The big four in Tainan

Here in Tainan there seems to be four big US businesses:

711
McDonald's
KFC
Starbucks

There are others but these are the biggies.
The good SAT word that describes 711 stores is ubiquitous. That's because they are everywhere. Every store has exactly the same products.

The above 711 is neighbors with the new gold temple I saw on the way to City hall. The other neighbor was a bing lang seller, so we can't say that the temple was in the best of neighborhoods. More about bing lang later.

Here is Starbucks and a 711 sharing the same corner building location in the Cheng Kung University area.
Of course, the big four are mostly in the shopping areas and around the high schools and universities.









Here's McDonald's and KFC, they seem to come in pairs.















Here's a pal waiting for a picture taking buddy. Nothing but the best of western culture makes it to Asia.















While at the City Hall I had a moving meeting with an old friend. In Taiwan this plant is called the "shy plant" because it folds up when you touch it. The scientific name is "Mimosa Pudica" and there's a very good article on Wikipedia. I met this guy when we went to Tikal in Guatemala, there they call it the "praying plant" because the leaves together look like folded hands in prayer. I tried to grow it in Bellevue without much luck. It's truly a tropical plant.


This was last night's dinner, typical pan fried pot stickers with a meat and vegetable filler. I like the hot sauce but usually the hot sauce is mixed with soy sauce. I grabbed the unmarked container that I thought was soy sauce and poured in on the hot sauce. They eventually stopped me because that container was black tea.
Now that was embarrassing, but I don't think they expected too much from me in the first place so we were all smiles in the end.