FR on Taiwan Golf and Food

Dear all,

it has been a very interesting week for me to visit Jason in Taiwan. Just a quick round up of what happened since Monday.

Day 1 (Mon) - arrived at Taoyuan and visited Jason's Den. it is a very cosy place and his workshop is set in the middle of the shop. it looks rather like a lab and customers can sit and watch him work or just turn round to hit balls.

Dinner was at Din Tai Fung....different from the singapore version.

Day 2 - demo at a driving range off the city. most of the golfers have never seen a launch monitor and they was surprise with the reading and how the club speed can be used to determine flex of shaft.

i have done quite a few fitting for taiwanese golfer before so i know that they can really hit hard. of the 12 golfers we fitted, only 1 was below 90 mph. the rest including some 60+ years old golfers was hitting in the 95 mph range.

a few of them wanted to buy the demo shaft, but only one succeed in snatching the 8 series from Jason.

Lunch was at a place call Keelung and the special noodle and the lor bak rice was really outstanding. Dinner was at a famous local night market where the oyster mee sua was out of this world.

Day 3 - wow today i traveled some 580 km to Chiayi and then Taichung. all done within an 8 hour day and made possible because of the HSR train which can top 300 km/hr. We visited the FST factory in Chiayi and saw how the KBS Tour are made. good meeting with the manufacturer and most impressed with their stringent QC process. then off to Karakal grips in Taichung for more talks. They made the Tiger Shark, most of the Ping, Rife and some of the Odyssey putter grips.

wow the broiled goose in taichung is really special and dinner was at a local noodle shop that's about a hundred years old.

Day 4 - played a round of golf with Jason at a golf course in Taipei. the hilly course is a bit more narrow and steep than Sembawang. the caddy was a old lady and she is really efficient in distance reading and handing us our clubs.

Met a ball manufacturer before dinner. His 3 piece ball reminds me of the U-tri tour with a near Pro-v finish. looking forward to trying out his samples soon.

Dinner was at a very nice grill call Yuan Sau, the quality is very good and luckily we walked 18 holes today.

Tomorrow we have another demo day at Taoyuan....

Jason please post photo if you have the chance.

DGman

Wow boss, looks like you visited some nice places. I hope you visited the original Din Thai Fung in Taipei and not the newer one. The old one you have to walk through the kitchen to the upper floors. Do visit the night markets in Taipei. They have a few and all are nice imo.

One place if you do have some time to visit is their national museum, got really good chinese collection (I know you are on biz trip, only if you have the time, its worth it).

Got cute golf stuff for the vain golfers here? Kekeke...

Wooooo!!
Cun wait for the photos! of the food!

Roystonn...this is for you especially if you are in india having chapati....



in the centre is braised bamboo shoots. on the top is the broiled goose (a little like our chikcen rice) but the texture and the sweetness of the goose is very different. bottom left is goose intestine and bottom right is liver and gizzard. top right is goose blood with glutinous rice. middle left is pork ball soup. YUMMYYYY!!!!

heres a close up of the rife and ping putter...who knows the next grip may have 999 fishes on them.





now why am i talking about food on a golf forum?????

Taiwan got a lot of good food; but also got some "stranger" ones that my palate is not so used to. I had the "blood on glutinous rice cake" that was not so good.

I remeber I had very good "chin chow in winter melon drink"; the Taiwan version of "stinky toufu" is also quite good (if you like stinky tofu lah)..

oh i learn a new term when i played golf with Jason the other day.

his ball was in a grass bunker and the pin was almost on an apex. if he hits it short, his ball will roll back to where he was, if he hits it too long, he will have a long up-slope putt.

he hits a perfect shot and the ball bounced once then stopped next to the hole.

he turns around to me and said...Chow Chi Bye..i was shocked and i said, its a perfect shot and why the bad lingo....he explained sheepishly that he meant 超级 Bite....meaning super bite.

no prize for guessing what he was using though....

DGman

wow! nice food!
Wats the one with the wasabi and the one at the centre?

Everyday i get to see curry oni..
Oh, n yoghurt

Ssquirrel wrote:

Taiwan got a lot of good food; but also got some "stranger" ones that my palate is not so used to. I had the "blood on glutinous rice cake" that was not so good.

I remeber I had very good "chin chow in winter melon drink"; the Taiwan version of "stinky toufu" is also quite good (if you like stinky tofu lah)..

did you try the 7 miles of fragrance?

DGman wrote:

he turns around to me and said...Chow Chi Bye..i was shocked and i said, its a perfect shot and why the bad lingo....he explained sheepishly that he meant 超级 Bite....meaning super bite.

no prize for guessing what he was using though....

DGman

Boss, this is so hilarious, does it mean we have to introduce our irons as Chow Chi Bye Ikasu from now?

DGman wrote:

oh i learn a new term when i played golf with Jason the other day.

his ball was in a grass bunker and the pin was almost on an apex. if he hits it short, his ball will roll back to where he was, if he hits it too long, he will have a long up-slope putt.

he hits a perfect shot and the ball bounced once then stopped next to the hole.

he turns around to me and said...Chow Chi Bye..i was shocked and i said, its a perfect shot and why the bad lingo....he explained sheepishly that he meant 超级 Bite....meaning super bite.

no prize for guessing what he was using though....

DGman

hehehheee

thats not all...the graman is known as chow chi bai kan 超级白竿, better not go into too many other terminology....

so next time when chip and stop the ball next to the pin. you know what to expect liao.

i don't mind stinky tofu but their version of super stinky tofu (boiled version) is a bit hard to stomach.

DGman

Where's the deep fried stuff????

Hi, All, it was very nice to have Mr. DGman visited, and glad we had good a lot of fun, and brainstormming with new terms heehee...

the launch at KeeLung was the ending by many wrong turn, but, a good mistake right?.. hee....
and for the whole week, DGman is having doubts that "is Jason really a Taiwanese?", "why not buy a real GPS, instead of using the phone+GPS software, and keep losing the signal? and made the wrong turn?" "why? why? why?..... " haha....

1st DEMO DAY


The guy helping us "promoting"


120 mph Swing Speed


2nd DEMO DAY


Glad to have you visited! and looking forward to see you guys soon!

Hi Jason, good to hear from u & from the pics, I can see that u r looking well too.....All the best 2u.

finally someone is talking about golf and with pictures to prove (the one and only BFG bag is in one of the pics)...someone is thinking that i went there for a food expedition.

DGman

damn, that thing looks good.. got stock?!

Hello from Taiwan

so fatboy, you went to taoyuan liao????

do you go up and say hi to Jason. oh i forgot to add that Chien senior is a renowned architect in taoyuan and he designed the wacoal building.

DGman

Yeah, did you come?

Did not go up as no time; on a business trip and rushing.

I know the place as I always stay at China Trust Hotel next to the shop.

I doubts I can get any lefties items there as well and need to work harder with my swing in order to get a new set.

Anyway, I got a new snake eyes casted irons (5 - 9), 23 degree hybrid, 52 degree and 56 degree forged wedge (all from snake eyes as well).

Getting them to be shafted with True Temper soon once the 6 iron and ferrules come in from Golfsmith this mth.

If got anything that is only sold in BFG Taiwan, I am interestd to get provided it can be used by lefties; what is the opening tiem ?