What can I say? Take cutting edge visual/interactive technology, add to it a generous helping of the Japanese "kawaii" aesthetic (you know: Hello Kitty, Sailor Moon, Pokemon, Totoro), stir in a steaming dollop of good ol' Chinese flowery rhetoric (artfully translated into Chinglish), season it with a dash of inadvertent (or perhaps advertent?) sexuality, and then add a powerful dose of shrooms. This is the Pavilion of Dreams.
First, you are led into a chamber to some rows of seats, where you are entertained for a few minutes by a flower-shaped mobile/chandelier thingy hanging from the ceiling, which opens and closes as it changes color.
After that thrilling event is overwith, you line up to be issued a bracelet. In the process, tall people like me have to squat down to read the monitor, which asks you to choose a life goal: career, health, emotion, and two others.... I forget. Why? Not really sure. The bracelet is used for the interactive stuff that comes up.
In the second room, you're presented with dozens of naked-eye 3D screens showing natural scenes. The technology that's used is a refinement of that used in old lenticular 3D postcards from the 70s, and it's actually pretty cool. You then stand in a green circle in front of a screen, and when cued by a light, you wave your hand. Sensors pick up the motion and "fairy dust" appears on the screen, making a flower grow. Kind of silly, but at least the plants you see are images of real ones you see when hiking in Taiwan's wildernesses.
You walk out, and you need to recharge your bracelet with "energy" (probably uploading some data for what comes up in the next room). And what you see in the next room defies belief. The theme of this room is the pollination of a flower. But you, imagining you're a bee, get to do the pollinating yourself. You are first invited to... I kid you not... "stroke the stamen". You approach several pendulous, testicular-looking objects hanging down from the ceiling, and you slap (rather than stroke) one of them. This supposedly releases the digital pollen.
Next you come to a curvy interactive screen where you "gather" "pollen." You wave your arm around, and the screen shows clusters of pollen gathering around your hand. Finally, charged with male DNA, you approach a large spherical ovule, which you plant your hand on and "impregnate," sparking a cascade of light that spreads outward and upward. ... Was it good for you?
Next you enter a hallway, where you place your bracelet in an energy circle to find out what flower you bloomed. Now you walk up the ramp to the second floor. This is where the coolest part of the experience takes place. It's the 360-degree amphitheater. Here you sit on the floor and are taken on a visual journey up into the clouds, and soon you zip through the mountains of Taiwan. This is the highlight of the Pavilion of Dreams. After that, you are brought down into a forest, where you do more interactive stuff. A wave of the hand causes a tree to spring up on screen, and touching a lighted area causes animals to come out.
Next you walk into another room where you're entertained by plastic cylinders that bob up, squat down and change color.
And finally, you walk to a table where you upload the data from your bracelet. The data is displayed on the tabletop screen, and it turns into flower, which joins everyone else's flowers. Woohoo.
You return your bracelet, and are given a souvenir/fortune card. You exit out a walkway lined with plastic bottles.
Drawbacks: Getting tickets is a real pain in the ay, the pavilion isn't everything it's cracked up to be, in my opinion. With the technology they had, they had the potential to do something much more awesome.
Advantages: Some of the technology used is very nice, and the visual flight through the mountains of Taiwan is awesome. And it's just a very bizarre, kitschy experience; an "only in Taiwan" kind of thing.
My rating: 4 stars (out of 5).
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About getting tickets:
There's a special ticketing area outside the expo grounds. It's by the Xinsheng Park Area, at a gateway that's about 100m east of the main Expo entrance on Minzu East Road.
The gate to the Pavilion of Dreams ticketing area opens at 7:00am. Make sure you have an Expo ticket for the day. Once secured, you walk in, and there's an open flat area (used to be tennis and basketball courts) with plastic dividers allowing for about 20 rows of people to line up in switchback fashion. There are yellow dots on the ground, and each person gets to stand (or sit) on one (this is smart - it makes keeps people from crowding each other out, and makes it easier for the staff to estimate the crowd size).
For the next two hours you sit and chat with your neighbors, read a book, listen to mp3s, whatever.
At 9:00am, they close the gate to the area, and the line starts moving. You file through a special entrance to the park, and they check your Expo ticket. Then they finally hand you the coveted Pavilion of Dreams ticket (no charge, of course)! Your entry time for the pavilion may be several hours later.
Best to show up around 7:00am. Believe me, it was not easy for me. I am not a morning person!
