Tidbits from Taiwan

I have been sick for the past week or more, getting better at a painstakingly slow pace. Though its my fault because I just really don't want to lie in bed all day and get better. I have loads of things on my mind and many things to do, though I still haven't been able to travel around that much of Taiwan.

My Host Parents were wonderful enough to invite me to the Premier of BrokeBack Mountain here in Taiwan (later than in the USA) which would be attended by the director, a native to Taiwan, Ang Lee (see side picture), the same director that made "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon". It was good fun, a very quiet peaceful movie out on the plains with many controversial scenes.

A sad day came upon us Oh-so-Suddenly when Zach announced he would be leaving to return to the States in the next week. We tried to do one more mountain trip to Muzha before he left but although he didn't get to make it do to packing and preparing, the Fantastic Four (臺北師) were together for hopefully not the last time before Zach left us on Thursday. May the Four be reunited one day not far away.

Wow, its already been 5 months. You all know what the means? Its the half-way mark and I only got about 5 more months to cram in some serious Chinese.

So I haven't spoken much since New Year's, so lets start there.

After two months, I have changed home family's again, though my new host family is not really new since it was also my first one. Things are going well for the most part, still studying Chinese, finished with College Essays (goodness...gracious).

Our little group has gone on a serious pool playing craze. This week we must have totalled about 12 hours of pool playing. Its pretty popular here, and we are getting better. We are frequenting the 7th floor pool hall enough so that we just got a "VIP" card from the employees, handed over with a smile. Actually probably just a discount card, but ya know, Chinese - English. Give or take.

I had coffee the other day with an interesting girl from Boston. She, just like us exchangers, is here in Taipei, Taiwan for one year to study Chinese. She gets about all the same benefits except doesn't go to a local high school and instead just gets two hours of classes a day at a college. Pretty nifty, other than that she is completely independent and free with no rules or curfews...nice setup, nuts. Heh, but I still like Rotary.

I also happened to be in Ximen with a particular craving for Fried Dumplings while on our path to the Pool Hall, so when one of the "California Fitness Center" employees approached me with a brochure, I asked where I might get some Fried Dumplings. He of course had no clue, but then asked, "Can I get your number? Maybe we could do something sometime." I guess I am used to this friendly forwardness by now, but, never a dull moment. Turns out he and his friends are pretty cool, we played some serious pool with them then next day.

Yes yes, calligraphy. My teacher is now teaching me about the Chinese Name Stamps and how to copy an engraving or sculpture. Very fantastic, and next time (after vacation I requested he teach me how to draw those really cool Chinese paintings with the bamboo, trees, mountains, water and stuff).

Sunday, we were a little more lazy than normal and met around 1:00 in the afternoon to go up the Muzha mountain. Gaston couldn't be reached, him not having a cell phone (though he just got one, after five months), and Zach came six hours later. So, me a Phillip headed up the mountain and sat down a different tea hut this time. This one though, unlike the other one, has fantasticly prepared noodles and rice. The water for tea is brought to a boil over private warm embers. Chinese mountain music (straight out of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon...not quite) played softy in the background. We played some Chinese Chess, chatted, and watched a good movie on (check this...) Phillip's brand-spanking-new laptop, with built in bluetooth-wifi, 80GB, Computer Case, slim design and just wonderful features, for the cheaper price of around $1,200. He has all the sweet gadgets, seriously, the nice cell phone, sleek iPod, and now this. Garg.

Winter Vacation approached a little quicker than expected, meaning I don't have school for the next three or so weeks. I am planning on taking some long and extensively tiring trips to everywhere. More temples, more mountains, more teapots, and more fun. We did have a small Chinese Test in which we had to read several chinese songs aloud to a video camera. Wasn't too hard though as we had the sheets with Characters and BoPoMoFo in front of us. After the break I plan hopefully to do something different, spending some time somewhere and experiencing more of Taiwan.

Today, very busy, started at 8:30 at YuanShanZhan (Circular Mountain [MRT] Station). Rotary organized a trip to two temples and a night market. It would have been really cool if we weren't in a large tourist looking group and the tour group leader didn't have a micrphone thereby disturbing the worshipers in the temple. Lots of interesting facts though, mostly about how to pray and fortunes.

A Vacation kind of sprung up on me from no where, normally that doesn't happen, but this was special. Starting today is four week vacation (...four weeks...heh) which will be quite relaxing, though I am not sure if I can find enough activities to fill that much free time, but I'll figure something out (more mountain time).

More later. Adios! Zai Jian!

January 2, 2006 (95年1月2日, 9:55pm)

Apologies...apologies, you know how it goes, busy with all that Christmas, New Year's Eve...kehm...applying to colleges...kehm. I spelled "cough" (kehm).

First on the Blog Agenda .::. A MERRY Christmas GOes out to everyone AROUND the world. Happy New Years also, as that happened to just have occured. I tell you, what a riot here seriously, we got Fireworks completely spewing out of the world tallest building, illegal firecrackers popping off in every corner. Just fantasticalific, gotta say.

But lets start with Christmas.

Okay, so, Christmas Eve we head over to Elsa's [Mexicana/Texas....Texicana] place for a relaxing Christmas Dinner, complete with turkey and decorations [though Jingle Bells replaced with Reggaeton]. We spent a short while there, relaxing, chatting, and semi-watching "Moulin Rouge". At about 10:30 we headed toward a club by the name of Luxy. Now I know what you are thinking, and I was thinking it too. I would much rather be snuggled up with a body-blanket, sipping hot cider, watching the Grinch and his Whoos, and awaiting the morn for presents, but as my adoptive family for this year, besides my wonderful host families, are my fellow exchangers, I wanted to stick with them for Christmas Eve. We danced for several hours, listened to some crazy Chinese Rap, oh yea, and got a little bit of techno in. Luxy, let me say, is just a great place, now even more so after seeing the "famous" MoS. Its got two different large rooms packed with persons. One room, the main room, is for rap type music and a nice video display, while the other has got techno going most of the time, sometimes with a singer. Entertaining place in general. Not much else besides some body jiggling.

Me, Zach, Phillip an I met at the MTV the other day to watch a movie, which was the plan until we realized we didn't want to watch a movie. After hanging out at the movie place for almost an hour deciding what movie to see, we headed out in search of a pool table, rather confusing the MTV employees. We travelled by taxi to an unknown destination, I am still not quite sure where we went, but we got home okay, and found a nice restaurant/pub where we played pool until late. Now, I have a duty here, to tell of my phenomenon of a pool game. Phillip, Zach, and I played pool for about an hour or two, and after came a guy that absolutely whomped us. He was seriously good, so of course he beat me. His friend walks over, who is pronounced by guy #1 as the master [of pool]. Phillip and Zach have to leave, which is a pity as there is no witness besides me and the two pool sharks who are long gone by now, but I stay to play with this "Master" dude, just to see how masterful he is. Indeed, as I watch the two men play at first, he is indeed "Masterful", pulling off 4, 5 balls in a row, with utter accuracy and precision. This all just to explain to you all the utter....no other word for it....masterful-ness with which this man played. Check it...I beat him, I crazy beat him. I know, I know. This truly was an act of thaumaturgy, truly a combination of random luck, some skill, or perhaps the good karma of a scrum-diddlyum-tious Quesadilla filling my innards. Whatever it was, I was, with ease and a smirk, popping the most gracefully perfect shots I have popped in a while. The final ball before the 8-ball, that I had to knock in, was dropped by banking the qeue-ball off TWO walls, before hitting the remaining ball in question at an angle to be set in the far corner pocket. Mind you the qeue ball was originally at the opposite end. That shot, though partly luck as I was only meaning to bank off one wall, was splendid enough that the guy #1 (not as pro as guy #2, the hotshot) began...believe it...bowing down to me...heh. I finished off the eight ball with repose; the "Master" of old, having 2, 3 balls left on the table. Pure Finesse. I bid the gentlemen good night, and like a smooth shark, strolled out of the bar at the top of my game.
My "I'm-all-that" high lasted several minutes before, upon arriving at the MRT station, ramming my uncovered toe into an escalator, thereafter prompting squimish looks from onlookers, from the amount of blood covering my sandals. That certainly balanced off my feeling of unstoppablility.

Ah, New Year's Eve. I used some extra smooth skills and got a 7 o'clock curfew for the Eve of the Year that is New. 7 o'clock of course being AM. Phillip and I hit up the Japanese Noodle Place...known for their noodles...and there we met Gaston [Mexico] along with his friend Sha-nnon/ron, one of those. Without success we tried to get a free meal by singing Chinese Songs to the Restaurant, though the lady with the check was kind enough to take off about 60 cents, though probably more out of impatience and exhasperation. We then headed toward 101 [again, the building's name], and along the way I fell into spasms of exhilaration at the amount of extremely giganticine glowsticks being sold for overly ridiculously cheapiest prices [Note: badly english to emphasize very-largness and non-expensivement of the glowing sticks]. Yes, it was a glowstickers haven that night. Our enthusiasm, however, was not properly taken advantage of, and prematurely disposed of in the account of a poor count down (the crowd group-think here needs training) and the firework display that merely lasted 3 minutes. Thats okay though! For those three minutes, it was freekin' awesome, besides, we, again, saw plenty of street fireworks.

We spent the next 30 to 60 minutes getting to know complete strangers a little more personally than desired, squished barely enough room to elbow the person trying to get in front of you. No need for that though, as the crowd waiting line for the MRT was motionless. Yae, we doth be waiting thar, but we passed the time wonderfully by entertaining the people surrounding us with belted songs and jolly laughter...ah, crazy foreigners [referring to us]. We also watched some short snowboarding clips on Phillip's iPod Video [Come One, Come All! Witness the evolution of the revolution. In lighter, thinner 30GB and 60GB models starting at $299, the new iPod is music to your eyes!]
Hope was lost for boarding the MRT station in our then present location, so we gave into peer-pressure, and followed the crowd to walk the distance of another two stations (quite a ways, mind ya'll). As the cell-phone networks finally became unbound by New Year's Greeting Calls, we managed to contact our fellow outgoers and meet up inside a club by the name of MoS. As previously hinted at, the club was not as swell as it was previously cracked up to be. The Music, while supposed to be deafeningly loud, was deafeningly loud plus some. The people were few, the DJ displayed an annoying propensity for changing songs right before the bass climax. Disgruntled, many people left early and the place was half clear by 3am. We left by five in the morning and, failing to convince any one of the five or so taxi drivers outside to take five people in one car, arrived ourselves in two at the nearest cafe that was open at that giddy hour of the morn. There, we talked for an hour or so, clinked some frozen coffee glasses amongst ourselves to a good start to a good year, and each retired to our perspective house host.

We all tried to get some rest. As for me, myself, I worked on college essays for the next 7 hours, finally nodding off for a couple at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and then going to bed at midnight that night.
What a weekend.