay spots, that is. once again, i walked around xmd belt and the little red house area. needed to grab a quick bite. and once done, i took the mrt to the 1914 cultural center. i timed it such that i arrived at the center about 7-plus. it was a nice creative place where there were lotsa young people mingling around, dancing, chatting, and just chilling out. there's this thing about taiwanese culture that one cannot find anywhere else. very chinese, yet very young and contemporary. it was a really energetic place.

i left the place around 8-ish and decided to walk to my next destination. it would be too early if i take the train, i reckoned. it was a slow 2km walk to daan forest park. this is a well-known park that was converted from a military camp and, over time, has become a gay cruising haunt, so i read from the web. when i arrived, there were many many joggers and families in the park. i guessed i was early but it didn't matter. it was a really good nice place to just sit, chill-out and people-watch. the weather averaged 22 degrees and it was really nice and best of all, there were no mozzies! and then soon enough, i began to see a couple of gay guys... as in everywhere else i know, gay guys are quite easy to spot. i am not sure if it's the local gay scene, but a few of them carried a water bottle as they walked - and it reminded me of fort road singapore! it was also interesting to see a potato queen walking with his caucasian friend (and they were very cute too!), complete with a pretentious american english slang! heh...

for some reasons, and unlike many gay cruising haunts, the few people i saw cruising there were in their 20s. very nice. i left the place about 10-ish and walked back to xmd area - it was a good long walk and passed by the chiang kai shek memorial, the presidential palace, the infamous 228 peace park (another gay cruising spot but i didn't stop by), before reaching xmd. walked a bit around xmd area again and ate some street food before heading back to my room. was totally dead beat by then. i had completed almost 14km that day...