7.20.2008 In Japan!!! Why I love Taipei more still....

Monday night Han and I left Taipei for 21 days in Japan. We're lucky enough that Han has a (wonderful, beautiful, and cool) sister Uken who lives in Tokyo who is housing us for most of our stay. I find every day in Japan I'm constantly comparing things to Taiwan. I've always wondered if I could, or would want to live here . So far Japan seems to be better than Taiwan in about a million different ways. Strangely some of the reasons that make Japan "better" make me love Taiwan more. Maybe I could stand to live here for a year when Han eventually has to do his mandatory military service but I am pretty sure now Taiwan is home.

I'm not sure if I want or need to have the choice of 1000s of different vacuum cleaners in one building, or as many different kinds of toilets, watches, or cellphones. I love public transportation but having the train and subway system so interconnected creates this monster spiderweb that makes every day feel like I'm living in some kind of complex video game labyrinth. I have to find the right ticket booth for the right gates for the right trains and figure out whether the train or subway is cheaper or faster. Just to illustrate what I'm talking about here is the Taipei metro map:

Here are two different systems for Tokyo that don't even show all of the stations that belong to the Tokyo area:



Taipei's metro has 8 lines and 67 stations. Tokyo has 13 lines and 282 stations.

In all fairness Tokyo boasts a population of 12,790,000 to Taipei's 2,630,515 but that's just one more reason why I love Taipei more.

The malls are nearly as bad as the subway system with so many interconnected buildings and endless levels of stores for everything you could ever imagine and some things that you would never imagine (humping dog USB anyone?? note: Uken has one of these):



It's a love/hate relationship with me and the malls.

Something else I didn't expect is that Tokyo doesn't share Taipei's love of convenience stores. It's hard to make anyone believe how many convenience stores are in Taipei unless you've been there and I have a hard time believing there are any countries that rival it. Between 7-11s, Family Marts, Hi lifes, Nico Marts, and some more I'm sure that I'm forgetting I feel like there is a conveniences store for every 10 people in Taiwan. It's not weird to see a conveniences store next door to a rival convenience store with another across the street. Two 7-11s can sometimes be on opposite ends of the same blocks. According to Wikipedia there are 7000 7-Eleven locations in Taiwan giving it the 3 largest amount in the world... keep in mind that's ONLY 7-Eleven.

In comparison in Tokyo the convenience stores seem almost scarce but in place are vending machines EVERYWHERE. I still haven't seen any of the famous beer vending machines but Soda, juice, and cigarette vending machines are everywhere.



Oh and my last observation of something I don't like about Japan so far before I get into what I love. People smoke here, it seems a lot! I'm actually really surprised. I hadn't imagined this as a smoking culture. In my own life I've had less and less exposure to smoking and smokers. In high school it seemed like EVERYONE one smoked, and my closest group of friends and I, excluding a couple of people were the rare ones who didn't. Then as laws were passed to prohibit smoking in more and more places smoking almost became invisible. I guess not being into the clubs is part of the reason why I haven't been so exposed to it. In Taiwan it seems more similar to Canada, there are smokers but it seems on my beaten path,it's a much smaller percentage of the population. Rarely do I see smokers in front of buildings or in parks. Sometimes flying by on scooters (smoking + flame seems like a bad idea but I see it) and sometimes in smoking sections of cafes or restaurants. I actually saw a propane delivery man (on a scooter with propane strapped to the back) with a lit cigarette before we left Taiwan. Yikes.

Labels: Japan, relationships, taipei, Tokyo

1.12.2008 A blogless 2007, 2008 baby I'm back

2007 proved to be a real test of character for all aspects of my life. My love life, work life, Taiwan life all suffered some major ups and downs. And somewhere in the midst of it I stopped typing. It's really sad because of how much I really got out of my site, how it really kept me moving artistically, and how it kept Taiwan forever new and fresh for me.

At some point this site had regular traffic that scared me, a modest number of visits by some people's standards but much more than I ever expected to get and then I started hearing more and more about how people in Taiwan and their friends were looking at my site. That kind of ruined things for me. As cool as it was the original intent of writing about Taiwan at all was to amuse my family and friends back home as well as other Westerners. I hadn't really thought or dreamed that people living in Taiwan and seeing the same things I was seeing would be spending any time at my site. So I started to worry about everything I wanted to write about. "Too many people in Taiwan have written about this, why blog about something everyone else already has??", "Everyone has already seen this, why put a picture up of this, it'll be boring!!". bla bla bla



Aside from that working 44 hours a week before I went home this summer didn't even leave me with time to check my e-mail.

Now I'm a lot less busy and don't care so much about who's reading or why. I'm grateful for anyone who gives me their time. It's cool to know that people are there. First and foremost I write for myself and for my family. A kind of visual scrapbook since I'm so bad at keeping a written diary or photo album, and why bother?



So where have I been? I spent the summer home in Canada. It wasn't what it should have been, I suffered a major betrayal before heading home and it soured the whole visit for me. I spent way too much time alone and miserable. I'm sorry for the family and friends I didn't see and grateful to the ones who I did see and were able to put up with me.

Since I've been back in Taiwan I FINALLY started taking Chinese classes. It's incredibly embarrassing that I've been living in Taiwan more than 2 years and hadn't studied at all. According to another ex-pat I met this is a very "Canadian" thing to do. It made me cringe but at the same time I can't feel offended. It seems in Taiwan Canadians are at the butt end of the joke and are criticized and joked about for the same things we are guilty of joking and criticizing Americans for back home. There are some nice, wonderful, talented, and motivated Canadians in Taiwan but there are unfortunately a good number of thoughtless, drunk, greedy, horny jerks (male and female) too. I used to feel proud to tell people I was from Canada when I first came to Taiwan until I started meeting the kind of Canadians who will head to work to teach kindergarten kids still drunk from the night before. argh.



Unfortunately my work hours have picked up again so I haven't had as much time as I've wanted to again and I've had to drop the Chinese classes but I intend to start some 1 on 1 classes soon. Having Han has helped me "cheat" a lot and live a much richer life in Taiwan that I could've without him but I'm an independent girl and always have been so it's really important to me.

I'm sneaking up on my 3 year anniversary in Taiwan and with that I seem to have hit a new milestone which involves everyone I never thought would ever leave Taiwan leaving. It's been heartbreaking. Sure I've heard them say they were planning on leaving at some point but denial kicked in and I didn't believe it. It's another reason I've resolved to study Chinese harder. It's great to have other ex-pat friends but in a way I don't want to make anymore friends in the ex-pat community. It becomes too heartbreaking. Meanwhile, I feel like the only thing that's changed about me in 3 years is my hair and everyone back home is having babies, buying houses and cars, and getting married. Thankfully I still have a few friends and a big sister who is content to live outside the norm so I don't feel so weird.



So how about the new year? Han and I decided to brave the fireworks since we've heard this year will be the last year they do them off of 101. I've moved to the Xinhai area and there is a little field of grass we pass sometimes when we are driving towards 101. We decided to try to make it there on the scooter on new year night because it has the most clear and perfect view of 101. Seriously, anyone wanting to get a good shot of 101 should setup their tripod here. If I can figure out where it is on the map I'll post the google map location. I have no idea what the place is called. I'm sure it's called a park even though there is seriously nothing there but a big triangle of grass but even a 6 ping square of grass with a rock on it is a park with an official name in Taipei :).



We never ended up making it to the field. We were so deadlocked in traffic we couldn't move for almost 2 hours. We ended up about 10 meters away from it with the most clear and perfect view of 101 imaginable. I'm glad we didn't make it because if we had we'd be standing with a bunch of people with their arms raised in the air trying to capture the fireworks on their cellphones or digital cameras but elevated on the scooter there was nothing to block our view. I didn't bother bringing a camera because I was lazy and didn't feel like lugging it along and because I knew there would be at least a dozen videos posted to youtube. Here's one for anyone who missed out:



This month also marked or 2 year anniversary together! We had a quiet night and celebrated with our tradition of returning to the spot of or first date (the giant ferris wheel in Neihu). We got in one of the two new ferris wheel cars that have glass bottoms. The glass was so scuffed up it was hard to see through but thankfully the seats were clear too (unnerving when you're in a skirt). It was pretty neat. Worth the wait since it was a special night.



I have some things to write about now and Rafael has helped me modify the template so it's more photo post friendly so I'm hoping to be putting up posts or photos at least twice a week. Kick my butt if I don't, please!

Labels: New Brunswick, relationships, taipei, taiwan

9.09.2007 I miss you - to my sisters

I planted a little seed tonight that says "I miss you". Thanks for putting up with me, and what a mess I was this summer. A new message is supposed to appear on the plant once it grows. I'll add a time-lapse so you can see how it grows.

Labels: Only in Asia, relationships

1.09.2007 Happy Anniversary! to us! ya

Han and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary on Wednesday (Jan 3rd). We returned to the site of our first date. The biiiiiiig ferris wheel in Neihu. It's a pretty exciting milestone for me since this is officially now my longest relationship ever and I'm not even a little bit sick and tired of him yet. :)



He puts up and tolerates with me in a way that only a family member would and he really is my family now... not to mention he's super thoughtful and helpful all the time. Western girls, I'm telling you... find a Taiwan guy!



And there was a dorky photo booth, how could we resist?

Labels: relationships, taipei, taiwan

10.11.2006 Moon Festival BBQ for Two (video)

Labels: relationships, taipei, taiwan, Video

5.22.2006 100th post - honouring the honourable!

It's time once again to tell you a story to prove how much my roommate Meg rocks.

Lately I've been depressed and have been sleeping way too much. One Sunday morning Meg went out venturing without me while I snoozed the day away.

She came back wide-eyed and excited while I was trying to drag myself out from underneath my mosquito net in the late afternoon and told me "do I have a story for you!"

As you may or may not have known Meg is a painter. She graduated from NASCAD with a degree in Fine Arts and this summer she will be starting her Master's program with an American University.

So Meg wrapped up one of her paintings that was in our room and went off to this really cool cafe she'd been to a year ago hoping that she could get them to put it up. When she got there the whole cafe had been remodeled and completely had lost all the appeal that had made her want to put her painting up....She remembered a really cool restaurant across the way and decided since she'd lugged the painting all this way she may as well see if she could get them to put it up. The restaurant unfortunately had been demolished.

Meg gave up and decided to shop around a bit. She went into a store she remembered being really cool that sells all kinds of weird vintage stuff. This store is one-of-a-kind since Taiwan doesn't really seem to believe in "second-hand". Everything is just thrown out. There are next to no second-hand stores. Everyone wants new. Anyway, this place has a mix of old and new and Meg found some really old chocolate bar stickers for me because they had reese peanut butter cups on them. She figured since my mission to find reese peanut butter cups in Taipei has come to a dead end (haven't found them at Jason's yet!) that it might be the next best thing.

While she was in the store she had them hold the painting behind the counter. When it came time to pay they handed the painting back to her (which was in a garbage bag). Meg decided she didn't want to lug the painting back home and decided to see if they'd put it up. She motioned to ask them if they wanted it. They opened up the garbage bag, looked inside and offered her a calculator (for her to enter in how much she'd like for it). Meg said she's still pretty uncomfortable in this kind of situation so she just made a motion for "one minute". She disappeared downstairs and came back up with a shirt. The workers made a phone call and then when they hung up they nodded that it was ok.

So this shirt...... wasn't even for Meg! She got the shirt for me!!!! She knows how much I love the ridiculous non-sensicle shirts here and she gave up her painting for me!! How awesome is she?

So here it is:



Isn't it true..... isn't it true!

I just can't believe someone gave up a rockin' painting they created to get a shirt for me.

ps - I must add an extra shout out to someone who rocks my world. Meg had a whole bunch of roommates before I came here. One of them is named Janelle. Well Janelle recently mailed Meg a care-package, and by some crazy chance included a couple packages of REESE PEANUT BUTTER CUPS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Meg being the awesome rocking queen that she is gave me a full package! (a 4 cup package at that!). I nearly cried. I think I actually drooled a little. You don't know me Janelle, but I love you, thank you.

Labels: relationships

4.18.2006 New study suggests that Ginger fights Ovarian cancer

Oh geez. Please don't tell my mother (the ginger pusher). I'm never going to live this one down. Click here to view the BBC article.

Labels: relationships

3.21.2006 People who seriously rock my world Pt.2 - Raf the friend and designer

Well awhile back after I tore down all the coding I'd done for my asp based page and moved to using all this premade stuff like blogger and minigal I started whining about the design of my page.

I love to code. I'm totally a geek.... but design. Ugh it's painful. I'm so fussy and I'm not a good enough designer to accommodate my own fussiness. So Rafael picked up my cry for help left on my website at one point (see excessive whining... I can't believe the results I get with my whining). He asked me what I wanted. I said "Something sexy, simple, and functional". Then like a week later he pops out this current design based on a recent picture I'd taken. Just like that. 3 words and he gives me a design I'm drooling over. That's impressive. He even picked up on my current obsession with oranges and implemented it nicely.

Anyway after that he's put up with my fussiness and given me endless patience about all the little changes I wanted made here or there. Things taken out, things put in. And I have to say he's done a pretty good job. Don't you think????

All of the blood, sweat and tears (ok maybe I'm being dramatic) that went into this site were just a labour of friendship. That's right. I got this design free. Now how awesome is he?

Rafael was my travel buddy in Thailand and is now living as a volunteer in Thailand working for the Tsunami Volunteer Center. He's helping to build and repair houses for displaced Tsunami victims and other people in need. He's currently doing this without any financial funding from any organization so all of his expenses (like food and lodging) are coming out of his own pocket. If you'd like to do something really nice send Rafael a donation to support him in his volunteer work. He's also started writing a blog about his volunteer work which is updated when his net connection isn't being dodgy.

Thanks Rafael! You seriously rock!

Labels: relationships, Thailand

People who seriously rock my world Pt.1 - Meg the friend and roommate

Ok I have some big ass-kissery to do to a couple of people who rock my world, severely!

I like to act tough, probably tougher than I am most of the time... but what happens behind closed doors... I am a big baby when I have the flu. Only a few "fortunate" individuals get to see this. Like family, or roommates. I never had roommates before Taiwan so this is all new for me.

Taiwan has been giving my immune system a run for its money. Between having to deal with dozens and dozens of snotty nosed little germ machines on a daily basis and crazy weather shifts I've been taking a beating.

Come on Taiwan, let's have a talk. What's the problem? I understand the weather changes, but what is with going from like 13 degrees and raining to like 30 degrees and sunny and then rainy and in the teens again all in the same week? How is my body supposed to deal with that????? I thought the weather in my little hometown port city was insane. It has nothing on Taipei lately.





Anyway... I only whine and complain to those nearest and dearest to me. Sunday night in the middle of the night... or I guess very early Monday morning Meg and I were up in our loft. I was whining about how sick I was and how I want soup (insert a bunch of whining and "poor me"s here) "my mom makes the best chicken with rice soup"... "make me soup Meg"... "Meeeeeeeeg make me soooooooup" (which I said jokingly since it was like 2am)... anyway the nutcase disappears.... Meanwhile I call home to mom on Skype to whine about how sick I am and to hear her voice. About 20 minutes later Meg appears with a steaming bowl of homemade soup.

I'm not trying to promote whining, but wow. I told her "I wasn't serious you know!!" and she just shrugged and walked away :)

Now I'm not a vegitarian. It doesn't mean that I don't love the little animals, I'm just slightly in love with meat. I eat a very small fraction of the meat I ate in Canada... usually tuna every week and chicken here and there... but still not near vegitarian. But this soup!!! ohhhh this soup. Mom, you have some competition. Big hunks of ginger, onion, tomatoes, noodles, bay leaves, some kind of mystical vegitarian organic soup stock, and some mystery spices. I give it 1000 stars out of 100 and then like 1800 stars out of 100 after it sat for a day and all the flavours mixed together even more. Even though I'm heterosexual, shortly after tasting the soup I proposed marriage to Meg. She turned me down with a humble "no thanks".

I'm eating it as I write this. I think I'm drooling on my keyboard.

Do my friends rock or what?

ps - I have to say ginger is fantastic, anytime I'm sick at all now I get the big lecture from mom about putting ginger in tea or ginger in ginger ale :) (like 50 million times). She is the ginger spokesperson now. I don't know what the ginger people are paying her, but it must be good, because she's seriously pushing the ginger. My own mother, a ginger pusher. The pain a daughter must endure in her lifetime. I must admit Ginger is good. Nature's anti-nauseant. If she didn't read this site I would tell you that I was going to secretly tape-record the ginger lecture for your enjoyment but my chances of not getting caught are waaaaay to slim.

So few people realize how absolutely hilarious and adorable my mom is. I wish I could share with the world. 99.9% of the time she has no idea she's doing it, that's what makes it even better.

pss- Rafael you're next.

Labels: relationships, taiwan

3.20.2006 date-o-rama update

Well I've taken a bit of heat from some locals about what I wrote in the "history" section of my "dating-Taiwanese guys don't mess around" post since part of the post was featured on Micheal Turton's web blog. I'm quite honoured to be featured on his page. I pretty much read his teaching information page one hundred and fifty times before coming over here. Pretty cool!

I've updated the post with the following:

20/03/06:I have made generalizations here but like any generalizations there is truth to them. I love Taiwanese women. I have many many Taiwanese girl friends. It makes me shake my head when I hear them say things like "Oh, I've never had a foreign guy ask me out. I must not be beautiful".

I know some Taiwanese female/foreign male couples who have been happily married for many years. This isn't about them.

I'm sure even happily married Taiwanese female/foreign male couples know plenty of other couples together for the wrong reason. I hear male foreigners complain about it all the time. Most of them aren't gems themselves but that's my point. It's interesting that guys who wouldn't get a second look back home because of their aesthetics and/or their personality have no problem attracting doting females.

I'm not bitter about this at all, just fascinated. I've had foreign males, and local males both interested in me and I'm very happily in a relationship right now.

I'm sure if there was a country out there (and maybe there is) where foreign males were completely ignored by the local women while foreign women with less than stellar personalities and physical appearance were the hottest thing around that scientists worldwide would be flown in as well as a top-notch team of private investigators to find out what the scoop is! :-P

I write all this in good humour. I see a lot of beautiful foreign male/taiwanese female couples. It's just a topic I'm interested in so it gets written about here. Don't take anything I say too personally. I am a very open-minded, non-judgmental person

Labels: relationships, taiwan

settle an argument!

OK. Settle an argument. Look at both our arms. Who is more brown? Me: top/left or Han: bottom/right

Note to any skeptics (*cough Han*): This was even while we were still on the bus, even before I got darker later that day :-P

Labels: relationships

3.09.2006 Dating: Taiwanese guys don't mess around, date-o-rama

Well not to be the kind of girl to kiss and tell, or to boast and brag but I have to write about this.

The History

First some history. For those of you who don't know, I'm a white girl. I'm a very very brown white girl, but I'm a white girl.

Asia is called "single girl hell" for north American women. I became very interested in this when I got over here. The short story is, Asia is North American boy heaven. It's not very uncommon to see gorgeous Asian girls, dressed to the nines, hanging off the arm of a guy who wouldn't get a second glance even by the plainest Jane back home. They're kind of a commodity over here. Some girls like them because of the "status" it gives them, some girls like them because of the $$$, some girls want the way into North America, and no doubt some girls it's pure attraction and/or love... but probably less than the first few reasons.

I actually feel sorry for some of the guys. If you were looking for a deeper meaningful relationship I think you'd constantly be asking yourself "does she love me for me, or does she love me because of who she thinks I am/what I can give her?". And it's not that some of these guys don't deserve incredible women, I just wonder if they're getting the incredible women for the right reasons. But none of my business I guess.

Anyway, so as you can imagine most foreign guys (meaning non-Taiwanese) do not have a lot of interest in foreign (non-Taiwanese) women. Taiwanese male with white female relationships are even more rare. There are a lot of interesting theories about this, many can be read online. The common ones seem to be:

- the Taiwanese (or even Asian in general) male's perception of us ie that we're loud, easy, outspoken, and overly independent.)
- that Taiwanese males are just too shy.... this stems from lack of confidence in their ability to speak English and confidence issues created by the way they're portrayed in Western media.
- they're unattracted to our shapes. Our facial features, colouring and hair colour are great... even envied.... but what they're fed by their media is even more extreme than what we're fed back home I think. An "attractive" Asian woman (as per sensationalized by their media) is almost pre-pubescent in body shape. Skinny skinny skinny.

Well I like challenges, and not that it was a goal, but I'm very happy to have a very very fantastic boyfriend. Not only does he like me for me (mentally and physically) but he's confident and accepting. And patient, oh so patient! I get stared at a lot in Asia for being foreign but a white girl with an Taiwanese male draws A LOT of attention (even from other foreigners). I tease Han that we're rock stars.

20/03/06:I have made generalizations here but like any generalizations I feel there is truth to them. This is based on what I've heard first hand from people in this type of relationship and different conversation threads I've read.

I love Taiwanese women. I have many many Taiwanese girl friends. It makes me shake my head when I hear them say things like "Oh, I've never had a foreign guy ask me out. I must not be beautiful".

I know some Taiwanese female/foreign male couples who have been happily married for many years. This isn't about them.

I'm sure even happily married Taiwanese female/foreign male couples know plenty of other couples together for the wrong reason. I hear male foreigners complain about it all the time. Most of them aren't gems themselves but that's my point. It's interesting that guys who wouldn't get a second look back home because of their aesthetics and/or their personality have no problem attracting doting females.

I'm not bitter about this at all, just fascinated. I've had foreign males, and local males both interested in me and I'm very happily in a relationship right now.

I'm sure if there was a country out there (and maybe there is) where foreign males were completely ignored by the local women while foreign women with less than stellar personalities and physical appearance were the hottest thing around that scientists worldwide would be flown in as well as a top-notch team of private investigators to find out what the scoop is! :-P

I write all this in good humour. I see a lot of beautiful foreign male/taiwanese female couples. It's just a topic I'm interested in, and fascinated by... so it gets written about here. Don't take anything I say too personally. I am a very open-minded, non-judgmental person

Date-o-Rama

So I have to tell you about my date-o-rama. One of the things I most adore about this guy is the diverse amount of activities he's willing to partake in. From hiking, to shopping, to playing in an arcade, to exploring museums and art galleries. He's like the boyfriend I've been fantasizing about ever since highschool. A guy who likes to do stuff, and all kinds of it. And best of all he integrates really well with my friends.

So Saturday night I called him late in the evening. I haven't been seeing him much lately because I've been keeping busy and because I'm a bit weird like that (I don't like seeing someone *ALL* the time). This is worse I think because before him I'd been single for over 3 years. Anyway he knows I've been wanting to see the Confucian temple near where he lives so he told me to come up to his MRT (subway) stop and meet him. Once I got there we decided it was too late, and since I didn't have my camera it would be a wasted trip. So instead we went bowling! This was great except it was big ball bowling which I'm not that great at. Still fun though. Oh but before bowling he bought me this really sweet t-shirt. It's like the Taiwanese equivalent of "I heart NY"

Next we headed to this fun multilevel arcade place we'd been to once before. Han was telling me about these go karts. I didn't really think it'd be REAL go karts, especially not indoors. But alas, I was wrong. It was a full out go kart track, indoors. And the karts went FAST. We raced around like crazy, and Han made me run into a wall once, but I forgive him. After we played some table hockey, and that close range basketball shooting game.

But that's not all! :) After all those good times we headed to this 24/hour pool hall where Han has a membership. We ended up playing pool until like 3am. It was great. The only time I won was when he sunk the eight ball but hey I'm getting better.

This evening I actually went back for round two with Han and my roommate Meg.... sadly Meg and I didn't fair much better taking Han on than I did alone. We'll get him though!

So this weekend is supposed to involve some pottery making..... and soon he's talking about taking me to this place down south where you can pay to sleep in this tunnel in an aquarium where fish swim over and under and all around you. He definitely deserves an award for date ideas. The more indecisive I am the better the date seems to be so I think I'm just going to shut up entirely. Although I will make him do some hiking and climbing with me, and hopefully rafting in Hualien.

Labels: relationships, taiwan

2.06.2006 photos: This is Meg

Took a couple of pictures with film that I'm really pleased with. I think they esentially capture Meg's personality... or at least her personality through my eyes. Meg is one of my ex-roommates from my first period of time in Taiwan.

She's also my muse and a real motivating force for me (creatively) lately.

Labels: Photography, relationships

1.30.2006 My relatives are cruel, but so am I.

So in response to my things I miss the most from home post my Aunt Cathy, and Uncle Mo were kind enough to send me these pictures of themselves enjoying some Tim's coffee.



Well I have this to say in response....... It's January 30th......



Ouch it hurts doesn't it? :) Still SooooooOOooOoOOOoooOOOo behind on responding to e-mails (ie I've responded to 0) but it's really sunny outside and Taipei is calling, calling to me and my camera, and my brand new shiny tripod.

Labels: relationships, taiwan

1.28.2006 oops - I'm a'ight, honest

First off, I'm really really behind on responding to e-mails. Sorry!

Sorry for any concern I caused with that last post. It seems only 2 or 3 people understood.

In short, I can't verbally express myself very well. I don't like to either. Even with the people I'm most close to and who I know will understand the intent of what I'm saying or where I'm coming from.

I find when I try to pour my heart out verbally about something I have to get off my chest I spend so much time responding to the responses of what I'm saying that I loose focus on what I'm actually trying to say. I become so frustrated and flustered that I usually don't get out my points or I just give up.

There's a quote I've always loved: "Seek first to understand and then to be understood. Most people do not listen with the intent to understand: They listen with the intent to reply"

In being able to write things out in a place that's *my place*, a place that people only come to if they choose to, only read if they choose to... I'm finding a freedom and voice that I've very rarely had before. Because of this I'm not censoring myself very much. I'm writing things that I probably wouldn't say because I don't like making people uncomfortable. But again, this is my place... so it feels different.

Once I write these things out I'm usually able to turn the page. It feels like a cleansing. I've solidified how I'm feeling in writing, I've acknowledged it, and from there I can let it go or work on improving it.

Ok that said, I am SOOOOOOOOO behind on responding to e-mails and I'm very sorry. I will have no excuse this week for not getting back to people since I have a week to do whatever I want with.

Labels: bereavement, relationships

1.17.2006 lack of updates = smitten

Well incase anyone hasn't heard.... part of the reason I haven't been so great about updating the site is because I've met a boy....... and it's turned into a relationship.

After over 3 years of being single, being infatuated with someone.... especially with someone who's infatuated back... and someone I have soooooo much fun with is fantastic.

Anyway, I'm blushing now so I'll stop. We spent Sunday at Taipei zoo.

Luckily for you my camera batteries died or else I would have an excessive amount of stupid animal pictures. Instead I'll just treat you to these:

The really really exciting discovery in the zoo (aside from the fact that a Taiwanese guy with a White girl attracts more attention than most of the animal exhibits) is that there actually exists a creature that is a rat the size of a dog. I always joked around with Michelle that I wanted one. They're called a "Coypu". My batteries died before I could get a snap but check it out. Taipei zoo had white ones though. Much cooler. Craziness!

Labels: relationships, taiwan, Taiwan day trips

1.16.2006 last, last weekend in Tainan (ie Fear Factor round 2)

I spent last, last weekend (Jan 6th - 8th) down in Tainan (my favourite weekend getaway spot) visiting my friends Kelly and Aaron. The bestest hostesses evers!

rr

Saturday started with a day at the coolest water spa I've ever seen in my life. A lot of hotels and even apartment buildings will have mini water spas that consist of a hot tub and a smaller square shallow tub with various shaped spouts that shoot various pressures of water.... but this.... this was the Disney Land of the water spas. If only I had the water-proof case for my Powershot I could've taken some pictures.

The place was *huge*...... like the size of a football field at least I'm sure. It had saunas, steam rooms, mineral baths (calcium and magnesium), tea baths... we're not sure what scents but we're pretty sure they were rose, green tea, maybe ecualyptus and aloe??? and some blue one... there were scortching hot tubs, ice cube tubs, a lazy river, a huge pool thingie with all kinds of crazy various waterfalls to beat up your back and neck with. They had foot pads that blew intense bubbles at your feet underwater (I think some kind of bubble reflexology), bubble neck and back massages, a "dumpling" pool that was just bubble madness.... and a room where you could lay flat on your belly and have and insane pressure waterfall on you from head to toe. It feels insane.... like 10 people simutaneously digging their fingers into you and dragging them up and down your body. I think that's it? oh how can I forget about the oldschool hairdryers (video to come)

After the spa action we had some good good eats and then headed out for badminton!

I haven't played badminton since I was 12.... Kelly and I had our butts thoroughly whooped by Aaron's mom, and Kelly's friend Billy. It was a bit embarassing playing since one of the Taiwanese olypmic badminton players was playing in the court next to us. I got a clip of them playing (video clip) but unfortunately accidently deleted it. I didn't know badminton could be so violent but it seemed like they were playing ping pong more than badminton. Madness.

Later we headed out for ginger duck hotpot. Hot pot is my favourite thing in Taiwan. Depending you either have a community pot of boiling water (for your table) or your own personal pot, which you throw food into to boil. After it's cooked you dig it out and, yum, eat it.

All the flavours of everything being cooked all blend together and at the end you're left with an awesome soup. So ginger duck hot pot included *every*, I mean *every* part of the duck. I ate some craaaazy stuff again. I didn't eat duck kidney, brain, bill, or feet, but I pretty much tried everything else. Including intestines, yes again, and ducks blood, again.

And I tried fish blood rice cake, see: (surprisingly ok)

After the feast we headed back to Kell and Aaron's for some Uno playin' and beer drinkin' Grace had the cutest sweater ever on.

Sunday I started to come down with the most horrible cold I've had since I've been a kid but I got to have some great one-on-one time with Kelly and got to do more scooterin! We headed to the Confucious temple in the evening and I took quite a few pictures. I'll put them in a seperate post. Nothing too fancy but I was rushing.

I like this picture a lot. There's a lot of random stuff in Kelly and Aaron's place.

Labels: gastronomical adventures, relationships, Roadtrip, Tainan, taiwan

12.26.2005 Ma, nevermind turkey! Pass those intestines (a.k.a Christmas Day in Taiwan)

Well.... as if my Christmas Eve wasn't gastronomically adventurous enough. I got up in the afternoon and met my sweet sweet sweet former Taiwanese co-teacher Rita for some hardcore shopping. We headed to "Wu fen pu" ...... it's this little shopping district outside of Taipei city where there's tons and tons and tons of stalls and shops with wholesale clothing.

Now for hardcore shopping you must properly fuel yourself. And I am proud to say I have been fully screetched into Taiwan now. I had pig intestines (pig bowels if you want to be technical) for lunch. Surprisingly, it was ok. Fear Factor here I come!!!!

I mean if you can get past the look, and texture, and the idea of what it is.... it's ok. I think I got a shot of it but unfortunately my digital was dead so it'll be on film.

After hours and hours and hours and hours of shopping (I got some great stuff!) we headed back to Taipei.

I spent the evening with Meg at "Taiwan mom & dad"'s place (Hal and Jane) for pizza & beer!!!! mmmm Christmas dinner.

I have intestines *in* my intestines.

I think it's time for sleep.

Happy ho ho everyone.

Labels: gastronomical adventures, relationships, taiwan, Taiwan day trips, Wu fen pu

Christmas Eve Day

I spent Christmas Eve with my ex-roommate Meg. We had a late brunch at this really great little Vietnamese restaurant. I've been wanting to try Vietnamese forever. What better day than Christmas Eve. So I get the curried chicken soup..... mmm curry.... and after awhile Meg looks at me raises her eyebrow.

Meg: "So what do you think of the ducks blood?" Me: "*looking down into my bowl* mmmm is that the brown jelly chunks?" Meg: "*grin* yep" Me: ".................. so is it...... like tofu saturated with duck's blood or ...... coagulated duck's blood?" Meg: "I think the second thing you just said"

mmmmm duck's blood.

Next we went shopping for stocking stuffers. Stockings are really the only part of Christmas I like whatsoever... aside from seeing someone get freaked out about something I bought them. So I decided with my roommate (Jess) that we were doing stockings. I found all kinds of fantastic goodies (including a mermaid shoe horn .... oooo ahhh) and then Meg and I decided to hit our old neighbourhood. Meg was one of my original roommates the first time I lived in Taiwan.

So we had cake and coffee at the 3C.

It was as good as it looks.

Afterwards we hit the good ol Jingmei night market and I boug ht my absolute favorite "engrish" shirt to date:

I also bought a sassy punky sporty weird top set (should take a picture) with some Japanese on it. Hopefully it's just really bad Japanese (like the other shirt has really bad English) and hopefully it doesn't say "death to Japan".... hopefully it's more like "Japanese guys are cute" or "Japanese rock star"

Meg and I had both been invited to about 4 or 5 different Christmas Eve bashes. Personally I really didn't feel like drinking my face off for Christmas Eve. While debating what to do for the evening Meg and I played some chess....

Unfortunately we also polished off a bottle of wine and some extremely strong vodka/bailey's drinks.





We saluted Popo Caviar a great many times (may his soul rest in peace). I ended up passing out on the couch with a cat on my crotch.

All and all a fantastic Christmas Eve I think.

Labels: gastronomical adventures, relationships, taipei, taiwan

11.14.2005 In Vancouver!

I made it in one piece to Vancouver and Shell's been showing me the city (it's fantastic). I have about a month here before I return to Taiwan. Here is a pic of Shell and I from my first evening here.

Labels: relationships, Vancouver