Flatland is scarce roads and railways must navigate rugged terrain and much of the area remains covered in dense Vegetation or protected national parks such as Kenting and Taroko But while Taiwan is very mountainous overall the western part consists of broad plains and rolling hills that provide ample space for cities infrastructure and perhaps most importantly Agriculture and more to that point the relatively flat land in the West allows for efficient transportation networks the construction of industrial hubs and the expansion of urban centers such as Taipei Taichung and Kaohsiung for example in 1999 Taiwan began construction of its first and only High-speed rail line linking the country's capital at Taipei with its large southern city, Kaohsiung Taiwan's high-speed rail which can travel up to 300 kilometers per hour can only really be built in flatter areas as Such nearly all of Taiwan's west coast is connected to its high-speed rail network Its east coast though It would be very challenging to make it work there due to the mountainous topography This kind of infrastructure keeps the country's population and industry focused on Taiwan's west coast, but it's not all about Infrastructure Taiwan is very prone to natural disasters But while it's a small island not all of Taiwan suffers these disasters in the same way frequent earthquakes and typhoons disproportionately impact the central and eastern regions You see the island sits at the boundary between the Philippine sea plate and the Eurasian plate making it highly seismically active In fact most of Taiwan's east coast between the cities of Taitung and Hualien Sits on the Chishang Fault a very active fault line that creates a large earthquake every few years in 2024 a magnitude 7.4 earthquake ripped through Hualien causing extensive damage and loss of life for the city and region While Taiwan's western cities can feel these same earthquakes They're rarely subjected to the full force in the same way as the country's east coast But also Taiwan's east coast routinely suffers from another devastating natural disaster large and powerful typhoons that form over the Pacific Ocean in 2024 alone Taiwan was hit by three powerful typhoons Typhoon Kong Ray the largest typhoon to hit Taiwan since 1996 sustained winds of up to 185 kilometers per hour this storm slammed into the country's east coast causing Extensive damage during a period of time when Taiwan was still trying to rebuild after its recent earthquake And while the whole country was under a typhoon warning It's the country's east coast that took the brunt of it suffice it to say natural disasters Don't make living in eastern Taiwan easy, but there are other economic factors at play as well One of the biggest factors is Taiwan's economic relationship with mainland China the west coast facing the Taiwan Strait is Strategically positioned to facilitate trade and transportation links with China Which remains Taiwan's largest trading partner with more than 40% of Taiwan's goods exported to its cousin country Major ports such as Kaohsiung Taichung and Keelung handle the vast majority of Taiwan's international trade Serving as gateways for goods moving between Taiwan and the global market this proximity has influenced Taiwan's economic development With industries clustering in areas that provide easy access to shipping routes and international markets the eastern coast in Contrast faces the wide open Pacific Ocean making trade and transportation routes less convenient This proximity to the mainland is reflected throughout history early Chinese settlers who arrived in increasing numbers during the Ming and Qing Dynasties primarily landed on the western side of the island the West's flatter terrain and fertile plains allowed for agriculture While the indigenous populations in the central and eastern mountains resisted large-scale settlement Even during the Japanese colonial era when major infrastructure projects such as railways and roads were developed the emphasis remained on the west coast due to its economic potential and Accessibility while the Taiwanese government has made efforts to develop the east including improved transportation networks such as the Sihua highway And the Eastern Line Railway the region remains far less populated than the West Hualien and Taitung the largest cities in eastern Taiwan are small compared to their western counterparts and function more as regional centers than major urban hubs Today Taiwan's west coast is home to about 90% of all of Taiwan's population Or a little more than 21 million people this would be led by New Taipei with 4 million people Kaohsiung with 2.8 million Taichung and Taipei with 2.7 million Taiwan with 2.1 million and Tainan with 1.8 million people by contrast Central and eastern Taiwan is home to just 2.5 million people smaller than most of Taiwan's west coast cities This region would be led by Hualien and Taitung with just 106,000 people each Guys, I'm literally walking through Hualien as I record this and let me tell you The eastern side of Taiwan is Incredibly beautiful, which is to say if you ever do visit Taiwan Don't skip out on coming to the east coast because the geography here is stunning But if you don't plan on visiting Taiwan anytime soon, and you do want to experience it Be sure to check out the two videos I have on Taiwan over on my travel channel Alex and I first go down the west coast and then back up the east coast and it's a lot of fun I hope you enjoyed learning all about Taiwan If you did, please like the video and subscribe to the channel if you want to watch more videos consider this one on Columbia's empty West Coast and Be sure to check out my adventures in Taiwan right here.

and I skip out of the back of the theater before people catch me.

My group was a little salty that they had to do all the work and I got to skip out,

good morning welcome to another day in my life in tokyo i thought i would take you guys along with me today i've got some christmas shopping to do some errands to run i'm going to see a movie later i get a lot of questions about how expensive it is to live in tokyo so i thought i would show you guys what my day-to-day costs are of just food transportation activities just daily life stuff so you can get an idea of how much i spend living here on a day-to-day basis so this is what the cats get for breakfast they've been obsessed with this recently i'm glad they like it because i can just get it from costco in a massive slab and it lasts forever and it's reasonably priced maro won't go near it unless i break it up into little pieces for him though starting the morning off with my skincare routine as usual it's getting colder in japan finally so happy about it well that means the air is quite a bit drier so i've added some more i've been using the same stuff for about a decade now it's amazing i used to have really bad cystic acne and these products cleared it up so i will probably never change i'm going to be using these forever it only takes a couple minutes to do my skincare routine i do it in the morning and before bed and just the difference in my skin is night and day so it's totally worth the effort if you are looking for some new skincare or if you know somebody that would like some for christmas i have put together a skincare box with the company that makes all these products it's on sale right now for nearly half off the regular price until stocks run out so check out the link below and they've got some fun freebies this time as well so hope you guys enjoy this okay get ready for the most delicious protein smoothie recipe you've ever had in your life add in one banana one full tray of ice cubes a cup of milk of your choice i'm using unsweetened soy milk you can use whatever you like now the key ingredients here are peanut butter powder i use this organic one by pb fit you can get this online i'll link it down below and the second key ingredient that you can't skip out on is cocoa powder this makes the most delicious peanut butter chocolate protein smoothie it's so good a couple scoops of that for protein powder you can use whatever you like this one is extra delicious for some reason it tastes like hot chocolate i don't know why it doesn't have that many calories it doesn't have that much sugar but they've made it taste so good so if you're looking for a really delicious protein you can just have this on its own with water and it tastes really good i don't know what they put in this stuff but it's it's really yummy i like to add in a scoop of collagen for some extra protein and to help my hair and nails and skin it's not necessary though and then if you feel like it needs a little bit liquid you can add in a bit of water at this point and that is it blend it up and you will be addicted to this you guys we have this for breakfast almost every morning i crave it all the time it's so creamy so chocolatey so peanut buttery so so good it's like a milkshake you really don't need to drive here the trains are always on time they come so often and they're quite affordable we're going on a really short train trip today it's only gonna cost us 140 yen i'm gonna meet up with yushka and we're going for lunch so time to do some shopping at daiso i've got to get sponges and garbage bags exciting stuff so 15 15 for a dollar why does the cat look so angry why does it have five legs is that a cat is it an octopus i think it's for cleaning spoons i think oh yeah look oh he's got a purpose yeah okay so what's that one for i don't know i don't know is it no i think i'll just stick with the normal ones these will do okay i'm just heading to the konbini i've got some bills to pay and i'm doing something fun i'm putting together a japanese snack advent calendar for my friend in the uk so i need to go pick out some little snacks that'll fit in an advent calendar i think they will have some because there's stuff like black thunder and they have a little section with a bunch of single chocolate bars that i think will work really well maybe some gummies he likes pokemon so we'll see what we can find these are good oh they have figures in them that's awesome a bunch of those there i think i got one of each that's so cool pokemon cards are in stock thank god sometimes these are hard to find and some of those oh they got all different ones i was thinking black thunder would be good the size is really good a couple of those a couple of special black thunders oh these are cute oh christmas krunky oh my god soybean sugar cocoa powder is that it soybean sugar and cocoa powder well at least it's simple ingredients i might try one i'm so curious let's give this gato chocola tofu sweets bar a try it's 81 calories and six grams of protein simple ingredients doesn't look great it's not bad at all it tastes like it tastes like chocolate mousse that's been solidified and has a lot of cocoa powder in it it's really chocolatey i like it it tastes really similar to like gato chocola they weren't lying if you know somebody that would love to get some japanese snacks for christmas check out today's sponsor sakura ko and they also have the tokyo treat box we're going to be opening up both of them today and i'll show you guys the differences inside the sakura ko box you will find 20 authentic artisan japanese snacks as well as a tea and a tableware item this month's box is hokkaido themed they have some of the most delicious snacks because they are well known for their dairy products this is hachimitsu ringo mochi honey apple mochi it smells like fresh apples it's gonna be amazing i can tell already it's like a combination of apple pie and mochi oh it's so good cheers yeah my tea might be my favorite type of japanese tea oh maybe second to matcha sakura ko is more of a traditional artisan snacks type of vibe tokyo treat is filled with more modern stuff like limited edition kit kats all kinds of goodies in here let's open up this month's special holiday version and see what's inside i see a bag of kit kats these must be brand new i've never seen this flavor before they look like they have a flaky chocolate layer possibly intriguing they taste a lot like cookies and cream very creamy very tasty if you would like to get a sakura ko or a tokyo treat subscription for yourself or for one of your loved ones for christmas check out the links down below in description box and you can use my code for five dollars off your first order time for the best sushi ever so this is a typical lunch for us so i thought i would show you guys the price of it i don't know if i ever have before it's busy so we gotta wait for a while there's eight people in front of us um all right so we always order the same thing so it's really easy no decision fatigue or salmon we'll get four of those and then i really like this restaurant because you can kind of customize it you can do no wasabi if you don't like wasabi you can also choose the amount of rice like if you're on a low carb diet you can order it with no rice we usually get a little bit of rice so then we can eat more and then tuna yeah tuna salad here is so good and look at the price it is crazy it's so affordable it's delicious um the best two sushi you can get at choshimaru beer is on sale for 357 yen it's half price that's crazy i don't think i've ever had a crab sushi um so big right mine was super spicy too it's hard to dip it's so heavy um perfect meal for two people under 6 000 yen maro's favorite snack is not here they've replaced it with weird dog treats oh my god he's gonna be so sad where are the fish flakes oh my god of cakes holy shit they're so fancy looking like this pizza for dogs that's so cute it's always just for dogs this is like a fancy cat can't eat anything fun oh they got fresh dog food why is it only for dogs found them safe maro he is so obsessed with these uh katsu this one it's a mix of three different fish he yells at me every morning to get him these from the fridge they got such a cute selection of cat scratches now the bus they would love that it's tiny they would be like jammed in there gotta get a tuna one and put tuna in it there's a skateboard oh my god it needs real wheels okay so cute yeah i'll love that i'll get that so i love going to the theater in japan the popcorn is amazing for one and it's a lot i've never had a papaya in japan no maybe i'll get one too yeah i think you should you just peel it and uh just cut it let's get a bunch of and scoop it out yeah i'll show you when we get home sweet gotta get some kaki whenever i see them best friends different types of kaki these ones are cheaper those ones look good they're so red maybe i should get these ones they're like the ones that we got oh sorry hokkaido you've been switched out matsutake look at the size they're so good yeah it's crazy those must be amazing that one's from america so it's cheap but when they're from japan they're very pricey i found a cheesecake flavored calpis what the heck i don't know about that i have never seen this before and it's such a good idea so you recycle your old cup ramen empty containers and then you buy one of these and it's seeds and dirt you just plop it in the bottom of the container and you can grow different herbs to put in your cup ramen it's genius seafood chili tomato curry is awesome okay that was awesome what a random grocery store we got some cool stuff i'm gonna get a warm milk tea to warm up 150. it's always exciting when the hot drinks are in the vending machine they're the best you can just carry this and keep your hands warm at night it's so nice it's dinner time yay yay i'm stoked you're gonna fucking love this place you do the most amazing pasta in all of tokyo and we're meeting pete pete's here pete dolson and who uh ian what two fantastic guys let's go come on the cocktails sound nice i'll probably just get a tea though they have um mango ice tea this one's good yeah i'm gonna try that the pasta is so good here stuffing rice chicken or yeah can you hear tuna munching on the christmas tree well that is pretty much it for my day here in tokyo were you guys surprised by the prices of or was that pretty much what you expected since moving to tokyo i've noticed it's definitely a lot more pricey on a daily basis living here than it was up in north japan however when i compare it with the prices of things back home in canada it feels quite affordable here i'm always shocked by how expensive things are in canada right now what do you guys think let me know how the prices here compare to where you're from i'd be really curious thanks so much for watching i hope you enjoyed this vlog and i'll see you guys again very soon bye for now

but that doesn't mean he got to skip out on any of the dangerous stuff.

I know, but my exercise regime is shot! I skip out too many days.

And if you're a coffee addict like me, then you can't skip out on this opportunity.

And the first don't I have for you is don't skip out on using the Tube.

Skip out on it, and your brain will notice, in both good and not-so-good ways.

stop. "Put on tha' things and run an' skip out o'