Sunday, December 28, 2008
Alana Does Not Write for the Great Silent Majority
She writes for the Garrulous Mulling Seniority. (Senior Citizenry begins at 55, according to many. Haha. Sorry, dad. :/ Mom, you can hitch onto his bandwagon.) She demands comments before she is willing to write another post.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Office Outing to Taipei
Wu Jie hosts an annual costume competition for its students and faculty. The students have to cobble their costumes together, I think, which they do during breaks between classes as orchestrated by their homeroom teachers. The teachers, however, rent costumes. And that is where I went tonight—to Taipei in a car with four other teachers on a mission to bring back show garb for themselves and some others in the office. I don’t know the name of the store we were at, but we were in a general shopping area known as Ximending (unless of course that is actually the name of the store) where Taiwanese teenagers like to go to pick up cheap and fashionable attire. The store, as far as I could tell, was U-shaped, with long tables covered with books full of pictures of costumes (think beauty parlor hairdo books). These costumes ran the gamut of Snow White to flight attendant to Elvis to Playboy bunny to Incredible Hulk to kimono to characters out of Chinese operas. And then some. We had a lot of fun pointing to muscle men suits and the like and commenting on which teachers we’d rent it for. Most references were to Hao Chuan and the principal. The walls were crammed with costumes like the ones found in the books. The entranceway had some hats and fans, which Jessica and I posed with while our rentals were being settled. The short part of the U had some more wigs and a stairway leading upstairs, which I thought would feature a changing room only. Along the other side of the U were more costumes, these generally more elaborate accessories like masks and ceremonial Chinese hats. It seemed to be more for storage than anything else, though. We pointed to the pictures of the costumes we wanted, and I thought that was it, but then we went upstairs for fittings. It turned out the upstairs was a crazier hodgepodge of everything downstairs. Whatever was out on the bottom floor was probably just there to tickle our imaginations. The real stuff was up here. Upstairs were numerous sets of each costume, varying by color and size. I had originally said I wanted a kimono, having seen a gorgeous one at the entranceway. Jessica agreed (we’re going as a two-person team), but when I flipped through the costume books and saw all the lacy and embroidered European style gowns, I said that would be fine, too, and that’s what we ended up choosing. Upstairs, we went to the section with the gowns, and Jessica and I tried on several to see which color and style suited us best. So much fun! Jessica went with a dress with a lovely flower pattern in reds and yellows. I got a crimson and cream dress. A bit ratty from being rented out a lot, but it’ll still be fun to sweep around in that skirt. I’m not quite sure what the other costumes were. I saw a paper mache head in our bag of loot and when we were about to leave, one of the teachers turned back to pick up some legs. It was all fun and games at first with three of us holding large bags filled with gowns, jackets, giant stuffed cartoonish heads, etc, and Jessica and me walking along either side of two giant blue wing-like things with styrofoamy pink tulle at the edges (you open and close these like butterfly wings—I saw it in a parade here). I kept looking around to see if people were staring at us but I think it takes a little more to surprise the Taipei dwellers. Well, anyway, it was all fun until we had to fit it into Yi Hui’s sedan. Hahaha. The bags went in and out of the trunk a few times, then out one last time while Yi Hui rearranged all the stuff that had originally been in the trunk. The bags made it in, the giant head went in the front seat, and in the back we put the blue wings, which ran the width of the car and rose to a height that probably blocked most of Yi Hui’s rear vision. I wondered what the ride back to Yilan would be like, how much room we’d have for our legs.
Leaving the car in the parking lot, we went to Fei Tian for hot pot. Amaaazing. I once remarked to a fellow ETA how incredible it is that everyone’s so excited to go to hot pot restaurants and pay to cook their own dinners. But it is so much fun. First you choose a soup base, in which you will steep everything you eat. Then, bring it to a boil and go scouting for stuff to boil. We filled platters with all sorts of raw and frozen stuff. Then, plop the stuff into the pot and wait for it to soften. Be careful when eating, since the food is extremely hot and, if you got a malaguo, unbelievably spicy. I ate one thing cooked in the malaguo half of our hotpot (this restaurant had pots with two sections, so you could have two different bases). Some juice from the spicy food dripped into my personal bowl, though, where it poisoned everything else and eventually I had to pour out all my liquid since I could not stand the burning spicy heat anymore. Sooo delicious, but let me specifically recommend corn on the cob for this. It comes out very sweet. My first piece I tried to hold between two chopsticks and did manage, though I dropped the corn a lot. Then Jessica showed me how to skewer the corn on the tip of a chopstick (so it looks like shish kabob or a roasted marshmallow). Very functional…but is this cheating? Does this trample the resplendent history of the chopstick? I have noticed that the Taiwanese will use spoons for things I would have thought were purely for chopsticks, such as rice and noodles. (Although, when eating noodles out of a soup, it is helpful to have a spoon to support the noodles you are trying to eat so that they do not fall back into the bowl and splash everyone.) Well, we ate our fill and then some. The hot pot is not an economy meal. And then it was time for dessert! Jessica and I filled our plates with an appalling amount of cakes and fruit. The kiwi and cheesecake were out of this world. I joked that her last name is Zhu (which sounds like the word for pig) and that I am a pig. After that, we went back for some ice cream—Haagen Dazs! That and a Fanta soda, and I’ve eaten my best meal in a while.
The ride back was quiet. I can’t comment too much on it, since I fell asleep myself. : ) It was a bit squishy in the back seat, but quite cozy, especially when Pei Yi brought the giant head in with us so that Yi Hui could see out the windshield. Jessica took longer to fall asleep. She was so excited to go out for fun. I awoke to see the car swinging around sharp angles in the dark, skirting rice paddies. Blearily concerned about toppling into the water, I soon saw that we had arrived back in front of Wu Jie. We all applauded and thanked Yi Hui and headed home. I got back at 12 midnight.
That’s the exciting part of today. Other features: taught my class “Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes. But they didn’t understand what I was saying or what the poem was about, so that was disappointing. No internet in the morning, so I couldn’t prepare my first lesson. Instead, I did an animated story with them, taken from a DVD given out by Lotus, a local junior high school teacher. That went well enough, coupled with a short activity I had thankfully brought along just in case.
During my second class, one student picked up my cell phone while we were split up to play pick-up sticks and dialed his phone from mine. So he has my number now. And he called me during lunch, though I didn’t answer because 1) I refuse to and 2) I didn’t even see it ring since I was meeting with students. But this is kind of disrespectful of him. Grrr.
Also finally mailed out dad’s car registration. I had a “fun” time trying to find some envelopes. It turns out that it’s very simple and you just ask the clerk at the window for an airmail envelope. I am very grateful to the clerk for accepting my sloppy handwriting done in a mixture of Traditional, Simplified, and botched characters.
I also bought paper for the Thanksgiving bulletin board at Li Ze AND gave advance notice that I’d be 15 minutes late to meet everyone to rent costumes (the post office took longer than expected since I don’t know my way around it yet), but was only something like 7 minutes late. We didn’t leave till later anyway, but I still felt pretty good about that.
Leaving the car in the parking lot, we went to Fei Tian for hot pot. Amaaazing. I once remarked to a fellow ETA how incredible it is that everyone’s so excited to go to hot pot restaurants and pay to cook their own dinners. But it is so much fun. First you choose a soup base, in which you will steep everything you eat. Then, bring it to a boil and go scouting for stuff to boil. We filled platters with all sorts of raw and frozen stuff. Then, plop the stuff into the pot and wait for it to soften. Be careful when eating, since the food is extremely hot and, if you got a malaguo, unbelievably spicy. I ate one thing cooked in the malaguo half of our hotpot (this restaurant had pots with two sections, so you could have two different bases). Some juice from the spicy food dripped into my personal bowl, though, where it poisoned everything else and eventually I had to pour out all my liquid since I could not stand the burning spicy heat anymore. Sooo delicious, but let me specifically recommend corn on the cob for this. It comes out very sweet. My first piece I tried to hold between two chopsticks and did manage, though I dropped the corn a lot. Then Jessica showed me how to skewer the corn on the tip of a chopstick (so it looks like shish kabob or a roasted marshmallow). Very functional…but is this cheating? Does this trample the resplendent history of the chopstick? I have noticed that the Taiwanese will use spoons for things I would have thought were purely for chopsticks, such as rice and noodles. (Although, when eating noodles out of a soup, it is helpful to have a spoon to support the noodles you are trying to eat so that they do not fall back into the bowl and splash everyone.) Well, we ate our fill and then some. The hot pot is not an economy meal. And then it was time for dessert! Jessica and I filled our plates with an appalling amount of cakes and fruit. The kiwi and cheesecake were out of this world. I joked that her last name is Zhu (which sounds like the word for pig) and that I am a pig. After that, we went back for some ice cream—Haagen Dazs! That and a Fanta soda, and I’ve eaten my best meal in a while.
The ride back was quiet. I can’t comment too much on it, since I fell asleep myself. : ) It was a bit squishy in the back seat, but quite cozy, especially when Pei Yi brought the giant head in with us so that Yi Hui could see out the windshield. Jessica took longer to fall asleep. She was so excited to go out for fun. I awoke to see the car swinging around sharp angles in the dark, skirting rice paddies. Blearily concerned about toppling into the water, I soon saw that we had arrived back in front of Wu Jie. We all applauded and thanked Yi Hui and headed home. I got back at 12 midnight.
That’s the exciting part of today. Other features: taught my class “Mother to Son” by Langston Hughes. But they didn’t understand what I was saying or what the poem was about, so that was disappointing. No internet in the morning, so I couldn’t prepare my first lesson. Instead, I did an animated story with them, taken from a DVD given out by Lotus, a local junior high school teacher. That went well enough, coupled with a short activity I had thankfully brought along just in case.
During my second class, one student picked up my cell phone while we were split up to play pick-up sticks and dialed his phone from mine. So he has my number now. And he called me during lunch, though I didn’t answer because 1) I refuse to and 2) I didn’t even see it ring since I was meeting with students. But this is kind of disrespectful of him. Grrr.
Also finally mailed out dad’s car registration. I had a “fun” time trying to find some envelopes. It turns out that it’s very simple and you just ask the clerk at the window for an airmail envelope. I am very grateful to the clerk for accepting my sloppy handwriting done in a mixture of Traditional, Simplified, and botched characters.
I also bought paper for the Thanksgiving bulletin board at Li Ze AND gave advance notice that I’d be 15 minutes late to meet everyone to rent costumes (the post office took longer than expected since I don’t know my way around it yet), but was only something like 7 minutes late. We didn’t leave till later anyway, but I still felt pretty good about that.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
The Chinese Name for Yoga is Not "Yoga"
I just thought I'd share that.
I was picking up a friend after her yoga class tonight, trying to find Gongzheng Elementary School, where we'd agreed to meet. This made a bit of a strange place for meeting at 10:30 pm since the school is under construction and totally deserted at that hour, though on a busy main road. So when I asked a fellow mototrist at a red light where I could find Gongzheng Guoxiao (=Gongzheng Elementary School=Gongzheng Guomin Xiaoxue=Gongzheng public elementary school), and she told me to follow her, I found myself wanting to explain why I was going to this shell of a building in the dark. "I'm waiting for my friend," I said easily enough. "She's coming from a yoga class." The two women looked at me blankly. Yes, two. The motorist had a friend on the back of her scooter (scooters are family vehicles here; it almost feels selfish and wantonly wasteful to drive a scooter all on your own). Here, as you can see, things got a bit difficult. I reached into my memory, trying to remember what my students always said when I was teaching them the phrase "doing yoga." They often shout out the Mandarin equivalent for what I'm teaching. It's a way for them to confirm amongst themselves that they understood me (I do my best to ignore it, keeping up the idea that I don't speak any Chinese). It also clues slower students in to the lesson. The shouting usually comes from the cram school students, who find English easier than do their classmates, and are eager to show off their skills and demonstrate how easy it is for them. (This is great for them, but can make teaching the class a bit tricky since it's easy to mistakenly think the whole class understands something when you hear the answer shouted loudly by several students; in fact, most of the students may be in the dark while a few are ahead of the material.) So, trying to recall the words I had tried to tune out in class, I amended: She's in a douyou class, a youdou class...it's exercise. At this point, I may even have tried some elementary yoga while still straddling my scooter. I almost got off my scooter and stood on one foot with my arms raised above my head, like a tree. The two women turned to each other and consulted. "Yu2jia1" suggested one. Yeah, sure, I said "yujia...douya, whatever." It should be clear to you by now that any of the words I tried for yoga were complete gibberish. "Okay," said the women, still looking a bit mystified, "she should be back a bit over there." And they waved at a building next to the elementary school. I thanked them for their help and turned back to wait for my friend coming out of her youdouyajiayuga-whatever class.
On the way home, I stopped off at a 7-eleven to see if I still had money on my phone card. (You can pay your bills at Taiwanese 7-elevens.) Pulling out of the sidewalk-strip lot was a bit difficult, though, since there was a giant praying mantis in my way. He hopped a bit to the side when I approached, but not enough to make me feel comfortable. I did not want to be the cause of the demise of such a noble creature, and I certainly didn't want to hear any sickening crunches.
Safely past the mantis (actually, I performed a bit of a U-turn in order to evade him), I headed back to my apartment. On my way to meet my friend and on the way back, the street was partially blocked off by a police car, several orange traffic cones, and a pulled-over car. I wasn't sure if we were allowed to use the road, but followed other cars and scooters through, waved on by a cop with his orange dayglo traffic-directing stick. As I pulled into a nearby store (the same one mentioned in my Sinlaku post) for a bar of soap and some ice cream--well, I had to break a 1,000 NT bill, ok?--I asked a couple guys standing on the corner if there had been an accident. They take accidents seriously here, and you are strictly forbidden from moving any vehicles involved in a collision until the police arrive. This reminds me of Chinese laws reaching into antiquity that forbid moving suicide and homicide corpses, which I find pretty cool. Anyway, the guys shook their heads no. "Drinking," one muttered. "Ooh," I said, "drinking and driving?" They assented. "Ouch," I said in English, and they laughed. Then I went into the store for my hand soap and ice cream cone. (Difficult maneuver, that--choosing a cone not too near the bottom [which might not have been replaced in 6 months] and not too near the top where it might have melted from people opening the freezer/possible power outage during the typhoon. Luckily, the stuff I was going for was more like synthetic cream than ice cream proper and therefore likely impervious to spoiling.) One of the sidewalk guys came in to ring me up. And that is the story of the yoga, the mantis, and the drunk driver.
I was picking up a friend after her yoga class tonight, trying to find Gongzheng Elementary School, where we'd agreed to meet. This made a bit of a strange place for meeting at 10:30 pm since the school is under construction and totally deserted at that hour, though on a busy main road. So when I asked a fellow mototrist at a red light where I could find Gongzheng Guoxiao (=Gongzheng Elementary School=Gongzheng Guomin Xiaoxue=Gongzheng public elementary school), and she told me to follow her, I found myself wanting to explain why I was going to this shell of a building in the dark. "I'm waiting for my friend," I said easily enough. "She's coming from a yoga class." The two women looked at me blankly. Yes, two. The motorist had a friend on the back of her scooter (scooters are family vehicles here; it almost feels selfish and wantonly wasteful to drive a scooter all on your own). Here, as you can see, things got a bit difficult. I reached into my memory, trying to remember what my students always said when I was teaching them the phrase "doing yoga." They often shout out the Mandarin equivalent for what I'm teaching. It's a way for them to confirm amongst themselves that they understood me (I do my best to ignore it, keeping up the idea that I don't speak any Chinese). It also clues slower students in to the lesson. The shouting usually comes from the cram school students, who find English easier than do their classmates, and are eager to show off their skills and demonstrate how easy it is for them. (This is great for them, but can make teaching the class a bit tricky since it's easy to mistakenly think the whole class understands something when you hear the answer shouted loudly by several students; in fact, most of the students may be in the dark while a few are ahead of the material.) So, trying to recall the words I had tried to tune out in class, I amended: She's in a douyou class, a youdou class...it's exercise. At this point, I may even have tried some elementary yoga while still straddling my scooter. I almost got off my scooter and stood on one foot with my arms raised above my head, like a tree. The two women turned to each other and consulted. "Yu2jia1" suggested one. Yeah, sure, I said "yujia...douya, whatever." It should be clear to you by now that any of the words I tried for yoga were complete gibberish. "Okay," said the women, still looking a bit mystified, "she should be back a bit over there." And they waved at a building next to the elementary school. I thanked them for their help and turned back to wait for my friend coming out of her youdouyajiayuga-whatever class.
On the way home, I stopped off at a 7-eleven to see if I still had money on my phone card. (You can pay your bills at Taiwanese 7-elevens.) Pulling out of the sidewalk-strip lot was a bit difficult, though, since there was a giant praying mantis in my way. He hopped a bit to the side when I approached, but not enough to make me feel comfortable. I did not want to be the cause of the demise of such a noble creature, and I certainly didn't want to hear any sickening crunches.
Safely past the mantis (actually, I performed a bit of a U-turn in order to evade him), I headed back to my apartment. On my way to meet my friend and on the way back, the street was partially blocked off by a police car, several orange traffic cones, and a pulled-over car. I wasn't sure if we were allowed to use the road, but followed other cars and scooters through, waved on by a cop with his orange dayglo traffic-directing stick. As I pulled into a nearby store (the same one mentioned in my Sinlaku post) for a bar of soap and some ice cream--well, I had to break a 1,000 NT bill, ok?--I asked a couple guys standing on the corner if there had been an accident. They take accidents seriously here, and you are strictly forbidden from moving any vehicles involved in a collision until the police arrive. This reminds me of Chinese laws reaching into antiquity that forbid moving suicide and homicide corpses, which I find pretty cool. Anyway, the guys shook their heads no. "Drinking," one muttered. "Ooh," I said, "drinking and driving?" They assented. "Ouch," I said in English, and they laughed. Then I went into the store for my hand soap and ice cream cone. (Difficult maneuver, that--choosing a cone not too near the bottom [which might not have been replaced in 6 months] and not too near the top where it might have melted from people opening the freezer/possible power outage during the typhoon. Luckily, the stuff I was going for was more like synthetic cream than ice cream proper and therefore likely impervious to spoiling.) One of the sidewalk guys came in to ring me up. And that is the story of the yoga, the mantis, and the drunk driver.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
All Bark, Little Bite
I woke up this morning to a calm and quiet world. Noticeably quiet, considering the sounds I had fallen asleep to. I went to bed and somewhat melodramatically placed a pillow upright lengthwise between my head and my window. I lay there hoping that the pillow would act as some type of guard against glass if necessary, and wondered if it was wiser to have my face or the back of my head (brain) face the window. Grim, neurotic thoughts. I blame the hour (around 3 am) and my upbringing.
As I lay there waiting to fall asleep—and scared to do it—the storm died down! It was quiet! I went to the large windows in the den to look at Gongzheng Lu, the street below us. It rained, but didn’t storm. The rain shimmered as it fell on the black pavement lit by yellow streetlights. The traffic light overlooking the scene blinked a red stop light off and on. Thankfully, I went to bed. A few minutes later, the storm began again, back to its full force. I mentally groaned and miraculously fell asleep.
So when it was quiet this morning, I wanted to know if the storm was really over. And I wanted the internet back. The trees on the street were at rest. No howling to be heard. I reconnected the internet and checked the news. I was a bit miffed to read that the winds were only traveling at about 43 mph, but then happily saw that the central winds were more like 170 mph. I don’t know what that means. Are there circular winds at the center of a typhoon? Was the typhoon as a whole only going at about 43 mph? It was category 3 before it hit Taiwan, but only category 2 on land, I think. The pictures of the hurricane in Texas looked worse than anything I was hearing about Sinlaku.
But how could I be sure that the storm had ended? Short of a dove, I decided to check it out for myself, especially after I heard the announcement broadcast throughout the building: Floor one flooded, some vehicles may be overturned. Or something like that. If there were overturned cars, I wanted to see them! I got down to the lobby which was basically in one piece, though there were leaves and small branches from indoor plants scattered about the floor. A couple trees looked like they had been chewed up by the winds, but maybe they were never growing properly. A large number of potted plants from the lobby’s garden were gathered behind a wall of the garden to shield them from the wind. On the way to the door, I met the guard. Going out for breakfast? he asked me. This made quite a change from the don’t-go-outside-let-me-go-with-you-if-you-insist of the day before. Can I go outside? I asked. Yes, he said, then offered me his umbrella and cautioned me to put my camera I my pocket so it wouldn’t get ruined. I hadn’t brought an umbrella since I figured that if the winds were very strong it would be useless. He noted that I needed proper rain gear (I was wearing flip flops). It’s ok, I said, I’m just going out for a look around. Outside was disappointingly orderly. At first I thought the top of the street sign had been knocked off and planted in the ground, but actually it was only let down low on its pole so it wouldn’t get damaged by the wind. Some young trees were messed with and may have to be replanted. Some bikes and a motorcycle were on their sides, but this isn’t too out of the ordinary. Old motorcycles are often on their sides, as if the riders had leapt off the backs on reaching their destinations, leaving the scooters to their own devices. The one I saw was shiny and new-looking, so maybe this way an accident, but I noticed that the mirrors were also absent—on both the side the scooter had fallen on and the other—so maybe the owner had prepared for this. And there was rain.
At five in the afternoon, it is still raining. Aside from my morning excursion and my outing now to a coffee shop/bakery, I stayed indoors all day puttering about. But I did not feel restless, as I did yesterday when shut indoors. What is the difference between a typhoon precaution and a lazy Sunday? Maybe it’s just the matter of choice. Yesterday we were all antsy, and Faith and I joked about taking a refreshing turn about the room as once suggested by the artful Caroline Bingley.
As far as I know, there has been no serious lasting damage inflicted by Typhoon Sinlaku. And so, my friends, it would seem that school will be open tomorrow morning. I remember the shout of glee that went up in the Academic Affairs office when school was closed early for the storm. Forget the students. How sad will all the teachers be tomorrow!
As I lay there waiting to fall asleep—and scared to do it—the storm died down! It was quiet! I went to the large windows in the den to look at Gongzheng Lu, the street below us. It rained, but didn’t storm. The rain shimmered as it fell on the black pavement lit by yellow streetlights. The traffic light overlooking the scene blinked a red stop light off and on. Thankfully, I went to bed. A few minutes later, the storm began again, back to its full force. I mentally groaned and miraculously fell asleep.
So when it was quiet this morning, I wanted to know if the storm was really over. And I wanted the internet back. The trees on the street were at rest. No howling to be heard. I reconnected the internet and checked the news. I was a bit miffed to read that the winds were only traveling at about 43 mph, but then happily saw that the central winds were more like 170 mph. I don’t know what that means. Are there circular winds at the center of a typhoon? Was the typhoon as a whole only going at about 43 mph? It was category 3 before it hit Taiwan, but only category 2 on land, I think. The pictures of the hurricane in Texas looked worse than anything I was hearing about Sinlaku.
But how could I be sure that the storm had ended? Short of a dove, I decided to check it out for myself, especially after I heard the announcement broadcast throughout the building: Floor one flooded, some vehicles may be overturned. Or something like that. If there were overturned cars, I wanted to see them! I got down to the lobby which was basically in one piece, though there were leaves and small branches from indoor plants scattered about the floor. A couple trees looked like they had been chewed up by the winds, but maybe they were never growing properly. A large number of potted plants from the lobby’s garden were gathered behind a wall of the garden to shield them from the wind. On the way to the door, I met the guard. Going out for breakfast? he asked me. This made quite a change from the don’t-go-outside-let-me-go-with-you-if-you-insist of the day before. Can I go outside? I asked. Yes, he said, then offered me his umbrella and cautioned me to put my camera I my pocket so it wouldn’t get ruined. I hadn’t brought an umbrella since I figured that if the winds were very strong it would be useless. He noted that I needed proper rain gear (I was wearing flip flops). It’s ok, I said, I’m just going out for a look around. Outside was disappointingly orderly. At first I thought the top of the street sign had been knocked off and planted in the ground, but actually it was only let down low on its pole so it wouldn’t get damaged by the wind. Some young trees were messed with and may have to be replanted. Some bikes and a motorcycle were on their sides, but this isn’t too out of the ordinary. Old motorcycles are often on their sides, as if the riders had leapt off the backs on reaching their destinations, leaving the scooters to their own devices. The one I saw was shiny and new-looking, so maybe this way an accident, but I noticed that the mirrors were also absent—on both the side the scooter had fallen on and the other—so maybe the owner had prepared for this. And there was rain.
At five in the afternoon, it is still raining. Aside from my morning excursion and my outing now to a coffee shop/bakery, I stayed indoors all day puttering about. But I did not feel restless, as I did yesterday when shut indoors. What is the difference between a typhoon precaution and a lazy Sunday? Maybe it’s just the matter of choice. Yesterday we were all antsy, and Faith and I joked about taking a refreshing turn about the room as once suggested by the artful Caroline Bingley.
As far as I know, there has been no serious lasting damage inflicted by Typhoon Sinlaku. And so, my friends, it would seem that school will be open tomorrow morning. I remember the shout of glee that went up in the Academic Affairs office when school was closed early for the storm. Forget the students. How sad will all the teachers be tomorrow!
Sinlaku
Yesterday school got out early by a period in order to allow people to get home and prepare for Typhoon Sinlaku. I rode home in the threatening rain, and parked my scooter in the apartment garage for the first time since the Golden Monkey’s suicidal charge. It took a Grade 3 typhoon to get me to park in the garage again.
Nell came home and the two of us went shopping for food to last through Sunday. This is unusual and quite mind-boggling in its own right, since usually people here just buy food for immediate use. In the US, my kitchen and fridge at home is neatly stocked with food, and I couldn’t be put out of sorts if a hurricane suddenly dropped out of nowhere. Here, however, Nell and I wandered up and down the four aisles of the shop down the street, wondering how much we would eat in two days. We settled on a hodgepodge of noodles, saltines, orange and grapefruit juice, and a packet of bread. Then we swung by the bakery hoping to get better bread, but settled for the day’s remnants of pastries (though one option was a delicious whole wheat bread stuffed with nuts). We also went to a kaorou place nearby (a stand that roasts food) and picked up some cooked food and red tea. We knew we wouldn’t go hungry since we had more noodles and oatmeal at the apartment, not to mention an unspeakable number of moon cakes.
Sunday is the Moon Festival (Zhong Qiu Jie [Mid-Autumn Festival]) which marks the occasion of when a lady was sent to the moon in order to fulfill her wish of living forever, I think. The Taiwanese celebrate with barbeques (not sure how traditional this is), going out in families to gaze at the moon, and giving friends, family, and coworkers moon cakes. Moon cakes are round pastries that fit in the palm of you hand. They are filled with green bean paste, red bean paste, egg yolks, some kind of marzipan-y pineapple paste, mootchie (thick gelatinous stuff), dried meat filings, etc. They are packed in boxes in rows of three, and, depending on how upscale the box is, may come with an assortment of other cookies, candies, bars, and moon cakes of a different shape—circular but flat, and almost as large as your hand. They are high high high in fat content. You absolutely must offer the people around you moon cakes, but while many will happily accept them, a good number flatly refuse and back away, saying they don’t want to get fat. The moon cake exchange ritual reminds me a lot of mishloach manot. You are socially compelled to offer food to everyone around you. Nobody really wants so much junk food. And yes, I will admit it—I have cake recycled. But only once! I was holding a box with three or four cakes left (I’d had 12 to start with) and went into an office to give a fellow English teacher a cake. Inside were three teachers, and I couldn’t very well give to one person right in the face of two others. I think the teachers might have even said something about thanking me for bringing them all cakes. So I handed them out, though one of the teachers might have turned down my cake. (Just so you know, having your moon cake turned down does come with a sense of rejection.) I now had one cake left. The English teacher, however, extended a box of moon cakes toward me, and I gratefully accepted a chocolaty-looking one. Still not enough for the rest of the English teachers at Wu Jie. So I headed back toward my office instead, passing the nurse’s office on the way. Inside were two people. Aha! I thought. This was a good opportunity to speak with someone whom I’d previously only waved at through her office window. The two women inside were happy to receive the cakes and to chat with me a bit (“Oh, you speak some Chinese! We can practice our English—it’s pretty rusty…”). So that was nice and I only felt the slightest guilty twinge at the origin of the chocolate moon cake.
Back to Sinlaku…I was originally supposed to join my landlady and dean (that’s one person) on Saturday with my roommates for a Moon Festival celebration, but all such celebrations have been canceled due to decidedly inclement weather.
Nell and I returned from our shopping spree (done in two stages, since we dropped off our first purchases with the building guard and went back for the bakery and kaorou) quite wet with rain. The typhoon takes some time to pass. On Friday, we felt light rain and wind from the outskirts of the storm. The ride home from school was mainly uneventful, but a bit unnerving since my scooter was pushed a little to the side by the wind on 2-4 occasions. Anyway, we felt pretty prepared with our typhoon supplies, and were set to do as Dr. Wu had advised via email: settle down in our apartments for the weekend with a good book.
The next morning, more tape had to be bought for the windows. We have large windows around two corners of the den, and a roll of tape goes pretty quickly. The building guard told us not to go outside since it was dangerous, but we were worried by the prospect of shattered glass. The building guard and his friend offered us tape, then rain gear when we said we wanted to go out and get our own, and then would probably have lent us money, as well. He had on his raincoat and wanted to go with us to make sure we’d be ok, but we told him that wasn’t necessary. Someone from my suite went with an ETA from another suite. Outside was rainy, but no too windy. Some shops were open, including the shop Nell and I visited, a fruit mart, a home appliance center, and the 7-eleven. There still wasn’t enough tape in the end for all of our windows, but the building guard came up to check out our apartment and said it was ok, since we only needed to tape up the front-facing windows in the den.
Throughout the day, we kept looking out the windows and venturing onto our balcony. It rained with some gusts of wind. What a lame typhoon, we said, and egged it on. This was quite unnecessary.
At around 10:00/11:00 pm, the storm picked up. Wind howled and whistled—and sometimes shrieked like a frightened girl—through the trees, the palm trees bent to the side, their fronds whipped up into balls of frenetically waving leaves. A thin layer of water on the street in front of our apartment undulated in small ripples. Green ground plants moved in the wind, not rhythmically enough to be like the ocean, but like some kind of muscled, scaled creature. A few birds flew through the air during the day, and I wondered if they were insane. Cars and motorcycles are still out on the road (it’s almost 2:00 am now), and I know those people are out of their minds. The wind throws the rain about and drives it up the street, herding it in misty gusts away from my apartment. When the wind picks up, the mists swirl about over the asphalt. There are patterns and tiny waves on the street. The palm fronds wave about as if they are thinking about coming loose and leaping away in a crazy tribal dance. Our green den curtains blow in the wind supposedly locked behind the glass doors, and the doors themselves reverberate in the wind. Faith, Nell, and I ogle at the scene below us and take pictures, then leap away (sometimes with a small shout) by turns. Rain has leaked from our air conditioner, from a spot in the ceiling by the windows, and from under the window in Nell’s room. We have towels on the floor to soak it up, and have unplugged all wires from the wall (thus losing our internet). If it leaks more tomorrow—and I’m guessing it will—we will have to use clothing to stop the water. Where are all the people in cars and on scooters going? Did they get caught in the storm, or did they do this on purpose? The three of us in my suite agreed it would be rotten to have an emergency this weekend. Then we heard ambulance sirens. Crazy motorists involved in an accident? We were scared to go to sleep, but the other two already bit the bullet, and soon I will to, trusting my windows to stay intact. Laughing and mostly joking around, we determined that our entryway would be the safest spot in our apartment, since it has no windows and is partially blocked off from the den by a shoe case (that’s like a bookcase but for shoes). It leads out to the hallway, which should also be rather secure since the door to the stairwell has been closed for the first time since we got here, presumably as a precautionary measure. (The stairs are open in places to the outdoors.) So if the windows blow in, that’s where we’ll go. While the three of us discussed these issues and dropped towels on the leaks, I rescued my computer and gift box from the coffee table in front of the den windows. Because we know what the caption will read in the worse-case scenario: Three Girls Buried Alive for a Week, Survive on Moon Cakes and Their Own Urine.
Nell came home and the two of us went shopping for food to last through Sunday. This is unusual and quite mind-boggling in its own right, since usually people here just buy food for immediate use. In the US, my kitchen and fridge at home is neatly stocked with food, and I couldn’t be put out of sorts if a hurricane suddenly dropped out of nowhere. Here, however, Nell and I wandered up and down the four aisles of the shop down the street, wondering how much we would eat in two days. We settled on a hodgepodge of noodles, saltines, orange and grapefruit juice, and a packet of bread. Then we swung by the bakery hoping to get better bread, but settled for the day’s remnants of pastries (though one option was a delicious whole wheat bread stuffed with nuts). We also went to a kaorou place nearby (a stand that roasts food) and picked up some cooked food and red tea. We knew we wouldn’t go hungry since we had more noodles and oatmeal at the apartment, not to mention an unspeakable number of moon cakes.
Sunday is the Moon Festival (Zhong Qiu Jie [Mid-Autumn Festival]) which marks the occasion of when a lady was sent to the moon in order to fulfill her wish of living forever, I think. The Taiwanese celebrate with barbeques (not sure how traditional this is), going out in families to gaze at the moon, and giving friends, family, and coworkers moon cakes. Moon cakes are round pastries that fit in the palm of you hand. They are filled with green bean paste, red bean paste, egg yolks, some kind of marzipan-y pineapple paste, mootchie (thick gelatinous stuff), dried meat filings, etc. They are packed in boxes in rows of three, and, depending on how upscale the box is, may come with an assortment of other cookies, candies, bars, and moon cakes of a different shape—circular but flat, and almost as large as your hand. They are high high high in fat content. You absolutely must offer the people around you moon cakes, but while many will happily accept them, a good number flatly refuse and back away, saying they don’t want to get fat. The moon cake exchange ritual reminds me a lot of mishloach manot. You are socially compelled to offer food to everyone around you. Nobody really wants so much junk food. And yes, I will admit it—I have cake recycled. But only once! I was holding a box with three or four cakes left (I’d had 12 to start with) and went into an office to give a fellow English teacher a cake. Inside were three teachers, and I couldn’t very well give to one person right in the face of two others. I think the teachers might have even said something about thanking me for bringing them all cakes. So I handed them out, though one of the teachers might have turned down my cake. (Just so you know, having your moon cake turned down does come with a sense of rejection.) I now had one cake left. The English teacher, however, extended a box of moon cakes toward me, and I gratefully accepted a chocolaty-looking one. Still not enough for the rest of the English teachers at Wu Jie. So I headed back toward my office instead, passing the nurse’s office on the way. Inside were two people. Aha! I thought. This was a good opportunity to speak with someone whom I’d previously only waved at through her office window. The two women inside were happy to receive the cakes and to chat with me a bit (“Oh, you speak some Chinese! We can practice our English—it’s pretty rusty…”). So that was nice and I only felt the slightest guilty twinge at the origin of the chocolate moon cake.
Back to Sinlaku…I was originally supposed to join my landlady and dean (that’s one person) on Saturday with my roommates for a Moon Festival celebration, but all such celebrations have been canceled due to decidedly inclement weather.
Nell and I returned from our shopping spree (done in two stages, since we dropped off our first purchases with the building guard and went back for the bakery and kaorou) quite wet with rain. The typhoon takes some time to pass. On Friday, we felt light rain and wind from the outskirts of the storm. The ride home from school was mainly uneventful, but a bit unnerving since my scooter was pushed a little to the side by the wind on 2-4 occasions. Anyway, we felt pretty prepared with our typhoon supplies, and were set to do as Dr. Wu had advised via email: settle down in our apartments for the weekend with a good book.
The next morning, more tape had to be bought for the windows. We have large windows around two corners of the den, and a roll of tape goes pretty quickly. The building guard told us not to go outside since it was dangerous, but we were worried by the prospect of shattered glass. The building guard and his friend offered us tape, then rain gear when we said we wanted to go out and get our own, and then would probably have lent us money, as well. He had on his raincoat and wanted to go with us to make sure we’d be ok, but we told him that wasn’t necessary. Someone from my suite went with an ETA from another suite. Outside was rainy, but no too windy. Some shops were open, including the shop Nell and I visited, a fruit mart, a home appliance center, and the 7-eleven. There still wasn’t enough tape in the end for all of our windows, but the building guard came up to check out our apartment and said it was ok, since we only needed to tape up the front-facing windows in the den.
Throughout the day, we kept looking out the windows and venturing onto our balcony. It rained with some gusts of wind. What a lame typhoon, we said, and egged it on. This was quite unnecessary.
At around 10:00/11:00 pm, the storm picked up. Wind howled and whistled—and sometimes shrieked like a frightened girl—through the trees, the palm trees bent to the side, their fronds whipped up into balls of frenetically waving leaves. A thin layer of water on the street in front of our apartment undulated in small ripples. Green ground plants moved in the wind, not rhythmically enough to be like the ocean, but like some kind of muscled, scaled creature. A few birds flew through the air during the day, and I wondered if they were insane. Cars and motorcycles are still out on the road (it’s almost 2:00 am now), and I know those people are out of their minds. The wind throws the rain about and drives it up the street, herding it in misty gusts away from my apartment. When the wind picks up, the mists swirl about over the asphalt. There are patterns and tiny waves on the street. The palm fronds wave about as if they are thinking about coming loose and leaping away in a crazy tribal dance. Our green den curtains blow in the wind supposedly locked behind the glass doors, and the doors themselves reverberate in the wind. Faith, Nell, and I ogle at the scene below us and take pictures, then leap away (sometimes with a small shout) by turns. Rain has leaked from our air conditioner, from a spot in the ceiling by the windows, and from under the window in Nell’s room. We have towels on the floor to soak it up, and have unplugged all wires from the wall (thus losing our internet). If it leaks more tomorrow—and I’m guessing it will—we will have to use clothing to stop the water. Where are all the people in cars and on scooters going? Did they get caught in the storm, or did they do this on purpose? The three of us in my suite agreed it would be rotten to have an emergency this weekend. Then we heard ambulance sirens. Crazy motorists involved in an accident? We were scared to go to sleep, but the other two already bit the bullet, and soon I will to, trusting my windows to stay intact. Laughing and mostly joking around, we determined that our entryway would be the safest spot in our apartment, since it has no windows and is partially blocked off from the den by a shoe case (that’s like a bookcase but for shoes). It leads out to the hallway, which should also be rather secure since the door to the stairwell has been closed for the first time since we got here, presumably as a precautionary measure. (The stairs are open in places to the outdoors.) So if the windows blow in, that’s where we’ll go. While the three of us discussed these issues and dropped towels on the leaks, I rescued my computer and gift box from the coffee table in front of the den windows. Because we know what the caption will read in the worse-case scenario: Three Girls Buried Alive for a Week, Survive on Moon Cakes and Their Own Urine.
Teacher Alana
Drive to school—cut off by teachers?
The Golden Monkey has a mind of its own—parking trouble, foot in puddle
Searching for Bess, office
Call to assembly—“Mama Mia” standing in lines, army drills
Interview in front of the whole school. Fudged it a bit.
No classes this week, met Jasmine
Gift from Jin Hua
Some introductions, inc black dogs
Got breakfast
Imagine a hamburger place that opens at 5. imagine eating one at 5.
Settled into desk
Students and I both nervous, timid, shy of each other. But I don’t drop my water bottle and run away giggling every time I bump into one of them. Happened to me at least twice. Students jumping out of my way. One guy saluted me. They see me in the halls from their classrooms.
Looked over quiz/questionnaire given by Jessica
Hecked out library. 1st time a Taiwanese told me I was too small to be an American
Lunch w/Jessica and a 9th grade. Spoke w/Dick and Betty
More quiz review, settling schedule
So much food! One person in the office remarked on how I’d be fat by the end of the year. Everyone laughed when I assented.
Cake from guy whose wife had a baby. Discussion of traditional Chinese practiced. Drove Yu Chun crazy w/speaking English.
Gmail
Home. Dropped Jessica off by her car, rocky driving in the mud. Chased ants off my scooter.
Got home safely, despite streets slightly wet from rain. Cut off again by people, also not teachers.
Home: chat w/nell and Faith, skype w/M and Evie.
EAT CAKE!
Ah, nap.
Too lazy again to take out garbage
Read
Tidy room
Discover cockroach. Yeck!
Here.
The Golden Monkey has a mind of its own—parking trouble, foot in puddle
Searching for Bess, office
Call to assembly—“Mama Mia” standing in lines, army drills
Interview in front of the whole school. Fudged it a bit.
No classes this week, met Jasmine
Gift from Jin Hua
Some introductions, inc black dogs
Got breakfast
Imagine a hamburger place that opens at 5. imagine eating one at 5.
Settled into desk
Students and I both nervous, timid, shy of each other. But I don’t drop my water bottle and run away giggling every time I bump into one of them. Happened to me at least twice. Students jumping out of my way. One guy saluted me. They see me in the halls from their classrooms.
Looked over quiz/questionnaire given by Jessica
Hecked out library. 1st time a Taiwanese told me I was too small to be an American
Lunch w/Jessica and a 9th grade. Spoke w/Dick and Betty
More quiz review, settling schedule
So much food! One person in the office remarked on how I’d be fat by the end of the year. Everyone laughed when I assented.
Cake from guy whose wife had a baby. Discussion of traditional Chinese practiced. Drove Yu Chun crazy w/speaking English.
Gmail
Home. Dropped Jessica off by her car, rocky driving in the mud. Chased ants off my scooter.
Got home safely, despite streets slightly wet from rain. Cut off again by people, also not teachers.
Home: chat w/nell and Faith, skype w/M and Evie.
EAT CAKE!
Ah, nap.
Too lazy again to take out garbage
Read
Tidy room
Discover cockroach. Yeck!
Here.
The Middle of Nowhere, Taiwan OR The Golden Monkey Lives
Rode w/Nell on back. Success.
Re-affirmation of intent to buy more comprehensive helmet, if only to keep my eyes from drying out and to avoid swallowing mites
Supply own radio
Radiation plants along side of the road
Is any of this familiar?
Proof of psychological study that we key into the bizarre. Didn’t remember going over bridge; remembered floppy dwarf-like/ tipsy witch-hatted haystacks with tires on top to keep heap from spilling over.
The Descent. Honor, pride, physically.Surprised, pleased to hear parents keep their cool.
Re-affirmation of intent to buy more comprehensive helmet, if only to keep my eyes from drying out and to avoid swallowing mites
Supply own radio
Radiation plants along side of the road
Is any of this familiar?
Proof of psychological study that we key into the bizarre. Didn’t remember going over bridge; remembered floppy dwarf-like/ tipsy witch-hatted haystacks with tires on top to keep heap from spilling over.
The Descent. Honor, pride, physically.Surprised, pleased to hear parents keep their cool.
Legend of the Golden Monkey
Cruising behind Cynthia and her boyfriend down a main road in Yilan County, I started thinking over possible names for my scooter. Instead I really ought to have been focusing on the road in order to remember how to get to school on Monday (learning the route being the purpose of our trip). I don’t think I missed on much, though, since it’s pretty much straight all the way, with a left (or right, depending on which school I’m going to) at the police station and a left by the tall pink apartments. I’m leaving out a few turns, but hopefully I’ll know them when I see them on my test ride tomorrow. In any case, when giving names to objects, I like to think of the most absurd possible, names you would never give another human being. Names like Olga, Hedwig, and Ursula, and I hope no one stumbling on this blog has an aunt by that name. So I thought of something along the lines of Gloria (the actual name now escapes me), when it occurred to me that this being Taiwan, I ought to give the scooter a Chinese name. Having had dinner with a colleague by the name of Golden Flower a couple nights ago, I came up with Jin Hu, aka Golden Monkey. Moneys are rather important animals in Chinese culture. There’s a year of the Monkey, not to mention a central character in one of the first and most renowned Chinese novels, Journey to the West (which, no, I have not read, but I mean to someday, along with The Brothers Karamazov). But why a golden monkey? I thought. “Monkey” seemed fitting enough, especially for a nippy little scooter, but “golden” was entirely unexplained. Jade might be a better idea, I figured. The Chinese are very into jade, and many people are named after it, such as one of my friends from Columbia. That would make the name Yu Hu. Yoohoo. I mentally giggled about that for about 50 meters, and then came to my senses. I could never grab, steer, park, or accelerate a Yoohoo and maintain my self-respect. My scooter is 125 CC and large enough to not be named after a chocolate beverage. Thinking back on my jade friend, I wondered why I didn’t just key in my scooter’s name to my own. Picking from my four characters, I figured Yang Hu would make the most sense, the Sun Monkey. But it just wasn’t that catchy. For that matter, I reasoned while checking my speed and balance, why not name it Zun Hu, Respectful Monkey, in anticipation of future successful driving and traffic compliance. Loser. And so I was back at Jin Hu, figuring that if I knew the name for silver, I might substitute that for Jin since my scooter is a silver-grey. With that, I refocused on the road and pensively wondered why my bike was bouncing and juddering along some of the pavement.
We arrived safely a few roads away from Wu Jie and stopped to get some food at a 7-11. I got off my bike and walked toward the store, at which point Cynthia turned to me and said her fiancée wanted to know why I was still wearing my helmet. “I don’t know,” I said, “I just forgot to take it off.” Well if you go into a 7-11 wearing a helmet, she said, they’ll think you’re trying to rob the store. Wearing the helmet makes it easier for you to get away quickly. I laughed and quickly removed mine. This is especially a concern, Cynthia continued to inform me, with banks and post offices, especially if the person is still wearing a scooter mask, in addition to the helmet. This was a lot of fun to hear, imagining the difficulties caused by a nation so fond of motorcycles. It was especially amusing given my first impressions of Taiwan’s scooter drivers as resembling suicide bombers, what with their helmets, sunglasses/visors, masks/handkerchiefs, jackets worn backward to minimize the added heat while getting protection against tanning, and squares of fabric pockets hung over the handles to make them easier to hold and possibly also anti-tanning devices. Question: who would rob a post office?
I am happy to report that I made it to and from the schools twice today without incident. Some things to work on are U-turns (more necessary than you’d think because of the two-part turn rule for left turns), keeping the brakes held firmly when stopped on a steep hill (nothing like sliding down a highway backwards on an open metal contraption), and making sure to brake with the left hand (rear wheel) before the right (front) to avoid flipping over. Also, sunscreen. I wore a long-sleeved t-shirt, which helped a lot. So now the two bright red strips of skin across the back of my hand (where the sleeves left off) look just a bit strange. In addition to the bottoms of my cheeks, causing me to fear I’m getting fat.
My only other accomplishments today were paying my phone bill (really just buying more minutes) so now I can make calls again instead of waiting for others to contact me, and finally watching the last half of 21.
We arrived safely a few roads away from Wu Jie and stopped to get some food at a 7-11. I got off my bike and walked toward the store, at which point Cynthia turned to me and said her fiancée wanted to know why I was still wearing my helmet. “I don’t know,” I said, “I just forgot to take it off.” Well if you go into a 7-11 wearing a helmet, she said, they’ll think you’re trying to rob the store. Wearing the helmet makes it easier for you to get away quickly. I laughed and quickly removed mine. This is especially a concern, Cynthia continued to inform me, with banks and post offices, especially if the person is still wearing a scooter mask, in addition to the helmet. This was a lot of fun to hear, imagining the difficulties caused by a nation so fond of motorcycles. It was especially amusing given my first impressions of Taiwan’s scooter drivers as resembling suicide bombers, what with their helmets, sunglasses/visors, masks/handkerchiefs, jackets worn backward to minimize the added heat while getting protection against tanning, and squares of fabric pockets hung over the handles to make them easier to hold and possibly also anti-tanning devices. Question: who would rob a post office?
I am happy to report that I made it to and from the schools twice today without incident. Some things to work on are U-turns (more necessary than you’d think because of the two-part turn rule for left turns), keeping the brakes held firmly when stopped on a steep hill (nothing like sliding down a highway backwards on an open metal contraption), and making sure to brake with the left hand (rear wheel) before the right (front) to avoid flipping over. Also, sunscreen. I wore a long-sleeved t-shirt, which helped a lot. So now the two bright red strips of skin across the back of my hand (where the sleeves left off) look just a bit strange. In addition to the bottoms of my cheeks, causing me to fear I’m getting fat.
My only other accomplishments today were paying my phone bill (really just buying more minutes) so now I can make calls again instead of waiting for others to contact me, and finally watching the last half of 21.
Trust Me
Today makes the second time I have heard or seen that phrase here. The first was proudly emblazoned on a container of floor-cleaning solvent in my Yilan apartment. What does this mean, I asked my suitemate, Brittany. She figured it meant we should trust the company’s recommended dosage of solvent. Sure enough, using just the small amount they prescribed worked to make our floors shiny and clean.
Today it came from someone selling me a used scooter. I was far less inclined to be trusting. In America, we all know that used car salesmen are the most conniving, desperate people the market has to offer. They are just a notch below the devil and one above bank robbers. But perhaps here that is not the case. I still can’t tell.
This morning I decided to walk around and find a better deal than the options from yesterday—a scooter under 10 years old and under 20,000 NT. I’d heard that another ETA had found a scooter near the train station, so that was where I headed, only slightly concerned that I wouldn’t be able to find one specific shop whose name I didn’t know among the packed area surrounding the station. Half an hour to 45 minutes after stepping out my front door, I arrived at the station, sweaty and highly doubtful of any chance of success. Along the way, I had found only one shop that sold only new scooters. They told me new ones were better since they were safer, no concern for prior histories. Thanks anyway, I said, and asked if they knew any places that sold used models. They didn’t. But they did point out the way to the train station. Used scooters are preferable, at least for the ETAs, since they are less likely to be stolen and for one year we’re looking for something serviceable, not a long-term investment. I finally found myself facing the train station. Great. Now what? I decided to turn right and see what I ran into. A few blocks down, I ran into a Kymco repair station. Kymco is a popular scooter brand in Taiwan. The guy there was very friendly, discussed the models I’d found yesterday, told me to look for something in the 6-8 age range, and recommended a shop on Gongdeng Road.
I headed over there and test-drove three models. None were satisfactory. I walked over to the train station, where Jessica, another English teacher at Wu Jie, picked me up. She drove me over to Wu Jie to pick up some textbooks, and then she, Bess (my LET from orientation), and I headed out to look for more scooters. They seemed impressed that I’d gone searching on my own for scooters. They decided to take me to a place that was owned by the father of a friend of Jessica’s from college, and who was also teaching English at San Xing Junior High, another school participating in the ETA program. Jessica kept calling the woman by a Spanish name since they had been in Spanish class together, but the woman introduced herself to me as Tiffany, her English name. At the moment, they did not have any suitable scooters in the shop, but the father said he would look for one for me. They said they knew I was looking for something cheap under 10 years old. Yes, I said, but I’m more concerned about safety than price. “It’s ok,” Tiffany said, “trust me.” Bess, Jessica, and I left it to them and headed out to go to the beach at Dali and to get our fortunes told. I imagined a Mama Fortuna-type lady draped in black lace with a crystal ball and a pack of grimy cards.
On our way over, though, the LETs received a call saying that the scooter shop owner had found a scooter for me.
We headed over and found a beautiful silver 6-year-old Sym scooter for 22,000 NT. The scooter shop owner said he’d look it over and make sure everything was in ship-shape order for me. I test-drove it a bit. I think it was Jessica who rode on the back with me since I was a bit nervous about the heavier traffic on the street. Brave soul. Bess also tested it. I asked if it had ever been in an accident, what type of guarantee there would be (though this was misunderstood to mean insurance, which the scooter shops—and not third parties—provide), etc. I tried to remember what my dad had done when buying cars. “Wow, you’re so nervous!” Tiffany exclaimed. “Don’t worry. It’s fine. Trust me.” I agreed to buy it. I figured that the LETs seemed to trust the situation, so this was probably normal for Taiwan (neither having an independent mechanic look at the vehicle nor drawing up a contract), and that since Jessica and Tiffany were friends, I wouldn’t be screwed over (at least not too much). They had me pick out a complementary helmet (it covers half the head and is silvery blue) and put down some money. I paid 15,000 of the 22,000 NT and agreed to pick it up later that night. I would pay the remaining 7,000 when I got an ATM card and could access my bank account. (This took longer than I thought—slightly over a week—, and Tiffany called Jessica to make sure I hadn’t forgotten—so embarrassing! Tiffany said she understood about the ATM card and was perfectly friendly. But I bought her family a box of moon cakes (it being moon cake season) as an apology and also to thank her father for helping me with my scooter for free when I accidentally dropped it—more about that later. I also had her count the 7,000 NT to make sure it was all there [even though she said she trusted me]…and also as an opportunity for her to check it there and give me a receipt saying that I had fully paid for the scooter, instead of us just trusting each other and knowing it was paid off without any written proof.)
Bess, Jessica, and I headed out again, but had to leave off the beach since time was running short. It turns out the fortune teller was an ordinary-looking person who works in a temple. I think it’s a Buddhist temple. But it could’ve been Daoist. The temple was intricately painted in blue, green, red, yellow, white, and black. The colors seemed brighter than similarly painted temples I had seen in China. They told me about some of the various gods and symbols I saw. There were too many to go over everything. I really liked the images of the door guard gods, with they weapons and sitars.
We headed back to Luodong, passing some rather interesting architecture on the way. One building was built of numerous arches and “legs” coming from the building. It reminded me of a crouching spider, but was a governmental building. I never thought bureaucrats could be so hip. Another was the entrance to the beach, or at least one of the entrances. It was a large, bright orange wall shaped like an upside-down isosceles triangle (base facing upward), but as if it had been stuck somewhat deeper into the sand on one side than it had on the other. From it protruded a shelf-like platform. A big square opening, and maybe a window, too, was cut in the orange wall. The last was a large white Arabic palace. It was like we had suddenly landed in Morocco. I think some rich man had just got the urge to build himself a palace, and so he had, squeezing it in with the local shops and Buddhist temples.
I brought my scooter home, driving slowly and led by my dedicated LETs and slooowly walked it down a rather steep ramp (for a scooter) into the parking garage.
Today it came from someone selling me a used scooter. I was far less inclined to be trusting. In America, we all know that used car salesmen are the most conniving, desperate people the market has to offer. They are just a notch below the devil and one above bank robbers. But perhaps here that is not the case. I still can’t tell.
This morning I decided to walk around and find a better deal than the options from yesterday—a scooter under 10 years old and under 20,000 NT. I’d heard that another ETA had found a scooter near the train station, so that was where I headed, only slightly concerned that I wouldn’t be able to find one specific shop whose name I didn’t know among the packed area surrounding the station. Half an hour to 45 minutes after stepping out my front door, I arrived at the station, sweaty and highly doubtful of any chance of success. Along the way, I had found only one shop that sold only new scooters. They told me new ones were better since they were safer, no concern for prior histories. Thanks anyway, I said, and asked if they knew any places that sold used models. They didn’t. But they did point out the way to the train station. Used scooters are preferable, at least for the ETAs, since they are less likely to be stolen and for one year we’re looking for something serviceable, not a long-term investment. I finally found myself facing the train station. Great. Now what? I decided to turn right and see what I ran into. A few blocks down, I ran into a Kymco repair station. Kymco is a popular scooter brand in Taiwan. The guy there was very friendly, discussed the models I’d found yesterday, told me to look for something in the 6-8 age range, and recommended a shop on Gongdeng Road.
I headed over there and test-drove three models. None were satisfactory. I walked over to the train station, where Jessica, another English teacher at Wu Jie, picked me up. She drove me over to Wu Jie to pick up some textbooks, and then she, Bess (my LET from orientation), and I headed out to look for more scooters. They seemed impressed that I’d gone searching on my own for scooters. They decided to take me to a place that was owned by the father of a friend of Jessica’s from college, and who was also teaching English at San Xing Junior High, another school participating in the ETA program. Jessica kept calling the woman by a Spanish name since they had been in Spanish class together, but the woman introduced herself to me as Tiffany, her English name. At the moment, they did not have any suitable scooters in the shop, but the father said he would look for one for me. They said they knew I was looking for something cheap under 10 years old. Yes, I said, but I’m more concerned about safety than price. “It’s ok,” Tiffany said, “trust me.” Bess, Jessica, and I left it to them and headed out to go to the beach at Dali and to get our fortunes told. I imagined a Mama Fortuna-type lady draped in black lace with a crystal ball and a pack of grimy cards.
On our way over, though, the LETs received a call saying that the scooter shop owner had found a scooter for me.
We headed over and found a beautiful silver 6-year-old Sym scooter for 22,000 NT. The scooter shop owner said he’d look it over and make sure everything was in ship-shape order for me. I test-drove it a bit. I think it was Jessica who rode on the back with me since I was a bit nervous about the heavier traffic on the street. Brave soul. Bess also tested it. I asked if it had ever been in an accident, what type of guarantee there would be (though this was misunderstood to mean insurance, which the scooter shops—and not third parties—provide), etc. I tried to remember what my dad had done when buying cars. “Wow, you’re so nervous!” Tiffany exclaimed. “Don’t worry. It’s fine. Trust me.” I agreed to buy it. I figured that the LETs seemed to trust the situation, so this was probably normal for Taiwan (neither having an independent mechanic look at the vehicle nor drawing up a contract), and that since Jessica and Tiffany were friends, I wouldn’t be screwed over (at least not too much). They had me pick out a complementary helmet (it covers half the head and is silvery blue) and put down some money. I paid 15,000 of the 22,000 NT and agreed to pick it up later that night. I would pay the remaining 7,000 when I got an ATM card and could access my bank account. (This took longer than I thought—slightly over a week—, and Tiffany called Jessica to make sure I hadn’t forgotten—so embarrassing! Tiffany said she understood about the ATM card and was perfectly friendly. But I bought her family a box of moon cakes (it being moon cake season) as an apology and also to thank her father for helping me with my scooter for free when I accidentally dropped it—more about that later. I also had her count the 7,000 NT to make sure it was all there [even though she said she trusted me]…and also as an opportunity for her to check it there and give me a receipt saying that I had fully paid for the scooter, instead of us just trusting each other and knowing it was paid off without any written proof.)
Bess, Jessica, and I headed out again, but had to leave off the beach since time was running short. It turns out the fortune teller was an ordinary-looking person who works in a temple. I think it’s a Buddhist temple. But it could’ve been Daoist. The temple was intricately painted in blue, green, red, yellow, white, and black. The colors seemed brighter than similarly painted temples I had seen in China. They told me about some of the various gods and symbols I saw. There were too many to go over everything. I really liked the images of the door guard gods, with they weapons and sitars.
We headed back to Luodong, passing some rather interesting architecture on the way. One building was built of numerous arches and “legs” coming from the building. It reminded me of a crouching spider, but was a governmental building. I never thought bureaucrats could be so hip. Another was the entrance to the beach, or at least one of the entrances. It was a large, bright orange wall shaped like an upside-down isosceles triangle (base facing upward), but as if it had been stuck somewhat deeper into the sand on one side than it had on the other. From it protruded a shelf-like platform. A big square opening, and maybe a window, too, was cut in the orange wall. The last was a large white Arabic palace. It was like we had suddenly landed in Morocco. I think some rich man had just got the urge to build himself a palace, and so he had, squeezing it in with the local shops and Buddhist temples.
I brought my scooter home, driving slowly and led by my dedicated LETs and slooowly walked it down a rather steep ramp (for a scooter) into the parking garage.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
titles
70's Child
-filling out forms. thurs the 21st
85 OR By the Skin of my Teeth
-driving test
-teaching and housing assignments
-very emotional day
-filling out forms. thurs the 21st
85 OR By the Skin of my Teeth
-driving test
-teaching and housing assignments
-very emotional day
Monday, August 18, 2008
Let Me Count the Ways
Let me count the ways, O Muse, the many ways I which I have made an ass of myself today.
-near crash into curb with scooter
-inkpot
-buzzing the wrong apt
-chasing down the garbage truck…recycling reject
Perhaps this outdoes the shoe thing.
Otherwise, nice. Made it to school on time! Presentation by hippies Shervin and Chris. Worked on lesson plan. Re-met Jessica and Lotus. Met Angus.
-near crash into curb with scooter
-inkpot
-buzzing the wrong apt
-chasing down the garbage truck…recycling reject
Perhaps this outdoes the shoe thing.
Otherwise, nice. Made it to school on time! Presentation by hippies Shervin and Chris. Worked on lesson plan. Re-met Jessica and Lotus. Met Angus.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Water Weekend
rain festival
parade
night market--yummy food
suao springs
brainstorming for Tuesday's lesson plan
parade
night market--yummy food
suao springs
brainstorming for Tuesday's lesson plan
Saturday, August 16, 2008
We Eat Turkey. We Eat Turkey. Gobble Gobble Gobble.
Use of songs to teach content. Thanksgiving songs. Sing-off. We ETAs get pretty competitive.
We eat turkey.We eat turkey. Gobble gobble gobble. Gobble gobble gobble.
Always on Thanksgiving.
Thank you for the food.
Yum yum yum. Gobble gobble gobble.
Reward system.
Trip to Nan-An and Nan-Ao. Nan-An: beautiful building, beach, interesting oceanographic education center. If teach there, run own class 1/5).
Beautiful busride to Nan-Ao. Skirt had time to dry. A bit dizzying.
Nan-Ao. Beautiful school, landscaping, scenery. Atalya and English written on walls and stairs to help the kids learn. Saw them practice martial arts. English classroom has platform by blackboard. Ten Little Monkeys in classroom, we all began chanting. Saw teacher's dorm a bit. We to neighboring elementary school (co-school). Lovely. Had Leonardo the Terrible Monster in Chinese in the library. Most most kids like to borrow from a nicer town library. We got served nice food by the school. (water and V-8ish juice at Nan-Ao), and the AP surprised us with icecream. I opted for taro and brown sugar. Pretty good. Walked back to bus with Vicky. She said most Taiwanese students can go to college, that there are even too many colleges for the students, and that all you need is money, but that most colleges are bad.
Butterflies flitting up to bus windows.
Fo Guang fiasco, contract. Walk home: buy book on Winston Churchill, could not understand shop owner. Bought webcam, bumped into James in store and he helped me find it. Walk home: tried new path. Thought would die. Got wrong directions once. Offer from lady to take me on her scooter since she thought I didn't understand her directions. Also tried new route to school in morning. Scenic.
Got home, Adam called, got beef noodle. Guy asked me my salary. Affronted, told him I didn't know, then remembered that that's an ok ques here. Then realized actually didn't remember. the guy was incredulous. Adam threw my shoes down to me from his window.
We eat turkey.We eat turkey. Gobble gobble gobble. Gobble gobble gobble.
Always on Thanksgiving.
Thank you for the food.
Yum yum yum. Gobble gobble gobble.
Reward system.
Trip to Nan-An and Nan-Ao. Nan-An: beautiful building, beach, interesting oceanographic education center. If teach there, run own class 1/5).
Beautiful busride to Nan-Ao. Skirt had time to dry. A bit dizzying.
Nan-Ao. Beautiful school, landscaping, scenery. Atalya and English written on walls and stairs to help the kids learn. Saw them practice martial arts. English classroom has platform by blackboard. Ten Little Monkeys in classroom, we all began chanting. Saw teacher's dorm a bit. We to neighboring elementary school (co-school). Lovely. Had Leonardo the Terrible Monster in Chinese in the library. Most most kids like to borrow from a nicer town library. We got served nice food by the school. (water and V-8ish juice at Nan-Ao), and the AP surprised us with icecream. I opted for taro and brown sugar. Pretty good. Walked back to bus with Vicky. She said most Taiwanese students can go to college, that there are even too many colleges for the students, and that all you need is money, but that most colleges are bad.
Butterflies flitting up to bus windows.
Fo Guang fiasco, contract. Walk home: buy book on Winston Churchill, could not understand shop owner. Bought webcam, bumped into James in store and he helped me find it. Walk home: tried new path. Thought would die. Got wrong directions once. Offer from lady to take me on her scooter since she thought I didn't understand her directions. Also tried new route to school in morning. Scenic.
Got home, Adam called, got beef noodle. Guy asked me my salary. Affronted, told him I didn't know, then remembered that that's an ok ques here. Then realized actually didn't remember. the guy was incredulous. Adam threw my shoes down to me from his window.
If a Picture Could Paint a Thousand Words
First time working with LETs.
Dr. Trites lectures us on teaching listening and speaking. We do a group exercise of listening to a song and putting the typed-up lyrics in order. She said she made it a bit more difficult because of the native speakers. So I was a bit nonplussed to see James putting it together so easily while I could barely make out the lines. I told myself that I was looking at the slips of paper upside-down, but so was Bess. Then James said that he taught this song to his classes. Aha.
Microteaching. Interesting idea and good for training us to come up with lesson plans, as well as giving us a chance to see how we work with different LETs. Cathy, Candy, and I worked together. At first I wanted to come up with a completely new lesson on our own, but the LETs wanted to stick to the text book, which is fair since the jr high kids need to know the textbook material for the national exam. So we looked at a lesson that discussed basketball, and decided to make a lesson about forming sentences like "I like to play basketball during winter vacation." This would train the kids in pronoun usage, verbs (like, enjoy, hate, need, want), infinitives, names for activities, names of vacations, and possibly usage of during/on/over. Planning out the lesson was fine, but performing it got rocky since we hadn't discussed who'd be leading it. I spoke, but the words weren't on the board, so hard to explain. Suggestions: work in pronouns more, also include other times and places. Commendation: put words on board in format for use in sentences--good for low-level students.
Heard more about college entrance. Spoke with Linda about it. Most kids don't go to college, but many can get in--but to bad colleges. I asked Linda why she teaches English to all these kids if most won't make it to college, not even to high school. I was looking for an uplifting answer, but she laughed and said she didn't know.
Dr. Trites lectures us on teaching listening and speaking. We do a group exercise of listening to a song and putting the typed-up lyrics in order. She said she made it a bit more difficult because of the native speakers. So I was a bit nonplussed to see James putting it together so easily while I could barely make out the lines. I told myself that I was looking at the slips of paper upside-down, but so was Bess. Then James said that he taught this song to his classes. Aha.
Microteaching. Interesting idea and good for training us to come up with lesson plans, as well as giving us a chance to see how we work with different LETs. Cathy, Candy, and I worked together. At first I wanted to come up with a completely new lesson on our own, but the LETs wanted to stick to the text book, which is fair since the jr high kids need to know the textbook material for the national exam. So we looked at a lesson that discussed basketball, and decided to make a lesson about forming sentences like "I like to play basketball during winter vacation." This would train the kids in pronoun usage, verbs (like, enjoy, hate, need, want), infinitives, names for activities, names of vacations, and possibly usage of during/on/over. Planning out the lesson was fine, but performing it got rocky since we hadn't discussed who'd be leading it. I spoke, but the words weren't on the board, so hard to explain. Suggestions: work in pronouns more, also include other times and places. Commendation: put words on board in format for use in sentences--good for low-level students.
Heard more about college entrance. Spoke with Linda about it. Most kids don't go to college, but many can get in--but to bad colleges. I asked Linda why she teaches English to all these kids if most won't make it to college, not even to high school. I was looking for an uplifting answer, but she laughed and said she didn't know.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Huey, Dewey, and Louie
Today began oddly enough, waking in the spare bedroom of one of the Luodong girls’ apartments. At 5:00, I rolled over and went back to sleep. At 6:00 I did some fuzzy and questionable calculations, decided that I wouldn’t have enough time to shower and dress if I decided to return to my apartment in Yilan before getting to the Teaching Center by 8:30 am, rolled over and went back to sleep. At 7:00 I rolled over, faced the facts, and got out of bed. I then stood dumbly in the center of the room, wondering what to do. Mary and Nell, the other two girls in the apartment, still seemed to be asleep. So I wandered out of my room, moseyed over to both their doors, noted that everything was quiet, and then bumbled over to their common room to gaze out the eleven (or so) stories at the city-and-farm view below, sharing the moment with the jailbird toy suctioned to one of the windowpanes, one of the few items left behind by that apartment’s ETAs from last year. (Our apartments were found for us by the Foundation for Scholarly Exchange, the Taiwanese half of the Fulbright—the other half being the US State Department. These apartments roll over from year to year, being handed down the line of ETAs. Those who leave, we discovered upon first entering our new homes, leave behind things for the next year’s group, which can be very useful and quite heartwarming. My own apartment was left an assortment of eating and cooking utensils and dishware, a blanket, a yoga mat, canned food in case of a typhoon, a router [that didn’t work, oh well], soap, and some other odds and ends. It’s all luck of the draw, however, as I saw a couple days ago when I visited a friend’s apartment and took in their cluttered entryway. This group had been bequeathed a construction paper turkey and a palm-sized pink rubber soccer ball sprouting feet from every angle, among other notable items. Another group had been left a bike, but could find it nowhere…thieves?) After a few more befuddled tours of the apartment, I decided to shower on my own and use my shirt from yesterday as a towel. This worked quite well. The only thing I regret is that in my haste to finally shower and be done with it, I forgot to turn on the gas and hot water heater on the balcony, and therefore missed out on my first hot shower since arriving at Yilan, which, I must admit, had been the true deciding factor when it came to deciding against returning to my own apartment. (I have had no hot water in my apartment since—we think—the hot water heater battery died and we were too busy/lazy/ignorant to replace it. But that is hopefully fixed now since yesterday’s euphoric trip to the supermarket.) Mary lent me a shirt and tank top which looked very nice, though a bit wide on the shoulders so that I kept having to adjust them, making me feel a little risqué in front of the…
LETs.
LET stands for “Local English Teacher,” the Taiwanese teachers who instruct the children in English. We the ETAs will be working with/under them as sort of “specialists” in the field. We’re there to fill the kids in on American culture, to provide living, interactive examples of American pronunciation and inflection, to help with explaining/teaching technical aspects of the language, and to make learning English seem cool and interesting, instead of merely tedious, pointless, and frustratingly impossible.
Today we met the LETs for the first time, which I think was exciting for the LETs and ETAs alike. Finally it seemed real to us, that we would actually be going to teach in a classroom. I admit the realization made me a bit nervous. We were split into two groups, one for the 30-odd elementary school LETs and 12 ETAs that would be working with them, and one for the LETs and ETAs assigned to junior high schools.
But to backtrack a little…After getting dressed, I went down with Mary to meet the shuttle in front of the Luodong apartment. (Nell had left earlier to buy some breakfast.) The shuttle, a white van with rounded corners and letters in yellow, red, and green letters proclaiming its name across its flanks, soon pulled up. All the girls from Luodong (that being every ETA from Luodong, since the only two guys on the program share an apartment in my complex in Yilan) piled into the shuttle, which was no simple feat, as the van was already filled. Along the road, it made a few more stops before reaching the train station, where we disembarked for the 20-minute trip to Yilan. Each time the shuttle stopped in front of a line of people waiting for a lift, my heart sank just a little more. Oh, how we squeezed. The seats were filled and the aisle was jam-packed, and it was clearly not designed for that. There were no handholds, so each time the shuttle came to a sudden stop (and I remember an astoundingly tumultuous one in particular), we aisle-crammers all fell on top of each other, leaning over like a gruesome stack of human dominoes. In a country where the elderly are expected to be honored, it is quite mollifying to find yourself stepping on the foot of an elder, while your elbow jabs her in the side. Aside from some grunts (at the van, not the people), there were no complaints, though, so I guess this is a common occurrence. During the ride, I remembered my friend Liz’s recollection of riding city buses in Beijing. There, apparently, the driver crams in as many people as possible and then half a hundred more, so that even if you are on an air-conditioned bus there is no way you would ever know it. The Beijing driver then shunts about the road, ripping into bus stops and shuddering to a standstill, and freely tearing the bus over to the side of the road so she can turn around and yell at the passengers, who have just been swung against one side or other of the bus, well, as much as one can be swung in such a packed environment. When we finally got to the train platform, a Taiwanese guy walked over to our group and asked if we were here to teach English. This is a common question here, since what else would a foreigner be doing in Yilan County? Although, yesterday or today some lady asked me if I was here to have fun, and I almost laughed. Come to Yilan or Luodong for kicks? These actually are fun places to see and be in, but I don’t know of any foreigner that would decide to go to Taiwan for these two cities. There are areas around, though, famous for hot and cold springs, hiking, etc, and so I guess her question made sense after all and I’m the silly one. Anyway, I figured this guy with a round face, soft voice, and bright red cap with multi-colored starbursts at the back and sides was another curious Taiwanese interested in brushing up on his English, and I’m embarrassed to say that I turned my back on him and focused instead on my plastic-packaged slice of brioche bread. It was early in the morning and I didn’t have patience to smile and chat and be pleasant. So some other girls in the group chatted with him, and he revealed within one sentence that he was also here to teach English, that he was in fact one of the LETs on the way to meet with us at the teacher training center, and that his name was Brian (in English). At that point I turned around and joined in the conversation. I don’t think he noticed. Along the way, he told us about some schools nearby, and that four of them were for Taiwanese aborigines.
And now back to the LETs. I went with the junior high group, since I will be teaching middle schoolers. One of the questions asked me by the LETs was why I chose junior high over teaching the elementary school kids. I will explain that to you now, since you are probably wondering the same thing. Working with junior high schools is new this year for ETAs, initiated because of their success with the elementary schools. Of our group, only four are teaching in junior high schools (me, Jill, Jaime, and Brett). This was a hard decision for me, since Taiwanese elementary school-aged children are so cute and it would be so much fun to work with them. We would be able to do fun things, like draw, read picture books (to them, not with them), sing “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes,” hand out cookies, and regularly use funky costume props for reading exercises. But I thought it would be more fun and rewarding to be able to converse with my students and joke around with them a bit, which junior high students can do, though only at a very low level in English. (We looked at some of their textbooks last week, and the material is quite elementary.) Teaching junior high students would also let me work more with English grammar and explaining idiomatic expressions, instead of mainly working on phonetics and repeating dialogues like “Hello. How are you? Fine, thank you, and you?” which we would have to do with the younger kids. Finally, junior high is a pretty stressful time in Taiwanese education. The students have to pass an exam at the end of junior high in order to get into high school, and from high school must again take an exam to get into college. One teacher told me that only a third of the students go on to college, but I might have misheard that. The fact is, though, that not every student can go to college, not by a long shot. Many do not even go to high school. If they don’t go to college, they go to vocational schools, and can end up as farmers and trash collectors (though probably also some pretty decent fields, like plumbing and electrics). So their studies in junior high are very important for giving them access to higher education and a chance to pursue their life goals. Eight grade (which we will be teaching) is relatively laid back, as it is the first of the three junior high years. Ninth grade, though, is sheer torture. The kids go on their graduation trip before the start of ninth grade (at least in one school) so that they can have some fun before settling down to long months of endless study. On the slideshow shown us at the beginning of orientation it even said that the national exam at the end of ninth grade is a “nightmare.” In teaching at a junior high, I would like to make the material as fun as possible to lessen the tedium and give the kids a chance to enjoy learning English, instead of despising it. But perhaps more importantly, I intend to give the students as solid a foundation in English as possible to help them prepare for the exam. I would like all of my students to be able to go to college, even though I know that is not a realistic wish. If they were to choose not to attend college, I would think it unfortunate, but there is something painfully tragic about that fact that they cannot all go, that most are forcibly turned away. I see trash collectors and street sweepers every day here, and it hurts to think that they might have wanted to be something else, but could not.
In our meeting, first the ETAs and then the LETs presented their self-introductory slideshows. It was a lot of fun to see what the other ETAs had written, and to find out more about their families and college and camp experiences than what had come out during our week-and-a-half of living together. It was kind of funny, though, since the ETAs each had upwards of five slides full of personal information, and the LETs kept it to 1-2 slides, 1 reserved for information about their school if there were two slides. We ended up using the internet a lot to show more about sporting event (curling), pets (sugar gliders!), and the local junior highs. There were seven high school LET presenters, though it looks from a handout that there are eight total. Fortunately, we will be working with two schools, and will therefore choose a pair of LETs. They all seemed so nice that it will be hard to choose amongst them, so it’s nice to know that we’ll at least work with two. After the slideshow presentations, we played bingo, where we had to go about the room finding people who fit certain qualifications (allergic to mango, know the name of Obama’s wife, can bike between Yilan City and Luodong in 20 minutes, etc) in order to break the ice (though it seemed pretty broken to me after our presentations and chatty question-and-answer sessions after each one—I was asked which was my favorite children’s book, and so we did an internet search for Howl’s Moving Castle, which the LETs knew by name in Chinese) and get to know each other a bit more. Then it was lunch time, and we sat down in the main conference room (our meeting had taken place in a lecture room on the 3rd floor, across from the computer lab) with everyone to eat. When Jaime and I remarked on how much better Taiwanese rice was than American rice, James, a junior high LET, told me that the rice comes out better when packaged in a bamboo box, such as had been provided at today’s lunch. It was another good chance to speak with the LETs, and I really enjoyed speaking with James and Cathy. (These names are their English names, which they choose in school, much like we Americans are assigned Chinese names. The difference is that our Chinese names are generally passable as serious names with a given name and surname provided. The Chinese go for only one name—the first—and this can be anything that appeals to them. Our group of LETs is quite conservative, being limited to Linda, James, Grace, Cynthia, Bess, Cathy, Candy, and Mr. Yeh [who we have not yet met, in addition to having a Chinese surname]. But one of the elementary school LETs goes by Apple, while the coworker of a former ETA dubbed herself Rafiki. Linda herself introduced the three boys in one of the pictures on her slide as her sons, noting that the one to the far left was Huey. Huey? I though, who would pick Huey? Granted this was and English name applied at whim by a Taiwanese, but still. What was going on? Couldn’t she hear how un-modern that was? And then later in her presentation she explained that her other sons were named Dewey and Louie, and that she had done this on purpose. And then it all made sense, and I have to admit that I really loved it. In addition to picking whatever name or noun suits their fancy, Taiwanese children are apt, I am told by fellow ETAs, to sporadically change their names during the school year. Minnie today, Rainbow tomorrow.
After lunch, Dr. Trites taught us all about developing lesson plans, which was pretty interesting. At one point, we watched a series of lesson segments on video, and then filled out a sheet with LETs to break the lessons into their various components. The LETs I was working with (Bess and Cynthia [and Doris, and administrator]) seemed a bit confused, which placed me in the awkward position of trying to guide along teachers far more experienced than myself. I think part of the confusion at least was resolved when one of the LETs asked me what a canopy was. We had watched a clip of a teacher teaching her (first grade?) class about the rainforest. Much of the clip had focused on defining and identifying the canopy of the forest (but not fully, since this was a review lesson, the material having been taught to the students the prior day or two). So I explained about forest, bed, and storefront canopies and how they are all coverings.
At 3:45, the lesson was over (ended a little sooner so that Evie, Nell, Ann, and I could go to Fo Guang University to take a placement exam for Chinese lessons). The other ETAs had scooter practice. The exam was alright. I definitely missed a bunch of stuff, and some of it definitely things I had learned before and that nagged at me when I saw them and could not place them. I ran out of time at the end, and didn’t do the last two reading passages, but figure I probably could have done at least half of the second one had I had time, the sections getting progressively harder. Mainly, though, I was pleased to see how much I could read, given that I had not reviewed at all this summer (which was just plain dumb). There is tons of Chinese in Yilan, obviously, but I have not been able to read as much as I read on the exam since the signs are in Traditional characters (instead of the Simplified that I studied my second two years at Columbia), and since they are names of businesses and restaurants instead of conventional sentences with conventional word groupings. So the exam actually afforded me quite a bit of relief and (likely misplaced) gratification. But we’ll see what the results are.
On completing the exam at six pm, Evie, Nell, Ann, and I joined the rest of the ETAs at a restaurant to eat dinner with Dr. Wu. We took a taxi from Fo Guang, and Kelly called me on the way to make sure we were en route. I asked if we’d still be able to catch dinner. We were expecting something along the lines of our dinner the night we arrived in Taiwan, so we were completely blown away by the extravagance of the meal before us. Jiuqiandai, the restaurant, placed 3 bowls and a large sectioned box at each seat, each filled with all manner of curious and visually entrancing food. There was so much that Evie said she didn’t know where to start, but I figured on simply plowing through everything, whatever my fingers and eyes first reached. This is not an admiral portrait of me, but then again, you have not seen the dishes that faced me. Evie asked Kelly several times, and I asked Evie several times if the stuff that looked like shrimp and other assorted seafood was really vegetarian (as we had requested), and were assured that they were. Hearts at ease, we ate with gusto, along with everyone else. Everyone said they had not eaten so much in a long time. There was so much, though I will accede that not everything tasted good, and, in fact, not everything had a taste. The fascinating purple drink in a glass goblet set amongst the dessert plate was itself rather curiously and disappointingly devoid of taste. Or maybe none of us has a sufficiently delicate palate. The dinner was in fact a buffet, and, while eating the mesmerizing selection before me, I kept my eye on what other curiosities people were bringing back to their seats. Once finished with my basic meal, I went on a tour of the restaurant, freely adding one of each vegetarian item to my plate and taking pictures of everything, the spitting image of the world’s most aggravating tourist. But some occasions call for that. My Taiwanese friend in New York sometimes takes pictures of the food we eat together, and I never understood that until now. I remarked to Evie that I was fulfilling every worst stereotype of the glutinous, all-consuming American and that I didn’t much give a damn. En route, a college student (lives in Yilan, studies in Taipei), filled me in on some of the mysterious food items and made recommendations. She smiled a lot and seemed really friendly and I think she wanted to talk with me more, but I didn’t have much to say. I felt bad about that, especially as she was so friendly and helpful. I made a second tour for dessert, and then went back for shaved ice. Shaved ice is just that—a bucket of ice shavings that you scoop into a bowl and then top with condensed milk or chocolate syrup, fruit, and/or gelatinous stuff that the Taiwanese like and the Americans need some getting used to. If you eat some fruit with a chunk of ice, your mouth will go numb, but if you eat the meltings, it’s deliciously sweet and fruity. And this, I think, is the solution for how to concoct the perfect fruit soup. We ate a feast out of a novel, and Evie said how funny it was that I asked Kelly if there would be any food left for us when we got there. We were wondering why people were dressed informally at this place of wonders, and how they could have afforded to bring their small children along, too. It turn out that a meal per person is 400-500 NT, quite affordable, though not something you would do daily. I asked the receptionist at the front desk if the vegetarian dishes were cooked in separate pots from the meat dishes, and she said they were, though this is of course something my parents would want to recheck when/if they visit later in the year (cough). From the restaurant, Evie, Ann, and I walked home (a bit later than everyone else since I was still eating), and passed a theater house (homey, the kind that community members would perform in), people practicing taiqi in the parking lot, a group of middle-school-aged guys rehearsing dance moves (breaking dancing for one, and moon-walking/tap for another, others lolled around a bit) and a couple leafy trees lit with blue Christmas lights. It was a lovely night and a pleasant, short walk home, where I have been writing this blog post ever since.
LETs.
LET stands for “Local English Teacher,” the Taiwanese teachers who instruct the children in English. We the ETAs will be working with/under them as sort of “specialists” in the field. We’re there to fill the kids in on American culture, to provide living, interactive examples of American pronunciation and inflection, to help with explaining/teaching technical aspects of the language, and to make learning English seem cool and interesting, instead of merely tedious, pointless, and frustratingly impossible.
Today we met the LETs for the first time, which I think was exciting for the LETs and ETAs alike. Finally it seemed real to us, that we would actually be going to teach in a classroom. I admit the realization made me a bit nervous. We were split into two groups, one for the 30-odd elementary school LETs and 12 ETAs that would be working with them, and one for the LETs and ETAs assigned to junior high schools.
But to backtrack a little…After getting dressed, I went down with Mary to meet the shuttle in front of the Luodong apartment. (Nell had left earlier to buy some breakfast.) The shuttle, a white van with rounded corners and letters in yellow, red, and green letters proclaiming its name across its flanks, soon pulled up. All the girls from Luodong (that being every ETA from Luodong, since the only two guys on the program share an apartment in my complex in Yilan) piled into the shuttle, which was no simple feat, as the van was already filled. Along the road, it made a few more stops before reaching the train station, where we disembarked for the 20-minute trip to Yilan. Each time the shuttle stopped in front of a line of people waiting for a lift, my heart sank just a little more. Oh, how we squeezed. The seats were filled and the aisle was jam-packed, and it was clearly not designed for that. There were no handholds, so each time the shuttle came to a sudden stop (and I remember an astoundingly tumultuous one in particular), we aisle-crammers all fell on top of each other, leaning over like a gruesome stack of human dominoes. In a country where the elderly are expected to be honored, it is quite mollifying to find yourself stepping on the foot of an elder, while your elbow jabs her in the side. Aside from some grunts (at the van, not the people), there were no complaints, though, so I guess this is a common occurrence. During the ride, I remembered my friend Liz’s recollection of riding city buses in Beijing. There, apparently, the driver crams in as many people as possible and then half a hundred more, so that even if you are on an air-conditioned bus there is no way you would ever know it. The Beijing driver then shunts about the road, ripping into bus stops and shuddering to a standstill, and freely tearing the bus over to the side of the road so she can turn around and yell at the passengers, who have just been swung against one side or other of the bus, well, as much as one can be swung in such a packed environment. When we finally got to the train platform, a Taiwanese guy walked over to our group and asked if we were here to teach English. This is a common question here, since what else would a foreigner be doing in Yilan County? Although, yesterday or today some lady asked me if I was here to have fun, and I almost laughed. Come to Yilan or Luodong for kicks? These actually are fun places to see and be in, but I don’t know of any foreigner that would decide to go to Taiwan for these two cities. There are areas around, though, famous for hot and cold springs, hiking, etc, and so I guess her question made sense after all and I’m the silly one. Anyway, I figured this guy with a round face, soft voice, and bright red cap with multi-colored starbursts at the back and sides was another curious Taiwanese interested in brushing up on his English, and I’m embarrassed to say that I turned my back on him and focused instead on my plastic-packaged slice of brioche bread. It was early in the morning and I didn’t have patience to smile and chat and be pleasant. So some other girls in the group chatted with him, and he revealed within one sentence that he was also here to teach English, that he was in fact one of the LETs on the way to meet with us at the teacher training center, and that his name was Brian (in English). At that point I turned around and joined in the conversation. I don’t think he noticed. Along the way, he told us about some schools nearby, and that four of them were for Taiwanese aborigines.
And now back to the LETs. I went with the junior high group, since I will be teaching middle schoolers. One of the questions asked me by the LETs was why I chose junior high over teaching the elementary school kids. I will explain that to you now, since you are probably wondering the same thing. Working with junior high schools is new this year for ETAs, initiated because of their success with the elementary schools. Of our group, only four are teaching in junior high schools (me, Jill, Jaime, and Brett). This was a hard decision for me, since Taiwanese elementary school-aged children are so cute and it would be so much fun to work with them. We would be able to do fun things, like draw, read picture books (to them, not with them), sing “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes,” hand out cookies, and regularly use funky costume props for reading exercises. But I thought it would be more fun and rewarding to be able to converse with my students and joke around with them a bit, which junior high students can do, though only at a very low level in English. (We looked at some of their textbooks last week, and the material is quite elementary.) Teaching junior high students would also let me work more with English grammar and explaining idiomatic expressions, instead of mainly working on phonetics and repeating dialogues like “Hello. How are you? Fine, thank you, and you?” which we would have to do with the younger kids. Finally, junior high is a pretty stressful time in Taiwanese education. The students have to pass an exam at the end of junior high in order to get into high school, and from high school must again take an exam to get into college. One teacher told me that only a third of the students go on to college, but I might have misheard that. The fact is, though, that not every student can go to college, not by a long shot. Many do not even go to high school. If they don’t go to college, they go to vocational schools, and can end up as farmers and trash collectors (though probably also some pretty decent fields, like plumbing and electrics). So their studies in junior high are very important for giving them access to higher education and a chance to pursue their life goals. Eight grade (which we will be teaching) is relatively laid back, as it is the first of the three junior high years. Ninth grade, though, is sheer torture. The kids go on their graduation trip before the start of ninth grade (at least in one school) so that they can have some fun before settling down to long months of endless study. On the slideshow shown us at the beginning of orientation it even said that the national exam at the end of ninth grade is a “nightmare.” In teaching at a junior high, I would like to make the material as fun as possible to lessen the tedium and give the kids a chance to enjoy learning English, instead of despising it. But perhaps more importantly, I intend to give the students as solid a foundation in English as possible to help them prepare for the exam. I would like all of my students to be able to go to college, even though I know that is not a realistic wish. If they were to choose not to attend college, I would think it unfortunate, but there is something painfully tragic about that fact that they cannot all go, that most are forcibly turned away. I see trash collectors and street sweepers every day here, and it hurts to think that they might have wanted to be something else, but could not.
In our meeting, first the ETAs and then the LETs presented their self-introductory slideshows. It was a lot of fun to see what the other ETAs had written, and to find out more about their families and college and camp experiences than what had come out during our week-and-a-half of living together. It was kind of funny, though, since the ETAs each had upwards of five slides full of personal information, and the LETs kept it to 1-2 slides, 1 reserved for information about their school if there were two slides. We ended up using the internet a lot to show more about sporting event (curling), pets (sugar gliders!), and the local junior highs. There were seven high school LET presenters, though it looks from a handout that there are eight total. Fortunately, we will be working with two schools, and will therefore choose a pair of LETs. They all seemed so nice that it will be hard to choose amongst them, so it’s nice to know that we’ll at least work with two. After the slideshow presentations, we played bingo, where we had to go about the room finding people who fit certain qualifications (allergic to mango, know the name of Obama’s wife, can bike between Yilan City and Luodong in 20 minutes, etc) in order to break the ice (though it seemed pretty broken to me after our presentations and chatty question-and-answer sessions after each one—I was asked which was my favorite children’s book, and so we did an internet search for Howl’s Moving Castle, which the LETs knew by name in Chinese) and get to know each other a bit more. Then it was lunch time, and we sat down in the main conference room (our meeting had taken place in a lecture room on the 3rd floor, across from the computer lab) with everyone to eat. When Jaime and I remarked on how much better Taiwanese rice was than American rice, James, a junior high LET, told me that the rice comes out better when packaged in a bamboo box, such as had been provided at today’s lunch. It was another good chance to speak with the LETs, and I really enjoyed speaking with James and Cathy. (These names are their English names, which they choose in school, much like we Americans are assigned Chinese names. The difference is that our Chinese names are generally passable as serious names with a given name and surname provided. The Chinese go for only one name—the first—and this can be anything that appeals to them. Our group of LETs is quite conservative, being limited to Linda, James, Grace, Cynthia, Bess, Cathy, Candy, and Mr. Yeh [who we have not yet met, in addition to having a Chinese surname]. But one of the elementary school LETs goes by Apple, while the coworker of a former ETA dubbed herself Rafiki. Linda herself introduced the three boys in one of the pictures on her slide as her sons, noting that the one to the far left was Huey. Huey? I though, who would pick Huey? Granted this was and English name applied at whim by a Taiwanese, but still. What was going on? Couldn’t she hear how un-modern that was? And then later in her presentation she explained that her other sons were named Dewey and Louie, and that she had done this on purpose. And then it all made sense, and I have to admit that I really loved it. In addition to picking whatever name or noun suits their fancy, Taiwanese children are apt, I am told by fellow ETAs, to sporadically change their names during the school year. Minnie today, Rainbow tomorrow.
After lunch, Dr. Trites taught us all about developing lesson plans, which was pretty interesting. At one point, we watched a series of lesson segments on video, and then filled out a sheet with LETs to break the lessons into their various components. The LETs I was working with (Bess and Cynthia [and Doris, and administrator]) seemed a bit confused, which placed me in the awkward position of trying to guide along teachers far more experienced than myself. I think part of the confusion at least was resolved when one of the LETs asked me what a canopy was. We had watched a clip of a teacher teaching her (first grade?) class about the rainforest. Much of the clip had focused on defining and identifying the canopy of the forest (but not fully, since this was a review lesson, the material having been taught to the students the prior day or two). So I explained about forest, bed, and storefront canopies and how they are all coverings.
At 3:45, the lesson was over (ended a little sooner so that Evie, Nell, Ann, and I could go to Fo Guang University to take a placement exam for Chinese lessons). The other ETAs had scooter practice. The exam was alright. I definitely missed a bunch of stuff, and some of it definitely things I had learned before and that nagged at me when I saw them and could not place them. I ran out of time at the end, and didn’t do the last two reading passages, but figure I probably could have done at least half of the second one had I had time, the sections getting progressively harder. Mainly, though, I was pleased to see how much I could read, given that I had not reviewed at all this summer (which was just plain dumb). There is tons of Chinese in Yilan, obviously, but I have not been able to read as much as I read on the exam since the signs are in Traditional characters (instead of the Simplified that I studied my second two years at Columbia), and since they are names of businesses and restaurants instead of conventional sentences with conventional word groupings. So the exam actually afforded me quite a bit of relief and (likely misplaced) gratification. But we’ll see what the results are.
On completing the exam at six pm, Evie, Nell, Ann, and I joined the rest of the ETAs at a restaurant to eat dinner with Dr. Wu. We took a taxi from Fo Guang, and Kelly called me on the way to make sure we were en route. I asked if we’d still be able to catch dinner. We were expecting something along the lines of our dinner the night we arrived in Taiwan, so we were completely blown away by the extravagance of the meal before us. Jiuqiandai, the restaurant, placed 3 bowls and a large sectioned box at each seat, each filled with all manner of curious and visually entrancing food. There was so much that Evie said she didn’t know where to start, but I figured on simply plowing through everything, whatever my fingers and eyes first reached. This is not an admiral portrait of me, but then again, you have not seen the dishes that faced me. Evie asked Kelly several times, and I asked Evie several times if the stuff that looked like shrimp and other assorted seafood was really vegetarian (as we had requested), and were assured that they were. Hearts at ease, we ate with gusto, along with everyone else. Everyone said they had not eaten so much in a long time. There was so much, though I will accede that not everything tasted good, and, in fact, not everything had a taste. The fascinating purple drink in a glass goblet set amongst the dessert plate was itself rather curiously and disappointingly devoid of taste. Or maybe none of us has a sufficiently delicate palate. The dinner was in fact a buffet, and, while eating the mesmerizing selection before me, I kept my eye on what other curiosities people were bringing back to their seats. Once finished with my basic meal, I went on a tour of the restaurant, freely adding one of each vegetarian item to my plate and taking pictures of everything, the spitting image of the world’s most aggravating tourist. But some occasions call for that. My Taiwanese friend in New York sometimes takes pictures of the food we eat together, and I never understood that until now. I remarked to Evie that I was fulfilling every worst stereotype of the glutinous, all-consuming American and that I didn’t much give a damn. En route, a college student (lives in Yilan, studies in Taipei), filled me in on some of the mysterious food items and made recommendations. She smiled a lot and seemed really friendly and I think she wanted to talk with me more, but I didn’t have much to say. I felt bad about that, especially as she was so friendly and helpful. I made a second tour for dessert, and then went back for shaved ice. Shaved ice is just that—a bucket of ice shavings that you scoop into a bowl and then top with condensed milk or chocolate syrup, fruit, and/or gelatinous stuff that the Taiwanese like and the Americans need some getting used to. If you eat some fruit with a chunk of ice, your mouth will go numb, but if you eat the meltings, it’s deliciously sweet and fruity. And this, I think, is the solution for how to concoct the perfect fruit soup. We ate a feast out of a novel, and Evie said how funny it was that I asked Kelly if there would be any food left for us when we got there. We were wondering why people were dressed informally at this place of wonders, and how they could have afforded to bring their small children along, too. It turn out that a meal per person is 400-500 NT, quite affordable, though not something you would do daily. I asked the receptionist at the front desk if the vegetarian dishes were cooked in separate pots from the meat dishes, and she said they were, though this is of course something my parents would want to recheck when/if they visit later in the year (cough). From the restaurant, Evie, Ann, and I walked home (a bit later than everyone else since I was still eating), and passed a theater house (homey, the kind that community members would perform in), people practicing taiqi in the parking lot, a group of middle-school-aged guys rehearsing dance moves (breaking dancing for one, and moon-walking/tap for another, others lolled around a bit) and a couple leafy trees lit with blue Christmas lights. It was a lovely night and a pleasant, short walk home, where I have been writing this blog post ever since.
Wa1 Li4
push off springs for another day (next weekend?)
consutl with parents over skype for router
fast
wrestling with uploading pics and vids to computer
ppt
sure-well
ppt
go to ludong to see Walle
-ride on scooter
-ticket exchange
movie so cute
decide to stay in luodong
chill with mary and nell
view each other's ppts
watch tommy boy
consutl with parents over skype for router
fast
wrestling with uploading pics and vids to computer
ppt
sure-well
ppt
go to ludong to see Walle
-ride on scooter
-ticket exchange
movie so cute
decide to stay in luodong
chill with mary and nell
view each other's ppts
watch tommy boy
Hang It!
register at fo guan
buyt t-shirts (hang Ten)
decide not to go to cold springs after all
music house
distillery
partay
buyt t-shirts (hang Ten)
decide not to go to cold springs after all
music house
distillery
partay
Ba Ba (Ba) Baby
friday
Father's Day
Beijing Olympics 2008!!
ludong night market, stinky tofy (oh dear)
sports bar
Father's Day
Beijing Olympics 2008!!
ludong night market, stinky tofy (oh dear)
sports bar
Thursday, August 7, 2008
The Road
bike tour around Yilan
-crazy traffic "rules"
-funky bikes
-HOT
-ices! (Rip-off Store) famous place w/o a sign
buy more stationery--so many planner options!
chinese class
back to Watsons--no, thanks, don't want Ahava
SIM cards!
food court
--stinky tofu to come
router works!!
-crazy traffic "rules"
-funky bikes
-HOT
-ices! (Rip-off Store) famous place w/o a sign
buy more stationery--so many planner options!
chinese class
back to Watsons--no, thanks, don't want Ahava
SIM cards!
food court
--stinky tofu to come
router works!!
1 of 3
visit to 2 schools
-beautiful grounds
-royal treatment
-cute kids
-choose which?
visit to hospital
test ride Kelly's scooter. much better this time. difficulty with right turns.
dinner: pizza (American style)
-beautiful grounds
-royal treatment
-cute kids
-choose which?
visit to hospital
test ride Kelly's scooter. much better this time. difficulty with right turns.
dinner: pizza (American style)
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
You Got It
dinner: vegetarian buffet
ARC app. missing money. train ride. taiwanese student too nervous to speak. really cool stationery store.
trash! part of the community.
ARC app. missing money. train ride. taiwanese student too nervous to speak. really cool stationery store.
trash! part of the community.
A Land of Incentives
plane ride: cute little girl, broken TV, Drillbit Taylor-bad. Half of 21-ok. Yucky porridge w/half fish. spray of artificial purple flowersin bathroom. vacuum sink.
keep the receipts! subway card--safety deposit so turn in old card.
Storyland. Hmm.
Dinner--can we go to sleep now. "10" minute walk to bs stop. help!
business card/link to Wing hotel
morning: dan bing
taking photos for ARC. show ears, not teeth.
bus ride out. tunnel. first view: open space, fields, turtle (?) island to left
housing assignments, check out appt, go to Sure-well for basics. paper money for sacrifices, incense sticks.
night: supposed to meet up w/Luodong team but they bailed. spontaneous (for us) concert in courtyard w/local music school. we "performed" "A Whole New World." Yikes. Spoke w/son of organizer. Went to 7-11 for drinks.(Lactic Acid Drink, Beer-flavored green tea.)
keep the receipts! subway card--safety deposit so turn in old card.
Storyland. Hmm.
Dinner--can we go to sleep now. "10" minute walk to bs stop. help!
business card/link to Wing hotel
morning: dan bing
taking photos for ARC. show ears, not teeth.
bus ride out. tunnel. first view: open space, fields, turtle (?) island to left
housing assignments, check out appt, go to Sure-well for basics. paper money for sacrifices, incense sticks.
night: supposed to meet up w/Luodong team but they bailed. spontaneous (for us) concert in courtyard w/local music school. we "performed" "A Whole New World." Yikes. Spoke w/son of organizer. Went to 7-11 for drinks.(Lactic Acid Drink, Beer-flavored green tea.)
This Cookie is for Medicinal Purposes
packing
2 things to take to a deserted island: epipen and (novel, umbrella)
dizziness, nausea
50 lbs! 50 lbs!
2 things to take to a deserted island: epipen and (novel, umbrella)
dizziness, nausea
50 lbs! 50 lbs!
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