Unemployed and Homeless (Taiwan)

I catch a taxi in less than 2 hours to catch a flight to Singapore... my thoughts are, I'll miss Taiwan. Its fun here, I've been having a blast. I'm so glad that I came here for my first international stop, I now have the courage to go out on my own.

Mike has been nothing but a great friend these past days. One day I was going to go out on my own while he was at work and he made sure that I was all prepared with a map, phone card & emergency contact #, keys, phrase book, and in the end a pick up ride from wherever I ended up. Thanks Mike!!! (For those of you who don't know Mike, we went to High school together, but then we also worked at Chapters together years ago, he left and moved on to Indigo... ironic.)

Sights I've seen:

Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall (in Taipei), Chiang Kai Shek's body in tomb (in Cihu).
All I know about this guy, is he basically made Taiwan what it is today by freeing it of the Japanese.

Long Shan Temple (in Taipei)
My first Budhist temple to see. I'm sure many more to come. I find it so interesting that they pray outside, in public where there's tourists taking pictures and stuff, as opposed to like the Mormon temple where the public are totally restricted.

Taroko Gorge (in Hualien)
Amazing... just amazingly beautiful. Mountains, waterfalls, dark tunnels, raw marble, marble bridges, bird shit on my shirt (well this wasn't so amazing), Pagodas, trees... just an astonishing place to see. Not only was this really cool to see, but it was an adventure riding up a winding road on the back of a scooter. Probably one of the coolest things I'll do my whole trip. I do intend to try and surpass this level of coolnees though.

Tung-Hua University (in.... Tung-Hua?)
Beautiful campass, with a little lake and cool buildings. It was a Sunday so not many students were about. We were visiting one of Mike's friends there, however she's not the best tour guide. Oh well, it was still fun.


My entertainment:

Shopping
Wow, if you need something, doesn't take long to find it. There's shops and markets EVERYWHERE! I think that every Taiwanese person owns their own shop, maybe two! If not a shop, then a food stand or restaurant. Normally there'll be a cluster of similar stores together, ie: shoes, cel phones, tailors. Creates a competitive edge I guess. In Taipei there was fancy district called Hsi Men Ding, you know, the big billboards and designer clothes, etc. Lots of CD shops where they alphabetize all the english stuff by first name, however not that many english CDs. That's ok, I'm holding myself back from buying any... however I realized there's a new Erykah Badu CD out that I really, really, really want. I just have to find it now.

Snake Eating only at the Night Maket
Yup, I did it! I had snake soup and had a tiny sip of snake wine (very stong). The snake itself didn't taste so bad, just like dull turkey and very bony. Didn't have any blood though, too expensive, I would of ran like a girl anyway if I was forced to drink the blood. Supposedly there's venom mixed in with it and you get a weird high and your body gets all warm. There's a big display box where you can choose which snake you want and then they kill it for you. Ewww.

Pubs
So we wanted to just hang out at a local bar and have a few drinks... you know. We went into one place called "Margaret" (I wonder if they were trying to spell the english word Margarita?) and were the only customers in the whole place. The two ladies there were very excited to have us though, they turned off their Chinese music and played some good ol' fashioned white music... Britany Spears!! It was the only CD they had, well actually they played the videos of Stronger, Oops... I did it again, and Lucky. They replayed it like 7 or 8 times!!!! The sad thing is I couldn't stop watching the videos and singing along. I think they finally got the hint that we didn't like Britany Spears and finally reverted back to the Chinese music.

Afterwards, we found another bar that had a live band. They played english cover songs, pretty good actually. There's a Heniken representative that gives you free prizes for ordering Heniken. I got a little money pouch, might come in handy. Mike got a little rugby ball... he loves rugby!


KTV
I think it just stands for Karaoke Television. Most interesting experience, there's tonnes of KTV's around. It's like a hotel, you go in and there's a swanky lobby with couches and a reception desk where you book a room for a certain period of time. They escort you up and inside there's leather couches and a big Karoke screen and microphones. Pick your own songs, drink some beer, eat some food at the free snack buffet and you're off to a great night of bad singing with your friends. I guess for a little $$ you can get an escort to join you and do "special favors".

English Teaching
I went to a few of Mike's English classes to keep me busy. It was actually fun to go, I learned some things about the Taiwanese culture doing so. Not to mention, I got to see Mike in action, made me think... I could do this too... hmmmm... maybe one day. Mike would always to introduce me after he did his roll call and all the student would just think I'm a new student. When Mike would tell them I'm from Canada, they got confused... "but... but... he's Asian... he's dark skinned... how can that be??" One of the words they were discussing was 'unemployed', Mike pointed at me and said that I was unemployed AND homeless. Hmmmm.... never thought of it that way, kinda weird but its true.

Yummy Chinese food... and Korean, Vietnamese and Japanese

All the food here is delicious. A lot of the Chinese food is actually quite the same than what you can find in Canada, which surprised me, just different veggies I guess. Then again, I only ate whatever Mike would order, he's learning the language and is able to pass by. Anyway, I'm sure there's a lot stuff on the menus that Mike and I have never heard of and is completely rare to find in Canada, but it sucks to try and order food you can't pronounce. Everyone always talks to me and I just turn my head to Mike. Before I left home, my friends and I were joking about asking the locals if they have "Chinese food". I don't know what I was expecting really.

Lots of bakeries everywhere... I love the bakeries.

Breakfast stands are color coded with red, yellow and orange signs.

There's a gross smell everynow that enters your nostrils and you think that its like a garbage truck driving by or maybe a dog shit in the alley or something. Nope, its "stinky tofu", don't know the Chinese name. Supposedly its really good though, must be if they cook it all the time. I guess its like how Filippinos have Tuyo fish and bagoong.

Little tidbits I've observed and learned

There's booths on the side of the road where a lady will get dressed up in a bikini or mini skirt and sell that weird stuff that makes your gums bleed. (kinda like chewing tabacco)

No shower curtains are used here, water splashes everywhere.

Its rude to leave your chopsticks standing up in your food.

Wedding rings are given at the time of marriage but are not worn in everyday life.

Its mandatory for men to give 2 years of military service.

Stray dogs everywhere... (Sonny you were right, I just never saw it). Supposedly these dogs know when to cross the street in conjunction with the stop lights, they'll normally go a few seconds before it turns green.



Hmmm... so many things I've seen but I can't remember them now. I've really got to run, my taxi is coming soon!!! Talk to you from somewhere else. Take care.