Today I traveled across town to the Taipei Xia-Hai City God Temple (台北霞海城隍廟), a Daoist temple located near the Shuang Lian Station (雙連站) and DiHua Street (迪化街). I’d heard a lot about one of the gods there 月下老人， the Old Man Under the Moon. He’s a pretty chill matchmaking dude who hangs out with a scroll listing who’s going to marry whom and he ties their feet together with red strings.
Apparently, it can be extremely worthwhile to visit the temple and pray to him in order to get a boyfriend/girlfriend/husband/wife and to bless your marriage. My hostel owner told me all about how the beautiful actresses and models in Taiwan go there to ask for boyfriends and then go back 3 months later to thank the god for helping them out.
On my way to the temple I stopped at Da Dao Cheng Ma Tou (大稻程碼頭) in order to check out the view. It looks like a lovely place to bike ride and I’m so going to have to try that out sometime.
Then I trekked around DiHua Street (迪化街), which is a really cool, old section of Taipei that is chocked full with all sorts of dried fruit, meats, and herbs. Apparently this section of the city gets blocked off for days during Chinese New Year when everyone comes shopping for offerings.
After asking numerous people, I finally made my way to the temple and after wandering around lost and confused, wondering what all the different statues were and what was up with all of the cookies, large fake money and incense, I found myself a guide, Titan Wu, who totally helped me to understand every step of the path to securing a hot boyfriend from the Old Man Under the Moon. From purchasing the fake money offerings and incense to getting the string to find your soul mate, the temple has you covered.
I took a wicked lot of video footage, so you can look forward to that! (I just need to stop being lazy and edit it!)
