It's All Chinese to Me!

Finally Internet in Taipei! I've written a couple of entries on Word and pasted them here, enjoy!

September 4, 2008

Well, Kate and I have had an eventful and exhausting day! We arrived in Taipei at around 5:30am Taiwan time. After registering into the country we headed down to baggage pick-up only to find that our luggage didn’t make the transfer at Las Angeles onto Singapore Air. This was because our 2.5-hour layover ended up being a 30-minute one (that WE were lucky to make!). There seem to be more positives than negatives in this delay. Singapore Air gave us NTD2200 (CDN73) each (to tide us over) and is delivering our baggage to Joyland (our school) tomorrow (thus, we didn’t have to drag it around Tien Mu today!).

Tina (our boss) and her husband Andy met us at the airport as planned and on the ½ hr drive to Tien Mu we learned the horrors of the Taiwan road. Not only are there a lot of cars, but also the proximity of each to the other is unbelievable! Scooters are everywhere and it seems to be a miracle each moment that pedestrians are not run down by them.

Once in Tien Mu, Andy took us to Taipei City Hospital to have our health checks done. Other than an unnecessary concern for our abnormally large lymph nodes, all went well. The hospitals here are a) filthy b) crowded! And c) very open concept (you will be watched while you’re having your blood taken, x-ray performed and will be walked in on by other patients while having your check-up with the doctor). That being said, the health care is very inexpensive and somewhat efficient.

We spent a greater part of the day watching classes at Joyland in session and walking around Tien Mu. I impressed myself with my use of Mandarin while purchasing and attempting to barter with sales people. I shamefully realized that even in Taiwan, one does not barter in a department store! The two English teachers that we met at Joyland were very unfriendly towards us, but we later figured that is because we are a possible threat to them (to take their hours).

In the afternoon we met Virginia in front of her school: Taipei American School. We are staying with Virginia until we find a place for ourselves. She is great, even provided us with a long distance calling card so we could call home tonight! It is only 7:35pm Taipei time, but I am done like dinner. – L

September 8, 2008

This is long… so grab a green tea (in the spirit of what you will read).

We’ve got a home and have started nesting! It’s very exciting. We signed a one-year lease on Saturday for the place. This means no turning back now… unless I want to lose a 2 MONTH security deposit! The place is awesome! It is located in an alley (no alley is sketch in Taiwan, seriously…) just off the main street of Tien Mu (our district in Taipei). We live beside a huge (and FANCY) mall (Coach, Burberry stores), across from the Tien Mu baseball stadium (also huge) and down the street from Starbucks!! I especially like the view from our street, MOUNTAINS! Very large and beautiful mountains border Tien Mu and I love it! I cannot wait to run towards/in the mountains.

We pay the equivalent of CDN300 (NTD9000) a month for: our rooms (huge and each with an on-suite bathroom), furnished (bed, air-con, desk, wardrobe, bar fridge), cable tv (no tv yet, but our boss is loaning us one free!), internet, cleaning/maintenance, laundry machine, hydro and gas. All we need to pay is electricity which is only CDN0.13 (NTD4) per point on the meter. So, to sum it up, Kate and I have a pretty sweet deal! Signing the lease was hilarious. It’s all in Chinese so we had our boss Tina and her husband Andy negotiating and translating for us. For about an hour there were 5 adults and Kate and I all squished in Kate’s room “negotiating”. But even a simple Chinese conversation sounds like yelling to Kate and I.

On Sunday, after moving our suitcases into the apartment, Kate and I ventured to Carrefour, the “Walmart” of Taipei. We bought everything from shower brushes to clothes hangers (key in Taiwan w/ no clothes dryers) to slippers (this is also a MUST as outside dirt can never be trekked in to the home, school, etc…). It’s funny, but after living in Taiwan for only 5 days, overhearing someone speak English has become strange. You just expect to hear Chinese gibberish everywhere you go.

I’d like to focus on some specific surprises/moments/anything of interest now to entertain everyone back home.

• The Streets – Many aspects of the streets in my neighbourhood of Taipei (Tien Mu) may or may not surprise the readers of this blog. Traffic is INSANE (and that is the only word to describe it. Intersections can have up to 6 different roads leading into them and U-turns are an accepted and standard vehicular maneuver. Pedestrians, despite the signs at every intersection that state, “Pedestrians have the right of way,” are never safe while crossing. Thus, it is extremely important to always stay alert in order to avoid being hit by a car/bus/truck/bicycle/scooter/another pedestrian/an opening umbrella (they do NOT look before opening those damn things!). Crosswalks all have a countdown with an animated “walker” on them and they can give you anywhere from 10 to 100 seconds to cross any size street (I have yet to figure out what this time depends on).

• Sidewalks – may or may not exist depending on where you are walking. Most alleys do not have them, despite the fact that many alleys function as main streets. As when walking across the street, one must be extremely alert while walking on the sidewalk. I have so far had to dodge: bikes, scooters (yes, they also drive on the sidewalk…), people, millions of vendors EVERYWHERE, stray dogs (there are a lot), poo (yes, dog poo on the sidewalk, Kate and I believe there is a street sweeper who removes this…), and a child peeing in the drain (I know).

• The food – okay, this is a favourite subject of mine. Before leaving Canada I was worried about what I would eat while living in Taipei (where the main food is fish, fish and rice). While there is A LOT of fish EVERYWHERE, it is easy enough to avoid. To my great surprise, I love the food here! Ordering food is one thing (very difficult, and often I don’t get what I meant to order, or I get laughed at) but eating the food is another. My favorite is: this breakfast thing (no idea what it’s name is) that is made by throwing scrambled egg on the pan, covering it with a circle crepe thing, fried (add bacon and cheese if you want), rolled and cut. This is served with a scoop of something that looks like soya sauce but much tastier and the whole thing taste delicious!

• It is HOT – very hot. Especially after such a cold summer in Oakville, Taipei is a sauna! Katelynn is not as affected by the heat as I, but the first few days I felt like I was going to pass out every time we went outside. However, once you walk inside a store, the school or even your own house (if the air-con is on) you’re freezing. There’s never really a happy medium. Despite the warnings I received regarding Taipei pollution, I see nothing. There are always random smells (fish, scooter exhaust, nasty un-identifiable smells) but when I look up in the sky, it is blue. Maybe it’s because wind currents sweep all of the pollution that the island produces over to Mainland China ☺. Probably about half of the people (mostly women) that you see walking around on the street have an umbrella up. They do not like the sun! The sun seems to have a different power over here, no matter how much time Kate and I spend walking in the blazing hot sun, we are not burned and barely tanned! It’s very odd.

I was positive before I left Canada that in one way or another I would succeed in making a fool of myself daily in Taiwan, and I was right. I entered a bakery in the fancy-pants mall that is right near our apartment and for the life of me couldn’t spot a bag in which to place the tasty pizza bun that was calling my name. I went to an employee and asked her what to do (assuming that Bakery etiquette must be different on the other side of the world). She called over her friend who then walked me over to the trays and tongs (which I didn’t not see before), picked up one of each, took the pizza bun, placed it on the tray and walked it to the cash. Then all SEVEN employees began to laugh. Humiliated, I paid and shamefully carried out my hard-earned pizza bun.

There are so many more things that I want to write about, but I fear that readers’ eyes will grow weary. All in all, when I look around while walking on the street I think of three things: 1) Take away the Chinese signs and replace them with English and this place could basically be Toronto; 2) I am truly on the other side of the world, if not on another planet, this place couldn’t be more different than everything I’m used to; and 3) Stop day dreaming and be alert or you will be hit by something! ☺ - L

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