Adventures in Taiwan: Part 5

So the first morning in Kaohsiung, we all slept in, then went over to my uncle's house to hang out with the relatives. It was a fun morning of exchanging presents, looking at family pictures. In the meantime, I met up with the photographer and ordered flowers. Oh my gosh, both were incredibly cheap compared to what I would have spent here in the U.S.

The photographer provided a ton of services:
-hair & makeup
-the option to wear different dresses/suits
-different accessories (i.e., veils, jewelry, etc.)
-they drove us to a couple different locations outside of the studio to take outdoor shots
-several different backdrops for indoor pix
-videographer
-they drove 45 min to the wedding location
-took a bunch of family pix at the church
-as soon as the wedding was over, they drove the 45 min back to their studio and immediately developed the wedding pix
-after the reception, we went to the studio to pick out the pix we wanted for the album they were to put together
-one huge portrait
-2 DVD's of the wedding

This entire package only cost about $763. Can you believe that? For the same package in the U.S., it would probably be several thousand dollars.

As for the flowers, I spent a total of about $186 for all the flowers at the church, my bouquet, 2 bridesmaids’ bouquets, and like 13 boutonnieres. And the bouquets were huge, too huge actually. I wanted something really simple, basically just a few flowers tied together with a ribbon, kinda like the bouquet Monica of the TV show "Friends" had. But when I got it, Oh my gosh, it was huge!!!! And apparently, it was half the size of what they usually use in Taiwan. Even the bridesmaids’ bouquets were a little bit bigger than what I wanted. I mean, they were beautiful flowers, they were even sprayed with glitter and they smelled amazing, but it was just too huge for my liking. At that point though, there wasn't anything I could do.

So anyway, after I got back from running errands, we all went to Chi-jin island. We rode a ferry from the Kaohsiung harbor over to the island. It is a cute/fun little island with a beach, lots of little shops, lots of seafood venders/restaurants. Apparently, if you are there at the right time, you can haggle alongside the restaurant owner with the people selling fresh seafood off the boat. Talk about fresh seafood! They also had pedicabs for rent, where the person rode a bike attached to the cart-like thing that the passenger rode on. We didn't rent pedicabs or eat there, but we met up with my relatives and had a good seafood dinner in Kaohsiung City.

Later that night, we headed to the clubs. Unfortunately, since it was a Thursday night, the clubs weren't very busy. But they were really cool. One of the clubs we stopped by, (I think it was called Roof), was on one of the top floors of a tall building. It had a great view of the city in one room that was pretty swanky; big bar in the middle, cushy leather couches, tables. There was also a "disco room" where they have a DJ and dancing on the weekends, but it was closed that night so I didn't get to see it. Since it was so dead, we decided to go to another club.

I can't remember what it was called, but it was pretty cool, too. They did have a DJ that night, but again, there were only a handful of people there. They had a cool upstairs though. It was open above the dance floor and you could look down on it. There were also a few VIP/private rooms.

We didn't stay long at either bar due to lack of people, but it was fun to see what Taiwan clubs look like. They really aren't that different than clubs in the U.S. It’s the people who go and the bands that play (when there is one) that make it different. I went a lot of clubs when I was in Taipei for school. Its kinda funny to watch the bands and the people dancing. There was a club in Taipei that my friends and I liked to go to called "Kiss la Boca." There was a cover band that just cracked me up. Just picture this: a skinny Chinese guy with long, long black hair, singing Back Street Boys and Brittany Spears songs. They were quite entertaining.

The DJs in clubs played a lot of techno music in the clubs. It was also popular for the patrons to blow whistles while they danced. Its funny how Asians lack rhythm, just like white people. :)