20/12/2023
The 12 queues to the Taipei Marathon
We have all become very adept in queuing up. After a dozen lots of queues, I finally completed the Taipei marathon on Sunday the 17th December 2023. There was the long queue at (1) airport check-in even though we checked in online, the queue at (2) the immigration gates, the 1-hour queue at the (3) Tourist Refund Scheme counter (just as well we budgeted for the expected delay), the queue at (4) security clearance, then the queue to (5) board the plane (cattle class, of course). The (6) Taipei immigration queue is just as bad as Sydney’s. There is another long long queue (at least 300 people in front of me) to pick up the bib at the (7) Taipei Marathon expo, then the queue at the (8) train station for the starting point of the marathon. Finally, the queue to the (9) start of the race. Of course, there were queues to (10) get your medal, your (11) finishing T-shirt and more queues to get back to the hotel on the (12) train.
It’s Christmas and these queues are generally long and some of them are more than an hour long and some a little less but that's life today. But I did it.
Came in 19 minutes faster than this year's Paris Marathon in April. I must be getting younger. Must be those secret Chinese herbs. Or perhaps, those 4-5 am wake up training over the last 3-4 months. Now, this is another one of those items ticked off on my Marathon bucket list. Next item (hopefully), it's Reykjavik, Iceland Marathon in August 2024.
