Thursday, October 9, 2014

World Chocolate Wonderland

  On Sunday I went to an exhibit in 淡水/Tamsui ALL ABOUT CHOCOLATE!!!!  So exciting!  Originally Kamiko and I planned to wear chocolate-themed clothing ,but since I sold my Little Bear Cafe, I had Teddy wear her Little Bear Cafe dress and I wore a bear-themed outfit.  That is sort of like chocolate, right???

The exhibit is split into "worlds" and you receive a little paper suitcase with three chocolate coins you can exchange for gifts at different places.  Before even entering the exhibit, there were many statues so we took photos with them!

First up was Maya Chocolate!  You could step on a scale and see how many cacao beans you weighed.  I will not reveal my cacao weight, but Teddy's was two beans.
Maya Chocolate had a little section you could roll out the cacao beans from the fruit.  Kamiko, Teddy, and I gave it a go.  We all ended up smelling of chocolate afterward!!  At Maya Chocolate world you could exchange a chocolate coin for SPICY HOT CHOCOLATE which was surprisingling delicious!!!!
After all that hard word, I had to have me a cigar.  Just kidding, this is a cinnamon stick!

Next up was Fantasy Forest!  I make the most attractive faces.




There was an adorable little house with props you could put on!  They were all children-sized so only the wings fit me....


After Fantasy Forest was a fashion Champs-Elysee room and a Future World but the lighting was very poor so we couldn't take many photos.  There were shoes, bags, masks, and hats made of real chocolate! 

The last world was a romantic one where you could exchange a coin for chocolate-covered marshmallow or a postcard.  There was also a photobooth you could take photos in!  It cost money to print, but you could scan the QR code and download for free.


There was also this game show below where you slide a digital coin on the small screen and it will fly into the big screen!!!  Like magic!!!  The goal was to hit the little white angel at the top of the fountain.  If you hit any of the other character they would still react so it was funny.  It took me many tries to hit the angel, but only took Kamiko three tries....
Hitting the angel would earn you an extra chocolate coin!  I earned two and gave one to a small child who didn't understand the game haha.

There was also an upstairs where two foreign chocolate artisans made chocolate items.
Here is a Mario spider: 
And then a KING SPIDER:



There was also a DIY class to sign up for.  We made these chocolate lollies, and the molds are gifts you can take home!  Super fun!


After leaving was a fun gift shop with loads of chocolate-theme goods such as molds, stationery objects, candies, etc.


By the time we left the chocolate world, it was dark already!!


The bridge back was shut off for maintenance, so we took a ferry instead :3
It was my first time on such a small ferry, and the roof was INSANELY low.  I'm so glad the waters were relatively calm otherwise there would be many headaches going around....


It was a really great and fun exhibit and definitely recommend everybody visit if you've got the chance.  The ticket prices are NT$240 for students and NT$280 regular.  Very worth it!  And try the spicy hot chocolate ;)