It's currently Saturday-turning-Sunday. I'm leaving Kaohsiung early Wednesday. I lose my internet sometime between now and then.
I know I have many unblogged stories. Those things that I said I'd blog about back in September, well, I still remember them.
And the month of July, when I'll be sitting on my couch waiting for my employed friends to get off work, will be a perfect time to write those blog entries.
For now, though, unless I get simultaneously creative and bored of packing, don't expect any new entries. Never fear, though. I will probably continue writing about this Taiwan experience for as long as there are new and interesting things to write, so this blog is far from over.
Goodbye and thanks, Fulbright. Taiwan, you've truly touched my heart. Kaohsiung, well, I think I'll miss you most of all.
I'm down to nine days left in Taiwan, so the goodbyes and thankyous are starting to happen. It's a rough time. I made a card for each of my 350-some students, and today I received a very nice card from a fifth grader named Vicky. It's all in English, which is no small feat. I hope you'll appreciate it as much as I did:
Katie teachers: a year to get along with you, we are very happy! Unfortunately, you want back to the United States, and if you are free to come back to see us oh! Something we all look forward to you coming back! I will often send mail to you the! I wish you happiness, youthful beauty, the right to marry as soon as possible! Married to tell us oh!
2009.6.22. 5-year Vicky
These kids will be very hard to leave. But hopefully, someday, I will get to come back to see them.
In Taiwan, elementary schools run K-6. Even though most kids continue to the same junior high school (grades 7-9), graduation is a relatively big to-do. While I do remember having an 8th grade graduation, I do not remember having a 4th grade graduation... and I don't remember shedding tears about either situation.
I wasn't able to attend Fu Xing's graduation ceremony, as it was held on Tuesday morning when I had to work at Tai Ping's English Village. I don't teach any 6th grade classes anyway, so at least I didn't miss out on any serious goodbyes. Instead, though, I went to see my host brother Kevin graduate from his elementary school on Wednesday evening. I sat in the back corner, so my pictures aren't great quality, but it should be enough to give you a sample.
The graduates (10+ classes of 6th graders-- Yang Ming is one of the biggest schools in Kaohsiung) process in... The teachers put on a dance performance. Fulbrighter Rebekah, a Yang Ming English teacher, danced in the middle: Representative students symbolically and literally "pass the torch" to some fifth graders: I did manage to sneak to the front to get a picture of Kevin with his class (he's the one smiling and looking at the camera): At one point, a younger student started talking to Rebekah and me. She had her pet pigeon with her. Not really related, just amusing: I caught up with Kevin afterward and we got a picture. I'm leaning over a little, which is why he looks so much taller than me... but yes, this kid has grown at least five inches since I met him in September! Kevin exits through the ceremonial graduate gateway... as Rebekah is a "retiring" teacher of sorts, she got this honor as well. I should note that she does not always have heavy makeup and hair glitter, but was made up like that for her dance performance: After the graduation, I took Kevin out for a nice sushi dinner to celebrate his graduation. (See the rotating sushi restaurant chain described in my last post.)
I was going to take some of my own recordings of this stuff, but why do that when someone else has?
Fact #1: Crossing the street in Taiwan is way more fun than it is in the US.
Fact #2: If you hear a singing truck, it is not ice cream. In fact, it is trash. And if you don't live in an apartment building where trash is centrally collected (which I do), you are expected to run out and meet it with your properly-sorted garbage.
Fact #3: In Taiwan, I have come to like... or love... sashimi. Contrary to most of my food habits and principles relating to fish, I can't get enough of that raw fish on rice stuff. Fortunately for me, there's a chain of rotating sushi restaurants all around Taiwan where you can get a plate of sushi for 1 USD. So, eating until you're absolutely full costs up to $7. Fantastic. Remember: not my video. Not my commentary. But it is from the same chain where I eat regularly.
So, the English textbooks used in Taiwanese elementary schools are, across the board, weird. "Hello, Darbie," the book we use for my fifth graders, is overall pretty good. Except that I just had to teach and explain this story to my students:
1. Tarzan is going to the bank. 2. He sees many monkeys, lions and elephants on his way. 3. Now he has some money. He is going to the department store. 4. The TV and the CD player are on sale. They are only one hundred dollars. 5. Ten monkeys are helping him. 6. Now he has a home theater. All the animals can see the movies with him.
I don't know about you, but this is certainly one of the first things I hope to learn when studying a foreign language.
Note: I didn't know how to say "home theater" in Chinese until today.
Today I convinced Dani to try shopping at my new favorite store, 光南. I've been raving about how this multi-floor store seems to sell everything, from shampoo to socks to digital cameras to DVDs to stationery to greeting cards to hair things to cell phone ornaments. Anyway. Dani and I approached the store around 3:30 to find that it was packed. Passing this off as just a Sunday shopping craze, we forced our way into the store.
As we were stuck in what seemed to be a line up to the second floor, we saw a lot of people coming down with the same CD in their hands. On the stairway, someone tapped me on the shoulder. It was my fifth grade student Charlie. We said hello, high-fived, and then I asked him why there were so many people. He said, "有明星." I asked who. He said, "潘瑋柏." The name didn't ring a bell, so we soon said goodbye to Charlie and pushed past the autograph/celebrity madness on the second floor. It wasn't until later when I saw a poster and recognized the music playing that I realized, 潘瑋柏 is a guy named Wilber Pan. Who's Wilber Pan? A Taiwanese popstar, rapper, soap star, and/or musician. Oddly enough, of the three Chinese-language pop CDs that I own, Wilber Pan is one of them. (The others are Jay Chou and Liang Jingru, or "Fish Leong"-- all recommended to me by a teenager in China in 2006.)
So anyway, the guy was only there for fifteen minutes to sign autographs, and Dani and I only bothered to catch a glimpse of him from across a crowded room. But I suppose this counts as my closest encounter with a famous Taiwanese person. That, and attending the same reception as Taiwan president Ma Yingjeou on 10/10.
PS: Turns out the guy is American-born and can't read or write Chinese. Perhaps he would've liked chatting with an English speaker who had actually heard of him. Next time...
When I am at a night market, particularly 新崛江 in Kaohsiung, I am rarely looking for anything specific. (Though "funny t-shirts" is a permanent item on my shopping list.) However I often come home with at least a few items. But... I'm so cheap! And my salary is so nonexistent! How can I afford such behavior?? Here's your answer: almost everything I buy costs one hundred Taiwan dollars, roughly equivalent to US $3 (give or take a quarter, depending on the exchange rate).
So, the question is... What can you buy for 100 dollars?
Answer: Ridiculous handbags. Answer: Colorful hats. (...that you can make your boyfriend wear!) Answer: Graphic T-shirts with bad English. Answer: Multiple face masks to protect you from SARS, swine flu, or industrialized air. Answer: Cloth or (p)leather belts of any color. Answer: These sunglasses, or any of the others that I've purchased since I got to Taiwan. Answer: This watch, or many others like it. Answer: A USB-powered keyboard vaccuum cleaner? So this, my friends, is how things like fanny packs, orange t-shirts, and neon pink hats happen. Remember this when you see me (and what I'm wearing) back home.
PS: Let this also be a catalogue for you of the many souvenirs I could bring back for you from Taiwan. Because with my salary, I can't afford much more. If you don't believe me, you can look in my neon rainbow-zippered wallet.
The past few weeks, many Kaohsiung Fulbrighters and I participated in the 端午節 festivities by forming our own 龍舟. We were competing in the foreigner division against the likes of full-of-giant-Germans 中山大學, the very European Wenzao University, and the International World Games team, to name a few.
Anyway, when I first heard about dragon boating back in the fall, and found out there was a drummer who kept the beat, I knew what I wanted to do. So as early as possible I "called" the role of 鼓手... after all, I have rhythm, and the boat wasn't really missing out by not having my rowing arms.
I can't speak for the rowers, but I had a fantastic time as drummer. The rowers were supposed to follow my beat, so I had to give them a steady and doable pace while also aiming to be competitive with the other boats. It was basically my job to bang a drum and scream. What could be more fun? Maybe the guy who got to sit on the front of the boat and grab the flag at the end, but then again, he almost fell into the not-so-sanitary Love River.
Our boat consisted of 20 rowers (half Fulbright, half Taiwanese friends), the drummer (me), a steerer/tiller (Chris, our Bureau of Education liaison), and a flag-grabber (Henry, a military worker at Ling Jhou English Village). We had a total of four practices that were about 45 minutes each before we raced, and as the practices were in the afternoon, we never got to practice with a full boat. So, we may have lost in the end, but I'm incredibly proud of our team. The first time we tried the full length of the course (500km), it took us over seven minutes. On our final race, we clocked in at 4:18. Not a technical victory, but a moral one. Plus, those Germans were huge.
Our team name was supposed to be something intimidating. We chose "Hamburger Breakfast." Why? Because Taiwanese people think that Americans eat hamburgers for every meal. So I frequently led the team in a motivational chant: What do we eat?HAMBURGERS When do we eat them? FOR BREAKFAST!
As I was actively drumming and screaming throughout practices and the competition, I couldn't take any pictures. But here are some pictures from Fulbrighter Shiela and Jo (from San Min English Village).
Warming up before practice: An afternoon practice with a less-than-full boat: Getting geared up for our first race, in uniform: Rowing into place for our first race: Maya got some great photos of our races here. Also check out her video:
Anyway, Hamburger Breakfast was certainly a positive experience. Drumming for the dragon boat was one of the most fun things I've done since coming to Taiwan, and I hope I get the opportunity to do it again someday.
I should include that our fantastic team t-shirts, courtesy of the design styles of Fulbrighter Gered, include our team name, all of our names, some great designs, and my suggested slogan of "Your Ass is Dragon." Ten points if you can name that literary reference :-)
At home, it is Memorial Day weekend. At home, people will get tomorrow off. At home, my high school friends are having their annual week(end) in Strathmere, New Jersey, and this is the first time in six years that I'm not there. It would be an easy time to feel homesick. But I haven't really had the time to think about it.
In Taiwan, we get next weekend as a long weekend (four days, in fact-- though does it really count, if you have to make one day up the following Saturday?). This weekend, the Fulbrighters and I were busy working from 9am-7pm on our Fulbright Kaohsiung project. The concept of our project changed (thanks to external forces) from an educational website to an educational DVD a few weeks ago. Since then, we've been scrambling to think of content, write scripts, and hire a film crew. So both days this weekend, we were at the Tai-Ping English Village filming our video (a great bonus of English Village is having your own private restaurant/airport/subway car for filming things).
It was pretty professionally done. The cameramen were concerned enough about noise that they wouldn't allow us to turn on fans or air conditioning in the small, windowless rooms where filming took place, and in late May in Kaohsiung (90+ degrees mid-day with high humidity), you can imagine how fun this was. But we pushed through it, we recorded all twelve scenes + vocabulary/grammar segments + self-introductions. Now it is in the hands of the film crew, until they give us back a version we can subtitle and approve.
So, it's not how I've normally spent my Memorial Day weekend, but it is certainly a weekend I'll remember. And if I ever forget, I can just watch the DVD. Someday, you might be lucky enough to see yours truly dancing the Hokey Pokey or playing the role of ambiguously-aged teacher Miss Cooper (the easiest to pronounce of my family names, and a tribute to the other [former] teacher in my family).
I only took a few photos, and they were all during the elaborate birthday party scene where I played 'girl who gave birthday boy a T-shirt and is also holding a camera.' I think it will give you an idea of what my weekend was like, though.
The camera crew: Setting up our scene in the English Village restaurant: Voila, a real-looking birthday party: My head is still spinning from the craziness that has been the last few weeks, but I have a feeling things will stay rolling until I leave. Now, I should get to bed... our first dragon boat race is tomorrow!
Sorry folks, I've been a little short on time lately thanks to (1) co-leading the Fulbright Kaohsiung project and (2) drumming for the Fulbright Dragon Boat team. More information on that is forthcoming.
So last weekend, the twelve members of my Fulbright group all went on a trip to eastern Taiwan. Our primary destination was Rueisuei, which is known for rafting and hot springs. We did both. So Friday afternoon we took two trains for 4.5 hours to get to Rueisuei.
The pretty train ride: We got to the hotel and relaxed in the hot springs. What are hot springs? Basically a murky, unchlorinated, "natural" hot tub, and very popular throughout Taiwan. Sorry, no pictures. Then we tried to find a restaurant and settled on hot pot. I had milk hot pot, which was a first for me (though I later heard that milk is a specialty of Rueisuei). It mostly just tasted like fish. Saturday morning, we were up bright and early to get driven to several mystery locations before finally ending up on the bank of a river with life vests and helmets, where we joined what appeared to be a high school or college graduation trip on a big rafting adventure. My proudest accomplishments from the day were not falling in and not getting sunburned. Long shorts, a hat, and SPF 55 sunscreen are my friends!
A man took our picture and sold it to us afterward. I'm the one in the back with the hat and sunglasses :
After a day of rafting, we took the train to Taidong/Taitung, a major city on the east coast (which is generally not very populated). We wandered the city, had a nice family-style dinner, and discovered there wasn't much else going on in Taidong on a Saturday night.
Sunday, we took a ferry to Green Island. Of all the places I've visited in Taiwan, I think Green Island was my favorite. We only had a few hours on the island, so we rented some cars and drove around to see the sights (the island is so small it takes 30 minutes to drive the whole thing-- and has one paved road, so no getting lost!).
Green Island is about a 40-minute ferry ride from Taidong. It is where they used to ship pro-independence political prisoners during martial law. We tried to drive around the old prisons, only to find out (after getting some dropped jaws from the guards at the gate) that one of the prisons is still quite active: Some pictures of why I loved Green Island: Then Sunday afternoon we rushed back to Taidong to get the 4pm train to Kaohsiung. There were no seats left. Oops. Fulbrighter Kate and I had a really comfortable ride on the little space between the last seat and the wall: And the weekend was followed by one of my more exhausting weeks in Kaohsiung. But as I said, more on that later. I'll be home in less than six weeks... but I have so much left to do!
A linguistics degree. A year teaching in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. Now what? The blog name, Fei Kaidi, comes from the Chinese transliteration of my name. For those who don't read pinyin, my Chinese name sounds like "Fake I.D."
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