Haian Lu

Tuesday night was a night of celebrating, because Jake's friend Kim was visiting town from Gaoshung (Jake is my roommate for the summer). We went to a popular Road called Haian that has a lot of tea shops and bars with outdoor seating, so its a main drag of sorts for going out. My friend Nicole took my to Haian 2 weeks ago and explained to me how the road was widened in recent memory, requiring a lot of old houses lining it to be cut in half! There is a nice mural on the front of one of these half-houses which I failed to photograph Tuesday night (I suck at this pictures thing! I will work on that), so I'm resorting to google once more here. There is also a sidewalk display of windows, cabinets and china taken out of one of the old houses before it was halved (no picture - YET).

First, we sat down at Moogo (tea and snacks). We all ordered Heineken and green tea (!) because neither Kim nor I had experienced this popular treat. It came in a normal 20oz paper cup. Heh, I'll have to get used to thinking in milliliters I guess. It had ice in it, and the taste was very refreshing. I swear there was something that tasted just like grapefruit added to it.
After we all gave the HGTs our stamp of approval, we walked to a bar that I had been wanting to go to called Blueprint. It is in one of the old half-houses, and the original scene from the house is drawn on the front of the building. Also, wooden support beams still stick out over the sidewalk. Here is are the pictures:

Me - the flash is on and no, I am not breaking nor even hanging from that beam.


Jake and Kim - the flash is off (nicer colors, but the picture of me with the flash off was a little blurry)

The bar was expensive for Tainan ($4 beers), but it was worth it for the atmosphere. A big tree is growing up through the middle of the place and is visible when you come in the door. The bar area has big clear Plexiglas tiles for a floor that are lit from below with blue light. The booths/ tables are in a dark room with candles on the tables, and they're separated by thin blue curtains. A deck of cards was brought to us by the waitress upon request, and I learned how to play "Chinese poker". The Chinese name translates to "big old two." It was fun, but I lost 3 games in a row. The music in the first room we were in was depressing, twangy singer-songwriter fare, so we went to the other half of the house where the music was... up beat house. It was cool going to a table upstairs because its very open up there. There's a balcony and you can see the underside of the old roof way above you. (Once again I should have taken a picture. Whenever I go back I'll have to get pics to edit into my writeup.) Overall a fun, low key place to drink, and the high price is OK becuase other fine establishments are always a short walk away. Fun.