Looking for Something to Do? Taipei is Full of Surprises, Bobwundaye
Saturday April 21, by Jerome F. Keating Ph.D.
Taipei is always full of surprises no matter how long you have lived here. There are always new shops, new businesses, new restaurants etc. springing up overnight. Just last night Monika and I discovered a small pub, Bobwundaye, right in our neighborhood. We had gotten an email from D. C. Rapier of the Taiwan Blues Society that Dave Chen and Conor Prunty of the Muddy Basin Ramblers were having a jam session there and any and all were welcome.
Since I am partial to the Muddy Basin Ramblers and seeing it was in the neighborhood we decided to walk over. We have lived in this area for fifteen years, and I don’t claim that it is my mission to investigate and/or source out every pub in the environs but still it was a pleasant surprise. There in pleasant surroundings on one of the side streets near the Liuchangli MRT station on the Mucha Line we found a good mix of ex-pats and locals drinking, clapping, and chatting to country blues.
Seeing an old friend, Paul Cox, I invited him over to chat and catch up. So I got another surprise, Paul is part-owner of the pub and has been for its three years of existence. The name of the pub, Bobwundaye, is their Romanization of the Taiwanese phrase for “No problem.”
That’s Taipei, full of surprises. You gotta love this town.
Anyone that wants to be on the mailing list of the Taiwan Blues Society can write here dcr@thebluespowerhour.com and check out their website at www.bsot.org
Bobwundaye’s address is No. 26, Lane 38, Chongde St., Phone: (02) 23771772. They don’t have live music all the time but it is a small comfortable place. If you are in the neighborhood, check it out, you may be surprised.