The Visitor

In which Hobbes Sees Our Lives Up Close (Poor Thing)

Hobbes flew in on the evening of Saturday the third.  Katy and I took a bus (a very posh bus) to the airport.  We were both excited, and reminisced about our own arrival.  Katy made a welcome sign in Chinese.  We held it up through various stages of excitement, anticipation, hope, and then weariness at entirely the wrong terminal for a while, before figuring out that there was a much bigger terminal accessible by sky train (creepily deserted, but effective).  We collected a somewhat worried Hobbes and found our bus back. 

We came back to our apartment and more or less slept immediately that first night.  The next morning I had a one-on-one class at School 8, so we met up afterwards and had dinner at a very nice little noodle place next to Da'an park.  After eating, we went to to see the flowers again.  Katy and Hobbes hadn't seen the show yet, so we wandered around for a bit and tried the candied tomatoes (Hobbes was a fan).  I saw some sections of the display I hadn't come across yet, but went home pretty quickly afterward due to exhaustion.  Katy and Hobbes split off and went to find dinner and the meditation group.

The week was, for me, a blur.  I left on Monday morning to do some editing, met Hobbes and Katy at the vegetarian buffet that I frequent, took Hobbes with me to the School 8 area, and deposited her at a Starbucks with instructions to meet me there after I was done with my classes.  I unfortunately (and unusually) had two that day - a regular class and a make-up.  I picked up Hobbes at 9:10ish and we made our way back to the Linsen area.  On Tuesday Hobbes and Katy went up to do some walking in the northern area of Taipei, while I prepped for my Tuesday class and graded their homework.  They had an oral quiz, and all did pretty well, apart from the two girls who have been entirely uninterested in the whole class.  

Wednesday morning Hobbes and I went to walk around the area with the art park and the art museum.  The art park was closed, but we finally made it into the Story House.  Weird stuff.  It was, when we went, housing a display of television and newspaper advertisements for nine or ten Taiwanese brandnames.  Soap, soy sauce, snake oil, stationary, toothpaste (see hei ren for a somewhat amusing history), and the necessary overpriced gift shop.  No photos were allowed in the building.  After my Sanchong class, Hobbes hung out at home until both Katy and I returned from our classes (another unusual thing - I had another make-up class on Wednesday).  On Thursday Hobbes took herself around and saw the touristy bits of Taipei - Taipei 101, etc - while Katy and I had class and editing.  I got done at 7 on Thursday, after a somewhat disturbing class in which one student was upset and wouldn't tell me why, and met Hobbes at the Taipei Main Station where we got some dinner and hit up the cultural gift shop for "hey, I've been to Taiwan" gifts for the folks back home, I presume.  I tried to find a trinket with the Taipei Railroad symbol on it, but the only one available was a hiddeous little alien figure with the symbol for a head.  Anyone wishing to take up metalsmithing is welcome to send me a Taipei Railroad symbol necklace.  Perhaps I'll find an arc-welder.

Friday morning we headed to the Peace Park area.  It was a pretty park, and we had lunch before-hand at another vegetarian buffet that was quite tasty.  The Peace Park (2-28 Park) commemorates an incident on February 28, 1947.  We wandered around until both of our cameras lost batteries, and then I had to go into work.  I dropped Hobbes off at the Starbucks again, and she uploaded her photos while I taught a couple of classes.  I finished my classes at ten, by which time Katy and Hobbes had eaten dinner at a little restaurant somewhere in the Da'an area.  We all met up back at our apartment and Hobbes and I stayed up while Katy took a nap.  We left the apartment to find transportation to the airport at 4 AM.  The busses weren't running yet, but we were approached by an extra-enthusiastic taxi driver who insisted that he could take us there.

The taxi driver was very nice, in spite of our initial suspicions.  He charged a bit less than the others (we considered the possibility that it might be a scam), and he was non-intrusive for the duration of the forty-minute ride.  He played a CD quietly and let us be giddy from exhaustion in the back seat.  At the end of the ride, we noticed that the music had a lot of harmonics in common with ABBA, and no sooner had that occured to us then a Chinese version of Gimme Gimme Gimme came on.  I asked him to write down the name of the guy singing, and he pulled one better and gave us the CD.  It turns out to be a CD he burned, and written on the disc are the words "hǎo tīng de gē."

We arrived at the airport at about 5:00.  It was deserted.  There was no one at the check-in desk, and after some peering blearily around, we discovered that it would not open until 6:15.  So we sat down in the waiting area and variously went to sleep (Katy), noticed our surroundings (Hobbes), or fought an all-consuming battle against startlingly heavy eyelids (me).  The staff got there promptly at 6:15, and Hobbes checked in and we hugged our goodbyes, then Katy and I made our way back to the terminal from which the busses left.  On our way to the sky-train, we ran into a young mother with a kid on her hip, one on the way, and a touchingly devoted husband who was having trouble with their metric ton of luggage.  We helped them get their baggage together and listened to her spout "Ai-o!"s and gratitude.  We made the bus and I spent most of the trip back staring vacantly at the seat in front of me.  When we got home, I made myself a cup of tea and promptly fell asleep before being able to drink it.

The New Year (Part The First)

In Which Western Holidays Are Documented

First, of course, you all must indulge me in a small bit of reminiscence - as far back as mid-December!  The Christmas decorations in Taiwan started going up before that, of course, but I'm only willing to delve so far into nostalgia -- even in the spirit of seasonal goodwill.  

I went with Sarah to a Chrysanthemum show a while back, and am finally putting up a few of the pictures.  It was surreal and dim, but lovely in the way that gardens are at night.  We wandered around for a while before coming back to join Katy for a game night we ended up not attending.  That was the last extra-curricular thing I took pictures of for a little while, apart from the views to and from work every day.

The daily commute featured such things as Strange Wall Decor, Stores With Dubious Wares, my students' Writing Books, Buildings, the Santa Clause Bus Drivers (none too pleased), and Sunset.

Sarah and I went out to dinner at a thoroughly charming little restaurant that reminded me in a not unpleasant way of the Black Cat Café in Ashland.  On our way there we were dizzied by one church's display of Faith and Electricity in honor of the season.  We ate and talked, and determined to return someday (we haven't yet, but we've been unavoidably distracted by other things - like holidays).  On our way back, Sarah declared her desire to introduce me to a friend of hers (I believe I mentioned him in an earlier post), Xie Yu-Cheng.  I met with him for a lovely dinner shortly thereafter and we have been having charming and extremely helpful (for me, at least) exchanges since.

My A10 class had a unit on ghosts, so I told them the story of Taily-Po.  Ann, the oldest girl (14) started out skittish, and when I got to the point where the story goes "Boo!" everyone jumped.  But Ann screamed.  It wasn't a little shriek of startlement, either, it was an outright scream.  One of the teachers next door stuck his head round, and I reassured him.  The rest of the class thought it was hilarious.  To my delight, about five minutes later the quietest girl in class pulled the balcony curtain aside a little, peered out, and said in Ann's general direction, "Oh! What's that?"  For the first time, that class was unified and interested.  They spent the break drawing their rendition of the monster.

On the twenty-third, there was a new addition to Taiwan from their mainland cousin, commemorated by very cute bread-things in the local bakeries.

We had a quiet and homey Christmas/Chanukah dinner.  Katy and I made dinner and invited Sarah and Jenny to join us.  We had mashed potatoes and squash and latkes (I made them in a wok) before opening presents under the bamboo-cum-Christmas-tree and lighting the menorah (while wearing a Santa hat).  Oh, we are so terribly multicultural it hurts.

I had dinner with Yu-Cheng on New Year's Eve, then went to Sarah's house to see the fireworks.  Her family's apartment building has a roof from which there's a pretty clear view of Taipei 101, and at midnight there were a lot of fireworks off of the building.  I'm not entirely certain of how to take photos of fireworks at night - anyone with input is welcome to advise.

New Year's Day, I went to Da'an Park with Sarah and her family.  There were a lot of flowers.  We met up with Jenny and Katy and went back to Sarah's house to bake cookies.  They were delicious.  Cranberries and chocolate chips and coconut and walnuts and lip-smacking goodness.  I do like making cookies.

Further New Year updates when Chinese New Year comes around.  In the mean time, our friend Hobbes is coming to visit (hi, Hobbes!) for a week or so very soon.  Our first visitor!

新年快樂!

Happy 2009, everyone!

Things That Are Going Well

In which several Good Things are Enumerated

Number One: We have been graced with the gloriousness of a new-fangled and hi-falutin' water heater.  It 'most glows with freshness and practicality and, most of all, not-being-broken.  We now are the fortunate recipients of such amenities as water pressure and warm showers.  All praise be to those that deserve it.

Number Two: My delightful conversation partner, Sarah, introduced me to a gentleman friend of hers (more of a proletarian most times, he hastens to assure me) with whom I enjoyed an absorbing dinner last Sunday.  He is Taiwanese, but spent last year at the University of Chicago studying public policy.  We seem to have a great deal to talk about, and I am quite pleased to have another Taiwanese friend.  He has promised to help me with my Chinese.  I think he will be a firm teacher with strict goals, which is beyond useful for me right now.  Exactly what I need.

Number Three: My classes are going splendidly.  There are occasionally hiccoughs, but primarily things are running quite smoothly.  I did a story-writing exercise with my A3 class today, and I think I may have actually managed to explain the importance of continuity in tense and topic.  Whether they follow through with it is another matter entirely, but it was nice to have their attention all focussed on the thing to which I was pointing.  They left the room laughing, five minutes after the bell rang.  Another teacher sat in on the earlier part of my class today and mentioned before-hand that he'd been told I was one of the best.  I am sure that's at least a little hyperbole on the Academic Director's part, but it was lovely to hear.  

In Short: Things are going well.

Drunk and Incompetent

I should never have gone in the first place.  I don't like bars, I don't like drunks, and I don't particularly like being up very late in the company of the latter at a table in the former.  But it was a farewell party for a friend/co-worker, and I'd said I would attend, so I did.  We'd been through a rough week: the water heater in our apartment has been broken for about two weeks, and this week the landlady sent someone in to fix it.  After many, many miscommunications about the time and the keys and the apartment number (they replaced the water heater in a different apartment, but not ours), a workman showed up, punched a hole in the wall, turned the lights on and off, and left.  Today another three came, punched a couple more holes in the wall, and now we can get hot water, but only if the sink in the bathroom is on at the same time as the shower.  Katy and I got home from our respective schools and had a lovely talk about hardcore music and the debatable merits of being angry, so perhaps I was not in the right frame of mind to be patient by the time we left.  

The friend -- let's call him Bob -- was obviously drunk by the time I arrived.  He was banging on the table with enough force to knock glasses over, and somehow still being served and not being thrown out.  I sat on the other side of the table, ordered some mulled wine (first experience - not bad), and tried to be entertaining and entertained instead of appalled and angry.  I don't think I succeeded very well.  Bob kept apologizing to me, but as the evening wore on, he got less and less coherent about it, until he was just saying "I'm sorry," at regular intervals, without anything in between.  Finally, after lots of shouting and banging, he came around the table and sat next to me, leaning in.  "Rowan, I'm sorry," he said.  "For what?" I asked.  "Just, I'm sorry."  I looked across the table.  This appeared to be the wrong thing to do.  He grabbed my face with his hand and turned my head back toward him.

Now, maybe it's the teaching, maybe it's the brief amount of time I spent learning the basics of street fighting (cheat, cheat early, often, and ruthlessly), or maybe it's the ridiculous ways people tend to see me, but I don't have any trouble communicating when I'm really, truly angry.  "Bob," I said.  I did not yell.  The guy across the table heard me and immediately started paying attention, but I'm pretty sure no one else did.  "Bob, if you touch me again I will disembowel you."  He dropped his hand and cocked his head to the side.  "Really?" he said, like he was questioning the answer to a confusing math problem.  "Yes," I said. "Really."  The guy across the table said, "Bob-" and Bob said, "No.  I want her to kill me."  I decided it was time for me to leave, so I slid under the table and shook hands with everyone and toddled off to the MRT.

Now.  Can anyone tell me what is so attractive about drinking to excess?

More Snapshots

Once again, my loyal readers, it has been far too long.  It's not quite a month since I last put finger to keyboard in an effort to catalogue my activities here for the enjoyment of those elsewhere.  I'm sure you've all gotten quite bored in the mean time.

It's solidly autumn here now, although the locals keep telling us it's winter.  The weather has been pretty consistently under the 75ºF, 23ºC range.  It fluctuates pretty wildly - in the morning it's been around 12ºC (that's 53ish in ºF), gets up to 21ºC in the afternoon, and then back down to 11 or 12ºC at night.  The rain mostly seems to come in the evening these days, usually while I'm teaching.

I was elated at the US election results.  Everyone was talking about it in the days leading up to the election, but since then there's been nary a word.  Katy and I sometimes talk about the things going on in the States, but most of the other people here seem pretty unaffected.  Of course, I'm the only FT in my school from the US, which might have something to do with it.  All the other FTs are from Canada, England, South Africa, or Australia.  

This has been the month of getting sick.  Katy's been fighting a cold for the last forever or so, and I picked it up last week.  I'm almost entirely recovered now, but for the residual cough.  I got a jacket and a scarf for the cooler parts of the day, and felt like a wimp doing so, but I'd rather be warm and feel foolish than be sick.  Our apartment isn't heated, but so far that hasn't been a problem.  I'm hoping it will remain a non-issue.

My students are wonderful.  They're teaching me a lot about teaching, and about learning.  Each of my classes responds to a different style, and it's exciting and challenging.  It's incredibly rewarding every time I learn what works well for a class.  Last week one of my classes refused to leave the classroom when the bell rang because they wanted to keep playing the vocabulary game we were in the middle of playing.  Made my week.

I will try for more frequent updates.  I have more to say if I'm not trying to cover a month all at once.

Snapshots Between Classes

My eternal apologies for being so silent for so long, my most estimable and patient friends and kin.  In the last two weeks, my teaching hours have gone from 12 to 21, bringing my total hours on paper to 27 per week.  This estimate, of course, does not take into account the preparation time, nor does it make clear that I've been working seven days out of every week.  My time for doing other things, in short, is in short supply.  This log suffers.

I find myself with a bit of time now, though, and will do my best to rectify the abominable void that has replaced news of me in the past weeks.  

I went up to Danshui with a fairly new acquaintance, Basharat (from England) to see the sunset and wander.  The sunset was lovely, although Bash missed it.  The sun appeared to be crashing into the horizon very slowly.

I got a new M1 class, and oh my stars and garters they are cute.  Challenging, but cute.  They're the first class to be really affectionate - they all give me hugs.  They're all quite rambunctious, too.

Halloween was also cute.  Uneventful, but cute.  Rita, the Sanchong librarian, decorated the Sanchong school rather too well, I think.  

Jenny (Katy's conversation partner), Sarah (mine), Katy and I all went to Yinghe a while ago and managed to find a place that would let us throw some of our own pottery.  It turned out pretty well.  We got to choose the glaze.  I will always miss kick-wheels and the experimentation of making my own glazes in Ms. Parson's class.  But they turned out alright.

We went to dinner with Chris and Debbie and Chris's class for his birthday.  There was a very cute little girl there who had perfected the art of eating soup.  

If this entry is disjointed and flighty, forgive me.  There is much to tell and not enough time to devote to telling it.  I am sacrificing quality for quantity.

The weather has cooled significantly.  Today was lovely - in the 70s and mostly sunny, breezy, dry.  It's been raining a lot.