We woke up to coffee and a delicious Taiwanese breakfast thanks to Spencer's mom, her second time welcoming me into their home. Spencer then drove us to the highway entrance where we waited for 10 minutes before a guy stopped and asked where we were headed. We said, "Any place south." He said he was going to Chiayi. It's about an hour south, so of course we got in.
He took us down to the highway exit, and we hopped over to the other side for just five minutes until a couple of young engineers, Jimmy and Vincent from near Taipei, let us hop in. We connected over their love for rock music, and got some AC/DC going. We parted ways in Tainan, and stopped into Hi-Life for a small break. We were making great time, and I said "If can we keep this up, we'll be swimming in Kenting by sun down."
We hit the road again, sweating for only five minutes again this time! It's unreal how lucky we were! Taiwanese people are so generous and their willingness to pick up foreign strangers is incredible. I wish we had more trust like that in the US. A lady stopped and she said she was headed to just north of Kenting. We said, "Perfect, let's go!" She spoke so enthusiastically, a contrast from the ride to Chiayi. If Alf didn't understand her, she would try to explain it a different way. She loved the idea of hitch hiking around the island. But what she didn't tell us was that she was going to pick up her 15 year old son and his friend in Kaohsiung! So we had a car of five headed south. We had a fun conversation with the kids, and discussed all sorts of topics from America's love for guns (no joke, he asked me) to the NBA. We stopped to get some Taro ice to cool us down, and we were back on the road. We said our goodbyes to mama and the kids and took a 7-11 break this time.
I suppose I don't have to say within five minutes...we were off again, this time with a family of four from Tainan. He introduces himself as Will and after we thank him, he says "Of course no problem. We are...one world." Well put in the simplest of English. One world, connected, and should be willing to help one another. A bright moment in a time in the world where we need to love one another the most.
We parted ways with Will and his family (and business card) at the infamous Kenting McDonald's I know all too well from being there this past April for a soccer tournament/music festival. Airbnb wasn't working well, so we walked into Kenting Walkers Hostel next door and we had our place for the night.
We had made it in time for a sunset swim.
The night was a ton of fun meeting travelers from all over but really befriended some hotel interns from Taiwan and Hong Kong at a VW bus selling 50 NT$ ($1.50 USD) shots and 100 NT$ beer. We had a few drinks with them (it may or may not have been more than three), and fun was had by all well into the evening.
A fantastic day #2 in the books.
No comments:
Post a Comment