Yes, you’ll have to read to the end before finding out why and how we evaded the police.
Our friends Ashley, Johnny and Alex invited us out for a day trip to Jiufen and Keelung, cities northeast of Taipei. Jiufen is one of the most picturesque spots in Taiwan with its red lantern strewn narrow streets and lush green hills alongside the ocean. It’s for these reasons that it is also tourist hell. Busloads of tourists normally clog the small streets even during the off season. But, Jules and I are making the pandemic work for us on this trip, so we breathed a great sigh of relief when we arrived to nearly empty streets. Of course, it’s awful for the many small vendors who own food and souvenir stalls here, but selfishly it felt nice not to be jostled and pushed along by a sea of people.
There were two things I wanted to accomplish in Jiufen:
1) eat fenyuan, small balls of tapioca, sweet potato and taro starch
2) check out the view from the beautiful 100 year old building housing the Jioufen Teahouse
Once the rain started coming down we headed further east to the city of Keelung, Taiwan’s second largest seaport. In all my years in Taiwan I’ve never been to Keelung, so I was excited to explore a new place, and we lucked out that the government just opened the famous Keelung Miaokou Night Market for indoor dining that very day!
Indoor dining is huuuge!! We were always on edge when eating with our friends in their homes, since the government limited indoor gatherings to four people or less. With our gatherings of five we risked a 20,000NT (approx 715 USD) fine per person every time we saw our friends in one of our homes so to be able to freely eat with them in public felt like absolute freedom.
This is a night market, which means we had about 4-5 other food stops to make. This stall was one of my favorites, a steamed rice flour noodle soup with mushrooms, shrimp, Chinese celery, fish paste, meatballs, oh my. I’ve never seen this dish anywhere else, so I was super excited.
There were so many other foods we tried, but my greasy hands were too busy stuffing my face so I just gave up on trying to photograph everything. Don’t worry, those food memories will be forever etched in my brain.
Ok, ok, enough with the food, what about the cops?? We lucked out that it was one of the few times where it wasn’t raining in Keelung, so Ashley suggested that we drive up the hill to see the ‘KEELUNG’ sign. It’s like the ‘HOLLYWOOD’ sign in Los Angeles, just a lot less famous. The neon lights rotate through a rainbow of colors, and it really does light up the Keelung night sky.
We wanted to get up close and personal with the sign, so we walked up a steep set of stairs until we reached a chain link fence with a notice posted saying no entry beyond. Keelung had experienced some heavy rains the week before causing erosion to the steps above, so the police didn’t want people venturing further for safety reasons. We would’ve turned around if I hadn’t heard people chatting and laughing…huh. To the left of the stairs was a three foot retaining wall surrounded by trees, so I told Jules to hop over the wall to do some recon. He said that people were eating, smoking and just doin’ some good ‘ole cavorting at the foot of the sign. You didn’t have to ask me twice as I hopped over the wall to get in on the action. Ashley, Johnny and Alex quickly followed suit, and we happily took in the spectacular city views from one of the best vantage points around.
Jules headed back down the stairs to look at the sign from a different angle while I continued to take pictures. All of a sudden, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed flashing red and blue lights. A police cruiser quietly pulled up into the parking lot adjacent to the top of the stairs to the right. I am not lying when I tell you that the first thing that popped into my head was RUN!! I ran over to the retaining wall as Jules was making his way back up the stairs. I hopped over that wall like I was an Olympic hurdler, looked at Jules and said RUN!! The trauma from the 15 day quarantine and constant fear/paranoia of being fined for the most nonsensical of infractions caught up to me, and I just thought, I’m not going back in. Also, the thought of Aunt Ivy seeing Jules and me on the evening news, which would haunt me until the end of my days, was enough motivation. Jules and I booked it to the bottom of the stairs and crouched behind some bushes. It was probably around this moment when I realized that I hadn’t even warned our friends, oops. This certainly wasn’t a ‘Force Majeure’ moment (if you’ve watched the movie you know what I mean), but I was proud of myself for remembering Jules.
I did feel a twinge of guilt as we heard the two officers give the partygoers and our friends what for for blatantly disregarding the notice. Thank goodness for the more laid back attitude in Keelung versus Taipei, since the officers sounded more like parents scolding young children. ‘Didn’t you see the notice? Why would you deliberately disobey it? Why would you do such a thing? We’re trying to keep you safe.’ The officers made everyone promise that they would clear off immediately and not return. No arrests, no fines, no iPhone photos to broadcast on the evening news’ walk of shame…phew!
‘Where are Judy and Jules? Do you see them? I think they’re still up here.’ Umm, hey guys, we’re down here.
