by Fratri Edson Silva

We got on the green line train bound for Xindian early in the afternoon. It was the first day of our trip to Taiwan. One thing I already found very amusing (and helpful) about Taipei was how tourist-friendly the Metro Rail was; several of the stops were named after famous landmarks and tourist spots, making it incredibly easy to visit the sites you want to see (i.e., if you want to go to Taipei 101, get off at the Taipei 101 stop on the red line).

Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, a must-see place if you ever find yourself in Taiwan (based on our research). After visiting Long Shan temple right after lunch, we decided to go to The Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall. The Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall is a national monument erected in honor of Chiang Kai-Shek, former president of the Republic of China. It stands at the end of Liberty Square, alongside the National Theater and National Concert Hall. The Liberty Gate stands across the Hall, welcoming people to come and step right in.

The Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall station exit opens up right next to the entrance of the main plaza. A tourist information map stood by to guide the crowd of visitors to the area, though it would be hard to miss the piazza just a hundred feet away.

What’s awesome about Liberty Square is how it sneaks up on you; as you walk toward it, you have the National theater on your right and a garden path on your left, and you’re just totally unaware of what’s about to hit you.

As soon as I stepped onto the square, I had to take a step back; the place was massive. Enormous. Colossal. Gigantic. Big. It’s hard to put into enough words. It’s unfathomable how large it is, and pictures can’t give it justice.

It was a long walk to get from the Liberty Square main gate to the actual Memorial Hall on the other end of the plaza. Along the way, we saw people walking their dogs, locals on benches eating their lunches, and tourists taking pictures. People were just going about their day as we

walked by, enabling us to enter their lives for a brief moment as passers-by on a sunshiny day.

The ache in my feet and the fever that I had temporarily subsided because I was so excited just to be there.

We walked up the eighty-nine steps to the actual memorial hall (each step representing each year of

Chiang Kai-Shek’s life). It had already seemed huge from across the plaza, but up close, it was unbelievable – scary almost. Inside the hall stood the memorial statue of Chiang Kai-Shek, the person this whole place was built for, closed off by velvet rope. It stood magnificently in the middle of the beautifully designed hall with an emblem of the Taiwanese flag painted onto the ceiling directly above the statue. Two guards stood on its sides, standing by, unmoving and unintimidated by all the people taking pictures of the statue and of them.

The view from the hall is what really sealed the deal for Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall being one of my favorite places I’ve ever visited. From the top step, you could look down and see all 240,000 square meters of Liberty Plaza, and all you could do was take in as much as you can.

Suddenly, I felt very, very small – not in an intimidating way, but in a refreshing way. Here I was, standing in a foreign country, in a city I’ve never been to, in a spot I’d never thought I’d get to see or be in, with people I never thought I’d get to travel with. It was an awesome experience and a great way to start the trip.

We spent a good hour and a half taking in the site before we set off for the next stop of our flexibly planned itinerary. I left with a smile on my face, excited for what else Taiwan had in store.