Longshan Temple

Taking the red line to Longshan Temple, we found an underground mall that resembled the typical marketplaces we see in Mexico and other Central American countries.  Here you can get the tourist souvenirs like bookmarkers, bags, tea sets, dolls, puppets, statuettes, etc. and when it says "made in Taiwan", you know you have a product that is really made by the locals.  Coming up to street level, street vendors lined up one side of the metro building selling all kinds of food.  Music coming loudly from a parked vehicle of sorts, people buying and eating as they walked around a beautiful fountain and a Buddhist temple across the street. This is the panoramic view you got as you stepped out of the metro building.

Longshan Temple was described in my guidebook as the real heartbeat of Taipei.  The temple is officially  dedicated to Guanyin (the Buddhist representation of compassion) but there is a great amount of folk religion mixed into it.  There were people everywhere.  Some with hands together making their way up to the temple, some giving their back to the temple but also praying, some with offerings of flowers and/or food, some chanting, some with prayer beads, and some in a long line making their way up to the altar.  There was a smell of incense throughout the temple.