Khaosiung Night # 4/Flight to Sapporo

The city’s hotels are all at capacity. The conference for mech-industrial engineering/shipping/(I heard someone at breakfast say) gun mounts/international something was making it tough to get hotels at the beginning of the year. The hotel managers are all running around smiling at the guests and nudging the employees. It was nice to eat as soon as they opened then get out of there.
I was trying to figure out why there are more Westerners at the Taiwan shows. You can get tickets on StubHub. The Tokyo shows were through lottery and seem very daunting.
My wicked cold is nearing the end of its visit with me and is packing up to go. It’s been about 10-12 days and it’s the 1st day I have woken up and not felt like shit. I’m really glad, b/c I’m flying out to the Northern most prefecture (like a State) and it is snowing and going to be really cold.
Taiwan reminds me more of Thailand. (It’s probably the motorbikes. But it’s a 1st world country and is clean and ranked as one of the safest countries period. Also, I’m comparing it to Japan, which is such a culture independent of anything else in the Asian world.
And, I just read that Taiwan was a colony of Japan, but was turned over to China after WW2. And something else I noticed last night. No stray kitties. They are cat crazy as a culture but I didn’t see any street kitties.
Taiwan is supposed to be an excellent place for expats. Hmmmmm. Add another option to the “retire in Asia” list. The dollar seems to do well here too. That braised pork set I had for lunch yesterday was $6.00. And that was good nutritious whole food.
The people here have been very nice too.
So I have just come back from the 4th show. 4th show and have been reflecting on the whole process from beginning to end. Truly, I am just amazed that :
a) I bought tickets for concerts in Taiwan when I was going to be in Japan; “making a long weekend out of it”. Then, thinking that applying for, and getting, tickets in Tokyo was such a long shot, but nothing ventured, nothing gained; and doing it anyway-then actually getting tickets for BOTH nights. 🤦‍♀️
B) 1 ticket for Taiwan was mailed to my house and the other mailed to my hotel in Khaosiung, and I really didn’t think that I would end out actually getting those tickets in my hand. And I did.
C) The thought that I would see Coldplay in Tokyo ( not to mention Taiwan) was so far away from my list of all things possible, I just don’t even know. I never even dreamed of something that good.
D) And it really goes to show, if you don’t try you will never know.
I did something a little different at this last show. First, I found a good spot, with room to dance and see the stage and just stayed there. Even with coffee and cold meds, I was tired last night. I knew what the last 2 songs were and I have never really liked either of them. So when the 2nd to the last song started I had made my way to the stairs to go up the side of the stadium and go out the way I came in. I could hear the last songs as I was leaving and they sounded great. By the time the concert ended, I was 1/2 way down the 1.3 km boulevard towards the metro station.
The night before stood in a crowd halfway up the Blvd as we slowly made our way to the same metro station. It was fine and fun to watch the crowd, but I wasn’t interested in doing that again. I rounded the corner and headed up the metro station stairs with out stopping and was able to get on the 1st train that came in. It was really nice.
So it is now Monday am about 8:10 am. I made the choice to get an early flight so I could make the most of this day. I went to bed at 1 am, got up at 4 am and was packed ready and waiting for my 5:30 car service to come pick me up. The hotel had been very kind and asked me if I needed a taxi and I had said no. Well, the car service never showed. At 5:38 I went in and asked the doorman for a taxi. There was one that was sitting right there in their driveway so they got me in and off I went. I messaged the car service and will email them when I’m not running around trying to catch flights.
Had a bit of a snafu at the airport as well. I had gone thru security and was at passport control when a China Air rep came running up to me. They needed me to open my checked luggage as there was something in there they needed to verify/check/have me take out. I was like Sure. So turns out it was my neck fan. I thought they just needed to identify it. So I showed it to him, then put it back in the checked luggage.
25 min later, I’m having coffee and rice/meat/veggies for a good Asian breakfast and they come up to me again. Luggage control needs me to open my luggage. I said, “Yes, it’s my neck fan. I showed it to him. “ This is where language and cultural barriers come into play. A rep from JFK would have said “You have to take that with you. “ But no one said that. And I didn’t ask. ( good lesson there) So we had to go back through security and I found myself in front of the same guy. So I asked, this needed to go with me, it cannot be checked? And he said correct.
Funny enough I had to go back through security and passport control a total of 3 times. lol, thank goodness it wasn’t very busy. It seemed like there was something I was supposed to be learning, so I was making sure to go with the flow.
So now we are taxi-ing down the tarmac getting ready to take off. I saw 2 private planes as I was boarding. I’m going to assume those belong to Coldplay and not a couple of Taiwanese business men. It’s more fun in my version.
So I boarded and promptly feel asleep. I declined the beautiful meal they offered as I had eaten in the lounge. The last trip when I flew home from Bangkok, I should have declined that meal, it had been delicious but I overdid it and could only sip peppermint tea the whole way home.
I’m landing in Tokyo soon, have to get my bag, go through immigration, transfer to a domestic terminal to fly up to Sapporo.
They do immigration and customs with a QR code if you want. I did not know I could text and walk at the same time. I had to register for it and fill it out. It makes it way faster than standing in line with paper documents. I’m feeling very tech savvy. I got checked in, cold meds with caffeine, lunch and I’m about to get in the plane to Sapporo. I even remembered to pull my winter coat out of my suitcase before checking it in.
So lunch had been eaten, Japanese daytime cold meds ( with caffeine ) have been taken, and a bottle of water and some chocolate have been consumed.
Now you may remember I was freaking out about the whole cold medicine trafficking worry. Well, my thought is I’m just going to be in the country for this next week and it will all be taken by the end of the week.
This has been the longest post ever. I’m in Sapporo, it’s lovely and cold. I can’t ship my luggage from her back to Tokyo and have it make it there by Thurs night. But I can ship it to Shin-Hakodate ( where I will be staying Wed night.) But now I’m going to have all my fucking luggage with me on the last leg. So I am trying to find out about oversized luggage seating because that’s what they do now. Which is fine, but. Well, this trip has gone so smoothly I was wondering where the hiccup would be. It’s all in how you react right?Read more