Hi All,
I want to start gardening but I have no idea where to buy seeds in Taipei. I am looking for tomatoes, fenugreek, and sacred basil in particular. Anybody knows please post.
The flower markets will have seeds for tomatoes. Reimer seeds on the internet will have less common seeds. You have a 75% chance of the package getting through postal inspections, IMO, and the risk is yours. You can buy fenugreek at Trinity, however.
Easily available at JianGuo flower market. If you’ve never been there before, get off at ZhongXiao XinSheng station, and it’s probably on the map on the wall (or google it: 建國假日花市). You can walk there in 10 mins. Tomatoes etc are available in ordinary seed packets. Fenugreek you can get in bigger bags from the guys selling ‘sprouts’ (there are two of them, towards the far end away from the Jade market). Incidentally, I recommend a stop at Magic Coffee after you’ve done your shopping 
If you want anything exotic, just order off the internets. Taiwan Customs don’t seem to have any issue with seeds, unless you’re trying to import a known invasive species, I guess. I just ordered some stuff from b-and-t-world-seeds.com, who seem to have (or will get) absolutely anything.
EDIT: ah, DB concurs
EDIT2: might be of interest: I recently bought a bag of turmeric root (which I never expected to find in Taiwan) from a little old lady with a tiny stand at the flower market. As you’re walking away from the Jade market, she’s on the left-hand side, just before you get to an automatic traffic barrier thingy. About one-third the way along, I’d guess.
Thanks. This market sounds excellent; already included it in my coming-weekend-trip
Warning: Getting seed imports in Taipei is relatively easy, but in central and southern rural Taiwan, everything gets inspected by customs, EVERYTHING. Put it in an Amazon box, they never open those up. 
Even Taipei is getting stricter on plant imports. And its one thing i don’t really disagree with. The method of importing plants/seeds is straightforward, but it involves filling out forms that discusses invasive risks, pest risks etc. Its all about environmental damage, and unlike other countries in Taiwan the whole damn procedure is FREE, just takes time. They are not looking for taxes/fees etc, it seems on this one they actually try to weed out the…weeds.
some tricks i found, if you import a lot use different names and switch around addresses now and then. I cant prove it but i am almost positive they keep names that come up over and over. My packages ALWAYS get checked as I always import plants. They just destroy it, no big deal i guess.
Envelopes get checked less than boxes. Make it as plain and non-eyey catchign as possible.
Use chinese name/address if the sender can manage that.
Hide the plants seeds inside something. THey tend to open boxes, but not open merchandise packaging.
there are 2-3 things that are required to import seeds and plants to taiwan, non are difficult.
1 is phytosanitary certificate. This is issued by the exporter. It proves that the seeds/plants were examined by the gov of the exporting country and deemed pest free. The exporter must get this. And Taiwan does require this for seeds as well, some countries its just plants. If you do not have a phyto cert, you can still; get them past if you pay them $3000 to spray some nasty chems on the stuff to kill any pathogens, they do not guarantee the plants living through this, but they are not rough.
Second is it needs to be approved to be imported. This is NOT an import permit, Taiwan has no import permits for plants. This is a long form you fill out and someone in Taipei checks it out to make sure its a not a pathogen host, invasive weed etc. Basically to get rid of risky imports. You need to check a big list, in excel file, that lists every plant (by latin name!) and the country it was imported from. If it has already been imported from that country, you dont need to get this form.
When customs catches your package, they send you a green paper sayign whats going on, and a second pink one if you dont answer. after that they destroy it. If you answer, you need to setup a time with plant quarantine department to meet you at customs. you show up and they look at the package and make sure its the right species and pest free and all paperwork is in order. If that is ok, you pay customs their taxes (get it quoted for low cost and tax is lwo. I thinks it s30% tax roughly). Customs, at least in Ktown are pretty level headed people. the first time we went we had about 200kg of various plants sitting in boxes that had gotten lost in post for 2 months. After getting the quarantine people happy and gone, we were asked how much did they cost. My wife translated to english for me and i told my wife the actual cost (900 euro) …at which point she said "no, i think it was more like 150 euro, RIGHT wink wink> Customs guys can understand english well, and he laughed very loud and went on to tax us on 150 euro. as long as you play their game they are pretty cool about it.
Once customs gets your name in their heads, you will be checked almost everytime, dont doubt it. they are also checking more and more for drug imports, so there is that too.
but for seeds, all common veggies are already here. the only time i want to import veggie seeds is for heirloom types that are not hugely hybridized/inbred/gmo.
I got everything at the market except Holy Basil. I got normal Basil though. Overall it was a successful trip. Thanks for suggestions. Fenugreek is available with the organic-sprout-lady. She carries fresh Fenugreek sprouts as well as seeds.