Class 1 Famous

Today, I went on a little outing to a nearby city, Tainan which was the capital of Taiwan from the 1680s until the 1880s. While still a big city, it’s got a different feel from Kaohsiung. It’s older and I think that the temple to resident ratio is about 1:1. I went with my roommates and 2 Taiwanese friends. My Chinese was put to the tests since one of them doesn’t really speak English. It got a bit complicated when I was trying to explain the classic game “would you rather”…. It was a little tuff so I opted to say funny phrases from Sarah’s lonely planet phrase book instead. One of the first things you’ll learn from the Taiwanese is that everywhere has a specific “famous” dish. You can’t possibly have any credibility in a conversation if you say you’ve been to some city without eating their famous dish. That was the main theme of our Tainan tour. We went to a temple- then ate the famous “coffin cakes.” Went to a castle- then ate the famous bean jelly dessert. Went to the beach- then ate the famous shrimp rolls. You’ll also quickly learn that you can’t possibly live a day without at least one trip to 7-11…. So that’s exactly where we ended our excursion, sipping some of the best coffee in town outside of the “sev”.

My scooter’s shot to hell. It broke down again about 2 weeks ago and instead of calling the mechanic again, I opted to leave it where it was and had my friend rescue me from the parking lot. It’s not the first time I’ve been forced to abandon a vehicle either. On a brighter note, I recently experienced the magic of Monkey Mountain. It’s less than a 15 minute drive from my house and is pretty much all my dreams come true. The mountain has a ton of paths winding all over it and more monkeys than you can shake a stick at. The biologist inside of me was a little appalled because they’re totally accustomed to human presence. However, the side of me that loves monkeys and dreams of having one as little sidekick was in 7th heaven. I was walking up the trail as a few monkeys were coming down. They didn’t even bat an eye at me. Unfortunately I forgot my bananas at home that trip otherwise I think they really would have liked me (or accosted me- can’t be sure).
I’ve been trying to minimize my expenditures this past month in an attempt to save my pennies for Thailand. I leave in 2 weeks! As of now, I’ve got the first week by myself. I have no clue what I’ll be doing. I imagine I’ll spend a lot of time with Leonardo DeCaprio eating pad-thai on a deserted beach. After a week, my friend Luke’s coming from Taiwan and Robyn’s flying over from Hawaii so we’ll have some grand Thai adventures.
Teaching’s going well too. I’ve finally got something that may resemble control of my wild class of 20 ten year olds (15 of which are boys). I use the word control very loosely because within the last week one of the boys was pushed down a flight of stairs, I’ve kicked 2 people out, and half of them are failing their tests. My baby class is the most entertaining. For 2 full hours there’s usually one little girl attached to my leg and a boy, ironically named Willy, who runs around trying to either kiss or wrestle the other boys. The funnies thing is when I actually try to teach something… like the letter “A” and someone starts singing the 3 little monkey song. Once someone starts, there’s no hope in teaching until we’ve all sung the song at least twice. If you can imagine playing charades for 2 hours when you’re the only person acting, then you can imagine my two entry level classes. I started a new one Thursday and got blank stares from the questions “What is your name?” and “How are you?”
Well, I just convinced my roommates that we should watch West Side Story….so I’m being beckoned by some choreographed gang fights now. My thoughts and love are with all of you. I want to know what’s going on in everyone else’s lives too so shoot me a message!