Dihua Street Lunar New Year or Chinese New Year Market is the biggest one of it's kind in Taipei, Taiwan. The street is closed off to pedestrian traffic exclusively and each side of the street is lined with stalls selling speciality food items for the holiday. This market starts 2 weeks prior to CNY every year-this year the Lunar New Year falls on February 5th-The Year Of The Pig. Chinese New Year in The People's Republic Of China can be extremely hectic and exhausting for it's citizens with an estimated 2.9 billion trips taking place during CNY and The Spring Festival. It's the biggest migration of humans on the planet! Taiwanese are very lucky with traveling back to their hometown usually lasting no more than a few hours. Taipei itself becomes quiet during the holidays with the the exception of the main temples, which are visited by the thousands hourly, especially on the first day of the New Year. One listener asked the question are there expats in Taiwan? Yes of course, I mentioned that many expats in Taiwan fall into the English Teacher category but most foreigners that live on the island are in the "overseas worker" category which mostly comprises of domestic care, factory workers, and people working in the fishing industry. The largest group are Indonesians with a population of over 250,000. Vietnamese are the next largest with over 223,000 followed by The Philippines with 154,000. There are currently just under 10,000 American citizens living in Taiwan. Thanks so much for listening! Just a reminder that every Sunday at 10pm EST I go live on Spreaker.com and Periscope. Join with for chat and your questions on travel throughout East, Southeast, and South Asia. Send me your questions to john@fareasttravels.com and I will try to answer them on upcoming episodes of the podcast.
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