Dragon Boat Festival

Today was a major holiday in the Chinese calendar - it's the solstice. I think. (I could have sworn the solstice was in late June, but if they want to celebrate it now, who am I to disagree?) Taiwanese celebrate the dragon boat festival by eating bao zi, having family gatherings, and racing long canoe-like boats known as... you guessed it, dragon boats! Casey's dad took us to see some of the races and managed to find two seats for the both of us on one of the boats! It was sooo cool. My arms were kind of sore, but I liked the whole thing.

For lunch, we went to a mainland Chinese restaurant. Shanghai style. It was interesting. It's severely different than Taiwanese. Shanghai dishes are generally spicier than Taiwanese dishes.

Hair!

Look at my hair, all nice and straight. Tell me what you think.

That's the 101 in the background. I love Casey's place in Taipei.

The Great Mette Incident

I'm in Taipei for a week. Mette, Amanda, and myself are living in this barely furnished apartment for the week with a French girl who just arrived in Taiwan for a two month work exchange. Marena is the elder sister of one of Sherry Chang's good friends. Sherry Chang is my host family's daughter who is France. The apartment is her uncle's on the maternal side, Richard. Get it? Good. Now explain it to me.

My host mom came up for the weekend, to make sure we were ok and it was only slightly stupid to leave a handful of teenagers alone in a apartment in Taipei City. This turned out to be a good thing. Why? Because the first night, Mette felt a horrible pain in her side, convinced my host mom to take her to the doctors, and subsequently found out she needed her appendix removed. I woke up Saturday morning to my host mom babbling about "knife", "cut" (she waved at her stomach here) and "Mei" (how she says Mette). I blinked blearily at her and rolled over to go back to sleep.

Eventually we made it to the nearby hospital and saw Mette after her surgery. Day 1 was pretty much a loss. The drugs made it pretty hard for her to remeber much of what happened in the morning for about 2 hours after the operation, despite her talking enthusiatically with us.

She was in better shape Day 2, but still couldn't eat. This was a blow, as I had trekked all over Taipei Main to find some stinking doughnuts to cheer her up. However, Nick, Amanda, and Mette's host mom all appreciated the pastries.

Mette was released yesterday. She's hanging out at the apartment a lot, playing on her computer. The only reason I'm on now is because she's sleeping. ;D She's good now, but we can't make her laugh or she bends over in agony. (I told her it could have been worse: she could have broken a rib.)

We're all happy the host moms are letting her recover a little in Taipei before braving the train ride home. Not only will she be able to relax here, but she won't have to deal with the over-protective parents. Besides, the train is pretty bumpy.

So, is this where the axe murder jumps out at me?

Friday I went to school as I was finished with the elementary school and I figured I ought to go to class once this week. I made it on time and what did I find but a nearly empty school? The classrooms were gutted - no personal items in the desks or on the walls. The bike racks were deserted. The tachers lounge was abandoned. There was a smattering of staff around, like the bare minamum when the school closes. Why?

It turns out this weekend (sunday and monday) they were holding a giant national test at Hua Nu. Thus, the classrooms had to be clear and they were giving the students a day off. Great.

Why I'll Never be a Teacher: Day 4

Hmm. Thursday was my last day as a volunteer at Zhong Xiao Primary School. It was a good day. I taught them "Old McDonald" and "It's a Small World". Dennis kept using his German song. We made zhong bao zi, or sticky rice balls, for the dragon festival, which is this Wednesday. It was amusing. Then we watched a talent show, very cute. The kids gave us all cards, which are adorable and I will keep them for a long time. On the downside, it seems that every kid who we taught wanted a signature or our chinese name or email address. It was annoying. Yes, I know it is flattering, but I figure 30-40 kids a class and 3-6 classes a dayand 4 days... that's a lot of kids.

But I got pictures, which I have since developed. I'll put some up, but right now I'm using Mette's laptop in Taipei, so I won't mess with it. She gets twitchy when people screw with her laptop.

What I Did This Afternoon

This afternoon I went out to lunch with Mette at this local noodle restaurant. We caught up on things. Even though we went to Taipei together, we mostly spent the time apart with our own set of friends. That was fun. Went home, crocheted a little, and took a nap.

Woke up late for dinner. We were supposed to pick up Mette at 6.30. We didn't make it there until 7.15. We went to a really great Thai place near downtown Hualien. Mmm, I love the spicy stuff. Went home, wrote some letters, answered some email, did this, and now I'm going to bed. But not before I take another aspirin.

Why I'll Never Be A Teacher: Day 3

Okay, today was a half-day, for which I am extremely grateful. Not because I'm lazy, or because I'm tired. No, it's because I'm an idiot.

This morning it was raining quite steadily. First period went off without a hitch. I changed from "Old McDonald" to "It's a small world". Bad move on my part - I can barely hit the notes with my voice as it is. But hey, I can deal. I go back to my 'homeroom' 401 with Dennis. Some of the girls ask if I want to go play on the playground. I say sure, ok. They drag me over to the chin-up bars and start showing off. Then they're saying, go on, your turn. Uh huh. (for those of you who know this will end in tragedy, you're right on the mark.) I get my legs over the freaking bar, no big. The problem is my hands slip just about the same time my legs do. Yah. I hit the ground flat on my back, the wind knocked out of me. Now, all the little girls who hang out with me are terrified I've broken something and they're only 10 or so, so I can't even curse.

End of the story: I go back to class relatively unscathed and smile for the teacher. I'm not bruising or anything (flashbacks to the time I fell down the stairs - about this time last month) but man am I sore.

Why I'll Never Be A Teacher: Day 2

Today was exhausting. I had to sing endless rounds of "Old McDonald". If I never hear that song it'll be too soon. My throat was killing me after each class - being sick and singing loudly is not pleasant. I'm singing for about 10-15 minutes too. Dennis's song is quite quick. I'll get pictures up this Friday when it's all over.

I gave my presentation on America in the afternoon. I did well, they loved seeing all my pictures on my 'web-page'. (My Picturetrail account - see my links.) Dennis did well too. Then we played around with Google Earth. You can zoom into our house so well that you can see the white table on our back porch! Everyone was impressed when we gave virtual tours of our hometowns (Port Jefferson, New York, and Bremen, Germany).

Today's weather was so hot and humid I was sweating walking down the half-block to the school. Yah, I never thought I'd say this, but there is a thing as too hot.

It poured at about 4 for an hour. I like it when the humidity finally spills over into rain. Then it's refreshing. The wind from the ocean is also especially welcome.

Net "Neutrality"

Support the campaign against Net Neutrality, a campaign to let the government regulate the Internet. (Yes, I dumbed that down immensely, but go see for yourself and see.)


http://dontregulate.org

Why I'll Never Be A Teacher: Day 1

Well, today I was a 'teacher' at the local elementary school with Dennis. Man, I can't believe how loud Asian kids are. Apparently, they spare the rod until junior and senior high. I was exhausted and we had frequent breaks. Maybe it didn't help that the breaks consisted of the little kids dragging me to the playground and insisting I chase them in a never-ending game of Tag. It's like freeze tag, except you voluntarily freeze yourself to escape being caught and are defrosted by the others. Anyways, I was 'spared' to speak all day because of my throat. Unfortunately, Dennis isn't very talkative in front of a crowd, so I had to carry the conversation... And quite often, his end of the teaching gig. Oh, I'll admit it was fun at times, but I'm certainly never doing this for a living. Unless the wages of teachers raise significantly enough to deal with the costs of living. Call me mercenary, but I'm not eating Ramen in an underfurnished apartment just to teach little ... children.

Anyways, we sat in 401 and helped the teacher out. At some periods, we went to the English classroom and taught different kids songs. That was painful, with my voice. The sad part is that I managed to get more participation and was actually heard. Dennis projects worse than I do and I'm sick! Then again, to be fair, he was singing 'Are You Sleeping' in German, whereas I was leading them in a rousing few rounds of 'Old McDonald Had a Farm'. (It didn't help that his handwriting sucks - I could barely read it and I frequently decipher the chicken scratch my friends call essays.)

We got out at 4, which was something of a relief. Thank you, god.

Sniff

I am sick. I caught some cold in Taipei, or maybe in Hualien. I woke up Sunday morning in Taipei with a stuffy nose and the worse bout of sneezing fits I've ever had. Since they've continued, even thought I'm back in Hualien, I'm assuming it's not something in the air. What's worse is that Taiwanese people don't understand the proper remedy to colds - Tylenol and bed rest. I don't need special soups that are absolutely horrible or five glasses of boiling hot water or twenty five different pills. I just want to sleep, dammit.

Taipei Weekend

I was in Taipei for the weekend. It was fun. We left Hualien on Friday, got in Taipei that evening, and partied at a local club with the Taichung kids. I will not deny that I had a few drinks at the club, nor the fact that I got in on a fake ID (thank you, Amanda.). It was necessary, as they actually checked the dates. I used Amanda's WI Driver's license and she used her ARC card (Alien Residency Card). Taiwanese can't differentiate between white people, so we were fine. Dennis, however, got turned away, cause he's only 17. Anyway, everything was fine. And please don't tell my mom - I'm pretty sure she wouldn't appreciate it. (I really don't care if Dad reads this or not, as he's not the one wigging out over every little thing right now.) My friends and I determined that I like to dance when drunk; they think that's great, so from now on they'll get me plastered if they want me to dance. (I'm a notorious wall-flower.)
(Post script: For those of you who were worried, I was with friends and drank carefully. I didn't put myself in risky situations and I took care of myself.)

Saturday I did not wake up hung-over, which was a great thing. Yay for me. Amanda and I went shopping - I got this great pair of jeans, only $15! Met up with a huge number of exchange students in Ximen. Eventually ended up with Brianna and Amanda at a Coke Forest. It's this Coca Cola restaurant, in 50's diner style. We wandered around, saw The DaVinci Code. Ate a late pizza dinner and went to the apartment. We were staying in this empty apartment of my host uncle Richard's. It was great. No adults, no hotel related problems, nothing. The only downside was its distance from a MRT station.

Sunday was the Speech Contest, the whole reason we were in Taipei. I was to go 20th, according to my little name-card. Imagine my surprise when I'm called up in the stand-by row as number 4. Yah, I was not pleased. What's worse, i was following Erik and Ginny, two very talented speakers. Erik is simply hilarious and Ginny's Chinese rocks. But I thought about it for a minute and you know what? I don't care that I bombed my speech. What counts is that I could write that speech in Chinese and that their opinions do not matter. (It's a fact - not a single inbound respects Rotary Taipei. Ginny said to me as we were making wisecracks throughout the interminable beginning speeches, "It's amazing how wrong good people go with the best of intentions." To which I replied, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." She blinked, "wow, Brendan said the exact same thing yesterday.") We had a great buffet lunch (drool, roast beef) and had to take the train home at 2.30, which put a damper on our fun. We wanted to stay for the Inbound after-party at a favorite bar, as some kids are leaving really soon (as I write this, Ginny's just left for Norway [lucky girl] .) and I probably won't see them again.

Dinner.

Just because I can, this is what I ate for dinner today. (Yes, I am happy that my camera is working again, why do you ask?)

This ... water pump... was on the table. As my lovely host mother is demonstrating, one pushes down the top in order for water to come out. It was fun to play with.

On the left is the appetizer. We had luo buo - a type of vegetable reminiscent of potato, except water. That's in the cup, masquerading as soup. (water and a vegetable is a soup. I nearly cried when I found this out.) The ... green stuff is, well, some pickled green thing. It's nasty and spicy. I'm not fond of it.

This is my entree, curry chicken. That's up in the corner in the aluminum foil stuff. There's rice, cabbage, spinach, and tofu, from left to right. I liked the cabbage, but the spinach had too much garlic and I despise tofu.

This is Dennis. He's eating fried shrimp. Covered in mayonnaise and sprinkles. Needless to say, I'm not asking for a bite of his dinner. (Urgh.)

Have I mentioned that I absolutely hate mayonnaise? It's odd, but hey.

l33t

Mmm. I feel like such a geek - I worked out the computer code to fit in a new thing for family links (See, it's under the sidebar. No, there, under the regular links.) and a hit counter at the bottom of that same sidebar. yes, i know it's relatively easy, but let me have my moment.

For those of you who don't know, l33t, or Elite, is the language geeks/hackers use when typing. It's an annoyance to read, but most adults ton't get it.

r0x0r j00r b0x0rz!

Now, without looking that up, what the heck am I saying? ^-^

Wow.

Well, I must say getting response is very nice. I didn't really know if anyone was reading this or not. Thank you, everyone!

There's not much going on today. I plan on seeing 'The DaVinci Code' with Dennis and maybe Mette (if we can drag her away from World of Warcraft, an extremely addictive online RPG [role-playing game] that she plays with a passion of a thousand suns. Yes, it is that addictive.) this evening. I'll let you know how it is.

My mini-vacation ends today as well. Back to school for me tomorrow. I have to run this weekend's speech by my Chinese teacher tomorrow and have her approve of next week's lesson plan. This weekend, all the exchange students in my district have to be in Taipei for a Speech Contest/Goodbye Party. It'll be fun to hang with the other exchange students. Kids start going home next week! Speaking of which, I've been here for 9 months exact. How scary is that? Next week, Dennis and I are volunteering at an elementary school down the street. We're supposed to introduce our cultures and some songs from our culture. o.O

I am going to get eaten alive.

...

On a pleasenter note, the weather is back to normal. The past 4 or 5 days it's been kind of scewy, due to a typhoon passing by. This is odd, for as a long-time resident of Florida, typhoon/hurricane season is from June to November. To have a typhoon this early in the season is quite strange. Besides, the heavy rain brings out the creepy bugs. Trust me, they're pretty freaky.

Annoyance

Okay, beware of rant. Yah.

Now, I know everyone is busy and has lives of their own, but right now, my biggest pet peeve is that no one answers my letters. On average, I write anywhere from 5 to 10 letters a week. On average, I receive 1 or 2 letters a month. It is NOT hard to write back people! It is annoying and, quite frankly, disheartening. I feel like I'm writing to myself here. And it makes keeping up the correspondences hard. I mean, it's a bit of an effort to keep such a flow of letters up. I'm not getting anything in return. The knowledge that whoever receives a letter gets a warm fuzzy is really nice, but what about me? If I was an investment banker, I'd dump this in an instant. (look at the returns for pete's sake and just dare to tell me I'm wrong.)

I realize no one wants to try writing my Chinese address. That's okay. Just send me an email. Email is 'the wave of the future' - everyone's got it. Besides, unlike some of my friends, I don't change email addresses every third day in accordance with my obsession of the moment. (Yeah, you know who you are.) I've had the AOL address for YEARS. The hotmail is newer, but still.

What really irks me is that none of my PJ friends are even attempting to keep in touch. Just Dani and Nadya. For that, they get bonus points. But next year, if anyone even tries to complain that I didn't try to keep in touch, I will smack them. Hard. Probably repeatedly.

Now, for posterity, here is my address:

張家珍
花蓮市中和街199號
Taiwan ROC

If you can't see it - then sucks to be you. No, really, if you can't see it, then leave me a message. It's your version of Microsoft Windows.

Yay for Tests

Mmm. Since today my classmates have day-long tests, I'm not expected to show up. Hallelujah, hallelujah. I never thought there'd be a time I would be happy for exam days. Anyway, today I slept til noon. My host mom and I went out to lunch - I got this nice beef stew dish. Then we went to a hair salon (Durance - Air de Provence) and got a wash/cut, which I desperately needed. My hair now smells lavender-y fresh and is softer. I also noticed I really should dye my hair again - there's about a three-inch band of normal brown hair instead of the red brown I changed it to. But I digress.

They're Watching You

Yesterday, I saw The Hills Have Eyes with Dennis in Ximen. Let me get this off my chest right now and say I was really freaked out. First off, it's a Wes Craven horrer flick. That should immediately tell you it's creepy. It's based on the assumption (ha!) that the nuclear testing in New Mexico left radioactive fallout that promptly mutated the hell out of the miners who wouldn't leave the area. These miners had offspring that looked like a very sick person was playing with Photoshop. Said offspring lives out in the hills, preying on the passerby a gas station owner sends their way.

Anywho, it's about the Carter family and who... well, who survives. It's gory, scary, and follows no known formula as to who lives and dies. (i.e. in Hollywood, the dog always survives. The first casulty is Beauty the german shepard.) I was scared and jumped a few times. ^.^ For any horror movie lovers, I totally suggest this movie.

Mother's Day 2006

Dennis, my host mom and I went to Taipei to visit my host mom's family for Mother's Day. We spent the morning at her brother's tea shop, which was okay. Driving for an hour to her families' apartment in the 'burbs of Taipei was boring, but Dennis and I talked about American, German, and Taiwanese politics. That was interesting enough. At her families' place, we met most of her relatives. That was slightly odd, but hey. A little cousin was kind of annoying, but hey. (She's wearing pink.) After that, we went to Carrefour for doughnuts (mmm) and then to Ximen Ding (a teen haven) to see movies. Dinner was at this Cantonese place and after that we went home.

Embaressing

Today at dinner, one of the neighbors came over. People do this often at the Changs, randomlydropping by, I mean. Anyways, this guy's wife is in Austria studying music, while he's here in Taiwan with the kid (say 12 months old or so). Dennis and I were sitting there, eating dinner, when he starts asking us questions. "Are you going to write Dennis when you're in America?" "Are you going to write Jane when you're in Germany?" Both of us nod, smile, and give each other looks, basically saying, not really, no in Teenspeak.

Then he starts saying how beautiful I am. It's creepy. The first time I met him, I thought the dude was hitting on me. He moves onto Dennis, saying he's a very handsome guy. Then he says we'd make a beatiful couple.

Yech.

Dennis and I exchange another highly creeped out look.

"mm, maybe we should eat faster?"
"yeah, yeah, sounds 'bout right."

We finish eating in record time and retreat upstairs. I decide I really don't need to use the downstairs computer - TV sounds good about now.

Fruit

I love Taiwan because it gets all this great fruit from all over the Pacific. My absolute favorite is fresh kiwi from New Zealand. It's so sweet, it's sinful. And honestly, has anyone ever thought of eating tomato after dinner? I do, now. Plus, Taiwan has these amazing watermelons that are yellow. It's delicious. I am so going to miss all this fruit.

PICTURES!!!

Well, after much drama, I finally got a battery charger for my camera. Note to self: NEVER buy Lithium battery-powered camera again. If your batteries run out and you don't have a charger, you're screwed. Anywho, I now have 100 or so new pictures up on my picturetrail account. (Which, by the way, I had to edit as I had too many pics.) Go see! (it's over in my links.)

Times 100 Most Influential People

Today in the library, I zipped over to the magazine rack and picked up this weeks issue of Time magazine. It's about the 100 most influential people in the world. I sat down and read through it. And found it to be kinda boring. However, the article after it was hilarious.

The Joel 100 is (you got it) the 100 people who have the most influence over a times writer's life. Head over to Time.com and you'll see it under the big blurb for their main 100 list.

It's hilarious.

Someone, somewhere, is laughing at me

This morning I overslept. I managed to shower, get dressed, brush my teeth and hair, and out the door in under fifteen minutes. I rode my bike like a madman, securing a new all-time low of 7 minutes as for how long it takes to get to school.

After all that, it turns out my one morning class is cancelled, because my teacher is in Taipei.

Grrr.

The Prince of Tennis

Today was my last tennis club meeting. At Hua Nu, the last period on Wednesdays is reserved for clubs. I picked tennis. Hoo-boy, was I stupid. The Tennis Club is populated by girls who adore the wildly popular manga The Prince of Tennis. It's a decent sports manga and the characters are neatly drawn. I know this because my host sister was addicted and owns every manga in the series.

I may have thumbed through a copy. Numbers 1 through 42.

But anyways, today was my last club meeting. I have improved over the past few months. Which is good. Even if I want to tear my hair out from frustration.

Silent Hill

Mmm. I saw Silent Hill yesterday with Amanda and Mette, both of which are in Hualien this week. For everyone over 20, Silent Hill is an amazing video game about a mother who goes through Hell to find her daughter. The reviews look bad, but that's cause the author is obviously not a gamer. It's a decent adaption from game to video and I'll say that I was creeped out by the monsters.

Exhausted

You know, there's nothing quite like having a day off to sleep in. Except, of course, when your body revolts and insists you get up, even when there is no good reason as to why you should.

The fun never stops, especially when you realize you need to move approximately 5 huge, heavy bags down four flights of stairs, all by yourself. After you pack said bags, which is a huge affair, as you have to stuff EVERYTHING in a rather limited amount of bags.

I now realize why no one likes to move. The effort involved is a pain in the butt.

I'm not even going to unpack until tomorrow.