The New Year

Gong hay fat choy (Cantonese)! Xi nian kuai le (Mandarin)! Happy Chinese New Year! Chinese New Year is a big deal here in Taiwan, and most businesses are closed for an entire week. Some people take two weeks off of work. Most of the time is spent eating with family and traveling. Our school has given us a week off, which is nice but at the same time it's tough because we are paid hourly.
We decided we needed to do something for our break because we have no idea how much longer we will be here for, and it would be a shame not to see as much as we can. So on Saturday morning we got up very early and met two other teachers, and we took a bus back up to Taipei. I must say, Taipei is cold compared to Taichung. It was probably around 50 degrees fahrenheit, rainy, windy, and humid (which makes it feel much colder).
We had a good time in Taipei. We were supposed to meet the teacher recruiting agency we used (Reach To Teach) for a hiking trip at Yangmingshan Mountain, but when we arrived at the train station the group was nowhere to be found, so we decided to do our own thing. Since Carolyn and I hadn't been to the National Museum we thought it would be a great time to go. We got on the MRT (Taipei subway, very efficient and nice) and rode it to the nearest stop where we got on a bus that brought us the rest of the way to the museum. The museum is quite nice. Apparently when the KMT were fleeing the communists in China they rescued (or plundered depending on how you look at it) all of the artifacts from the Forbidden City. They have a gigantic collection of ancient Chinese artifacts, jewelry, weapons, furniture, religious statues, and paintings. Supposedly the collection is so huge that they rotate the exhibits frequently so there is always something new to look at.
We ended up spending maybe 3 or 4 hours at the museum so we didn't pursue our planned follow-up activity of hiking. Instead we got back on the MRT and rode it out to Danshui, a suburb of Taipei where the Danshui River meets the ocean. Danshui is a nice town with a boardwalk, plenty of restaurants and stores, and a fishball museum. Yes we decided we should visit the fishball museum, but it wasn't nearly as awesome as I thought it would be. Fishballs here are essentially fish and various other ingredients formed into balls and fried. They use many different types of fish, squid, octopus, lobster, crab, and shrimp. The museum itself was rather empty. It only had some pictures, some old equipment used to make fishballs, and some scale models of fishing boats. There were some lonely fishballs in a freezer. I was hoping we could see fishballs being made and on display, but no such luck. It's OK though, I don't like fishballs. Carolyn however was sad.
After the museum we bought some piping hot sausage on the street which was nice considering the temperature. We strolled down to the boardwalk area where our friends played the carnival games for a bit, and then we took some pictures along the river. We were getting very cold by this point so we got back on the MRT and took it all the way back to Taipei. We then got on a shuttle bus and rode to Taipei 101, the tallest building in the world (though I think one somewhere in Dubai may be taller now). We were going to ride the elevator to the top of the building to see the view but we decided against it because it was expensive and dark out so we wouldn't be able to see much. Instead we ate dinner at the food court, got some ice cream, and checked out a nice bookstore.
It was a long day, so by 10p.m. we got back on the bus to Taichung. Since it was Chinese New Year's Eve every city we passed on the way back to Taichung was shooting off fireworks. It was pretty cool to see fireworks at night constantly on the bus ride home.
We don't have much else planned for the week but we are considering going to Tainan, the old capital of Taiwan. We will probably go hiking in Dakeng again and visit a hot spring to relax. I start working again on Monday, February 1st. My Tuesday/Thursday evening class ended so tentatively I work Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday morning for a total of 10 hours :( . I'm still looking for a job in Chicago though and I am still looking for work here so hopefully I find something!
Our friends Matt and Kristin are on a road trip/camping trip in Southern Taiwan for the week, so we are watching their dog. It's technically not their dog, they found it abandoned and are fostering it until they find a home for it. It's a small little white fluffy lap dog that you can imagine Taiwanese women love. It's personality is nice enough, but it smells awful and it must have been trained to urinate on newspaper in an apartment because after every walk when it gets back into our apartment it urinates on the floor. It's not a dog I would want to have but it's fine watching it for just a week (and Carolyn gets to clean up the urine because it was her decision to watch it!).

One Foot From a Scooter Accident

Sorry I have not written a blog post in awhile! Here is a new one that I hope is interesting.
This Saturday (1/18), Carolyn and I decided to drive our scooter down to another part of Taichung City that is rather far from where we live. I wanted to go there because I have an interview for a part-time English job at a school in the area and because Tunghai University is there which supposedly has a very nice campus. The drive down there was nice, although it takes awhile and I am having second thoughts about doing this commute every day if I get this job. We parked at the university and looked around the campus. The buildings are all very nice and seem to be Japanese inspired. In the middle of the campus is a landmark building in Taichung called Luce Chapel. It's a giant Christian Chapel that was designed to look like an upside down boat.

It's a pretty neat building and I bet it looks cool at night when all the spotlights are on it. It was nice walking around Tunghai because it was a lot quieter than the downtown where we live, and it smelled like grass and trees (a smell I only experience here when I go hiking). The smell where we live is predominantly car exhaust/sewage/stinky tofu. I am afraid of what the pollution here is doing to my lungs.
After walking around Tunghai we drove to a promenade with a bunch of shops nearby. It was here that I found the only Yoshinoya I have seen in Taichung City. If you have read my first post you will see that I ate at Yoshinoya my first full day in Taiwan. Yoshinoya is my favorite fast-food Japanese restaurant. The food is good, quick, fresh tasting, and cheap.
We were both getting pretty tired and it was starting to get dark so we decided to head back to our apartment. Since I drove to the university (with Carolyn sitting in the back), we agreed that Carolyn would drive us home. At this point in the day, around 5:30, the streets were starting to get packed. I realize driving here in Taiwan you have to assume that every motorist will make the least safe maneuver possible in every situation. Halfway home we had a prime example of a scooter driver doing something completely stupid. We were waiting at a stoplight with a pack of scooters and cars and the light changed to green. A guy from the other side on his scooter decides to zip out in front of the traffic and make it across before us scooters pulled into the intersection. Unfortunately we couldn't see him because cars were blocking our view and so all the scooters pulled out. We were in the front of the line along with a guy to our right who was also on a scooter. Well as we started into the middle of the intersection this guy zips across at a very fast speed and just plows into the left side of the guy to our right. Their scooters collided within 1 foot of us and it was scary. The guy zipping across making the stupid maneuver must not have had his helmet on all the way because it popped right off him as soon as he hit the other guy. Their scooters were really banged up but they both seemed alive fortunately. We did not stop to help because we were in the middle of the intersection and the people behind us were not stopping. Accidents must be so commonplace here that people just continue driving around without stopping or trying to make the scene safe.
That was the third accident I have personally seen occur here. The first one I saw was when a car making a left turn in an intersection pulled out in front of a scooter coming the opposite way. The guy on the scooter did a faceplant right into the car door. He had a helmet on so he got up and was blindly stumbling around. Luckily he did not die traveling at that speed, but I'm sure he had a concussion and possibly some broken bones. His scooter was smashed up and the car was also severely dented.
The large amount of accidents here makes me think twice about getting a job that requires me to commute by scooter. I would have to travel around during rush hour on a scooter with thousands of maniacs 4 days a week. I suppose I'd rather be broke and alive than dead with some money.
Today however was brighter. The weather was very nice, maybe 75 degrees and sunny with a cool breeze. We ate lunch at the park and then walked to the art museum. The art museum is nice but the exhibits kind of bored me. They were mostly modern art which I just don't find interesting. Afterwards we walked back to People's Park and looked at all the dogs people brought out to play. Later we went to PJ's Cafe which is a cool little cafe/pub with a very friendly owner named PJ. We had been there once before for Thanksgiving dinner. The food is pretty good and not too expensive. We got burritos and they were delicious.
So I want to tell everybody reading this that I am looking for a full time job back in the U.S. If you or anybody you know knows of such a position please please please e-mail me and let me know. The economy is so bad in Taiwan that people aren't signing up for English classes so I only work 12 hours a week average and Carolyn the same. I'm not rushing back without a job because at least I have an income here, and if things pick up here I will stay here for the full year like I planned. But at this point I'm not going to hold out hope that the economy will improve and more people will want to learn English. Please keep your eyes open and be sure to let me know if you see anything. I really appreciate it!

More Posts to Come

Hello everybody, I know I haven't posted much recently. I have taken a winter break from posting but I will soon begin to make some new posts. Things have been rather slow here (work and travel) so I haven't had many exciting things to talk about. But be sure to check back next week for a new blog post that is sure to be interesting!