Just pick any crosswalk and your chances of bodily harm go up exponentially. 
5 Likes
Iām absolutely kidding.
Guess Iām not so lucky.
Lost one phone and returned.
Left one phone in a taxi, he turned it off and kept it within three minutes.
Lost my wallet in front of my house with 10000 in it and plenty of my contact information if they wanted to contact me. Nothing.
I lost my phone in the Philippines and a guy saw my hotel address on the home screen and drove to my hotel the next day and gave it to me. Wow.
I got stuff like ARCs returned, I also have had money taken from a wallet but all the cards left in it and returned. My phone was left on a bus, it was also turned off and stolen within about 10 mins as well.
Itās pretty nice not to worry about bag snatchers, mobile snatchers, pickpockets too much.
Challenge accepted.
I sometimes walk out onto those cross walks to see if cars stop. Gf gives me the looks, but I tell her they pay if I get hurtā¦I havenāt been hurt yet.
Also reminds me of that time I was at a light waiting to go and some dude was walking his scooter on the pedestrian crossing and saw his phone drop from his pocket. Now, it was 11AM on a Sunday, broad daylight and about 10 scooters in the box waiting to go. I figured, someone in front of me will go and pick it up. Light turns green, everyone zooms by, even the cars behind us.
Pure luck that the dudeās phone was untouched when I walked out to pick it up in the middle of the street. It kept getting LINE messages, but the phone was locked so gf and I werenāt able to reply. Hell, we even charged it so we could wait to see if someone would call.
I returned the phone later that evening and the dude and his gf treated me to a late night snack in the form of bubble tea a few days after.
Weāre still FB friends.
I honestly had the thought of just turning it off and keeping it. However, I thought, this one good deed could be viral and when I returned the phone to the guy, it could cause him to do something nice for a stranger somewhere along the road.
But wait!
Thereās more.
Little did brother @ranlee know that that same young man would one day grow up and discover the cure for polio, meaning that, in effect, @ranlee was responsible for saving the lives of millions of children around the world.
And now you know the REST of the Story.
2 Likes
I would settle for nothing less than giving back the phone to the dude who one day finds a cure for cancer, but polio is good too.
Iāve ran out of Rocket memes and gifs, hereās Spider Man
[quote=āBrianjones, post:15, topic:160306, full:trueā]How long did you pay your health insurance and labour insurance fees here?
Maybe you should go back home instead of being a leech on our health system?
[/quote]
Are you kidding? Whatās that about?
I happily paid my fees from the day I was admitted, and have so far used zero of it.
Go figure.
Heās irked by your āYankee go homeā comment. Oops, heāll probably be irked by the āYankeeā too.
[quote=āDr_Milker, post:29, topic:160306, full:trueā]Heās irked by your āYankee go homeā comment. Oops, heāll probably be irked by the āYankeeā too.
[/quote]
Well, if he is irked about what I said (which was definitely not āYankee go homeā), he feels he is probably the right candidate ā¦ :).
My guess is heās irkedātotally rightfully IMO, and count me irked as wellāby your comment that people expressing ānegativityā about this place should ājust go back homeā.
Who wants to break it to the FNG that we are home?
South African reporting in, when my mom came to visit me she took the mrt alone with her Canon 5D to go take pics alone at Longshan Temple and she loved it.
1 Like
We may need to start using a sarcasm font here 
2 Likes
I would like to vote to enforce the obligatory meme to indicate sarcasm
Honestly, it is not my favorite place, yet it is top ātouristyā choiceā¦ especially among those looking for a place to buy fake Rolex. hate to break it to them, it is a lot cheaper and easier these days to buy secodn hand Rolex at any of a multitude of secodn hand stores in posh parts of town. Same with prostitutes. You stand a bigger chance of bumping into an aboriginal from the Amazon in full regalia than anyone selling their āwareā on the streets of Taipei.
Taiwan is not the ol country where prostitution is legal, os the ladies -and gentlemen and eveything in between- hang out at hotel bars or lobbies and custoemrs just ask āhow much?ā. Taipei has no places I know where it is lost zones, blocks and cblocks of dug addicts and drug trade and other stuff going own, famous for their stiff drinks with roach apperitifs.
I do not have to worry when I get on or off the bus/train/taxi that someone will slip a hand under my dress or blouse, and will be laughed away as I try to fight and no one will intervene. Have you ever seen when a bunch of Taiwanese amas corral a pervert on the bus and pummel him until the cops arrive? Then the cops will ātenderize his meatā, as we say in the ol country.
Iāve done this too, Iām embarrased to say several times. Look for my keys when I get off work, canāt find them, hope they are still in the ignition while walking to my scooter, they always areā¦
I leave the house keys on, I leave the gate open, all nightā¦at least the pets do not get out.
I actually like the area for its seediness. It has that gritty character thatās getting harder and harder to find as Taipei continues to gentrify. Iād much rather hang out somewhere like Ximending than a sanitized playground like the area around Taipei 101. I must just be one of those First World douchebags who likes slumming it among the riff raff.
2 Likes
I would be more worried about the furry ones unlocking the door to strangers (and invite them in for a cup of joe from your ol country) than the strangers intentionally breaking in.