What's happening in Taipei this week?

Taipei's night markets don't take days off, but they follow a clear weekly pulse. Shilin Night Market in Shilin District opens around 4pm, though the food stalls along Jihe Road don't fill until 6pm. Tuesday and Wednesday nights you can walk the lanes without brushing elbows. Friday and Saturday crowds roughly double. Raohe Street Night Market near Songshan MRT is tighter, about 600 meters end to end, and tends to stay manageable even on weekends. The NT$60 pepper buns at the entrance (胡椒餅) sell out by 9pm on Saturdays, each one a crackle of black pepper and pork fat. Ningxia Night Market in Datong District runs quieter than Shilin any night of the week. The oyster omelettes at Ningxia go for about NT$70, and the stall smoke smells like sesame oil and scallion from half a block away.

The Jianguo Weekend Jade Market and Flower Market set up Saturday and Sunday from 9am to 6pm beneath the Jianguo Elevated Road near Da'an. The jade market draws collectors by 10am. The flower market smells like tuberose and jasmine even from the sidewalk. Both shut down Sunday at 6pm sharp. Monday is museum-closure day in Taipei. The National Taiwan Museum (founded 1908, on the north edge of 228 Peace Memorial Park) closes, along with the Taipei Fine Arts Museum in Zhongshan and most smaller galleries. The National Palace Museum in Shilin stays open all 7 days. Mind you, Longshan Temple in Wanhua has held daily worship since 1738, and Monday mornings the incense smoke thins enough that you can see the ceiling woodwork without squinting through haze.

June is plum rain season (梅雨季) in Taipei. Humidity currently sits at 97% and the temperature feels closer to 32°C than the measured 26°C. Afternoon showers tend to arrive between 2pm and 4pm, sometimes hard enough to flood the gutters along Zhongxiao East Road in minutes. They pass in 20 to 40 minutes. Mornings before 10am are the reliable dry window. Da'an Forest Park, Taipei's 26-hectare rectangle between Xinyi Road and Heping East Road, is walkable at 7am when the air feels damp but not yet punishing. The MRT runs until midnight at a steady 24°C inside, which matters more than you'd expect after getting soaked at 3pm. The arcade-covered sidewalks along Zhongshan North Road keep you dry for 4 or 5 blocks without an umbrella. A packable rain jacket beats an umbrella in Taipei's June wind.

Taipei's temples follow the lunar calendar, but the weekly pattern holds. Weekday mornings at Xingtian Temple in Zhongshan District draw office workers lighting incense before 8am shifts. The incense at Xingtian is thick, sweet, faintly woody. Weekend mornings bring families to Xingtian and the larger temples. Bao'an Temple in Dalongdong, which won a UNESCO Asia-Pacific Heritage Award in 2003, is quieter any day and has finer stone carvings. Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall (opened 1980) in Zhongzheng runs the changing of the guard hourly from 9am to 5pm, 7 days a week. The ceremony lasts about 10 minutes. Weekday viewings draw maybe 30 people. Saturday viewings pack 200 or more into the upper hall. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall (opened 1972) runs the same ceremony with roughly half the crowd on any given day.