AmCham arrow Publications arrow Topics Archive arrow Topics Archive 2006 arrow Vol.36- No.12 arrow Seeing Taiwan: Where Night Owls Feel at Home
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Where Night Owls Feel at Home

In the evenings, Taipei and the island's other cities come to life. The neon lights flicker on and the pubs, restaurants, night markets, bubble-tea shops, lounge bars, and various all-night shops begin to attract customers. Add the relative safety of cities in Taiwan, along with the reduced traffic and the atmospheric, neon-lit neighborhoods, and you get all the ingredients that suit the night owls of Taiwan. If you're sleepless in Taipei, there is always something to do.

The island's signature night-time activity is undoubtedly a visit to a night market. Almost every big city has at least one, and Taipei, as luck would have it, has four or five, depending on your definition of a night market. The biggest, brightest, most famous and most sprawling of them all is Shilin Night market, a moveable feast of food, clothes, and games that qualifies as a must-do experience.

 

Among their other charms, the night markets of Taiwan are absolutely unique. China doesn't have them; Singapore did formerly before it shoved them indoors, and Hong Kong has one, but it is shrinking, and has nowhere near the variety of stalls of those in Taiwan. The Taiwan Tourism Bureau has found that when visitors are surveyed about their favorite locations in Taiwan, the night markets top the list, and it has begun to promote them more heavily to prospective overseas tourists, especially those from Asian countries.

Night markets can be broadly divided into three main activities: food, games, and shopping. These three ingredients are swirled together into a single lively street scene, with mobile carts and street vendors vying for space with pachinko players, and purveyors of balloon popping, shrimp catching, and various other games. Night markets have something for everyone, but somehow, they always seem to revolve around food. Simplicity and freshness are the hallmarks of night market dining. The food is fresh because the turnover is high, and the snacks are simple because each stand concentrates on a single dish. Most of the stalls are basic set-ups with a generator, a tank of cooking gas, and some cooking gear: a grill, a pot, or a steamer. And the variety is remarkable. A Taiwan night market is a feast of Chinese treats, ranging from fried rice, congee, noodles, and grilled beef dishes to unusual offerings like oyster omelets, wheat gluten, onion pancakes, and "stinky" tofu. Other stands offer barbecue squid and pork, candied cherry tomatoes, roast chestnuts, corn on the cob, fresh juice, dumplings, and more.

While night markets are still going strong, a couple of other night-time traditions are less common than they used to be - bubble milk tea shops and beerhouse eateries. Bubble milk tea, or zhen zhu nai cha, is a sweet tea and milk mixture that was invented in Taiwan, and soon swept Asia. The "pearls" are made of gelatin, and are sucked up through a special extra-wide straw. It's a delicious hot-weather drink, and a good night-time one as well; bubble-tea joints still dot the after-dark landscape, and they are often filled with socializing 20-somethings.

Beerhouses (pijiu wu) are another uniquely Taiwanese invention. Jurassic Restaurant (formerly called Indian) on Taipei's BaDe Road is the most famous, but it is hardly the only one. Eight Immortals on XinSheng South Road, Apocalypse Now on FuXing North Road, and others are still fixtures on the dining scene. Whatever the name, the formula is usually the same: salty seafood, fried snacks, cold beer, and over-the-top decor. The biggest and most outlandish of all is Jurassic, a four-floor extravaganza filled with replicas of dinosaur skeletons, which seats a thousand people. It is a must-visit, because there is nothing else like it, anywhere. Beerhouse cuisine is sometimes called "hot seafood." Clams with chili pepper is the signature dish, while crab, teppanyaki, "three-cup" squid or chicken, deep-fried bean curd, grilled oysters, and so on (all of it salty, oily, and thirst-inspiring) are popular. Roll out the barrel - these are beer houses, after all.

Another night-time innovation that has proven popular in Taipei is the 24-hour bookstore. The Eslite bookstore near the RenAi traffic circle is believed to be the first bookstore-chain outlet in the world to open its doors 24-seven. At night, this busy bookstore morphs into a hangout for young adults, who flock there to see the latest magazines, browse paperbacks, and meet one another. It has wide aisles, classy wood paneling, and a large selection of books in a venue that is air-conditioned and quiet. What more could a night owl want?

Naturally, Taipei also has its share of pubs, lounge bars, and live music. ShuangCheng Street, nicknamed the Combat Zone, is a neon-lit collection of some 40 bars. It has remained popular since its start as an R&R stopover during the Vietnam War era. Elsewhere in Taipei, Malibu West is a well-lighted beacon that attracts a crowd of expats and tourists, many of them de-stressing after one of Taipei's trade shows. Dimmer and darker, but no less lively, is My Place, a favorite with Chinese and Westerners alike, while another old favorite, the Patina, is going strong in a hard-to-find back alley. The most popular upscale dance hall in town is still Carnegie's, on AnHe Road. A stylish restaurant-pub with high ceilings, a mirrored backdrop bristling with bottles, and a professional DJ, Carnegie's is something new in Taipei, a dance pub. As midnight approaches, the big restaurant-pub morphs into a lively disco.

Lounge bars, the latest wrinkle in drinking and hanging out, are also firm favorites in Taiwan. The epicenter of the lounge scene seems to be the Xinyi District in the shadow of the Taipei 101 tower. The names change, but the couch-and-champagne formula stays the same: patrons rent lounge space, which comes with a set number of drinks. The indolent night owls can then wile away the wee hours in Roman-style luxury - sipping wine or champagne, relaxing, dancing, and socializing. Most lounge bars don't close until 5 a.m. The Xinyi District is also home to the ever-popular Brown Sugar, the city's top jazz venue, where imported bands play jazz standards on a simple stage. And, no matter how late the hour, after emerging from a pub or lounge bar or a jazz club, a bowl of noodles or a barbecue sausage is never far away. Nor is a convenience store or a milk tea shop or a 24-hour bookstore. There is truly something for everyone, and that's the real magic of a Taiwan night.
 
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