I presume you live in an area with mostly apartment buildings right? There'd be no yard or whatever for cats to be kept to be given the chance to wander...

Yep. I don't think there are a lot of houses here that have yards, unless they live up in a mountain or farmlands or something...

It's weird, it's becoming increasingly like that here too. There are houses, one storey houses in unit blocks with hardly any yard in the front and back....A lot of land that would once only have one house nowadays would have at least 2, often 4 houses. Many older houses are being demolished for this very reason. Sure, the newer houses are nice to look at but with only a few plants in the front and back and a yard that can't even fit a car (the car would be in a garaged area next to the house) they often lack character.

Originally Posted by Antagonist

@Iku: lol It looks like a 'Wtf am I doing here where did my pants go' kind of expression to me

This sounds about right!

@Ling: lol, It's nearly all tall buildings here. >_< Where I live in the south is a little better than Taipei, where I've heard that you can barely even find parking space anywhere and have to rent a parking spot with monthly fees to find a place for their cars. Here at least our home we have a parking space in the two-levelled basement where everyone parks their cars.

@Iku: "And what is this random crystal doing in my face" xDDD

I need to change and use the new CI.

I've been to Taipei once...the only part of Taiwan I've been to in fact...Most of the buildings were tall. I always thought it was interesting how living in an area where it is most common to live in apartment buildings was like. Until that year that I went to China and Taiwan I had no idea how things like hanging of washing, and parking of cars was sort of done on a daily basis around the home.

Speaking of Taipei, I think it's so weird how they have small streets where you can sort of find the exact same thing sold in multiple spots along the street for the same price...Like those tall soft serve ice creams in a cone that are made tall and skinny with green tea, vanilla and chocolate varieties. And because it's not just the one thing that has the multiple stall effect, one street might only sell a few different things...with most of them sort of multiplied along the same street. Do you have that in the South too Antagonist?

Yeah, it's mostly all apartment buildings here. @[email protected]

And yep! They're pretty much everywhere. xD Vendors are everywhere, and the ice cream vendors are usually pretty much repetitive with one another, nearly always the same flavors and stuff. Other food stuffs too, depending on the day and what vendors are there. Sometimes there's a large variety, sometimes it seems like they're all selling the same stuff.


@Iku: Looking good and creepy there! ;D

hehe, it must be a Taiwanese thing...then again I think I came across the same sort of same stall/vendor thing in Beijing with the 冰糖葫芦, scorpion skewers, and deep fried milk custard.

lol, I guess they're the more popular local foodstuffs that people like there, so a bunch of people are all selling them. @[email protected]

There are so many stinky tofu vendors here it's sometimes hard to breathe when I'm at a night market. >_>

yeah, out of those all I tried was the 冰糖葫芦, I wanted to try to deep fried milk custard too, but my mum who I went with, said it was unhygienic.

Stinky tofu...I wish I had tried that while I was in Taiwan, I hear it's tasty once you get past the actual smell.

-high fives Nim- 8D
I feel like my avatar is the version of yours after everything is all burnt.

I think we have those fried milk custard here too, but I'm not sure if it's milk custard or butter they're frying. I've never tried it before because I kept thinking about how many calories must be in them. My friend's sister apparently likes it a lot though since whenever we're at the night market my friend nearly always buys a package for her.

Stinky tofu's the stuff that's actually unhygienic...I know not every vendor does it like that but according to a research paper that a student made on stinky tofu, the tofu's fermented by soaking in half-rotted fish/animal guts until they mold, and then the workers wash and 'clean' the mold off by running them under water and brushing them with a toothbrush. They're then deep fried and sold to customers. Yuck!

I've heard that it's tasty but have never tried it before despite being surrounded by them. The smell also differs from people to people...some people find the smell disgusting while others think it smells heavenly. When I was a kid (like around six years old if I remember correctly) I thought it smelled heavenly and delicious, but then after I returned from those few years in the states, I now find them to smell like rotten...things.

Same goes for durians; I used to find the odor disgusting but now I love it.

That red eye in Ikuto's chest makes me think of a heart.

Yes, I quite like the taste of durian, the smell, not so much, and I've never even had the fresh fruit of durian. All we get down here is the thawed durians. That is they had been frozen and then thawed.

@Iku: lol!!! That's so true, maybe I should add a tree in there for the black branches you have in yours.

@Ling: When it blinks that means it's beating.

@Nim: Yeah! 8D

Ikuto, that's even more creepy when you put it that way...>_<

@Iku: How's it look now?

@Ling: I've never had frozen and then thawed durian before, though according to some it's more tasty that way...since I have sensitive teeth I tend to not like chilled food much, so I prefer fresh ones. They're really sweet and creamy and delicious.

I hear the fresh durians are more pungent in smell but I imagine the creamy delicious flesh would make up for that. As for the frozen and thawed ones which I have when available, sometimes you get ones that are so icy the flesh has become slightly transparent in appearance, that's when it tastes chilled and lacking in flavour..other times possibly when not frozen for such a long period, the flesh still maintains that creamy yellow colour. Which I think resembles more the fresh taste.

Whether it smells bad or good depends on the person~ Most people tend to find the odor off-putting.

I don't like the semi-transparent ones. Just doesn't taste right anymore.

I agree! the taste is bland and more importantly the texture is....I can't think of an adjective so I'll just say wrong.

I'm craving for some durian now. Too bad they're a little on the expensive side.

Yes, durians can be expensive...

Question for you Antagonist, do you cut open your own fresh durians? If so, can you tell me a good technique for opening them without getting pricked?

@ling, I'd say an axe/machette/bowie :P

lol! It's not that hard, just wait for them to crack open themselves. When they're ripe, they crack open on their own, and you just have to pry it apart to get to the tasty bits inside. It's easy.