But stay awhile and maybe then you'll see

I've been in Shanghai (上海) for nearly three weeks now. My host family is very nice. I've got five family members: my host mother/aunt (阿姨), her husband, their daughter and her husband, and their daughter. The little girl just started first grade in school; she's about 7 years old. My host mother tries to kill me by making me eat a lot at every meal. I'm never hungry enough though. We live in a nice apartment near the school. It's on the sixth floor, but it's two floors. So really, my room is the seventh floor. That's a lot of stairs, but I really don't mind.

Orientation was the longest week of my life. By Thursday it felt like it should have been Saturday. Then the first week of classes was stressful, figuring out what electives to take. I had solved all that business by Wednesday and then decided I might want to switch language classes. which was more stressful because I only had a day or two to decide that. Eventually, I decided to stay where I was so that I can focus more on speaking rather than spending my life doing all the written work for the other class. So, for those of you who wish to know, my classes I'm taking are: Chinese Language class, Classical Chinese, Global Issues in China, and China's Economic Reforms. Econ is taught in English and the other three are all taught in Chinese.

I've also decided to volunteer and teach at a migrant school for an hour each week. We went this past week for the first time. It was a bit intense. While it was nice to have three of us together for one class of 40ish students, we thought they might give us an idea of what to do. But really, they only gave us a copy of the kids' textbook. Anyway, I'm pretty confident we bored the kids to death, and we're determined to make up games and give them candy and stickers to make class more exciting in the future.

Last weekend we went on a trip to Lianyungang (连云港). And by "we" I mean the ten of us from the ACS (Advanced Chinese Studies) program. BLC (Business, Language, and Culture) and CGC (China in a Global Context) both went to different places. Anyway, we had a 6 hour drive to get where we were going, but got in a car accident on the highway after half an hour. We then waited two hours for the next bus, before continuing on our way. We went to a place where a famous old story is set, about a monkey king. It was pretty beautiful up in the mountains there. We took a ride up the mountain Indian Jones style, and we basically feared flying off the road and down the hill. It was a rather long weekend with many hours on the bus, but it was good to get away with just our small group of ACS kids (because we're the coolest ones).

Fun things about China:
1) Apparently, the biggest danger we foreign kids have to worry about is getting hit by a car.
>My solution: I only cross the big streets when the locals do, and I stay close to them slash in the middle of the pack.

2) Most of the motorcycles and bicycles have brakes that suck completely and nearly kill my ears when stopping near me.
>My solution: I'm going to figure out how to tell them that they need to fix their brakes. I just need to figure out how to say 'brakes' and 'fix' properly.

3) I'm going to really like have class only four days a week and three day weekends.
>Minor catch: I have like seven hours of class on Thursdays. Lame.

4)It was rainy the last few days. It was lovely.
>Not so fun: Today was hotter.

5) I'm tired of all the clothes I brought with me.
>Potential solution: Buy more clothes?

6) It takes a long time for mail to arrive.
>My thought: I'll get over it, because I like getting mail no matter how long it takes.

7) I've run out of things to say. Also, I lost track of whether this list was a list of good things or bad things. It's just random thoughts I guess. Whatevs, Evs.

P.S. That last bit was especially for you, my avid reader. :-) Also, thank you. I only saw your comment when I got back on here to write again.

Sad story.

Hey kids, it seems that I can't upload pictures anymore. I'm not sure why exactly (I blame China), and I'm not sure if I can fix this problem (很大的問題）。 I'm already using a proxy to get on blogspot to post. My proxy failed at logging in to facebook too. Sad sad story. I mean, I knew this was how it was going to be (with facebook) but then the proxy business just gave me false hope. And the regular internet wouldn't even load the blogger. This pictures problem is super lame because now there's even less motivation for any of you to read my blog (which you don't anyway). It weird talking to an absent audience.

Just before I got on here, I picked out pictures to put up. However, since that won't work, I'll still use them as the highlight points to talk about here and hopefully not be too boring.

My last week at Tunghai (東海）was rather sad because I didn't want to leave, but also fun as always. On the last day, I had an unfortunate headache, slept through my last class, and then during the farewell party, Da Zhang Laoshi (大張老師）assaulted my face. I had taken medicine two hours before, but it hadn't kicked in, so she did this thing to make my head better. Also, I had drunk a number of bottles of water. So those three things (I don't know which actually did it) finally made my headache better.

After class and the party, we most definitely went shrimping again. The three of us girls asked Liu Laoshi to go again, so we were going to go Thursday. But he changed it to Friday and a bigger group of people went. Courtney and I rocked because we took the claws off the shrimps without using the towel. Also, at the end, Leechew, Courtney, and I prepared and cooked the 30 shrimps we caught. I cut their legs off, Courtney salted, and Leechew skewered. Courtney and I both tried to skewer, but we just couldn't go through with it. Then Courtney cut the legs off and I salted. It was quite sad. But tasty once they were barbecued.

Early Saturday morning the five of us from Puget Sound left Taichung (台中）to go to Hualien (花蓮）for a few days. Courtney left Sunday afternoon to go back to the States, Ryan went on a river swimming trip, and Leechew, Max, and I went to see the famous beautiful gorge over there. Monday we headed back to Taipei, as Ryan, Max and I were all leaving on Tuesday (and Leechew on Wednesday).

So that's the end of Taiwan（台灣）. It really sucked leaving again, but I'll be back in approximately two years I've decided.

Ryan and I went to Hong Kong (香港）to get our visas for China（中國）. Hong Kong was interesting. We had a number of adventures, sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes on purpose, sometimes unintentionally. It was rather ridiculous. I was more than tired of living out of a suitcase and was anxious to get to Shanghai （上海）. But we did see some beautiful things in Hong Kong. We went up to the peak to look down on the city lights at night. We went to a couple of beaches on the south side of Hong Kong Island. We went to a couple of the outlying islands, one of which had no cars on it. We hiked across the island from on harbor to the other in about an hour and a half. But the heat was crazy intense and we were practically drenched in sweat. Lovely.

This morning we flew into Shanghai. Finally. I'm staying in the dorms for a few days until I move into my host family on Wednesday night. I was really looking forward to getting settled in tonight, after living out of my suitcase for more than a week. And unpacking. And doing laundry. But no. In the dorms. It shouldn't be too bad. This dorm room is like a hotel. It's basically luxury after the sketchiness of Hong Kong. And I'm nearly out of clean clothes, but I'll wash some in the sink with the soap they've given us. This free soap is excellent, otherwise I would have a problem. So now I'm really really looking forward to moving into my homestay. Also, we have orientation all week and classes start Monday September 7. Then it's my birthday. Yeah!

A few bits of the past month.

Remember that time I was going to be good at this game at update at somewhat regular intervals? Yeah, that worked well.

It's been a busy month. I'm using pictures again to keep things interesting, so I have one or two from the more exciting things that went on.

At the end of July there was a solar eclipse. It was fantastic because we spent like 20 minutes outside looking at it. Then as we were about to have class for the remaining 40 minutes of the hour, everybody started running outside (including all the teachers) because the peak of the eclipse was about to hit. We were using film, CDs, a piece of paper with a pin prick hole, and a number of pairs of sunglasses. Da Zhang Laoshi (大張老師) insisted that it worked best with three.

It was easiest to see as clouds were just barely passing over it. The camera was able to capture with the cloud cover too. Also, I'm pretty sure I nearly blinded myself that from looking at the sun so much.

The weekend after that we took a trip to the beach in the south, Kending (墾丁). It was fantastic and beautiful. We persuaded them to let us go a day early and that also resulted in the renting of a regular sized tour bus to take 7 people (5 Puget Sound students, our teacher/tutor, and A-mo - the boys' roommate slash the work study student at the language center). As the picture shows, we clearly needed a bus this big.

This was one of the most southern points of the island. Just to the right of this pictures are a bunch of rocks that look like a cat. (I really only put this one on to show the next one).

There was a bus full of Chinese tourists visiting there when we were there. Umbrellas to guard against the sun, but sometimes the wind makes that difficult.

The view from our hotel the second night. Pretty much amazing.

The next weekend we went to an aboriginal amusement park. A-mo, his friend, Courtney, Leechew, three other students at the language center and me. Courtney is deceptively tall on her toes and I'm deceptively short bending over, so that we wouldn't be blocked by our classmates' heads.

We saw a show with many aboriginal dances. Then they threw this guy into the water at the end.

Leechew, Courtney, and I have made wonderfully delicious guacamole a few times. So good.

Last weekend (the weekend of Aug. 8th) a typhoon hit Taiwan. The few days before it hit were relatively cool and rainy. It was lovely. Then the day of the typhoon (Friday), when we wanted to play in the rain, it didn't rain at all. This tree has already had a rough time and it was just mid-afternoon.

It started raining again Saturday. It was a little difficult to walk in the wind and rain. The best defense was to use your umbrella like a shield vertically rather than horizontal above your head. We still got somewhat soaked.

This typhoon was actually the most severe typhoon in Taiwan in the last 50 years. This picture was taken Monday outside the language center. I have more pictures of more trees who didn't quite make it through the storm.

We went to study in Mos Burgers (Mos漢堡). We ran into A-mo and some other kids from the language center. A-Mo fell in love with a game on my ipod and may or may not have played it for a number of hours, completely taking over the high scores. We've been working to fix this problem, but I really fail at the game so am really no help.

Okay, so all this was all good and fun (and super condensed). We've done more and I have a ton of pictures, but this is just a blog after all. However exceptions must be made. We had the most epic adventure this past weekend and I'm dedicating a number of pictures to tell the story - and this is even a shortened version for the sake of space.

Liu Laoshi took Leechew, Courtney and I shrimping (釣蝦). Or rather, fishing for big shrimp using small shrimp as bait. It was in a big building with a pool in the center, and along the two sides were a number of spaces for people to sit and fish for shrimp.

Baiting the hooks took a few tries to do correctly, but we were pros by the end of the night. They were very small shrimps and very small hooks.

Once you caught a shrimp, you had to take off its claws before you could take the hook out of its mouth. The first few shrimp each of us girls caught, Liu Laoshi had to take the arms off because we were afraid. After he got the claws off he'd hand us the shrimp and say, "It's your work" to get the hook out (妳的工作). He was very busy and I asked him if he was sorry that he brought three girls shrimping. He laughed and said no, but that we were 可愛 (which means silly when used here). However, shortly after this I tore the legs off my own shrimp and it was epic. The rest of the night the three of us did it all ourselves. Here is a picture of one of my shrimps before I put in back in the water in my net.

This is the monster shrimp that Courtney caught. And it only had one claw. I'm not sure you can tell its actual size from this picture though, I may need to add another later for the full effect.

Here Liu Laoshi is baiting his hook and Leechew is trying to strangle him apparently.

I decided I might want to eat one of my shrimps right off the fishing line.

Courtney and I are posing with another shrimp I caught a while later.

So the trick to catching shrimp is to wait for a ten seconds after the floating thing goes under water so that the shrimp is really eating the bait, then pull it up slowly then quickly to get it to stay on the hook and not lose it. (There really is a skill to it haha). The next picture is ridiculous. Look closely.

Leechew somehow managed to catch the shrimp by the tail, meaning it probably started to get away as she was pulling up, but she caught its tail. The following picture is the tray of nine shrimp I caught.

Here are the nine shrimp Courtney caught (note the monster shrimp with its crazy long claw).

And 17 shrimp Leechew and Liu Laoshi caught. (We only had three nets because we technically squeezed four people into a space for three). But really, if we were separated how would that have been any fun?

So after the shrimp were taken out of the water and put onto trays, Liu Laoshi cut off all their legs. It was tragic how we slowly dismembered this poor things.

Especially since after that they get salted and skewered, while they're still somewhat alive.

Finally, the shrimps are roasted.

This last Sunday I went down to Dalin (大林) to see my host family again before I go. We took some pictures outside of the new train station which has a lovely sign of the name of the town.

At the end of the day, we visited my second host family at their new house in Jiayi (嘉義) - the big city near my little town. So below is a picture of my second host parents, brother, and sister around me and on the left. Those kids were all grown up and I kind of felt old. Also, the other brother wasn't there. On the right of the picture is my first host mother, sister, and father. My brother in this family had the unfortunate task of being photographer.

And that my friends is my story. :-) I only have three more days of class in Taiwan. Then us Puget Sound kids are taking off to see Hualien on the east coast of the island before leaving on Tuesday. I'll be flying to Hong Kong with Ryan to get our visas for China and then we'll fly into Shanghai on the morning of the 30th. I highly doubt that I'll update this before then, especially considering the past intervals. So yeah. Talk to you all later!!

Every Picture Tells A Story - Rod Stewart (Almost Famous soundtrack)

I've decided to tell my story in picture because I'm tired of writing things, but I know that it's time for an update here. Also, many (most) of these pictures are already on Facebook but whatever. There may be a few more details here. Who knows.

Last Saturday at the Organic Farm we started out the day by digging for sweet potatoes (地瓜). It was really hot outside (surprise) but we all dug up one or two. They let us take some home and Leechew took them to school on Monday to cook them, as our dorms have nothing close to a kitchen. Liu Laoshi and Bai Laoshi ended up cooking them in a rice cooker I'm pretty sure, then Leechew shared the 地瓜 with all the teachers and everyone else. This all went on during our study hours in the afternoon.

Back to the farm, after gardening we went to a table and ended up making plant boxes, in which we planted sprouts. I re-discovered my lack of ability in the carpentry department. We had some fun though -  Courtney was a creeper as usual. After lunch, we put dirt in the boxes. I discovered some bugs in the dirt and freaked out a bit - and tried to check that I didn't have any in my box. Anyway, we brought them home and they've grown quite nicely without much help. All of our sprouts are growing toward the window, which means sideways, and it's rather funny looking.

I like smelling flowers. Actually, it doesn't smell. It was really pretty in this area, with a bunch of lotus flowers and various others. There were some pretty awesome really tall orange ones. 

Ryan is fishing in the tiny stream, using a flower petal to catch a fish to put into the giant leaves that repel water. We're not quite sure how he's doing it though. 

We got a tour of all the various plants and flowers growing around the field and restaurant. One of them was a tree which grew very tiny limes (or lemons as they're called here?). They were quite tasty, but also quite sour. 


This is my desk set up for doing my calligraphy homework. I'm going to do my homework for this week as soon as I finish up here. Calligraphy class is pretty much awesome, though I still really can't do it. They split the class so now it's just the four of us Puget Sound kids together. Last week, we talked with Bai Laoshi about how he can tell our personalities by looking at our calligraphy. Also, whenever he left the room, we talked about how epically we fail at calligraphy and generally started laughing. Then Bai Laoshi would come back and we would be in hysterics. Good times.

Courtney, Leechew and I went on an adventure to find the ice place Liu Laoshi took us to the first day we arrived in the university. It took us a while. We had a bad map, people sending us to the wrong kind of ice place, finding some sketchy shops up alleys, and after a phone call and some more wrong turns we found it.

So delicious! I don't know how to describe it. Shaved ice (冰) plus three things you choose out of a selection. I have tapioca balls (珍珠), another kind of balls that are pink and white, and green beans(綠豆). Then there's some sugar and milk (牛奶) on top. 

Yesterday (Friday) we made jiaozi (餃子) during the afternoon. I don't like any of the translations, but generally we made either dumplings or pot stickers. In reality we make jiaozi, both shuijiao (水餃) and guotie (鍋貼). Chen Laoshi and Liu Laoshi are here preparing the filling. Courtney chopped vegetables and I washed some. In this picture I am being very helpful. Clearly.

The insides all mixed and ready to go. Pork, vegetables, and sauces.

Here we are learning how to make (抱) the jiaozi. Ours didn't look so good, but I think got a little better after some practice. Or that what the teachers said (越來越好).

Liu Laoshi and his wonderful jiaozi, which he does know how to make. 


Cooking in the jiaozi.

And eating the jiaozi.


And that's my story for today. Comment! Or something. Or not. 

Two farms in three days?

Hello! Look at this: a somewhat timely update!

Tuesday we had our first calligraphy class (書法). We legitimately spent more than two hours writing the numbers one, two, and three (一，二，三). We have to start with the basics and as Bai Laoshi says, this character is the most important because all other characters have it in them. I showed some of the sheets I practiced on while we were chatting on skype and what she said pretty much explains it: They just look like lines to me. :-) We have class again on Monday and I am determined to take more pictures on a regular day basis instead of just on trips and such. So I'll see how that actually goes. (I do have some from today which I will attempt to upload here shortly). 

Wednesday nothing really extraordinary happened. We (girls) ate delicious dinner because the boys continually fail to be cool and go out and do things when we ask. :-) Oh, we've had really delicious lunches this week because we go out to eat with other students from the language center who have been here longer. Wednesday I think we had cheesy noodles that are baked in the oven. They were actually extra cheesy. Today (Friday) we had saucy rice (燴飯) - Caralee you had better read this one because you'll appreciate that the most.

Thursday I went met up with my first host family!! It was relatively spontaneous because they emailed me Wednesday night and we arranged it. I woke up super early to take the bus to the train station in Taichung, then I took the train to Dalin (大林 - where I lived the first time I was here). Fun fact or two: The price of a train ticket from Taichung to Dalin has not changed in four years (NT$123) and Dalin has a new fancy train station. That kind of threw me off a bit. Anyway, I called my host father to say that I had arrived and a few minutes later they pulled up in the van I remember and it was wonderful. I pretty much love the whole family. It was nice to spend some more time with my host sister because she was in the US when I was at her house. And my little brother was all grown up. Crazy. But my mother and father were very much as I remember them. 

We then drove for another hour or so north to the mountains. Quick recap: 30+ minutes on the bus, 30+ minutes waiting for the train, 90 minutes on the train, 60+ minutes driving. It was worth it though. We stopped in Puli (I think?) where they make some famous alcohol (Shaoshing? that's what one of the boxes of candy they bought me says). We toured the little museum explaining how it's made and it's history and such. Then walked around the little shopping area. Everything they had to sell there was prepared with the special alcohol. Also, I ate a duck's foot. 

Then we went further up the mountain to Qingjing nongchang (情境農場) which is a farm with sheep. We went to watch the sheep show but it was ridiculously foggy that afternoon. So it was a little hard to see at times. 

After walking around some more we headed back down the mountain toward Taichung because they were going to drop me off the Tunghai before going back south. The farm was basically east of Taichung up in the mountains. So another car ride, I got a painful headache, we ate dinner and a relatively fancy restaurant with knives and forks, and they dropped me off with a bunch of things they bought throughout the day because they're too wonderful and nice. Then I took a nap to try and get rid of my headache and let the medicine kick. That didn't really work so when I started studying at 10 I only lasted a little bit and then went to bed. 

I studied in the morning before class and my tests today were fine. This afternoon we watched another movie with Liu Laoshi. It was really rather good but also intense at points. It was about Grandmaster Ip Man, who is master of a type kungfu . It was the story of the guy Bruce Lee studied under, if that rings a bell for anybody. There was some pretty bad ass kungfu scenes. Seriously. But a few were stressful to watch because of the violent pain. Also, we watched it in the computer lab because somebody was in the room we used before. The projector was too low and the wall was too close so we stacked all of our text books up to raise the machine a bit. 

Later tonight we're planning to go check out another night market in the city. And tomorrow we have another trip with Liu Laoshi that the school scheduled. We're going to another farm oddly enough, but I'm pretty sure this is a farm that grows things organically. 

P.S. My next plan is to go add some pictures to the last blog now that I've successfully put these pictures up here. 

a trip to the mountains and starting school.

Sunday night (a week ago) we arrived at our university and spent the night in the guest hotel. Liu Laoshi met up with us for dinner, but none of us were hungry so we went out to eat ice （吃冰）. It's shaved ice (?) with things in it and some sauce. You can get things like red beans, fruit, jelly things, tapioca pearls, and such. I'm not sure if it's really coming across but it's delicious. Then we went and played some pool. However, nobody really knows how to play it very well at all. No big deal though. :-)

 The next morning we dropped all our things off in our dorm room then left on an overnight trip to Xitou（溪頭） - which is a little east and a little more south of Taichung（台中）. That first day we went around to various establishments seeing the various stages of making tea. We saw it laying out in the sun, a farm growing the tea plants, and a factory drying and breaking up the leaves (?). By the way "we" means the five students from UPS, two of our tutors/teachers, and our tour guide for the day. 

We stopped for lunch at some place and everybody had the chance to set off a way of communication - bamboo explosive - thing. It was rather frightening the first time because nobody really knew what was going on slash what to expect. 

We ate lunch out of some pretty awesome bamboo bowls that we got to take home. After lunch we took a ridiculously stressful hike through a bamboo forest. First there was a dead snake that was poisonous and bright green at the bottom of a stream next to the path. Then there were a ton giant spiders just hanging out. There were next to the path, over head, and between trees. They were legitimately the size of a hand - the legs were crazy long and the bodies a few inches long. 

After that, our tour guide lady took us back to her house where her husband served us tea and her daughter played an instrument similar to a piano (?). Eventually we left to go to our hotel. I'm pretty sure we stayed at the Shi-tou Youth Corps Activity Center and/or in the Sitou Nature Education Area (Sitou Forest Recreation Area). Those are the two brochures I have anyway. We just hung out and chatted and played a bunch of cards all evening. 

The next day we hiked around the recreation area all morning. There was another snake - also poisonous and alive this time. It was rather traumatic for me. We walked on the skybridge in the trees, saw a giant tree, saw a pretty sweet pond and semi-sketchy bridge. It was really beautiful walking around in the trees and  such. Fortunately it wasn't too hot that day and we were in the shade much of the time. Lunch was wonderful and delicious - I have a picture of the table. They kept bringing out more and more dishes. 

We arrived back at school in the early evening of Tuesday. We met up with another student from UPS who has been in Taiwan for a few weeks staying with family. So the six of us and another kid from the US who's living in the boys' dorm room went out for karaoke - which is always a good time. :-) 

So Wednesday we went to the Language Center for the first time. The teachers talked to us a bit and gave us a lesson to prepare for Thursday's class. I can't remember what all we did the rest of the day. It was our last free day - I feel like we explored the campus a bit, and walked around Dongbie (a market-type area just up the hill from the school). Ah, I think we went and bought some necessities for our dorm room to get settled in a little more. 

The first day of class was alright. It was somewhat frustrating. At this point a lot of things weren't going well. None of us could get online in our dorm. We (the three girls) were alone in our room. Our fourth roommate was completely missing. She had some things here but we hadn't seen her and we didn't know when she would come back. It was lame because with no Taiwanese student in the room we had no real incentive to speak Chinese in the room. And part of the whole experience is to speak Chinese (oddly enough) and we didn't know how to make more Taiwanese friends without a roommate. Anyway, by Thursday night we were all very grumpy and called our professor back at UPS, but didn't get a hold of her. She called back the next morning while we were in class (taking a test actually) and I talked to her. It's wonderful how many problems were solved in less than two hours. My internet sign on still doesn't work, but the other four all are able to get online - I'm actually on with Leechew's info because she doesn't have a laptop here. This is mostly why I have failed to blog or update much in the last week. We were able to check email briefly before or after class but that was if for the first few days. 

Friday was more successful and we all have two textbooks to work out of, except Leechew who rocks and has three. Her classes are super intense though. Friday night Courtney and I went out to play and Leechew slept for 13 hours. For serious - she didn't sleep the night before because she already had two tests and a presentation to prepare for. Saturday Liu Laoshi took the five of us the the Science Museum and around the town a bit. We had lunch and drank tea at a teahouse, sitting on the floor and everything. Everybody had their turn at pouring the tea too （泡茶）. For the fourth of July, the boys were lame and stayed in while the three of us girls went out to find a hotdog to eat （熱狗）. Sketchiest hotdog ever. Really. Get this: under the hotdog in the bun was cabbage, apple, corn, onion, pickles - then the hot dog. On top was ketchup and possibly mustard, possibly something else. The best part is the menu said this was "american style". We have pictures. Well I think Leechew has them. Our celebration lacked any sort of fireworks or sparklers though. 

Sunday (yesterday) we spent the entire day studying. Truly. I don't remember spending so much time sitting at a desk in one day. It paid off because I rocked my 聽寫 （tingxie） test this morning. Classes went well but I have a bunch of homework still, which I will return to shortly as soon as I finish this epic blog. This is what happens when I don't update for a week! By the way, if you want more detail (!), pictures, or more frequent updates I kindly direct you to Ryan's blog: ryantateintaiwan.blogspot.com. I may see about setting up a flickr account. That's really testing my motivation though. I'm pretty proud that I've put up a few pictures on facebook and written this entry. :-) I will try to be more consistent now that things are settling down and we're getting into more of a routine. 

好了。再見！

PS. I like how I already directed you to Ryan's blog in the last post. It's mostly for the pictures. But I'll let you know if I set up flickr or something. 

PPS. This website lies about the time. Currently, I'm posting this at 6:30pm on Monday July 6.