Itinerary: Homeschool, Maokong, Taipei Zoo, Mos Burger, Soho Art Class, Uber
Wow, we’ve been having jam packed days the last few days. Will probably need to be a homebody soon.
We finally connected with a local homeschooling group that has outings this week and last minute decided to join their trip to the Taipei Zoo today. To get there we tried out taking the bus instead of MRT, since buses are much cheaper ($15 per segment) than long distance MRT ($40-$50). Plus sometimes buses are more direct than MRT.
Since the bus got there way earlier than we expected, we took a detour to Maokong 貓空, which is right next to the zoo. 貓空 is high up in the mountains there are tea plantations around there. But because we were pressed for time and the whole trip is 2 miles each way, we turned around half way.
Maokong remains my favorite gondola rides. I only went to one in Japan and one to Namsan in Korea and those didn’t compare. The cram as many as 30 people into those gondola, whereas our party of 5 got to enjoy the long and peaceful ride up to Maokong. If you are quiet enough, you can hear the sounds of the forests and the wind rushing by your gondola while looking down at the the super greenery down below you.
We met the homeschooling group around 12:30pm and meandered our way around the Taipei Zoo. It was so so so hot and humid. The zoo is sloped but we took the train to the top and then meandered our way down. It’s got quite a collection of animals I don’t see in our local zoo.
Plus a wall of animal poop.
The group we met had 3 families, where the home language is all different and Mandarin is the common language. Everyone was very easy going and nice. All the kids spoke Mandarin well. Of course our kids were the loudest of the bunch. How is it that the children are all so much quieter here?
It was so hot we had to take another trip to the Micky D’s in the zoo for some sesame sundae. Then we caught another bus around 4pm and went to the Mos Burger that’s right across from our closest MRT stop for dinner.
Mos Burger is a Japanese chain that we actually didn’t try in Japan. Funny I see these Japanese chains way more often scattered throughout Taipei than the cities I visited in Japan. This chain is famous for their rice burgers.
We ended up not trying those because we just ate snack at McDonalds. All we had was clam chowder (Thumper thought it tasted strange) and chicken nuggets (Astroboy liked). I didn’t get anything for myself.
We then walked to the Soho Art Studio close by for our 5pm-6:30pm art class. Why are all the classes so late at night? Do kids not have to eat dinner? Because by the time they were done I was ravenous.
I’ve been eyeing Soho Art since I attended their demo class in the states. I really like their art philosophy, which is very color-based in the beginning and also includes art education. They don’t stress so much on the technique it seems.
The cost is $25 USD per class. Still way expensive by Taiwanese standards but cheaper than the $40 USD in the US. Each session is 8 classes. Once we finish the beginner class, they will let us double up on subsequent classes (2x a week class) because we told them we will be going back to the US.
You’re required to take a beginner class where the parents have to sit there and listen to some art lecture; basically to teach the parents how to discuss and talk about art with their children, and indirectly show you what they teach.
Yesterday they talked about Da Vinci. I learned much more about him than the Art History 101 class I took in college! They then showed art work their students did, titled “Children vs. Da Vinci”. The owner basically said, Da Vinci already perfected the art of drawing, along with Raphael and I forget who else. So we don’t need to compete with them. Instead, she showed the children different art styles (like Dada, Picaso, and Warhol) and the children reimagined Da Vinci’s famous Mona Lisa in these different styles.
After class, the teacher also talked to the parents about what they did in the class. Tonight, the aim was to learn to mix different shades of green. The teacher showed the children different shades of green on the whiteboard. The children divided up a piece of paper with a pencil. Then the teacher used a hot glue gun to mark the spot so the shades don’t bleed together.
She told the children they’re drawing green fields (田) and also showed them pictures of different green vegetables and animals that are green, for them to observe that they’re not all one color. Then the children got to work! The finished product is really pretty.
Very happy we signed up for this class. And with the exploration of buses and discovering more of the shops and restaurants around our MRT stops, I finally feel like we don’t really live in the boonies.
