Open until 2am at weekends and filled with moodily lit nooks, Insomnia’s (睡不著) name is fitting in more ways than one. Digital 3D art hung in the front gives the eerie feeling that the glassy-eyed mannequins within are going to jump out at you; a gigantic wooden rocking horse, soft jazz music and a sleek black dog who slinks quietly among the tables adds to the cafe’s sleepy and dream-like ambiance.
Insomnia’s meals are distinctly more down to earth, however. The homey selection of international comfort foods includes kong-pao chicken (宮保雞丁, NT$250), Silician meatballs (西西里丸子, NT$230), Chinese beef stew (紅燒牛腩, NT$250) and Java curry chicken (爪哇咖哩雞, NT$230). The portions are slender for the relatively steep price tags, but Insomnia takes great care with the presentation of each meal. Carrot, cucumber and celery crudites are arranged like flowers among cubes of ice in a small glass tumbler and served alongside a dish filled with smooth, sweet honey mustard dipping sauce. Rice is molded into a round pat and topped with black sesame seeds, while the main course is contained in a separate bowl.
The piquant, tender kong-pao chicken is the best of the bunch and stir-fried with plenty of chili peppers and crunchy peanuts. Other dishes are less memorable. The tomato sauce coating the Sicilian meatballs was satisfyingly savory and chunky, but the meatballs themselves were filled with chewy bits of gristle, which added some unexpected texture. The quality of the meat in the Chinese beef stew was much better and complemented by tender cubes of daikon. My dining companion had the Java curry chicken and thought the quality of the dish was mediocre, though I did not mind the sweetness of the sauce.
Sandwiches for NT$150 to NT$160 are also available for more budget-conscious diners. The black pepper beef sandwich (黑胡椒牛肉, NT$150) consists of meat, lettuce, tomato, cucumber and slices of American cheese on soft white baguette slices. The black pepper beef added enough kick to the sandwich to keep it from being bland, despite the presence of the American cheese. Sandwiches are served with a large mound of nacho cheese chips, an unhealthy but welcome touch.
Insomnia has an extensive drink menu, including Glenfiddich, Macallan and Glenmorangie whiskeys, as well as classic staples Jim Bean and Jack Daniels (prices range from NT$180 to NT$950 per glass, or NT$1,500 to NT$11,000 per bottle, with the most expensive being Glenfiddich 30Y). Cocktails, imported beers, liqueurs, coffee drinks and a very good, non-alcoholic iced peppermint chocolate (薄荷可可, NT$180) are also available.
Insomnia’s food and drink may be on the pricey side, but the ambiance and wide tables make it an excellent study location for students or out-of-office workers. Bookshelves filled with Chinese, English and Japanese titles provide excellent procrastination tools, as does playtime with the cafe’s friendly Formosan mountain dog, Hei Hei (黑黑).
The primaries for this year’s nine-in-one local elections in November began early in this election cycle, starting last autumn. The local press has been full of tales of intrigue, betrayal, infighting and drama going back to the summer of 2024. This is not widely covered in the English-language press, and the nine-in-one elections are not well understood. The nine-in-one elections refer to the nine levels of local governments that go to the ballot, from the neighborhood and village borough chief level on up to the city mayor and county commissioner level. The main focus is on the 22 special municipality
The People’s Republic of China (PRC) invaded Vietnam in 1979, following a year of increasingly tense relations between the two states. Beijing viewed Vietnam’s close relations with Soviet Russia as a threat. One of the pretexts it used was the alleged mistreatment of the ethnic Chinese in Vietnam. Tension between the ethnic Chinese and governments in Vietnam had been ongoing for decades. The French used to play off the Vietnamese against the Chinese as a divide-and-rule strategy. The Saigon government in 1956 compelled all Vietnam-born Chinese to adopt Vietnamese citizenship. It also banned them from 11 trades they had previously
In the 2010s, the Communist Party of China (CCP) began cracking down on Christian churches. Media reports said at the time that various versions of Protestant Christianity were likely the fastest growing religions in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The crackdown was part of a campaign that in turn was part of a larger movement to bring religion under party control. For the Protestant churches, “the government’s aim has been to force all churches into the state-controlled organization,” according to a 2023 article in Christianity Today. That piece was centered on Wang Yi (王怡), the fiery, charismatic pastor of the
Hsu Pu-liao (許不了) never lived to see the premiere of his most successful film, The Clown and the Swan (小丑與天鵝, 1985). The movie, which starred Hsu, the “Taiwanese Charlie Chaplin,” outgrossed Jackie Chan’s Heart of Dragon (龍的心), earning NT$9.2 million at the local box office. Forty years after its premiere, the film has become the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute’s (TFAI) 100th restoration. “It is the only one of Hsu’s films whose original negative survived,” says director Kevin Chu (朱延平), one of Taiwan’s most commercially successful
RSS