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Today we went to the NATAS fair 2008 at the Singapore Expo. Well, as expected, there were so many people there, and even the queue for admission tickets was quite long too. Anyways, it took me quite a while for us to find a parking lot and quite a bit of effort to enter the expo hall. I really think people are getting quite smart on holding exhibitions, cos Popular and some other advertisers are also holding their exhibition sale there. Well, it is good for some people, but definitely I must say that it's not a good idea for me... all those crowd... argghh... gave me quite a bit of headache. The admission is $3 per person, so Shujun and I really hope that we better find some good deals there. It was our first time participating in NATAS fair, so things were pretty unsure for us initially. As we entered the hall, we were welcomed by a row of people with stacks of brochures and pamphlets. As we walked past, they just place what they have onto our hands... you know what this reminds me?... I feel like I am in Sim Lim Square where the pamplet distributors are strategically placed along the corridor and escalators... :D Initially, we do not know where to start. Good thing is that I managed to persuade Shujun to bring me to Taiwan for our honeymoon and she agreed :). So it doesn't take us long to notice a booth from the Taiwan Tourism Board (it's actually quite big), with the well known slogan "Welcome to Taiwan". You know what, everything is perfect there, they have lots of brochures which includes a simplified tourist map. I also managed to grab hold of a book which records all the hotels and restaurants there, which I think will come in very useful since we wanted Free and Easy (F&E) trip there; but the only thing missing there is our Taiwan Tourism Ambassador - too bad Jolin Tsai weren't there, wished we could take a photo with her :). Anyways, the Korea Tourism Board was just opposite and there was a huge crowd surrounding the booth. As we glanced over, we saw some Korean Models posing for the audience. After talking to the different groups of people manning the Taiwan Tourism Board booth, we finally realised that they do not sell or promote any tours lor... they will direct us to the tour agents instead. But it's a really informative booth, cos the brochures that we gathered will be very useful for us to plan our itinery :). Knowning that we won't be able to get any good information from them regarding which tour agents can offer the best rates, we decided to do comparison by our own instead. We decided to try some recommeded tour agents first, so we approached the Farmosa Tour Agency. We asked about F&E packages but the salesperson immediately tried to convince us to take up their tour packages, so..... we said "OK, bye.". Next, we came to SA tour. The lady who served us, weren't so friendly. She couldn't do any recommendations and she do not know Taiwan and the packages that her agency holds. Her answers were always a one-sentence answer, yes or no, answer only what was asked - no elaboration, her attitude was like, "hey, if you want, just buy, don't waste my time". Well, I can be considerate that maybe she's tired of serving customers non-stop the whole day and maybe it just so happens that she might be having some PMS, but Shujun and I are really green horns when it comes to planning such a long and far tour on our own, so we needed more than this lor.... so in the end.... I strongly believed that we need to compare further with other agents... and so we proceeded on for our search. However, I would say the time spent wasn't wasted there lah, cos we got to know that we can actually take up this package that she holds which is actually a 4 days F&E tour and we are actually allowed to extend it and we can get our own accomodations during the extension. Meaning it's pure DIY during the extension, up to the point of finding our own transport to the airport for departure back to Singapore. This is really quite a good news for us. This means, we can purchase this tour, which includes accomodation for the first 3 nights in Taipei, during which we will explore Taipei, which includes a full day tour on the 2nd day. Meaning it's F&E in Taipei on Day 1, tour on Day 2, and then F&E on Day 3. Day 4 onwards, after check out, we can plan our own itinery to go maybe KenTing or Tai Zhong and book our own accomodations and it's really DIY tour then. Indeed, only then do I realised that F&E can really be so flexible. Moving on from SA tour, we came to this New Shan Tour Agency near SA and also just beside the exhibition hall wall. We talked to this salesperson ( I think he's Alan). He's quick and knowledgeable, and knows exactly what we want. He's knows quite a lot about Taiwan too as he brings tour team there before too. It is also from him that we know a bit about how the Bullet Train works. And really, this further confirmed our idea of going F&E in Taiwan. He assured us that even if we were impromtu about our accommodations during the next few days after the package, we shouldn't face problem too. By the way, he offered us exactly the same tour package as SA tour, as mentioned just now. Comparing the prices in my mind, it is quite comparable. However, when we asked about upgrading our flights to SQ, he immediately said that SIA is having a promotion now and that the upgrade is only $25 per person. So he offered to help us check the flight availability. This is totally different from what the SA salesperson did. She just mentioned that each person needs a $100 top up and she didn't mention about any SIA promotion and din bothered to help us check availability lor.... so... we were glad that we did some comparison. Upon analysing that Alan was helpful, friendly, knowledgeable and that the price was reasonable, we decided not to compare anymore.... we went ahead and confirmed our tour purchase. Alan got his colleague, Joey to handle our purchase, who was equally friendly too. Shujun used her UOB card, and since our package is more than $1800 (it's actually just above), we got a free suitcase from UOB at the New Shan booth itself. New Shan also gave us some pineapple tart (凤梨� which taste good too.  UOB foc suitcase Because our flight is SQ, we could go over to the SIA booth to fill in 2 lucky draw entries too. An we were given 2 shoe bags as a freeby :). And also, since Shujun's UOB card is Mastercard, we went over to the Mastercard booth and she redeemed a 45 mins SPA voucher. Finally, with our receipt, we went back to the Taiwan Tourism Board, who gave us 2 cute cups and also 2 MRT pass (I think it's unlimited ride for 1 day), which I think the pass is really something useful to us, and I am really grateful for the Taiwan Tourism Board to provide such a nice gift for F&E travellers to Taiwan.  Nice cups from Taiwan Tourism Board Ultimately, we took up the AIG travel insurance at $40.80 each (superior). And we got a cute little cute bear.  AIG Insurance Bear Overall, the NATAS experience was fruitful and I think I will return next time when we wish to go on holidays. So, it's finally fixed, our honeymoon shall officially start on the 5th of May and wil end on 13th of May. Yippee! Now I can visit the country that I always yearn to! :)
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i hope ur wedding n honeymoon was a success! 
