Japan and South Korea take the larger share of visitors to East Asia, and Taiwan receives a fraction of the attention despite offering a comparable range of things to do with considerably smaller crowds. These four pages cover what to know before booking, the case for going, and the assumptions worth dropping first.

Taiwan rewards visitors who approach it with curiosity rather than assumptions. Guidebooks and websites, this one included, provide the framework; the rest comes from observing, asking questions and following what you find.