winter break trip part 4

we sat for a few more minutes on the side of the road. most everyone had left, but i noticed there was a woman and a man a little ways in the distance sort of keeping an eye on us in case we passed out or something like that. it was decided that amanda was in no shape, physically or mentally, to drive, so it was up to me to get us back. i had lost one of my contacts during the crash, but fortunately, my eyeglasses were in my bag and still in one piece.

i tested out the scooter a bit by myself, getting comfortable with it and making sure the lights and brakes were working, then amanda got on and we were off. for the first few minutes i was shivering uncontrollably. i'm not sure if it was the cooler night air, the shock from our accident, or both. getting back to kenting was pretty straightforward. as soon as we got near though, there were a lot more hazards... like people walking on the side of the road, cars and scooters pulling out, buses passing by us. at one point, i had a big bus on my left, an old man half an arm's length to my right, and a stopped car fifty yards in front of us. i had to speed up to pass the bus, praying the old man wouldn't move at all and that my spatial sense was accurate enough to keep us from colliding with anything.

we got back and sat on the balcony recounting the accident and the other details of the day, sort of reassuring ourselves that everything was okay. we had a good dinner at another thai food restaurant and turned in early.

the next morning, we checked out of our hotel, ate breakfast, and went down to the nearby chateau resort beach. it was a nice sandy beach, much like the one where we had beers two nights before. amanda pointed out and caught a few ghost crabs, so named because their shells are transparent. she told me one of her colleagues at academica sineca was renowned for having devised an effective trap for catching these guys. however, she clearly demonstrated bare hands and tenacity were really all that was needed.

after the beach, we went back towards our hotel and arranged to catch a bus to donggang, a town famous for its seafood. an hour and a half later, we got off the bus near the center of donggang. the town was only mentioned in passing in my guidebook, and as such, we had no maps to navigate by. we spent about thirty minutes searching for a street that was supposed to have a lot of seafood restaurants on it. later we found out it was pretty close to where the bus had dropped us off.

we walked into the first open restaurant we found at about 1:30. much like kenting, there didn't seem to be a lot of restaurant business outside of normal eating hours. the one we went into looked pretty nice, but had only one other table with people eating. i asked about their bluefin tuna sashimi and found out it cost an incredible $2000NT for seven pieces. instead, the waitress recommend we have some other sashimi, shrimp fried rice, and crabs, all of which were delicious. the shrimp fried rice is a specialty of this town. after our lunch, we found a visitor center that was selling pouches of these little shrimp as souvenirs.

we weren't in any hurry to get back on another bus, so we spent the rest of the afternoon walking around donggang. we went to a handful of interesting temples. the second one we went to was donglong temple, famous for its boat-burning ceremony as part of an offering to ask for the protection of the fisherman of the town.





it was a really nice place and full of life. what surprises me is how these temples are at once places full of tradition and yet firmly rooted in the daily activities of the town. just outside the entrance of the temple hung an led message board, scrolling what i guessed to be a calendar of upcoming events. meanwhile, between the temple and the main gate, a work crew was busy setting up a stage and testing a sound system in preparation for a concert. inside the temple, people were busy visiting each god and leaving burning sticks of incense. it was a nice place to rest a little until we were scared away by a hostile taiwanese man chewing betel nut, upset that i couldn't speak chinese or taiwanese.





we continued in a circle, hoping to see more sights before returning back to the bus station to arrange to get to kaohsiung. by the river we saw another temple, named dongxi temple, brilliantly lit by the setting sun. inside was a lot more peaceful and was a nice way to end our temple visiting after the encounter at donglong temple. we got a little lost on the way back, walking along roads that didn't seem very heavily frequented by visitors. on the way, we passed by a big set of the mysterious fish farms we had seen on the bus rides before. determined to find out what they were, i followed amanda into one where she asked the farmer what was in the ponds. it turns out that these ponds aren't fish farms but shrimp farms, one of which was the previous home of the shrimp we had for lunch that day.

we were a bit worn out from walking around all afternoon carrying all our bags, but we made it back to the bus station and arranged a ride to kaohsiung. after arriving in kaohsiung, we had a quick dinner at mos burger before getting on a train to tainan.

winter break trip part 2

the next day, we set off towards the west side of kenting national park. amanda was driving while i rode on the back of the scooter. a short stop at the main visitor center for the park gave us a chance to pick up a nicer map of kenting and gave me a chance to demonstrate my ability to drive the scooter. i didn't think i did that bad and amanda had nothing negative to say, but i think we silently agreed that she would be doing most of the driving that day. a peek at the map confirmed our route to wanlitong and we very shortly found the only dive shop with an english speaking divemaster. his name was john. i remember he had strange looking eyes behind strange looking eyeglasses. there was no time for a dive that day, but we scheduled one for the next.

the whole day was suddenly free and not knowing where to go, we pointed the scooter up the coast towards shuchungsi hot springs. as we went along, there were a lot of beautiful views of the ocean, each one more inviting than the last, but we'd never get far if we stopped at all of them, so on we went, enjoying each one if only for a moment.

eventually, the road we took started to turn away from the ocean and towards the center of the park. climbing a little bit into the hills. we arrived at shuchungsi a little before lunch time. there wasn't much town to see but we turned off the main road, parked the scooter, and wandered around hoping to find some outdoor hot springs. it seemed as though all the places to soak were inside hotels. not wanting to miss the beautiful day, we took a path up a hill instead. the path had seen better days, with broken planks in the walkway and fallen trees that had to be climbed over. taking random turns, we made our way to the top of one hill and found we unwittingly interrupted an old man and his lover. we immediately turned around and took a different route, making our way to a more peaceful hilltop.

back at the town, we had lunch in the only place that seemed prepared to serve it to us. whatever it was, it had pork, bean sprouts, and noodles. much better than fish sausages. in addition, the owner brought out some vegetables he had grown himself, and a big piece of tofu with two "thousand year eggs". it was a veritable feast compared to our earlier attempts at finding food in off hours. there was another american in this shop named dave. another chinese language student on holiday this week, i learned he had studied chinese for three years at university before coming to taiwan. despite that, he was unable to convince anyone in kenting to rent him a scooter and had to hitchhike to get here. more warm feelings at our good fortune.

already well into the park and not wanting to retrace our steps, the plan grew more ambitious. continue northeast, out to the coast, come down south to see the inland corals, turn west to see the grasslands, get back to the southwest in time for sunset at baisha beach, turn around to see the natural gas fires at chuhuo after sunset, back to kenting for dinner. our haphazard methods had worked well enough so far. we could do no wrong.



the ride northeast went higher into the hills. sharp turns with mountains off in the distance and steep dropoffs perilously close. wind rushing past, cars and trucks appearing out of nowhere, construction workers chewing betel nut shouting at the foreign girl driving the scooter and the foreign guy clinging to the back. the ride was exciting for me, with no responsibilities, with no means to do anything about anything anyway.

at the highest point of the road, we could see the ocean again and what looked to be a huge fort at the top of a hill. as we descended down, barbed wire fences appeared on the right hand side of the road. i remember thinking, if we should crash, i hope we steer off to the left because a face full of barbed wire would ruin our day. fortunately, no such crash happened here. instead, we stopped at one of the most amazing beaches i've ever seen.



is it a beach if it doesn't have sand? whatever you call it, it was full of perfectly smooth, dark gray stones, perfect for skipping if they were the right size. the waves were crashing in as they were at the southern point, but here you could wade out a bit without fear of having your legs sliced by sharp rocks and coral. everywhere i looked were these perfect little stones.



further down the beach, we climbed out onto some bigger rocks and found some golden rays of late afternoon sunshine. it looked like the end of the world lay just beyond the horizon.

in my greed, i picked up at least five rocks to take back with me from this beautiful beach. we got back on the scooter and continued south. within a few minutes, we could see the sand dunes at gangzai beach and pulled over for a look here as well. i do like sand dunes but i couldn't ignore the ocean. i walked some way and found a big tree limb stripped smooth of all its bark sticking out of the sand.



i lay on it with my feet on the ground as if on a bench press and stared up into the sky. the moon was already out and there was maybe half an hour of daylight left. even little rocks cast long shadows. there was no way we could have made it through the rest of our itinerary, but it didn't matter.

leaving that beach, we knew there wasn't much daylight left and although amanda had done a superb job driving all day, neither of us were very comfortable with driving at night. we headed for chuhuo, skipping the places in between. as the sun was setting, the air became colder and the wind seemed to pick up. the sharp turns were unsettling enough in broad daylight. we had to go even slower around them now. we came down out of the hills and the sun had already set. bugs had started to come out and were pelting amanda in the face. no sign of chuhuo yet. we pulled over, some way outside of hengchun, thinking we ought to be near chuhuo. amanda had to blink and clear out all the bugs that had hit her eyes. after figuring out where we thought we were, we got back on the scooter and started off again.

and this is where we crashed.

winter break trip part 1

my adventure in south taiwan began with a seven hour train ride from taipei to kaohsiung. i bought my train ticket the day before and showed up an hour early at taipei main station to catch the second slowest class train in taiwan. for less than $25US, i was on my way to the south.

kaohsiung:

seven hours later, with not much happening in between, i arrived in kaohsiung and met up with amanda, who had been in town long enough to book us a room and get what sounded like a painful chinese massage. my first impression of kaohsiung was that it was a sparser, slower city than taipei. the weather was nice and cool, the skies were clear, and i congratulated myself on deciding not to take a raincoat or a sweater. we got back to the room, i set down my bags, and off we went again in search of dinner. after much wandering around, we found our way to the liuhe night market (六合夜市). i was starving from the train ride and ate like a glutton. among the things i had were:

spicy crab claws
bbq squid balls with eel sauce
potato cheese filled bread
kiwi yogurt smoothie

we also played a carnival game where i impressively shot a whole bunch of balloons with a pellet gun, missing only one shot. for our display of skill, we were each rewarded with a small keychain led light.

after the night market, we went looking for more sights. we spent an excessive amount of effort in search of love pier only to find ourselves on a dark street somewhere near fisherman's wharf at the last stop of the mrt. eventually, we made our way back to central park. a little walk led us to a labyrinth in the making, a rock climbing wall, and a jungle gym set. the rock climbing wall was conquered, the jungle gym scaled, and the labyrinth escaped.

kenting:

we caught a bus to kenting the next day. it was a two and a half hour ride, passing by what i thought to be fish farms, rice fields, and plantations, before driving alongside the ocean. the weather was beautiful, warm, and clear, a much welcome change from the beginnings of winter in taipei. the air was unexpectedly crisp and fresh, not much hint of salt in it and not the slightest bit sticky feeling.

we got off the bus a little past the main part of kenting town, found a hotel for about $1000NT/night that also rented us a scooter for $300NT/day with minimal hassle because amanda had a new zealand motorcycle license and was able to complete a driving test that put the woman renting us the scooter at ease. almost immediately, we set out on the scooter with no particular plan of action and found ourselves at the entrance to a path towards the southernmost point of taiwan.





the coastline here is treacherous with waves crashing onto what looked like a fossilized coral reef. not really prepared for this, amanda and i walked out onto it anyway. the nooks and crannies proved to be good hiding spots for little crabs and fish while the sharp points proved cumbersome for my delicate feet.

after going out as far out on the reef as reason would allow, the rest of the afternoon was spent in search of food again. four o'clock in the afternoon, being too late for lunch and too early for dinner, is not a very good time to try to find food in kenting. the first place we found served us the worst food i've had in taiwan in three months. a dish of "fish sausages" covered in mayonnaise with a little bit of rice came out while the chowmian i ordered never appeared, despite patiently waiting for almost twenty minutes. this pathetic dish also cost almost three times as much as a decent lunch at the school cafeteria. still hungry, we found a nice thai food restaurant where we had a decent meal of bbq shrimp and curry beef.

kenting doesn't really start to come alive until after sunset. after our late lunch, we sat out on the the second story patio of our hotel room reading and enjoying the fresh air as the kenting night market started to perform it's daily assembly ritual on the street below. about an hour after sunset, the night market was in full swing and a steady stream of tour buses seemed to be dropping off one busload of students after another. a line of junior high students four blocks long walked past our patio towards the main part of town, giving us reason to believe that this was the right time to find dinner. among the things i had this time were:

mulberry yogurt
stinky tofu
nougat candies
roasted corn

the stinky tofu was exceptional. i'm no connoisseur, but it was the best dish of stinky tofu i've had in taiwan this time around. it had a nice texture and good flavor without being overpowering.

after getting our fill at the night market, we went a little way out of town to try to find a street side bar. it wasn't open, but a little further along, drawn by the sounds of some lovely jazz music, we found a set of stairs down to a beachside bar in front of caesar park resort. the beach here was more inviting than the southern point, sandy with waves slowly rolling in. under a clear sky with a half moon, we drank a few coronas feeling incredibly fortunate for being here.

fall in taipei

the days have really started to fly by. fall has arrived in taipei and it's been surprisingly lovely. a few days ago i went out sightseeing on a sunny afternoon to the confucius temple near yuanshan station. it was a quiet, green space and having gone on a weekday, there were only a few other people there.





a little way down the street was the livelier baoan temple. here there were many more people visiting the gods, carrying sticks of burning incense. i wish i knew more about the traditions in visiting these temples. i only know that you're supposed to enter from the right door and walk counterclockwise.

i've started to try more of the restaurants around my studio. i had my first slice of pizza in taipei yesterday at a restaurant nearby. not bad. better than the spaghetti i've had here. my appetite continues to get better, especially now that i've started to swim more. i'm happy that i've been able to resume some of the routine i had while still in houston.

there's one more month left of the fall term with a one week break before the winter term starts. i'm pretty satisfied with how my chinese is going. i've noticed within the last two weeks or so that things are just starting to click. yesterday i was in a taxi and after going the wrong way a bit, i explained to the driver that we wanted to go in the other direction. speaking was the easy part and i did it without hesitation, but when he replied, i didn't really catch it all. luckily amanda was able to figure out what he was trying to say. listening and understanding are the slowest things in coming, but i can definitely tell that i've made some progress. kung fu club has been pretty good too. i've learned how to say a few useful words related to body parts, but haven't learned the characters for them.

this week has been pretty good for firsts. tomorrow i'll be going to my first club in taipei for a halloween party being thrown by the ntu school of management. i still haven't bought a costume, but neither have my friends. i'm not sure how late i'll stay as the last mrt train leaves at midnight, but in any case, it ought to be a fun night out. i missed out on halloween last year, so maybe i ought to make up for it tomorrow...

daily life

i was pleased to find out a few days ago that my dad is reading this and i think he'd be pleased to know that the most exciting thing i did today was to do my laundry and sweep the dust off the floor in my apartment.

i'm in my sixth week here and daily life has slowly transformed from running around, getting setup, into the kind of quiet days i had back home. yesterday i went shopping for a usb drive (4GB for $350NT) and a new set of drumsticks ($330 NT). eventually i'm going to find a night market to buy some new jeans. maybe i'm getting old, or more practically i don't have much money, but i don't mind staying home these days.

i learned on friday where there are free music practice rooms on campus. they have a whole bunch of rooms with pianos and two rooms with a set of drums in them. at the moment, the drums are in need of repair, but i'm going to make it a habit of playing in there when i'm not in the library or swimming. i suppose i ought to find out where i can buy earplugs...

this wednesday is the first meeting of the ntu jazz club which coincides with the first meeting of the ntu rock club. they're even next door to each other so i can drop in on both of them. i'm hoping to be able to play with other people and have more opportunity for practicing my chinese.

that's about it for now i suppose, except for this:



yes, they have busch in taiwan. they also have miller high life, but i didn't get any pics of that one.

why am i not sleeping?

i'm feeling a little bit like a zombie at the moment. the last few nights i've been sleeping more irregularly than usual, if that makes sense, to where i wake up in the morning and feel as though i've just had a nap and i'm picking up where i left off. the weather has been muggy and gloomy since sunday morning.

before all that though, i had a very good weekend. i met amanda and i-shuan to go to the national palace museum saturday night, which i just happened to know would be free after 5pm. the museum is huge, requiring more than a single trip to really have a chance to see what's there. i spent a long time looking at bronze and jade on the third floor with two highlights being the jadeite cabbage and a jadeite piece of pork. most striking about the cabbage is that the single piece of jade fades from a deep green to white with the green being used as the tips of the cabbage leaves. it hadn't occurred to me how impressive this is until i actually saw it. the jadeite pork was impressive in that you could see a shiny layer of fat on top of the rest of the meat. i just wonder at the skill and sensitivity it takes to do things like that.

sunday was a gloomy day, but i had arranged a full schedule for myself. i met my japanese classmate, who we call 章三 (zhangsan) in class, to study for our test on monday. instead, we had some real life chinese usage. first we went to find lunch in an alley near my apartment. we found a noodle house and ordered a wanton soup i think. although his chinese sounds a lot better than mine, he told me he's basically pointing at food and asking how much it costs. for my part, i spoke to the shop owner and asked her in chinese if she could speak english. no luck.

after lunch, we had some language exchange in the basement of the library at ntu. he taught me a tiny bit of japanese and listed the hiragana chart for me as well as helped me with my chinese tones. the tones are the area where i need to most work in. having a deep voice and being more comfortable speaking flatly and softly presents me with some difficulty in pronouncing the high first tone (i feel as though my voice will break), and pronouncing the low third tone (i feel as though i'm growling). especially difficult is when there are consecutive third tones. fortunately, i seem to be able to make the right sounds...

in return, we had some english pronunciation practice, which reminded me of the days when i had speech classes in elementary school for not being able to correctly pronounce "s"s. my teacher would have to explain to me verbally how the tongue should move when pronouncing one thing or another. i found myself doing the same thing when trying to explain "th" which is found neither in japanese or chinese.

i ran late on my meeting with him because i was supposed to check out the school clubs that day too. i left the library at 3pm and found that a third of the tables setup were already empty. i did walk past the ntu jazz club which still had a drumset out with a guy sort of playing on it. i walked up to the table and did my best to look interested. i met one of the leaders of the club and he gave me some flyers. as i was about to walk away, he asked me if i played any instruments. i told him i play drums, so maybe i'll get a chance to play some while i'm here. i found out that the meeting for new members is 9/23 but i neglected to find out what building (the flyer is in chinese) or if there would be a fee. i think i was able to match the writing to a building on my map of ntu, but i'll ask a student tomorrow just to be sure.

my classmates had more success with finding clubs as they were out when the people were still setup. i found out there's a tai qi club, a kung fu club, a glbt (maybe just glb) club, a chinese music club, a hiking club, roller hockey club, juggling club... on and on and on.

monday i had my test and i got it back today. i did pretty well, missing only one thing for grammar and having a little deduction on the speech part for some tone mistakes. i had further success monday night in ordering food. i had gone for a swim and was really hungry. i went to the same alley i was in on sunday and walked around some more until i walked past a shop that smelled delicious. i went in and tried to read the menu but didn't recognize anything. after the shop owner found out i couldn't speak chinese, he pointed at the first item and gave me a thumbs up. i gave him the thumbs up back and ordered whatever it was that he pointed at. it turned out to be bbq pork with cabbage and bitter melon. a decent meal that tasted as good as it smelled from outside.

today i've been sort of brain dead from all the lack of sleep. i took a series of long naps this afternoon, both in the library and back at home. in between i managed to start and finish "the true story of ah q" and read a few selections of sherlock holmes. "ah q" is a book i picked up on friday with english on the left pages and chinese on the right pages. to my great joy, i could read a little bit of the chinese and even recognized some choice curse words.

i've also picked up a chinese dictionary which i've been having some fun with trying to look up words i don't know how to say. it's fairly easy to find things when you know how to pronounce them, but when you don't, you have to figure out what the radical of the character is, and then you have to figure out how many strokes are in the character. with any luck, you can find it in the index and then find it in the main definition section.

well once again, i'm awake way past when i should have been in bed. oh, one more note. i picked up some postcards from the national palace museum gift shop. it's a set of 24 where each card depicts a section of a famous scroll painting. i imagined sending them out and all of the recipients having some meeting to assemble all the cards to see what the scroll looks like and then comparing what i wrote to each of them to see if i had said exactly the same thing. i have the habit of buying postcards in gift shops and never sending them out, but i intend to break that habit this time around.

rooftop party

i've just come back from hanging out on the rooftop of some mid-rise in taipei with my classmates and two new friends, alex and denise. i wasn't expecting to meet them today, but i was hanging around starbucks reading sherlock holmes thinking about what i was going to do for dinner when i got a text rescheduling our little party for tonight instead of tomorrow. i don't have a very demanding schedule so meeting tonight was just fine and it solved my problem about what to do for dinner.

so, dinner included a tallboy of heineken, half a six pack of essential beer (from korea), and a bag of popcorn on the roof. the roof was pretty cool. i wish the sky had been more clear tonight. there's a bunch of roaches on this roof. i was sitting on a chair chit chatting when my friend reached over for some popcorn and pointed out that there was a roach on my knee. i think there were two other roaches on my pants, but i just sort of stamped the ground and they all jumped off and ran for cover. this sort of thing might have bothered me before, but somehow i've been desensitized to a lot of things since arriving here. i figure all the sort of things that might have bothered me at home are just part of the culture here so i've been pretty accepting of all that's come my way so far. this includes bad service at the bank, shady landlords showing me studios, and poor treatment at the hostel.

i was kind of early for my meeting tonight, so i went to the taipei main station area to kill some time. i successfully ordered a pearl tea, with some kind language assistance from the cashier, and i even bought a book titled "the true story of ah q" which i seem to have forgotten at sebastian's apartment as we were leaving.

let me see if i can recap the week. i've been given a ton of homework every night. all the homework has to be completed with chinese characters. it's kind of amazing that after two weeks, i'm able to write some simple sentences with characters.

i had dinner at i-shuan's house last night which was my first home cooked meal in taiwan. it was beef stewed in a meat stock that's been used for ten years with fresh homemade noodles and some greens. very delicious. 很好吃 (hen hao chi)。i also tried "thousand year egg" 千年皮蛋 (qian nian pi dan) for the first time with two different preparations. one was with tofu, soy sauce, and green onions i think, and the other a dipping sauce made with some herbs from her mom's garden. both were pretty good. when i first heard about "thousand year egg" and encouraged to try it with a suspicious smile, i was pretty wary of it but it turned out to be much tamer than i expected. i would definitely eat it again.

i've also had a lot of good noodle dishes this week. one was 拉麵 (lamian) in an area kind of away from the nearest mrt station. i'm still sort of exploring the areas close to the mrt stations and haven't really ventured far away from them.



i also had a good noodle dish near the main gate at ntu. for the life of me, i can't even remember what it was called, but the dish was with flat, slippery noodles and beef. after that meal, i-shuan and i went back to the witch house cafe for late night coffee and some games. we played one called "ninja vs. ninja" which is entirely dice based, and another one called "carcassonne" where you build some fortified towns and try to control as much area as possible.

the ninja vs. ninja game had rules in english whereas the carcassone game we picked only had rules in german. eventually, we were able to get another set with rules in chinese that i-shuan was able to explain to me.

i've been out late every night and so i haven't been around to take out the trash. tomorrow i'm not sure if they pick it up even. it's either tomorrow or sunday that they take off. my apartment has gotten dusty very quickly. i think living near a major street and running the a/c all the time doesn't help much, but my asthma has not really been a problem.

so far, i'm having a pretty good time. i have a test on monday. there's also a thing on sunday where all the student organizations recruit members for their clubs. i'm hoping to find a music club so that i can play some drums. i heard from denise that there are plenty of clubs at ntu, so i'm sure that i'll find at least one that will be to my taste.

finally some night markets

our snake alley field trip went pretty well. we ate a few tasty things and walked around drinking beers from 7-11. one of the things we ate was called 肉圓 (rouyuan) which basically translates into "meat ball". it was ground pork in a thick sticky wrapper, like a stuffed rice cake. after that we had stinky tofu, which was okay but kind of sour. i'm going to have to find another place to try it because i remember it being much better when i had it before. the last thing we had at the night market was oyster in egg omelet with lettuce and onions. this was pretty tasty. we walked over to a nearby fountain with our night market food and our 7-11 beers and sat around and chit chatted until the police came over to kick out everyone who was sitting down. we were actually sitting in a part of the fountain and we soon discovered that all our butts were wet. after we were kicked out, they turned on the fountain.

we finished our beers before heading over to 龍山寺 (longshan temple). there were a lot of people around praying and lighting incense. i didn't really know how to behave except to stay out of everyone's way and try not to knock anything over. amanda had a pretty good observation about the place. amongst all the noise, tall buildings, and bright lights, in the middle of the temple, it felt calm and you could look up into the sky and just have a nice view.

after some time at the temple, we went off in quest of these giant beers amanda had told us stories about. we got on the mrt and got off one stop later at 西門站 (ximen station). ximen has a lot of teenagers running around with boutique shops and cheap places to eat. also nearby are some bars. after about half an hour of wandering around, we stumbled upon the beer place. amanda and i ordered two giant coronas which came out in two handled mugs taller than my head. however, these things were pretty expensive by any standard so i only got one and nursed it until it was time to go.

the next day, i was back in ximen again but this time during daylight hours. i had some fried chicken snacks in a shop where they sing when the chicken is finished. after that, i had a desert of chilled pineapple slices over chopped iced with pineapple juice. very sweet. a little later, we had "opium pearls" (鴉片粉圓，yapian fenyuan) which are kind of clear tapioca pearls over chopped ice with lemonade.

after eating a ton of sweets, i-shuan and i went to an arcade. it was noisy as hell inside. a lot of the games were something like ddr or guitar hero. one that we tried had us playing on a japanese taiko drum to the beat of some pop songs. one that i didn't get to try looked like whack-a-mole except with a 4x4 grid of squares. whenever the square changed patterns, you had to hit it with your hands. we had the chance to watch one guy play and it looked pretty cool. for some, his hands would alternate like a drum roll and for others his hands would sweep around the grid.

for dinner, i had mos burger for the first time. it's a japanese chain that serves japanese-sized burgers. some come with bread, but some come with rice cakes as buns. the one i had was ginger pork with the rice cake buns. more good eating.

finally, for a late night snack, we went to another night market and i had 大腸包小腸 (dachang bao xiaochang), which literally means "big sausage wrapping small sausage". the "big sausage" is a greasy rice sausage. it's heated up and then split open and covered with a little sauce. the "small sausage" is a fatty pork sausage i think. then the whole thing is topped with whatever you like, sort of like a hot dog. i had mine with green onions and lettuce. it was super greasy but nice and filling.

so, after being here for almost a month, i've finally had some adventures in the night market. pretty nice weekend with lovely weather and good friends.

first week of school wrapup

it's saturday right around lunch time. i caught up on a lot of sleep last night and this morning i went for my first swim here. ntu has a very nice athletic center and it's really right across the street from where i live.

they have a bunch of boxes where you put your shoes before you even walk into the locker room, sort of like the things kids put their shoes in before getting into the ball pit at chucky cheese. the locker room has these raised plastic grid things which lets water drain to the floor beneath so you're not walking around in nasty puddles. same goes for the shower.

the requirement to swim here is that you wear skin tight clothing so i bought some swim shorts and a swim cap yesterday. i discovered that the shorts already have a tear in them so i'm going to find a sewing kit to patch them today. my swim was nice. either i've gotten stronger, thinner, or more likely, the swim shorts are pretty effective, because i noticed i was swimming a lot easier than i'm used to.

later this evening i'm meeting with my classmates at 龍山寺站 (longshan temple mrt station) for some fun at the nearby night market. there's a particularly famous section of it called "snake alley" where you can have snake soup, snake venom, and some exotic, expensive dishes. not sure what we'll end up doing but it will be hilarious trying to order food because the stands most likely won't have any pictures and maybe not have menus at all. i suppose we can just point at the dishes as they're being cooked or as people walk away with them.

the first week of class has gone pretty well. i was worried we'd be going slow, but after the first week, we're already writing our homework with characters. this week i think we've learned 40 characters and a handful of useful sentences. i get the feeling that my classmates are doing a lot of extra work outside of class too because we're moving along at such a good rate.

anyway, i'm happy things are starting to settle. it's such a nice luxury to just have a place to lay around. i'm using a whole lot of electricity at the moment, but i can't figure out how to reduce it except to stay out all day or to just open the window onto the busy road below. thankfully, fall is coming and it won't be so hot.

one other thing i've seen around the city is a lot of fires on the sidewalk. i think the other day was the first day of ghost month. it's been described to me as summer vacation for all the ghosts in hell. the gates are opened and they wander around with the living. the fires are burning "ghost money" as offerings to the ghosts so that they don't cause trouble. in an effort to minimize air pollution, these burnings are grouped together in front of large buildings instead of every family having their own fire. i don't know how often this is going to happen in the month, but i've only seen it the other day.

here's a picture of the delicious beef noodle soup i had the other night. the meat didn't look all that tender, but it just fell apart in my mouth. it was so good i-shuan and i ate half of it before i could get the picture. missing from the picture is the stewed tofu we had as an appetizer. this too was incredibly tasty. the place started as a small shop with only five seats. since it's done so well, they rented some more space in a taiwan lottery shop next door.





follow your nose, it always knows.

a little routine would be nice

third day of school and i seem to be jet lagging or at least sleeping like i'm jet lagging. i can't sleep until well past midnight and i feel very sleepy right around 2pm. school is pretty fun so far. i have a good teacher and good classmates. i'm having trouble though getting used to a regular schedule so that i feel as though i'm not getting as much done as i could during the day. today i applied for my library card. afterwards, i wandered around upstairs and found a section with movable shelves. then i found the study area and took a little nap.

i ate in the school cafeteria with my new classmates for the first time yesterday. the food is much cheaper than eating outside, although on the greasy side. there's a buffet area and they charge by the weight of your tray. my tray cost $39 today and i had more food than i really needed.

i finally put up some pictures around my room today. i still have one suitcase to unpack, but i need more hangers to put things on. more shopping to do. so far, i've bought bedsheets, dishes, stuff to organize the bathroom... my latest purchase that i'm sort of excited about has been a washbin to do dishes in instead of the tiny sink. it reminds me of the filipinos i saw last year squatting by the river washing their clothes or dishes or both, except my waste water is going into the sewer.

i got soaking wet this afternoon because of a storm. i've heard we're having a typhoon this weekend. that ought to be exciting, or at least it will encourage me to stay home and study.

what else? i had my first chance to throw out the trash last night. the trash truck played fur elise when it pulled up. i nearly fell down the stairs in the dark as i rushed out to get to it. it's pretty inconvenient when you're used to just throwing things in a dumpster or a trashcan at any time of day. i guess this will either encourage people to minimize their trash at home, or encourage people to throw their trash in places they shouldn't, like bicycle baskets according to a forum post on forumosa.com. well, i'm being a good citizen, so instead i'll either minimize what i have to throw out or else leave it at starbucks.

can i unpack now?

happy chinese valentines day!

after almost two weeks of hunting, i settled on the first studio i looked at. i signed a lease today for a place just across the street from the ntu language center. tomorrow i get to check out of the hostel and move into my new place. i have to say that two weeks is about the limit of tolerance i have for living out of my suitcase. there is something to be said for having furniture and a door with a lock. a trip to ikea and a few other places should be enough to make the place feel like home.

tonight i had a delicious meal although i can't really name the dishes i had. one dish was some kind of chewy cake-like bean sauteed with vegetables. another dish was tofu, intestine, and liver in an oily sauce. the last dish was homemade noodles in sesame sauce. all of this was complimented with a delicious bottle of carlsberg beer. the shop was loud and vibrant with old military songs playing. the flirty girl selling beer was disappointed that i didn't speak mandarin. everyone there was really enjoying themselves.

last night i attended my first toastmasters meeting. isn't it strange that i would attend a public speaking club in english while in a foreign country? after going though, i'm tempted to join them. everyone i met was very friendly with a good sense of humor. i had a good time at the meeting. next time they're going to have a joke telling contest.

i'm exhausted, but it looks like next week i'll be able to concentrate on school. can't wait to get started.

flatfoot

so i've been here a little over a week and it seems i've been trudging along all over the city. apartment hunting is kinda hit and miss. i saw a bunch of overpriced dumps yesterday. lots of foreigners getting sucked into overpriced rooms and then trashing the place. today i saw a nice suite and room in a shared apartment with a girl named uki. i met her at the guting mrt stop. the place was far enough away from the station that she came over on her scooter. so, i had my first experience riding a scooter in taipei rush hour traffic, with my laptop strapped to my back even. five minutes later, we arrived at the apartment. much cleaner than the ones yesterday. i liked it a lot except it's so far from the mrt. it took me about twenty minutes to walk back. fifteen if i hadn't gotten lost.

this weekend i went back to taipei city hall to check out the mitsukoshi department store. it's a collection of four separate buildings with a lot of stuff on all floors that i can't afford. the nice thing is that there are some street performers in the walkway between the buildings. i saw a performer do some acrobatic thing involving a metal hoop. imagine that dude da vinci drew in a circle rolling around and doing a lot of graceful tricks.



i registered for class today. after handing over almost 35K NT in cash, i tried to take the placement test. i took one look at the written part and got up to return it, saying "no need", hahaha. i couldn't read a single thing on the page. looks like i'm starting from scratch. well, at least the placement test wasn't elementary. i'd be upset to be spending so much money to learn numbers again.

after paying my registration, i was left with about $3 in my pocket, so my plans for not eating at 7-11 for lunch were foiled. i walked to my bank to get some more money and 7-11 just happened to be nearby... i did order some food tonight in a cafe. i pointed at a sandwich but the cashier didn't understand what i wanted. the man behind me in line had to translate. later on, i ordered a water. i at least know how to say that.

apartment hunting

i made my third trip to the bank today. the guard at the door and the bankers at the counter know me now, if not by name, then as the sweaty guy with a backpack who doesn't speak mandarin. the banker at the first counter, monica, even laughed a little with me because she knew i was coming in to do the same thing i did yesterday. things went a lot smoother. one more trip and that should be it for a while.

afterwards, i walked from the mrt station to the language center to see if i could find anymore studio for rent flyers on the bulletin boards. i found two more and tried to call, but when they realized i couldn't speak mandarin, they hung up. i called two others from the tsuei ma ma (tmm/催媽媽) apartment listing service but didn't get much further. i was pretty lucky that the landlord with the first listing spoke english. i might just go with that one if it's not already taken.

my roommate told me that he found his apartment through www.tealit.com, a website for english teachers in taiwan. i took a look at it, but i'm a little reluctant to be roommates with a lot of expats or living in an expat neighborhood. it just seems like i'd be living in an inferior imitation of home. if i want to be reminded of home, starbucks is the place to go. i keep hearing rem and grizzly bear. one way or another, i'll find a place to live and then i can get on with the business of actually studying here.

i've been doing more walking today to get a sense of distance. riding the mrt all the time is expensive and probably unnecessary for all the places i'm going. it turns out the walk from daan (大安) station to the north gate of ntu is 10-15 mins. not too bad. riding the mrt that far doesn't save me from sweating (the brown line stations aren't air conditioned), so i might as well just walk.

last night i had a crash course in menu reading followed with a pop quiz by walking around the eslite basement food court, trying to identify what each shop served. i failed. need more practice. however, i'm getting to be a pro at picking food in 7-11. soymilk good. brown rice milk disgusting.

i'll have the number 2

as i was sitting in the starbucks in the sogo basement food court, it occured to me that i have managed to navigate the mrt, get an id number from the immigration office, open a bank account, and find my hostel, yet the most intimidating thing i'm faced with is ordering food in a restaurant. i spent the weekend with i-shuan who gave me the first grand tour of taipei. this meant that whenever we walked into a place to eat, she handled the ordering. i ate in this same food court when i arrived on friday, but today i wanted to try to find a shop on the street instead.

i got out of the mrt station and started wandering around, first along the main road, and then off into some alleys. i ran into the same doctor i saw on friday. he was out in the alley smoking a cigarette and talking on his cell phone. i waved at him and he waved back with a look on his face as if he never imagined he would see me again. after some walking around, i gave up on the idea of eating in a shop and went to 7-11 instead. they have combo specials on different things in the store. i got a box of soy milk and some rice and seaweed thing for about $1. picking food off the shelf is much easier than off the menu.

after eating my lunch on a bench in the east metro mall, i made my way to taipei 101. on the fourth floor of the taipei 101 mall is a bookstore called page one. the thing to do in taipei seems to be get out at 11, mall rat until after 3, then go out because it's finally cool enough outside. page one is a great place to do that unless you're walking around with a big backpack like i was. it's pretty crowded and it's hard to find a place to sit down with a book if you're carrying a whole bunch of stuff.

i looked at an apartment today near school. it's a room with a bed, a fridge, a tv, and a small bathroom for about $300 including water, cable, and internet. the owner was pretty nice and it's close to school, but kind of a hike from the nearest mrt station. my roommate here just told me he found a place for $125 with two other roommates. hopefully the business of getting setup will be done before school starts. the sooner i can unpack my bags, the sooner i can stop walking around with a heavy bag looking like a tourist.