Re-living Meteor Garden at Taiwan National University
When I found out we were off to Taiwan for the New Year's, I immediately thought about F4 and Shancai. The millennials probably don't remember who they are but to me and my fellow 90s kids, they were the reason we all went home right after school to tune in to ABS-CBN in the afternoons.
I knew I wanted to see that fictional Ying De University and dine inside the pink car at the cafe where Shancai and Dao Ming Si had their first date.
We were off after breakfast. It's a good thing that our hotel was near the Ximen train station which made commuting fairly easy.We took the Ximen station to Gongguan. According to google maps, it takes 14 minutes to get there.
Take Songshan-Xindian Line (to Xindian) from Ximen Station => Gongguan Station
Taiwan National University is walking distance from Gongguan Station. We took the back entrance where most of the students enter because we weren't sure if there were rules about ousiders entering the school premises. (not recommended, btw!) There were no guards anywhere (maybe because it was a Sunday?) but we just walked like we were from there, hoping no one would notice. It helps that we were Asians so it was easy to blend in.
When we got in, this is what greeted us: thousands of bicycles parked inside the campus! Imagine how clean the air would be if a majority of the student population rode bikes to school in the Philippines. It would decongest traffic and reduce the carbon footprint on the environment.
After walking for a few minutes and passing by a pond, we finally saw the main building where F4 shot some scenes for the series. This is where all the awkward ootd shots took place. Haha.
After getting tired of taking pictures, we decided to head back to Gongguan Station. As per our guide, we needed to get off the Shilin Station and take a cab to P.S. Bubu.
On a Sunday, this is how the MRT station looks like at around lunch time.
Since we didn't know how to speak Fookien/Mandarin, our guide asked me to call her as soon as we got in the cab so she could give the driver instructions on where to take us. I remember paying NTD 150 for the cab ride to P.S. Bubu.
The famous pink car!
