One Month In!

I wanted to give a quick update since I know it's been about a week. If you can't tell by now, I'm terrible at updating. I got the suggestion that I try and post at least one picture a day. I have a ton of them so I don't have to worry about running out any time soon.

So this weekend Steph and I went with our church group on a mini-hike. I say mini-hike because it was more of a long walk. We had children with us so we didn't go up into the mountains or anything. There's a spot that gets drainage from a mountain stream where we stopped. It had small benches where you can stop and let your feet soak in the water. It's very relaxing and nice on a hot, steamy day. We had a lunch of winter melon tea (which is fast becoming one of my favorite drinks here) and sandwiches. And lemme tell you, these were the weirdest sandwiches I've ever had. They had peanut butter, jelly, a mango mixture, tofu, seaweed, and some kinda sweet cucumber. Yeah, definitely the weirdest sandwich I've ever had.

Later that evening, I had the worst stomach cramps. Not from the sandwich, but from what I think was not drinking enough water on the walk. I've been eating a lot of weird stuff here and this is the first time I've had these cramps; that's the reason I think it had more to do with the lack of water than the food.

On a lighter note, the church held a zither performance which I went to. If you look at some of my earliest entries on this blog, you'll see that I did a few assignments on Chinese instruments. The zither (I can't remember what the Chinese name is) was one of them. It was very beautiful to watch and hear. The performance was done with a singer as well. I took a couple videos of the performance. I will put them up on Youtube and link to it from here when I get the chance.

Today was just another laid back Sunday. I went to church where the missionaries interpreted for us and attending an after-church luncheon. They served some really spicy stuff over rice today, but at that point, I had forgotten to eat breakfast and was so hungry I didn't care. I don't even know what half of the food is called. Seaweed and tofu seem to be staple foods along with rice. It's all good to me.

This afternoon, I relaxed and listened to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on audio book. I saw a reference to it somewhere on the internet and decided to finally check it out. It's a spectacular book and I'd say it's now one of my favorites. Soon after, Steph and I were invited to a party the church ward was having for a couple that's going to be getting married soon. The girl is American so they are going back to the United States for the wedding (I think). I know they are leaving Wednesday and they will be going to Salt Lake City to visit her family. The party was nice, but it was way too hot. Think about a lot of people being crammed into an apartment in an already hot and humid country. Ugh. At least the cake was good and the people were very nice.

So that's my weekend. I know a lot of it has to do with the church, but I can't help it if they are the ones I'm most exposed to. They are the biggest way I'm getting to do stuff in Taiwan. Fun times, fun times.

Oh, everybody has a water buffalo. Yours is fast but mine is slow...

The canal where we could soak our feet.


That's the biggest watermelon I've ever seen!
Steph caught a frog near the water. It's a good thing she didn't touch it because we weren't sure if it was poisonous or not.

The zither player and the singer. Videos to come in another post.

Quick Post

This will be a quick post for some of the week as well as Friday evening. After I lost my map of Hualien last weekend (it flew out of my bike basket while I was riding around and I didn't want to stop and pick it up because by then the two helpful women were leading me back to the night market), I decided to get another map, because I like having them around. Well, I found a map book of ALL of Taiwan, effectively eliminating the risk of getting lost again. Unless you take into account that the map book is in Chinese. Oh well, it will be fun translating it.

The preschool has a Chinese "intern" named Jasmine who has been very helpful to Steph and me during the past few weeks. Her position with the school is weird, because she sometimes drops in to teach the English classes, like she did during the first two days I was here, but she is not an official teacher. She has only been at the preschool for a handful of the days, so I'm not sure where exactly she stands with us. But she is very experienced with teaching a foreign language to little kids, so she gives us advice where it is needed and takes us to activities around Hualien. Her friend, a guy named Chad, suggested I take my map book to new places around Taiwan and get it signed by the people I meet in those new areas. It sounds like a neat idea, so I might try it.

On Friday evening, Jasmine took us to see Harry Potter: Deathly Hollows (Hallows? Too lazy and tired to look it up right now) Pt. 2. I was hesitant to see it because I haven't seen the first part yet, but I decided to go and be social. It's interesting to see how Chinese theaters differ from American theaters. The movie was in English with Chinese subtitles and the concession stands served chicken fingers and nuggets along with the standard movie stuff like popcorn. I was tempted to get the chicken, but they said it would take five minutes and I didn't feel like waiting so I got some popcorn. It was actually very sweet popcorn, which surprised me since I'm used to salt.

The movie was excellent. I want to see the first part now whenever I get the chance. I won't give away any spoilers, although I'm sure everyone who wants to go see the movie has read the books by now, so they know what's going to happen anyway. I will say that stylistically, it was very beautiful. The action scenes were easy to follow and the tension built up nicely. I'm still not a fan of Harry and Ginny getting together; I would have preferred Harry and Luna in a relationship. They seemed to have more chemistry. Luna's quirkiness would balance out Harry's seriousness. And on screen, those two had more time together than Harry and Ginny, so it just seemed like it would make more sense. Oh well, there's always fanfiction.

During our 'Learning about Sickness' week, Steph had the children make the doctor headbands. They all looked so cute with them on!

Me failing at a first person shooter called 'Vampire Knight/Night'. I would have done much better had I only known how to reload the gun. The screen looks like it is blank because it is loading. No, I was not pretending to shoot at monsters whhen it was actually a blank screen!
This is a special kind of caterpillar that can only be found in Taiwan. I can't remember the name of it right now, but it is something Chinese. The kids were making a big fuss out of it, so I picked it up and put it safely in the bushes where it wouldn't get squished.

Pay special attention to the Chinese down at the bottom of this poster.

Oh, Harry. Forget Ginny and come to me!

1st Week of Teaching

I've found new respect for my teachers all through my schooling. This is way harder than it looks. Every day I wonder if my lesson plans will be interesting for the kids or not. And when one day gets over with, you have to start prepping for the next day. Maybe i will get to the point where i will get really efficient at planning so that it will be less stressful. Until then, there's always the weekends to look forward to.

So this week Yu's son had a birthday and I got a picture of us standing with him and his cake. I also got some pictures of the rest of the kids, but I'm not sure if I would be able to stick them up on the internet without running into privacy issues. So I'll just put up the ones with the teachers.

Steph came all the way from Utah to be here and calls this place a jungle because it's so green and there are so many animals living here. I guess when compared to a city in the middle of the desert, Taiwan would seem like a jungle. I'm used to hearing animal sounds in the Midwest, so it doesn't surprise me all that much. But at night, if we go outside, there are dozens of bats that fly around catching bugs. They must come from caves in the mountains because that's the only place where I think they could go undisturbed yet still be close enough to hunt in our skies.

An interesting thing about Taiwan is that the government doesn't like English to be taught to children at new young an age. They think English will damage their little brains, or they're concerned with it as an equal-opportunity issue. A lot of families might not be able to afford English education for their kids. Either way, our school has figured out a way to keep from being caught by government inspectors. First, there's a fake lock on the gate outside. When the officers come and want to inspect the place, one of the teachers say that she needs to find the key. Then, she goes inside and sends a kid to the classrooms to let the teachers know that we are having an inspection. The Chinese teachers immediately take over the class and the English teachers start acting like assistants so that it looks like no one is teaching English. Eventually, the officers should be convinced and leave. I think it's hilarious that we even have a system for this sort of thing. We are supposed to have a drill next week so that us new teachers see how it works.

On Saturday, Steph went to Taipei to see the temple and spend some time in the city. I couldn't go because i left my temple recommend back in America, so I spent the day exploring Hualien. I went to the weekend market about 20 minutes away from the preschool to pick up some new clothes. They always have sales on the weekend at the block where I went. They sell stuff like dresses, shirts, and shoes for 100 kwai (which is about $3 in US currency). Yeah, it's dirt cheap and I'm not complaining. I wanted to get some new duds while I was here anyway.

I went to the ocean again and took some pictures before trying to head back to the apartment. I didn't take into account how far south I was, though, and eventually wound up lost in another city adjacent to Hualien. I wasn't even on my map anymore! I got close to the mountains and saw the entrance to a national park. By then I knew I was screwed and that it was time to ask for directions. I stopped near a construction site and tried to ask an older worker who had to ask a couple of younger women on a nearby scooter if they could speak English so I could get directions. They offered to lead me back to the Hualien night market for which I was very grateful! They had a tiny kitten with them that was sleeping in passenger girl's raincoat. I was surprised since I hadn't noticed it at first and I'm not used to seeing cats around the city. Most of the animals I see are either birds or dogs and most of the dogs are strays. They look so gross and mangy I can't help but feel sorry for them. And they aren't like the affectionate animals of America; most will nip at you if you get too close. I miss my adorable pets! At least I can pet them!

Here are some pics I took during the day. I was so wiped out last night from the four straight hours of bike riding, I didn't have the energy to post them.

Steph found this cocoon in one of the plants on our deck. It's eaten a lot of the leaves, more than I expected since it's so small.

They have Catholic churches here, who knew?

Pictures from the birthday party. That was a yummy cake!
I would have put up a pic where the little girl isn't putting her arm over the birthday boy's face, but I look like I'm grimacing in that pic, so I didn't want to put it up. I have to watch how I look on this blog, you know!

Instead of letter H's, people in Hualien throw giant stone triangles into the water for blockades.
While I was riding around, I passed what looked like people setting up for a rock concert. Those seats don't look comfy at all.

A cool fountain thingie near the concert stage.

This is a giant statue of what I think is Buddha. I wanted to get closer, but the path up was blocked off by construction. I'll have to go back in a few weeks and see if it's open again.

An observation tower I stoppped at along the shore.

I spied this huge building just before getting lost. I thought it was a high school, but some gold lettering said it was a kindergarten! Jeez!

A hilltop near the shore gave some scenic views of the city.

Festivals and an Ocean Excursion

On Friday night, one of the Chinese teachers took us to the annual aborigine festival. This is the one time of year that most of the 12 aborigine tribes get together over an entire weekend, eat food, and dance. The costumes were very colorful and I was amazed at how alike they were to the Native American tribes of the US. Unlike one of the previous teachers that got tricked into dancing on stage on national television, we played it safe in the crowd.

I had some sugarcane drink, a fried chicken breast, a purple-colored rice patty, and some stinky tofu. Ever since I arrived in Taiwan, there's been one smell that I pick up every so often. It isn't the most pleasant of smells, but it's very distinctive. Once I bit into that stinky tofu, I realized that that was what I had been smelling. Lemme tell you, it tastes exactly how it smells. Once I had tried it, I gave it to the Chinese teacher, who absolutely loves the stuff. I may not have liked it, but I wasn't going to let it go to waste.

Yes, one of the women lent me their hat for this pic.


The purple rice patty. It was actually very good!
Apparently one of the popular ancient styles of the aborigine tribes was for women to wear lampshades over their heads. At least that's my interpretation of this pic. No longer are lampshades restricted to people who party too hard!

On Saturday Steph and I went to try and find the ocean. I figured as long as you went in the direction opposite of the mountains, you would have to run into the ocean eventually since the mountains are located in the center of the island. We still brought a map so that we could find our way back, though.

I'm making it official; I love the ocean! It's so beautiful and I love it when the wind coming off of it cools you down. Someday, if I live on the coast, it could be my muse for writing. I got pictures of some of the monuments on the shore, but I can't read the characters, so I don't know what they are for.

I found some writing on the rocks nearby. Probably love notes. Next time I go, I'll have to take a marker and write 'Kim wuz here' or something.

When we were coming back from the shore, we stopped at a 7 Eleven to get some lunch. We were about to go back to the preschool when we noticed a commotion up the street and saw a parade coming for us. They had big costumes and dolls they were carrying around and fireworks that they were blowing off in the middle of the sidewalks. The pics are kinda blurry because the people were in motion, sorry!

Yes, those are horse heads we are seeing...or maybe donkey heads.
This car brought up the rear of the parade. When it was level with us, it stopped and threw out some mints. It was a mad scramble for them (even worse than America!) but I managed to collect a couple.


Afterwards we found a mall that Yu had taken me to a couple weeks ago. We just wandered around and enjoyed the air conditioning until we found the grocery store and picked up some food. Usually, people here use boxes to pack away their groceries. If you want to use plastic bags, you have to buy them. I think I might have to get a re-usable grocery bag while I'm here.

WARNING: POTENTIALLY DISGUSTING PICS AHEAD

A moth we found resting near our bikes.

A dead GDC (Giant Disgusting Cockroach) after a mighty battle with me.