Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung Miyahara Ice Cream

After spending almost 6 hours in the Natural Science Museum, and eating only two miserable sausages, I was famish! I took the bus back to town, and since it went past Miyahara store, I got down early and decided to treat myself! 

Although I have visited Miyahara the day before, I didn't share with you that Miyahara is also famous for their ice cream! Like the one shown above. Granted that it wasn't cheap! But I was already here! And since I didn't spend much on lunch, and the museum was such a good ROI for the cost, I though I could spare a nice treat for myself, right?

I queued up. Got the form, and pray that I pick the correct items! Insider trick. I always google a day before the menu and do my research before coming to a place I plan to eat at. So, haha! No taking chances here. I picked the flavour that I wanted. I think it was tea, cause I was in Taiwan! And dark chocolate, my favourite!

There were sooooo many flavours to pick from. But I find that tea flavoured ice cream are rare and the good ones can only be found in Taiwan and Japan. 

I even splurge on some extra toppings. I was in Taiwan, of course I picked the pineapple tart!

Here is the final order! I was gonna eat this ALONE! There was no place to seat, so I was standing in the side walk since it was crowded with people queueing and eating ice cream. Hey, I didn't know anyone here, who cares if people stare at a lady eating a huge ice cream alone? Actually people did stare at me while I eat. But mainly they stare and smiled at me as they saw I was enjoying the ice cream. Of course I smiled back, but I was more interested in enjoying my ice cream! The people who stared were often those that was pondering whether to buy the ice cream, or was already in the queue and just looking around....

The shop has so many beautiful retro poster. Unfortunately I couldn't get any nice shots due to the reflection on the glass frame. 

Still, I am posting them, cause I love anything retro!

Hope you enjoy them as much as I do!

Eye test!

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM Other Odds and Ends

 

This will be my last post on Natural Science Museum. I'm sure you must be pretty sick reading about it already. So here are just some odds and ends that I thought worth mentioning. Like those common calls that connects different exhibit? Even those have beautiful acrifacts, like the giant mammoth(?) above?

Zooming in, isn't this sign just lovely? Like some classic paintings from the old era.

Actually it was the poster to this small room showcasing how natural science scientist do their work and how they collect their specimens and the tool of their trade, how their preserved and documents all things from nature. It was just beautiful to me. I used to love doing this when I was in biology class too. 

Stumbling around the museum seeing which hall I can go in with my entry ticket, I was surprised to find a hall full of polynesians items too. It was kinda like voodoo stuff, but nice and cuter. Kinda like Orang Asli stuff, but just, I don't know, more refine? Perhaps softer in nature? I did wonder why they have such exhibit in Taiwan. Then I recall there are aboriginal tribes in Taiwan too. Maybe there is a link to these for them?

See, they look friendlier....

Even this one, is nothing compare to the chilling items I've seen in the museums in Brazil.... lol.

And tiny wooden craving too...

I'm not much of a physic fans, or on space, quantum and gravity. But the way they display the exhibit, how it draws you in. It was like traveling through a time wrap. Do you know what I mean? Like walking into a worm hole. How could I resist? And the by product was, I unsuspectingly learn more about space, and time.... sneaking.....

Captivating display. Maybe it's the dark mode that just draws me in, which those beautiful lighting....Good job Taiwan! Can't praise you enough for this lovely museum!

Beautiful place to emerge yourself in space and time..... This room was pretty funny. Before I stepped in, a little boy around ten came out and keep repeating to himself "so scarry, so scary" in mandarin. Of course I hesitated. I mean, what could have scared this boy so much? But I went in anyway into the dark room, and it was just beautiful. What was scary was the kids were just spinning around by themselves in the room and making themselves sick from all the motion, lol. I'm glad I didn't chicken out!

Leaving you with some wise wordings fond in the museum. I can roughly make out their meaning..... That was why I took these photos to share with you. Hope you feel them words too, and learn to love and protect our nature and the world we live in..... 

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM Chinese Spirituality and Medicine

 

Once all the natural science topic was covered, there were a few halls dedicated to Chinese related exhibit. I was equally fascinated by them. Being more familiar with western information as I mostly read English material, I was quite surprised that Chinese too have so many advance technology even in the old period.  For example the below structure, it was kind of a detector for earthquake. I always thought those technology only comes from the wester world, lol. At least, that is the impression you get when you watch the global news these days. 

It was such a gigantic structure too!

There was also a hall on Chinese spirituality, which was quite interesting too. For example, I though the above were the guardians of hell, but since there were 12 of them, on closer inspection, there are the 12 zodiac in, erm, human forms? Yeah, I don't get it either, let's move on!

There was a lot on tao, and warding of evils, and balance and stuff. My mandarin ain't good enough to read all those complicated text here, so I took some photos and hope one day I will realise what they mean. Which reminds me, that's how I listen to my Chinese songs too. Just last night I was google lyrics and trying to translate or guess the meaning of a beautiful song from Zhang Zhen Yue which I have been listening to for a while. Sometimes you can't trust the English translation, so I'm just looking at the Chinese characters and guessing the meaning based on my best abilities too, lol. I guess I may need to seek help from others if I really want to know the meaning. I did the same for Cantonese songs too! Hey, at least I am learning!

More chinese, are these related to qi? Or meridians? I was never good on these. 

There was a section on QiGong too, an art form that I am actually quite interested to learn but never gotten around to it. I always though all these were for old people, slow movement and such. But after doing yoga for a few years, I now know that the slower the movement, the harder it is! I had a very sadist yoga teacher who likes to make the class super slow motion when he is in a lousy mood....

Lot's of drawings and pictures of erm, old people? Gods? 

I just like these cause it's chinese and I am chinese too :P

There was something about scrolls and spells and talisman too. I think this is one of them.

And some information on warding of ghost and evil beings from your home.

There are actually auspicious symbols and tiles that people use around their house to  guard it from evil spirit. Very Fengshui? Or just ancient superstitious belief? Chinese houses are always surrounded by these, right? Auspicious everything, from plants, to numbers, to wordings etc. Even me in my own modern home have all these weird stuff even though I don't believe in them. It's just something that, I guess, balance the 'energy' in the house? Just something to make yourself calmer.... make sense?

There was a section on Chinese Medicine which I was really hooked on. It was almost lunch time, and yet I stayed on to watch almost 2 or 3 video clips about Chinese Medicine. Learned so much in those short hour. Each clip was around 15 to 20 minutes. Perhaps every Chinese already knew about it, cause there wasn't anyone watching it with me except a chinese lady who was just sitting there and sneakily eating an apple..... I have never consulted a Chinese doctor before. But I am a fan of chinese herbal soup, does that count? And I mixed my own herbs too, cause I hate those pre-packet ones that usually contains I hate, like orange peels or sweet dates and fig which makes the soup super sweet and smells funny to me. So yeah, again, it is an area that I am interested in. If I wasn't travelling so much, maybe I should slowly pick up more knowledge on this..... hmmmm. Let me ponder over that ....

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM 黄帝内经 Huangdi Neijing

Before we move on to the next exhibit, I thought I'll do one dedicated to the 黄帝内经. This is the Emperor's book that contains advice on how to live a long and healthy life. I though it was interesting and actually stood there and took every screenshot you see here :)  I mean, where else can I find such knowledge for a banana like me? Not gonna write much in this post. It's just a collection of screenshot for sharing, and for you to ponder over. 

Ref: 黄帝内经 

Solo Trip - Taiwan (July 2023) - Taichung NSM The Journey of Human Life

Next comes a hall all about ourself! Humans! The Journey of Human Life. Isn't it a nice touch that they placed a pregnant lady statue there? Just before you were born.... Again, I thought this hall would be boring, and AGAIN, pleasantly surprised. Everything here is so hands-on!

One of the exhibit was a station with three machines that helps uniquely identify you. This was the first time I've seen something so advance in a science museum. Am I that outdated? Or should I visit more museums? I had a lot of fun here learning more about my own trademark.

The first was Iris recognition. There is a camera that actually scans your iris and tells you more about it. This is not new since it's already being used by coms immigration system in the certain countries.

Next is voice recognition. You can actually speak into a mic and they will mark out the voice print. I wonder how reliable this was. 

Last was the fingerprint. Even our mobile phone uses this nowadays. Interestingly, my mobile can't recognised my fingerprint if I go to a cold country and all my skins dried up. It took nearly a month before the normal print is visible again for the mobile to detect it. 

There is also a heat image camera. I wonder, is this same as aura photo? Some places charged you money to get a photo like that. I took mine here for free. Don't mind the hand blocking my face, I was trying to take a selfie :P

Next, an eyeball motion detection. Wow, this was the first time I played with this. You could use your eyeballs to move the mouse around on the screen. It was so cool!

Next, a lot on aging of the human body, how we grow old and breakdown. Yes, a bit depressing. But better to know more about it so that we know what to expect, then be caught by surprise, right? At this age and time, science and technology has advanced so much that we are living longer and longer. But living longer should also come hand in hand with quality of life and health!

Some advice on how to keep your brain healthy to slow down aging. I guess once our brains are gone, it is as good as our whole existence is gone. Our memories, our abilities to remember, to reason, to understand etc. Gone. So do try to keep yourself active physically, as well as mentally. Play games if you have to. Do things that may looked childish if you have to, like painting, drawing, arts and craft. Learn. Keep on learning. Languages, knowledge, DIY, anything! There is more to life than just growing old and dying!

The exhibit closes with how human tries to achieve immortality, from long time back till today. They have the Egyptians Mummy, where all the organs and the whole body is preserved. With all the religious scripts surrounding it, hoping that the dead lives on in another life, or perhaps can be brought back to life again one day? Preserved, just in case they need anything when they are back?

The Chinese too have their own mummies. The Jade Burial, where the body is covered in a suit of jade to preserved it. 

And now? the coolest of it all, literally, nitrogen freezing via cryogenic tanks. I mean, I've seen these in documentaries and movies before, but to see it in real life right in front of you, kinda make the future seems closer than you imagine it to be. It was a surprisingly educational exhibit on human from start to finish!