I arrived in Taipei with seven hours to spare. Realistically, it’s too short to really do much in the city, but it’s ridiculously long to spend inside an airport! Good thing that Taoyuan International Airport (桃園國際機場) is huge and should be able to keep me entertained.

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As with any international connecting flights, I had to go through security again. This was pretty quick as I was one of the first passengers to disembark our plane. Still, it’s quite inconvenient that you’ve already been screened and you have to go through it again. Afterwards, I found myself right in the middle of a busy terminal.

My first agenda was to locate my gate so that I’d know where to go to when the time comes. Apparently, indoor navigation isn’t one of my strengths so I ended up walking all the way to the other end of the terminal. On the good side though, I was able to complete 10,000 steps of walking and got to see the interesting themes that distinguishes each gate from each other.









One of the things that I noticed is that this airport does not seem to like foreigners seeing what Taiwan looks like. For one, windows are only in certain areas, and two, the windows are obstructed by stickers so you can hardly see anything outside. At times, I felt like I’m underground instead of in an airport.


For some reason, Hello Kitty has a strong presence in this terminal. As far as I know, Hello Kitty is not Taiwanese so I find it quite intriguing. One of the gates is dedicated to Hello Kitty and right beside it is a store that sells everything Hello Kitty.




After visiting practically every gate in Terminal 2, I decided to finally take a rest and eat, and go to my airline’s lounge.






One of the nice features of lounges of major airlines in their home countries or hubs is the availability of hot showers. This is definitely something that I really look forward to as I can get myself refreshed before embarking on another flight.




Of course, food and drinks are available in the lounge, buffet style. For some reason, my appetite wasn’t really there during my stay so I only got the smallest sizes of some of the items that I found interesting. I didn’t even bother taking photos of what I ate. I did find some interesting Taiwanese drinks though.

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Apple Chronicles:
- A Journey of Superlatives
- Taoyuan International and EVA Air Infinity Lounge
- Houston, We’ve Arrived!
- Exploring Houston
- Space Center Houston
- California-Bound
- Hello Again, San Francisco!
- Delayed in Detroit
- New York City
- The Statue of Liberty
- Niagara Falls
- Boston
- Washington, D.C.
- The High Line
- Central Park
- More of NYC
- Wrap-Up