Happy Moon Festival 2007

It's that time of year again! Happy Moon Festival to all of you!

Oh wait-- Holy crap! Congratulations Viktor and April! My former Fulbright colleagues shocked us all with the good news this weekend that they are expecting a bouncing bundle of joy this winter. Wow!

Moon Festival, aka Mid-Autumn Festival, marks the autumnal equinox, I think. It's a national holiday here. There's some mythology about it... Something about a princess shooting arrows and flying to the Moon and living there with a jade rabbit or something. I dunno. Mostly it's about people getting out of work and school so they can have a barbeque with their friends and family. If you live in Taipei, as millions do, you likely don't have a back yard for your barbeque, and if you aren't the lucky SOB who occupies the upper floor of your building and thus has access to the rooftop, don't despair. You can take your little hibachi grill out to the sidewalk and-- what's that? You have no sidewalk? Oh-- the sidewalk is crowded with scooters. Well, just set it down in the street and hunker down for some grilled meats and vegetables. Yum.

Really, Moon Festival is a cool time. Kind of like a Thanksgiving, I guess. It's not exactly a religious holiday, just a time for people to get together and enjoy food. We've had a four day weekend, but I'll also have to work on Saturday to make up for Monday. Stupid. Anyway.

Luke and I went to the Taiwan Beer Garden on Saturday with his Canadian Hockey Team frat brothers. Actually, they are very nice guys and fun to hang out with. The Beer Garden was fun. It's located at the Taiwan Beer factory. There's no cover, there's plenty of space (wow!) and there's some outdoor seating in the offhand chance it's neither raining nor miserably hot in Taipei. There were lots of western folks there as well as Taiwanese. Maybe 50-50. The beer was cheap by Taiwan standards but I'd say reasonable by US standards (nobody drinks here, yo), and it was a generally jovial scene. Luke and I even saw friends we'd met playing poker at James' house. It's a small world, after all. And yeah that's right, I play poker now. Well, I did once and I wanna try again.

After the Beer Garden we cabbed back to my 'hood, where I walked home and the rest of them went to a club. Apparently I missed out on a wild night, which is just as well. It's not easy to get back on track for the week when I stay up late and sleep in on the weekends. I'm minimizing that this year. And really, I don't much feel like doing it anyway.

The next day, Sunday, Luke and I got a late start going to Yangmingshan, a national park in the mountains north of Taipei. Luke has his scooter here (my moto is still in Yilan County-- I'm waiting on my ARC (green card) so I can renew my registration) so we doubled up and hit the road. I did the driving, as he was too tired. It was great fun to ride again, although I felt a bit nervous in the city traffic, so I rode very slowly and cautiously. As we got out of the city and started up into the mountains, the sunny skies gave way to clouds, fog and rain, which is common up there, I suppose. We rode to an area called Xiaoyoukeng, where we parked, walked around a bit, and saw what little we could see-- at that point, we were basically inside a cloud, and it was rainy and windy. There was a visitor center and some lookout points and a few soggy picknickers. We scouted out the trails and maps and decided we'd go back the next day to climb to the peak of Qixingshan, the tallest mountain in northern Taiwan.

This was from half-way along the drive to the park. I know I look silly. It's windy!

Here's a panorama I put together. The color is weird because it's two different photos.

And that's what we did. Went home that night and rested up. Monday, yesterday, was

a beautiful blue sky day in Taipei, and we got on the road by noon for the 40 mins up the mountain. Again, the mountains were rainy and foggy, but this time we had more daylight to make the hike. It was maybe a 50 minute walk up to the peak and back, and not very strenuous. There are stone steps all the way. I think there are longer and more serious hiking trails around the park, and I plan to explore some more. The visibility was awful there. On a clear day, we should have been able to see the city on one side and the ocean on the other, but we were lucky to see 50 yards through breaks in the cloud cover. It was was wildly windy, too. With the fog, the mist, the scattered hot springs and steam vents and their sulphur smells, the place had quite a mystic feel.

That night, we went to a barbeque at one of Luke's Taiwanese friends' house. Adrian, an American classmate of Luke's who insists on speaking only Chinese, accompanied us. I admire his resolve, but I gotta say, it feels weird to speak Chinese with someone when you both speak English natively. It's fine with my classmates, none of whom are native English speakers, but all of whom speak English quite well, because there's no obvious reason for us to speak English. But with another American, it's kinda awkward. Anyway.

The bbq was lots of fun but exhausting because it was entirely in Chinese. For me, that means a lot of listening, because my Chinese still sucks. But I did speak a little and I guess I understood 3/4 of what I heard. Granted, it was slowed down and simplified for us foreigners, but I still think I did alright.

Today I woke up earlyish, went around the corner to a breakfast shop, then came back and started on some work. I wrote some freelance articles for a magazine here. It's one of those English learning magazines for local people here, and I write about three articles a month because a friend asked me to and I can make a little extra money.

I'm trying to get into a routine where I can master my daily studies and work so I can free up time for more long-term tasks, like researching and applying to graduate schools.

After doing this all day, I went to James' Moon Fest BBQ. Actually, it's where I met James and lots of other people last year. It was a great time, there were some friends and acquaintances there, and the food was great. There was salsa!

Luke and I left a bit early and went home to study Chinese. The holiday weekend is over.

Ps-- I have tiny, tiny ants in my apartment. They must be stopped.

Typhoon Wipha

I walked the eight rainy minutes to campus today, only to find the buildings were all locked up, and there were only a few confused foreign students huddling around. A local woman explained to me that classes were canceled due to the typhoon.
The typhoon has already caused a couple of rainy days, but it should come into to northern Taiwan in full force this afternoon. Not to worry. These things don't usually do any damage, they just cause high winds and lots of rain, and everybody stays home for a day or so until it blows over. So apparently I won't have work this afternoon, either.
Things have been going well lately, despite all the rain. School is great, work is pretty good, and I'm learning to live with my cramped little apartment. Actually, I don't have much time to spend here, so I'm content with it for now. I had lunch with five of my classmates after class on Friday. We went to a little fried rice and noodle restaurant. They are all fun people. Once or twice a cockroach appeared on the wall or under the table, and it was funny to watch them jump back and cower. I guess they better get used to that! Cockroaches are pretty much everywhere here. In fact, just yesterday I saw one on the floor of the food court at Taipei 101.
In other news, 我剛剛學了怎 麽打中文字。:-) That is, I just learned how to type Chinese characters on my computer. Exciting!
And here are a couple of photos.

Typhoon Wipha, a category 4, approaches:




Here's where I work-- the red awning in the bottom right corner. Literally two blocks from Taipei 101 and the WTC. Note the urban produce farm in the foreground. Taipei is a place of great contrasts: here, the tallest building in the world, and near the foot of it, a local farmer grows a few rows of beans and tomatoes.


More of that garden:



Equally noteworthy is this little urban scooter jungle, as I like to call it, which is literally across the street from 101, at the back of this garden. Some people have hollowed out a little parking lot in the middle of some brush. I guess it beats paying for a parking pass.



Here's a view of the city at night, from James' apartment where I was staying.



And another. The tall building is "Technology Building," for which the neighborhood is named. I guess it's a business incubator for high-tech companies.



And, near work, I found these. Now I know where to buy a suit and get a haircut. After all, these models look great, right? No?

Miles to go...

Whew...

These last couple of weeks have been unexpectedly rough, but I'm hanging on. Two bedroom apartments are very rare here, and after much searching together for a place together, Luke and I split up for better odds. He's now renting a bedroom in a six bedroom apartment full of hockey playing Canadian dudes. So far that seems to be working.

I just yesterday moved all my stuff from James' to my new place, which is basically an 8 foot cube. Yeah, it's tiny. I have a bed, a desk and chair, and a bookshelf, and that's all there's room for. Also a good sized closet and bathroom. But the location is great-- a three minute walk from the university, and one minute from the night market. It's newish, and pretty clean, and I think I like living alone... but it's stupidly cramped and I haven't even unpacked my stuff yet. I guess I was tired of looking. We probably saw 30 or 40 apartments and I was exhausted and ready to be done with it. I guess I can live with it for a while.

Classes started Monday of last week. I like that a lot. My classes are 8-10:00am M-F, and I usually stay in the library until 12 studying. There are 7 of us in the class, and all from different countries, so that's fun.

I just started a job today. Working at a "cram school" for grade school kids. My schedule there is 1:30-3:00, 4:00-6:00, M-F. Except for Tuesdays, when I only teach from 4-6. The location isn't perfect, but it's not bad. But for now, as long as I don't have my motorcycle back from Yilan, I have to get the buses figured out so I know how to get to work and back conveniently.

This year is already shaping up to be a lot of long, long days... I'm dead tired now. I'll write more soon.