Today's route: Home --> Taipei 101 --> Elim Bookstore --> MacKay Hospital --> Home. Ate a mediocre lunch at 101. A passion fruit smoothie went sour. Found out that the cost of going to the observatory is $350, which is quite a bit more than the $120 for the ferris wheel yesterday, so I didn't go. There's a bookstore that contains more English books than a typical bookstore in Canada. There's a $12,000 ($480CAN) headphone at Bose. "If I were a rich man..." then I would go for it. A long walk to the subway and a short ride on the subway took me to Elim bookstore, where I bought a book. Would have bought much more, but I guess I was in a fruitful mode of "self control." A long ride on the subway took me to MacKay hospital, where a few minutes wait and 2 minutes of meeting with the doctor yielded two things: (1) I don't have hep B nor C; and (2) The 2-minute meeting cost $350. So the ride to the top of 101 doesn't sound too expensive right now... Then there's the uneventful ride home, and my legs were sore again. So much for the planned mountain climbing tomorrow...

Two things that I won't miss in Taiwan: Food venders literally shouting for business, and the flyer distributors on the street. I just find that food venders that are shouting for business are very annoying. So to make a point, I usually don't go for food venders that do that, just to show that their incredibly intrusive advertising tactics do not work. Well, I'm only one person, so that's not going to change anything... About the flyer distributors, again, I find it really annoying and intrusive. I have to change my walking patterns just to avoid receiving (or refusing to receive) some useless pieces of paper, andthen have the trouble of thinking where to recycle the junk if I indeed got them. It's also a waste of natural resources, quite frankly. Both practices are, in my opinion, hints to this city that is in love with business and money.

Typhoon Khanun was formed in the Pacific today, and forecasters say it will hit Taiwan with full force on the 11th, possibly the strongest at 2pm. Hey, guess what, that is also the departure time for my flight to Vancouver! Yikes...I really hope CI does well this time...