Weekend Wanderings

       This week Greta went to Japan with Tyler.  Anthony and I stayed in Jhongli and worked. Fair? Maybe not, but the idea of traveling far away just sounds so exhausting right now, especially when Greta booked her flights.  Aside from working all week, we had a pretty great weekend together.
         Friday night we had been planning on going to the night marker near our apartment.  Although by the time we both got home we were tired, we decided to go anyways.  I was in the mood to try some new food and we hadn't gone to the night market together for a while.  We got there and had a bit to eat and were walking around.  I was still in search of noodle soup of some sort, when "Oh no, is it raining?"  Of course it is.  Did we bring an umbrella?  Of course not.  Why would we bring an umbrella when we leave the house after living in Taiwan for 8 months and are very aware of the fact that it rains all the time? Well we kept meandering down the market as the vendors hauled ass clearing their things up and bundling them with tarp.  I was really quite impressed with how quickly they got everything put away, I'm sure they have years of experience. So there we were, walking around in the now pouring rain, the 7-11 across the street was packed with people, so we walked a few blocks to the next one and purchased yet another umbrella.  By this time we were already soaking, but it only continued to rain harder and harder on the rest of the walk home.  Lesson re-instated, but we'll probably never really learn, for the love of God bring your umbrella when you go outside! Well, I'll only have myself to blame when all my hair falls out from the acid rain.
         Saturday morning I actually didn't have to work!  A new teacher came last week, and took over my class. However,I still "get" to do Open Houses in YangMei all the time, now on Saturday mornings as opposed to Saturday afternoon's after my class.  This week there wasn't an OH on Saturday, it was Sunday morning, so don't be too jealous. Sunday OH's are done at the local libraries instead of the usual McDonald's and tend to yield more kids as well, strangely enough.  Back to Saturday though.  Anthony still had to work, until 330.  I met him for lunch break, and when he went back to work I walked around and shopped for a few hours, sadly with no luck,  but still had a nice afternoon ending with a treat of Starbucks!
       Later in the day, after Anthony had returned from work, we went to get my birthday present, yes only a month late.  He knew what I wanted, but was waiting until we could go together.  I got an awesome mint green Swatch!  It's beautiful and I love it.

Then, we decided it would be nice to go somewhere for Happy Hour.  Yeah, right.  If only such a concept existed here in Jhongli.  If you want a happy hour your options are going to the 7-11, selecting 1 of 4 different styles of beer (that all taste the same) and sitting there by the window to "enjoy."  Or you could just purchase and return to sit in your apartment. by the window, or not.  We walked around to see all the closed bars and realized it was time for supper.  We tried a place we'd never been, and had shabu shabu (hot pot).  It was yummy.  When we were done, the weather was so nice out (not raining!)  we decided to go on for a walk, and be classy foreigners and drink beer while walking around. Yes, I know all the other foreigners are judging us ( and perhaps you are too), but sometimes you just have to take advantage of the non-laws here.  Our walk took us another market area, where I finally convinced Anthony to buy some new shirts!  I also founds some things this time, including an awesome Mustard Yellow Sparkle Hat!! Clearly it needed to be worn right then and there, so I spent the rest of the evening in my new hat.

You can see the agony in Anthony's face because he doesn't have a mustard yellow sparkle hat.  

 On the way back home we chilled in the park for a while, where our dog friend naturally found us and came to hang out.
        About our dog friend.  There are loads and loads of stray dogs over here, just roaming, shitting, sleeping on streets at all times.  There's this one that I believe belongs to this guy who maybe lives on the streets as well, I'm not sure.  We see him alllll the time (the dog, not the man), and over the course of the past... 4 months or so, he's been following us everywhere and pops up whenever we're hanging outside (again, the dog,).  One time he followed Anthony and I all over downtown and would follow us into stores and people looked at us like "why is your big smelly dog in here? Only small poodles are allowed in stores don't you know!" (which really is true, or at least people bring their small dogs in stores all the time). What could we do?  It's not really our dog, he's just following us, and if we spoke the same language, I would tell them that.  Eventually we lost him when some store workers shooed him away.  A lot of times if we're at the park or outside places, he always shows up, and it's like "hey, I know that dog."  I think he has a thing for foreigners, cause many of our friends have the same experiences with him.  Last night he was laying near Anthony and I and there were a number of people in the park, many runners and people just enjoying the weather.  He was chillin, then he jumped up and started barking at this one man who then gave us the look of "control your dog!"  so we yelled "booshe" at the dog which means "no" in Chinese, because really, the dog probably doesn't speak English.  Then we decided that would be his name.  Booshe the dog is our friend, and eventually he left us for some other interesting people, but he'll be back, he always is.

He sniffed us out, and stayed for a while.  

       










        Sunday I worked in the morning for a bit (read above if you've forgotten why) and then Anthony and I decided we were actually going to do something with our day together and headed in search of the Shimen Reservoir.  This is a Dam area in LongTan (where I teach kindy), that I've heard is really pretty and has some good hiking trails.  I tried searching for how to get there, but couldn't find much, so we just drove to Longtan and hoped there would be signs, and in English.  Well there were, and we miraculously found what we were looking for!  This alone was rather exciting.  It was again really great weather and the reservoir was neat with pretty mountains around and not too many people.  Originally we had planned on hiking, but weren't sure of finding the trails, and found that when we entered the park it was ideal for scootering around.  We stopped at the dam area and walked around for a while, took some pictures, and then scootered through the mountainous area for an hour or two.

   









        Funny thing about when Anthony and I scooter together.  Since it's MY scooter, and I drive all the time, it only makes sense that I drive.  So Anthony must ride sitting behind me.  I bought a heavy duty helmet to protect my head every day, obviously Anthony has no use for such an item.  The girl I bought the scooter from also gave me her old helmet, which is perfect to use as a spare helmet, and it's bright pink.  Today when leaving the dam area, Anthony was reluctant to put his helmet back on and says to me "Those guys over there are laughing at my pink helmet, and because my girlfriend's driving me around."  :)

Don't worry, we weren't driving while taking the picture.  I tried to get the scenery, but I always fail.  

I look like a goon, but I got the background this time!

SPOILER ALERT: First Field Trip, Sun Moon Lake, Ali Mountain, Egg Hunt, Ukulele.

      This has been a busy week!  It started with a field trip on Tuesday with my Kindy class.  We took a bus to Dashi, a small town about half an hour from LongTan, and went to the Old Street Market to walk around.  Each student brought 50NT so they could purchase a toy, as we were going to a toy store there.  The theme this month is Toys, so it was appropriate.  Since it was only about 10 am, not many other things were open.  It was a pretty smooth field trip trying to keep 18 3 year-old's in check, no one was hit by a car or anything.

 

 The Old Street in Dashi.
 





The kids looking at toys.  Definitely not what you'd see at Toys R'Us.

 Waiting in line nicely waiting to pay the man. Note the big wooden Buddha.

   





Most of them got these windmill things they thought were pretty neat.

     







Aaaand back on the bus! This is what all school buses look like here.  Ours has the hippo sticker since that's HESS's mascot.


      The next day all hell broke loose in class.  Before Exercise Time Jimmy shit his pants and had to be cleaned and changed, not by me thank goodness. Then  I went into the room to find Kylie, the Chinese Teacher, feeling nauseous and about to vom in the sink.  During snack time Sophia gagged and spit up into her plate, and then after Jimmy drank his bowl of milk he stood up only to spew it all over the floor.  Messes everywhere!  Everyone was sick.  Luckily I'm still doing ok.

      Then on Wednesday night, Tyler arrived!  We went to get him from the airport that night, and brought him to experience "The dumpling shop."  He had some noodles, and apparently it was also his first time eating with chopsticks!  Thursday we set out for Sun Moon Lake!  We took a bus to the HSR (High Speed Rail), then the HSR to Taichung, then another bus from the Taichung station to Nantou, which is the county that holds Sun Moon Lake.  About 2 to 2 1/2 hours total to get there.  Sun Moon Lake is beautiful.  We got there on a Thursday, and since it wasn't a holiday weekend or anything, there were hardly any people.  There's not much of a "town" or anything around the lake, just a few souvenir shops, some restaurants, and loads of hotels scattered around the lake.  Our hotel was quite ritzy, with touch screen lighting, a Jacuzzi in the bathroom with a flat screen TV, and a little Japanese living room table.  After checking in we walked around the shops and took a boat ride across the lake to another area.  There were tons of people there, and a walking area with some painted rocks they were all crazy about getting photographed with.  Then we had supper at an outside cafe, walked around some more, and then back to the hotel.  There isn't much of a "night life" there.

 Me with many of the boats at dock.



The view from our hotel room at night, and then in the morning!  There were lots of bicyclers out in the morning on the pathway.
   

   





   




  The next morning we got on a bus that circled the lake, but made various stops were you could get off, and then back on another bus whenever you wanted.  We stopped at a few temples around the lake and walked around to get some good pictures.  There was also an area were you can take cable cars up to The Aboriginal Cultural Village, which is actually just an amusement park?  Yeah. And that's really all there was on the other side of the cable cars, so we rode them just for fun I guess, but it was a nice view of the whole lake. Tyler was quite frightened by the height.

The weather was amazing while we were here.  A little hot sometimes with walking so much, but it was beautiful.  

 The water looks wonderful.  I wanted to jump in. That little circle island you see on the left, that's the "moon" and the rest of the lake is the "sun." Hence, Sun Moon Lake!

Going up in the cable car!  

Friday was our last day at Sun Moon Lake, so once we were done traveling the lake, we got on a different bus to take us back to the HSR in Taichung.
           Here we rode the train further down south to Chiayi where we would spend the night before heading up to Alishan Mt. early Saturday morning.  It was only a half hour ride from Taichung to Chiayi, but then we needed to take a shuttle bus from the HSR to the train station in town, and then a taxi to our hotel.  So many different forms of transportation!  This hotel was great as well, it's called the Nice Prince Hotel.  After checking in here we spoke with the front desk about how to go about getting up to Ali Mt.  Originally we had wanted to make it up the mountain in time to see the sunrise.  Ali Mt. is well known for having a fabulous sunrise view.  However, it takes 2-3 hours to get up to the top by bus, so they said we'd need to leave like 2:30 am.  We decided to save the sunrise for another time, and just go up in the morning at a normal hour.  The rest of Friday night we walked around Chiayi in search of a restaurant, we took Tyler to a teppanyaki place, where they cook it right in front of you.  It was delicious.
      We planned on taking the 8:10 bus up to the mountain, but needed to go to the train station to get the bus.    It was a bit difficult figuring out where to go, and all sorts of people with vans were walking around trying to harass us about riding with them for a cheaper price.  My limited Chinese includes the phrase "buu yow" which means "I don't want" but they just didn't take me seriously.  We got our tickets for the real bus, and were off!  This bus ride was rather scary.  The driver was in some sort of hurry I guess and drove like a maniac!  On narrow, winding roads up a mountain with traffic coming down the other lane.  Looking out the window you could see so far down, and there wasn't much of an edge to keep you there.  I slept off and on, and it was 2 and a half hours to the top.
         The bus dropped us off and we went to find the famous little red train that drives you around up there.  We took that to the end of one path, and then hiked around on the trails for a while.  Sadly we missed the blooming flower season by like... a week.  There were maybe 4 trees with flowers still present, otherwise it was just dead petals all over the ground.  A bit sad.  We also failed to find the view of "a sea of clouds" as the train running to that part was closed, so we weren't sure how to find it.  It was a nice foresty area though, so I wasn't disappointed.  We stayed up at the top walking around for about 3 hours, then took the bus back down the mountain, back into town, back to the HSR, and then we were headed for home! Side note, Anthony has not disappeared, he just didn't take the days off work to be able to come with us.  He's still well and alive!

 One of the few Sakura Trees left.  

This tree is 1,000 years old! Holy moly.

So many treeeeeees. 

 Mountains and clouds forever.

       
        Now, Abe had been planning his monthly theme party for April to be held on this Saturday night.  We got back to town around 6 30, and it started at 8 30.  Since it's April, and Easter just passed, he had an Easter egg hunt in store for us.  He painted eggs and hid riddled notes inside of them, all leading to one golden egg at the end.  Tyler was tired from just arriving in Taiwan and already doing a lot, plus his flight left Sunday morning at 8 am  for Japan, so he opted out of the hunt.  We had 4 teams of 4 or 5 people.  My team was Greta, Nate, Rainy, and Austin.  Oh, and only Greta, Rainy, and I are from Jhongli, and Rainy's English isn't perfect, so I think we were at a slight disadvantage.  Our first clue mentioned "A river" so we thought, for sure the bar "The River" that we frequent. Well we went in, no egg, but Jinger was working, so we all had a shot, and set out to the apple store, cause it also mentioned an apple.  It wasn't there either, so we called The Master of Games (Abe) and said we didn't know.  He told us the bar, but not inside. Ahhh. So baaack to The River (and another shot) and we found it.  This one mentioned being lazy, and a bird, clearly The Lazy Bird.  Since we took so much time finding it though, they were closing and moping the floors.  Luckily the staff there knows us, and Abe had given them the egg to hold, so they let us in and we had our next clue.  This one we didn't even need to read the whole thing, and we knew it was at Search.  Greta found it hidden under a bench.  Well, then we got the call that another team had won.  Oh the sting of defeat.  There was still one more egg to be found, but everyone decided to go to the bar in the park since it was so nice out, so there's still one more egg out there.  I was told it's outside our apartment somewhere actually.  Anthony's team won, and it was 50 NT to play so the winning team could have a small prize.  They spent their winnings on drinks in the park.  It was fun hunt.

                 Our team photo.

      Today is now Sunday, and tomorrow back to work from my small vacation.  Anthony and I went out for a while this afternoon as I need a new phone card and he wanted to get some sandals.  So down the street from our apartment is a laundry mat, there used to be 2.  Although we have a washer, we lack a dryer so we bring our clothes down to dry them.  We used to like the one on the corner, it was pretty ghetto so no one really went there.  Then one day it was closed, and then another day, then we saw them tearing everything out.  Then a few days later it opened.  As a ukulele store.  So random.  Anyways today as we were walked home, I stopped to take a picture of it, then Anthony become curious about how much one costs.  We went in and he decided he must have a ukulele.  There were 2 guys in back playing together and came out to try and talk with us.  I think they were pretty amused that 2 Americans wanted a ukulele when I was saying how Anthony didn't even know how to play it.  They were laughing, but very friendly.   I convinced him to get a colored one.  Now Antony has a cute little yellow ukulele and he's looking up the chords and practicing it right now.

So cute :)

Yehliu

       Yesterday we got a holiday from work!  April 4th is Children's Day in Taiwan, so everyone got the day off. It was quite nice to get a little break, and although it was in the middle of the week we wanted to take advantage and get out of Jhongli. 

       Before Wednesday was Tuesday, which happens to be Trivia night!  Since usually I always have to work so early during the week I've only gone once before to Trivia.  A bunch of us from work planned to go together Tuesday night.  Trivia consists of a lot of foreigners from Jhongli that get together at this restaurant called Johnson's I think, some old Taiwanese man owns it, and the regulars all take turns coming up with questions every week.  This week was Ben's turn, a guy that we work with and a regular at trivia night.  It costs $110 NT to enter, so that the winning team gets to split the pool!  Then everyone writes down their name on paper and the teams are made at random.  I was lucky and got put on a team with people that know a lot of random things.  I, however, did contribute like 4 answers!  And my team won!!! Each of us got $450 NT, about 15 US dollars, holla!  

    For the next day we had planned a trip to go see Yehliu, on one of the northern tips of the island.  Yehliu is a big Geopark that's famous for it's unique rock formations and gorgeous views.  Originally a few of our friends had been in for this day trip, but after having maybe too much fun Tuesday night, they decided to opt out, and since Anthony's had a bad cold all week, he didn't come either.  It was just Greta and I plus a friend from training who lives not too far from us, Stephanie.  After looking online I figured it would take about an hour and a half to get there.  We would take the train to Keelung, and then a bus from Keelung to Yehliu.  Welllll it turned out to be almost 2 hours just to get to Keelung, and then another 30 minute bus ride winding through the mountains where we had to stand the whole time.  Let me tell you I did not feel so well bumping along those roads.  I thought for a while I was going to throw up, don't worry though, I had a plan.  There was a little kid standing near me with a plastic bag full of some food, I was just going to snatch his sack, dump out the contents, and I wouldn't have to barf all over the bus!  

        Luckily, I made it off the bus, and didn't have to throw up anywhere.  It was a short little walk to the coast from the bus, and we were hit with an amazing view of the water and the air felt so fresh and clean.  It was an absolute fabulous day out as well.  Super sunny and warm with a great breeze!  Being in Yehliu made made me very sad that I live so close to the coast, yet so far away!  Why can't I see this kind of stuff in Jhongli!?  Since it's like a little cape/peninsula, there's a 3.5 km (like 5 mile?) walk that wraps around the whole part.  We walked along the whole thing, and then climbed up where you could overlook water on all three sides around you.  It was beautiful, and definitely worth the awful bus ride to get there.  

     Taiwan's "real" name is Formosa, or Ilha Formosa which means "beautiful island" in Portuguese as it was Portuguese sailors who discovered the island.  Going to Yehliu reminded me that hey, it really is a beautiful island that I live on, even if I can't always see it.  

       On our way back we chose to take a bus straight from Yehliu to Taipei, and then a train from Taipei to Jhongli which cut down on time as well as cut out the terrible standing bus back to Keelung.  Then we got home and made tacos!!! Well... taco meat and such over chips, tortilla shells don't exist here.  And then, that night when I checked my e-mail I got the most wonderful news that Ariel has booked her trip and will be coming to visit me!!!!!!!!!!!! She'll arrive on May 29th! I sure have a great next two months coming up!

 

These were weirdy bugs that were creepin' around everywhere.  I may have found one of their nests.  





A little cave! 

 The rocks remind me of honeycomb, it's so crazy how they become like that! Some people posed their dog and were taking pictures, I was smitten with their dog as well.  

 These rocks in water made me think of octopus! 

                     

                 I was sooo happy here! 

 Walking up the tons of winding stairs.  It was extremely windy being right on the water.  

So lovely.  

 These rocks are a large part of what draws people here. I think this one looks like a dragon face!