Hello Kitty Terminal - Taoyuan Airport

Since I seem to be doing things in duos, (i.e. the themed-restaurant duo) I decided to follow up my Hello Kitty Sweets Cafe post with the Hello Kitty Terminal in the Taoyuan International Airport.

Now, my whole experience leaving Taoyuan was not particularly great, though it did end with me flying home first class on Delta. While I don't wish to reiterate some of the bad parts of my time in that airport, I would be very happy to discuss the Hello Kitty terminal, which I got to see for all of thirty seconds while racing from the security checkpoint to my airplane.

The terminal can be found at gate C3, right next to a large Hello Kitty gift shop. As if they didn't have enough Hello Kitty merchandise floating around Taipei, this shop and terminal offers one final Sanrio experience before departing the country.
Unlike the cafe, this place was crawling with children. As a non-parent / non-child, I felt horribly out of place. Not the type of area I would just like to linger about, though it does make for some good picture-taking.

Hello Kitty Sweets Cafe

Part 2 of the Theme duo:
 
Taiwan = Totally obsessed with Hello Kitty. 
Case and Point: The Hello Kitty Sweets Cafe. 

So, apparently I'm kind of a sucker for theme restaurants. That's probably obvious given that I've been to Tokyo Alcatraz ER about 50 times. There's just something about the silliness of it all that I find charming. And speaking of charming, today's themed feature is the Hello Kitty Sweets Cafe in Taipei.

It was a very hard decision for me to come here in the first place. There are many wonderful restaurants in Taipei, and street food is to-die-for...so how did I end up at a cheesy cafe? I'm still wondering that myself.  Growing up in rural Texas, perhaps I was deprived of Hello Kitty as a child, so I sought to relive my girlhood fantasies of being surrounded by all things pink and cute. Whatever the reasons are, I found myself in Da'an using Taipei's free mobile wifi (which I heard since is no more...?) to look up directions to the cafe from the metro station.

But with that giant Hello Kitty face out front, what was the point.

Upon entering, one is greeted with a glass case of fried and cream-filled Hello Kitty heads served on gold trays. (Talk about morbid, this place could outdo Alcatraz). After speaking with the host, you may be lead upstairs (as we were) to a restaurant-styled seating area. I was surprised to see mostly adults this time. I had expected it to be riddled with seven-year-old girls, but on this afternoon it was mostly young couples.

The waitress explained how the menu and ordering system works in Chinese. Between the two of us (my friend being Japanese, and me being American), we didn't understand at all. We interpreted it to be something like, you have to spend $100 NTD on a drink to order a cake for another $300, which seemed  like it would make for an expensive lunch. Turns out we were totally wrong. It was something like, if you spend $300 on a cake, you  get $100 off a drink. What a nice surprise that was when we went to pay.

My friend was surprised to see men working here...

My friend ordered a delicious tiramisu, and I got a green tea cake. Both desserts were soft, just slightly sweet, and very photogenic.
Despite being a themed restaurant, the food was actually quite good. I expected it to be overpriced, and it was, but I did not expect the desserts to be prepared so lavishly, which they were, and taste so good, which they did.

Friend's tiramisu tray

Tiramisu kitty

Everything on this plate was edible.

I ordered a strawberry float with ice cream and a red ice Hello Kitty sculpture. The red ice was kind of creepy actually. It reminded me of an ice sculpture I once saw that was made entirely out of the frozen blood of the sculptor. Hehe, didn't think you'd be reading about frozen blood on a Hello Kitty Sweets cafe blog post, did ya?

Blood Kitty

I totally match the decor in all black with a rosary

Hello Kitty pudding head

Snapshot from Taiwan

He hates competition, Hello Kitty Sweets, Taipei, Taiwan