Wienertrip 2k9: Day three

Now, the long-awaited conclusion to Jonathan and my trip to Vienna!

Sunday was less exciting than Friday and Saturday, so you haven't been missing much. We overslept and missed mass with the Vienna boys choir, but did manage to get standing room tickets to see the Lipizzaner Stallions at the Spanish Riding School, which is part of the Hofburg Palace. No pictures allowed, but I snuck a few as evidence:

As the venue emptied afterward, I took another. A very pretty interior for a horse show:

I'd say that the show must be great for people who love and appreciate horses. For those who are allergic and have kept their distance from the animals (me), it's not the best choice. It was still a good experience, despite the 3 packs of tissues I went through.

Afterward we walked around Vienna and got some of the famed Wiener schnitzel; some sort of meat (veal?) cut very thin and then breaded. Fantastic? Not really. But good enough for me to eat, which is more than I can say for a lot of foreign food.


As you can guess from the size, I wasn't able to eat the whole thing. I'm pretty sure Jonathan rose to the challenge, though.

After a little more aimless wandering around the city, it was time to go to the airport and head back to Krakow. As wonderful as Vienna was, it was nice to get back to Poland, where the exchange rate means dividing, not multiplying.

Not dead, just sleeping.

For the few of you who read my blog but do not read my emails, here is the official word that I'm safe back home in the good old U.S.A.

What have I been up to since I got back? Sleeping. Honestly. I don't have the energy for anything these days. Maybe it's the jet lag, maybe it's the recovery period from teaching three hundred and fifty small children, maybe it's the first soft bed I've slept on in a year. Either way, you haven't missed anything exciting. I haven't even checked off everything on my "to-eat" list. Though I have had hot dogs, hamburgers, Yuengling beer, the family brown rice, a frosty from Wendy's, a turkey club from Minella's, a black and white milkshake, a Wawa hoagie, a Tastykake, and lots of Mountain Dew. Of course right now, I'm craving fresh salmon sashimi more than ever.

Milo, my puppy, is also happy in his new home. He likes running in the yard, smelling everything, following my parents around, and bugging our 12-year-old dachshund Daphne. Every bird, bunny, squirrel, and barbecuing neighbor is cause for curiosity. Overall, though I'm sure that a trans-continental flight in a cage in the belly of an airplane is not fun for any dog, the move has been a very good one for Milo.

Once I find myself awake and creative, I'll get back to the blog in earnest. I have some great pictures and stories from my last days in Taiwan, as well as all the ones I forgot to share along the way.

Until then, if you need me, I'll probably be asleep.

Some fun facts

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.

Did you know there's a Hello Kitty Bakery and Restaurant?

Because there is. In Taipei. And I went there.

My Hello Kitty hamburger:

The Hello Kitty decor:
To quote Dani's friend Alex, "I feel like I just walked into an eight-year-old girl's bedroom."

Hello Kitty pastries:

Even a Hello Kitty Bathroom:

Oh, and Hello Kitty says "Happy Mother's Day!"

Brains...

As I biked to work on my usual route this morning, I was behind a slow-moving scooter for a few blocks (slow-moving enough that its pace matched my bike's). The scooter had a big box/cart attachment on the back. Fortunately (for me, anyway), there was a plastic cover over the contents of the cart. But hanging on either side were several, um, animal parts. I can't tell what animal they came from, but I recognized raw, dried muscle on bone, and brains. Just hangin' out on the scooter.

What's weird is, it took me a few minutes to notice it, and even longer to realize I should probably be (would normally be?) grossed out. Thanks to Taiwan's special pick-something-and-fry-it carts pervasive at night markets, I apparently have become immune to the sight of animal brains hanging off the side of a scooter on my morning commute.

Sorry, no pictures. Biking + photographing + Taiwan traffic = certain injury.

Take me home...

If my current itinerary works out, I'm going to be back in the US on 1 July, 2009.

These are the things I've had undeniable cravings for and cannot wait to eat:

• pancakes
• Cinnabon
• turkey club sandwich
• good bread
  
• brownies/cookies/banana bread
  
• brown rice (the family recipe)
• lasagna
• pizza (Taiwanese pizza doesn't cut it)
  
• cheese steak
  
• anything else that can be made in an oven

I'm not really an unhealthy person, but come on, how often do you crave vegetables?

Jonathan is currently visiting me in Kaohsiung, so sorry about the silence on the blog. Yesterday we were walking Milo through the Cultural Center by my apartment and there was this tea festival going on, vendors and performances and all. We had to stop and watch this one. Particularly relevant for Office fans:

Kaohsiung earns more tourist dollars because of American Fulbrighters...

Last week, my friend Lauren (also Harvard '08) decided to take her own spring break and visit me in Taiwan. This was very fun and exciting for me, as I don't get a spring break. So during her visit, I gave her a sampler of things essential to Kaohsiung City and my life there. Things like...

...eating 雪花冰 at Ice Art:


...taking a boat ride on the 愛河:

...getting all-you-can-eat 火鍋:

...going shopping at 新崛江, one of Kaohsiung's many 夜市s:

...hanging out with Chia-ling (and making peace signs in every picture):

...teaching some classes at 復興國小:

...and even stopping by the 太平國小 English Village:

Lauren and I also ventured to Lotus Lake, a place I hadn't been since August (when it was more like Lotus all-dry-and-smelly-because-it-was-dug-up-for-the-WorldGames), and spent the weekend in the mountains of central Taiwan. Blog posts on these adventures and more coming soon!

A weekend in Tainan

This weekend, Dan, Dani, Nicki, Shana, and I ventured into the city of 台南, about an hour north of 高雄, led by Shana's host family. Tainan is the former capital of Taiwan, known for its beautiful architecture and numerous old temples. It had a pleasant old-town feel, and though it's also a large city for Taiwan, it felt much less like a city than dear old Kaohsiung.

Anyway, I'm tired and it's been a long day, so enjoy your favorite kind of blog post: light on narrative, heavy on pictures.

Saturday night, a nice alley/side-street (in black and white-- I was fooling with my camera settings):

The front of Shana's host father's favorite temple:

A nominee for my Taiwanese food hall of fame, 鱔魚米粉, for the categories "thing I least wanted to eat" and "thing that made me feel sick the longest:"

Sunday morning, scenes from the temple parade (switch to phone camera as my real one ran out of batteries):


The Confucius temple:


A very old tree outside the temple:

And a nice garden:

And those are the highlights from my weekend trip to Tainan.

I will also note, it was no colder than 55 degrees Fahrenheit on Saturday night, and we found ourselves shivering in sweatshirts, hoods pulled up, and blowing on our hands to keep warm. Oh, Taiwanese winter...

Happy Thanksgiving!

So, I may be in a country that doesn't celebrate Thanksgiving, and I may have had to work on both days that most Americans get off work, but at least I got to eat some turkey. And talk about it, a lot, in my 感恩節 lesson plan.

I was actually lucky enough to have two Thanksgivings. The first was last Saturday night; we met an American woman at a bar a few weeks back, and she was kind enough to invite us to her own American Thanksgiving at her apartment. So we enjoyed a Costco turkey, homemade pumpkin pie, and lots of other traditional American Thanksgiving food (including mashed sweet potatoes, provided by Apartment C) in the company of several English cram school teachers from the US and Canada.

The second Thanksgiving took place on Thanksgiving night and was held by the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) in Kaohsiung, which is basically the American consulate/embassy (but due to Taiwan's ambiguous political status, it cannot officially be called that). So, the chief of AIT hosted this event for Fulbrighters, our Taiwanese co-teachers, and some other Americans living and working in Kaohsiung. It was more than we could have ever hoped for on Thanksgiving in a foreign country. There was turkey, stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, cookies, cranberry sauce... and it was all fantastic. And thankfully for me (and all of you), my fantastic co-teacher Amy brought her camera and sent me all the pictures she took. And Taiwanese people love to photograph food. So, some photos from my first Thanksgiving away from home, care of Amy.

Homemade dinner, probably in the largest domestic oven in southern Taiwan... which would be average size in the U.S.


Pumpkin pie... straight from Costco!

A lot of the Fulbrighters and our co-teachers, with Mason (deputy chief of AIT):

Amy, Susan, and me, with the host (chief of AIT-Kaohsiung, or whatever you call it):

Note my insistence on wearing a sweater, even though it certainly wasn't cold enough to do so. The good news is, it was as low as 65 the other day! I hope these "cold fronts" come with more frequency from now on. (It's back to 78 today.)

Culturally Confounded in Taiwan: Chapter 3

This one sort of goes along the lines of getting free stuff. But it doesn't.

I'm sitting in the classroom right now during lunch break. All the students are in their homerooms, either eating or settling in for an afternoon nap. A small girl just came in and said to me (in Chinese), "Today is my birthday. Here is juice for you." I replied with a confused "Happy birthday" in English and Chinese as she walked out the door.

So now I'm sitting here with papaya juice on my desk that some child gave me for her birthday. I feel a little bad. First I was disappointed to have my birthday on a Saturday because it meant no adorable 4th grade chorus of "Happy Birthday" in class, but now that I realize I might have had to provide treats for everyone on my birthday, maybe it was for the better.

This is not the first time this has happened, either. I've also gotten candy and mooncakes from students on their birthdays. I vaguely remember parents baking brownies or cupcakes or something for kids to bring in on their birthdays back in elementary school, but buying papaya juice for the whole faculty? This one's new to me.

Typhoon Holiday, Brother Birthday

Gchatting with Alex, one of our Fulbright leaders in Taipei:

Tsung-hsun: hi, katie

home?school?

me: Hi Alex

yes, we are all at home today

Tsung-hsun: good

enjoy your typhoon holiday

Movies I watched while stuck inside during the typhoon:

• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
• Waitress
• Lust, Caution
• 10 Things I Hate About You
• Miracle Dogs Too (on Taiwanese TV)
  
• She's the Man
  

Food I consumed while most restaurants were closed because of the typhoon:

• Leftover Pizza Hut pizza (cold, of course)
• Peanut butter granola bar
• Kiwi (1)
  
• Oreos (several)
  
• Coca-cola
• Chicken Teriyaki burger and fries from Mos Burger

Amount my sleep schedule was thrown off because of the typhoon:

• A lot

Things that will make October different after this week:

• Typhoons will stop coming through ... knock on wood
• Jonathan will be visiting Oct 4th-22nd
  
• English Village will be on hiatus 10/7 to 11/2, which means more free time on Tuesdays and Fridays
• It will be at least a little cooler here in Kaohsiung ... knock on wood again

Time to go to bed again. If you know my brother Steve, remember to wish him a happy 25th birthday!


(Steve, at my graduation, after a night of no sleep, probably glaring at my mother for taking a picture of him)

Who ordered pizza?

Saturday accomplishments:

• Finish another NYT Sunday crossword with Jonathan
• Buy groceries
• Discover that Taiwan does sell deodorant, razors, and hand sanitizer, at least a little bit
  
• Clean entire apartment (thanks to 小清)
• Wash and air-dry sheets, pillowcases, and blanket...
  
• Wear a sweatshirt and long PJ pants, however briefly and artificially, thanks to a strategically aimed air conditioning unit (I miss being cold)
  
• Watch some actual TV on my Slingbox
• Get the most expensive thing at Ice Art (actually on Friday): 雪花冰 with fresh mango, kiwi, and strawberry, and a scoop of chocolate chip ice cream for just over $7 US... probably the most you could spend on a single food item in Kaohsiung
• Find and navigate the online menu, then place an online order (all in Chinese) at必勝客; have a phone conversation with the server there, and pick it up
• Purchase three tubes of SPF 50+ sunscreen
• Watch "Pretty Woman" with Chinese subtitles
  

Tomorrow's to-do list:

• Write my weekly reflection (assigned by Fulbright and the Kaohsiung Bureau of Education)
  
• Go to Costco and a bookstore with my host family
  
• Plan lessons?
  
• Find a song to sing for demanding 4th graders
• Make a list of the top players in the MLB to help my baseball classes pick English names ("Po-sa-da!" "But Posada isn't his name... his name is Jorge... so you can be Jorge, or George!" "PO-SA-DA!")
• Triple-check that my DVR will be recording all the new TV starting up this week (via Slingbox, of course): Grey's, The Office, How I Met Your Mother, Chuck, and (many) more

With such a big day ahead, I better get started on sleep. More inspiring posts to come, but my mom said she wanted me to post more. So post more I shall.

In case you're in the area...

Alternate title: Cultural Imperialism, ahoy!


Green dot near bottom/left/center = our apartment.

Addendum: see this page for information about 7-11 in Taiwan. It is basically the most ubiquitous chain around, with at least 4 within a 5-minute walk from our apartment. Not only can you buy snacks there, but you can also pay your bills, fax/print documents or pictures, and buy tickets to local events and attractions.

Katie 老師 and the mooncakes

So, I'm writing this at the end of my first two days of classes, my first two days being called "Katie 老師." Because I'm not yet familiar with the students' ability levels, how a class here should run, etc., Susan ran the class and then had time for 外國老師 introduction and open questions. For some classes this lasted a few minutes, but in most of the classes this took almost the full 40-minute period. As a 22-year-old, it's hard to believe how distanced I am from the major interests and preoccupations of elementary school kids. For example, I haven't really thought about my favorite colors, animals, sports, movies, moviestars, or foods in quite a while. Between that and cultural differences, I had to make up a good number of answers on the spot that were at least mildly true, and also understandable to students in their first, second, or third year of a rather infrequent, un-rigorous English program.

A lot of the questions were basic, but many were really strange, and I can't imagine an American elementary school student asking them. In both cases though, I had fun, and the kids had fun, and I hope they learned something. I should note-- Susan translated for them. If they knew how to ask all of these questions and understand the answers in English, I don't think they'd need me.

So, here are some fun examples from my two days of questioning...

First, what you'd expect from a kid.

• What is your favorite color? (green and orange)
  
• What do you like to eat? (牛肉麵 and pizza)
  
• What sport do you like best? (baseball)
  
• Do you have any brothers or sisters? (two older brothers)
  
• What's your favorite animal? Why? (I like fish because they are pretty and quiet)
  

Second, what a lot of people ask me here.

• Why did you want to come to Taiwan? (it is pretty, the people are friendly, I want to learn Chinese)
  
• What did you study in college? (linguistics)
  
• How do you like Taiwan? (I like it a lot)
  
• What do you want to do when you go home? (I don't know, maybe become 美國的總統)
  

Third... Are you trying to ask me out?

• What's your sign? (Scorpio for zodiac, Ox for Chinese calendar)
  
• Do you have a boyfriend? (yes, he is in America) ...and lots of follow-up
• Why aren't you married? (I am too young)
  
• Do you have children? (I am too young)
• Why are you so pretty? (thank you)... not throwing that in to boost my ego... they basically think anyone western-looking is beautiful/handsome.
  

Fourth... um, what?

• Why is your hair yellow? / Why are your eyes blue? (I was born that way, everybody looks different in America)
  
• What is your blood type? (O, I think)
  
• Does America have more trash than Taiwan? (Some places have trash, some don't)
  
• Do you come from a broken home? (My parents live together in Philadelphia, where the Phillies play!)
  

So, yeah. That was basically my first two days of class, meeting all of the students and having a Q+A with Katie 老師.

The fourth grade class was particularly endearing. One of the girls asked during the Q+A, "Does Katie like to eat 月餅?" Not really knowing what they were, I said yes. Later, during my last class of the day, a troop of 4th graders lined up outside and presented me one by one with mooncakes that they had made... somehow... in the hour since I'd seen them. So adorable.

Here is a picture of the ten mooncakes they gave me yesterday:

And a close-up of one:

Now, because the Moon Festival is coming up this weekend, everyone is exchanging mooncakes like there's no tomorrow. As far as I can tell, the Moon Festival is something like a Taiwanese Thanksgiving, in that you gather with family and eat a lot. My roommates and I have all accrued a massive amount of mooncakes. I'm happy to say that the little handmade mooncakes from my students are far superior to the expensive packaged ones given from school faculty... though maybe I'm biased.

To conclude, here is a picture of all the mooncakes in our apartment so far (most are still in fancy boxes). And just think... the Moon Festival isn't even until Sunday...

Addendum: I guess I should tell you what's in a mooncake. So far, we've had taro, red bean, egg yolk, some meat-flavored thing, and a good number of unidentifiable substances. We've heard that some have things like coffee, fruit, or chocolate inside. I guess we have until Sunday to find out for sure.

我的日常生活

I remember from my earlier Chinese classes, one of the most common topics for essays (aside from 自我介紹 ) was 我的日常生活. So, true to my Chinese Ba/Bb roots, I thought I'd make a post on some of the things in my daily life here that are far different from my daily life at home (Berwyn, Cambridge, or otherwise). I've broken it up into a few categories...

Food
Because of the size and (lack of) appliances our kitchen has to offer, in addition to the fact that eating at restaurants is very inexpensive, we have yet to cook a meal for ourselves. So far I've taken to eating most of my lunches and dinners at a restaurant right next to our apartment building. Though she has a more extensive menu, I've only gone for 湯麵, 乾麵, and 餛飩麵. Until we officially exchanged names and phone numbers, I referred to the young woman working there as "Noodle Lady." The other day when I got 乾麵 for the third time in a row, she gave me a hard-boiled egg "on the house." I'm not sure whether she was trying to be friendly, or gently reminding me to vary my diet.

But more on "Noodle Lady" another time. Spoiler? She is a great friend who has been immensely helpful in my settling in here in Taiwan.

A common form of food is the 便當, which is what they fed us for lunch every day of orientation. Every 便當 is different. I could explain it to you, or I could just show you a picture. This picture is of the best meal I've had here, from a vegetarian buffet one night. In the large compartment there is white rice and some sort of tofu, and on the right there are green peppers (top), lima beans (middle), and corn/carrots/eggs (bottom). Few can relate to my deep appreciation for lima beans... but trust me, these were amazing, thus earning it the "best meal" title.



Finally, in an effort to save the environment and guard against unclean restaurants, most people carry their own set of chopsticks around. Here is my chopstick carrying case:



Transportation
Because the traffic here is dangerous and Kaohsiung is currently spending a lot of money on new public transit, our program directors are strongly advising us against buying scooters (the most popular mode of transportation). My roommates and I all bought bikes to help us get to and from our schools and other places in the area. While Dan went the fancy new road bike route, and Dani and Vicky got some nice standard mountain bikes, I decided to go in another direction. I wanted a foldable bike so that I could take it on the MRT (subway) or buses for free (can't do that with big bikes). Again, a picture is worth a thousand words, so instead of explaining the ridiculousness that is my bike, here's a picture.

Folded:


Unfolded:


Yeah, this thing doesn't even have gears. Also, the basket has an elephant on it. In case you couldn't tell.

Also, the seemingly "Asian" thing to do is to wear one of those facemasks around to protect yourself from airborne disease, or pollution, or something. Though I initially thought this was ridiculous, after riding around on the back of Susan's scooter I realized that not getting stuff in your face as you ride in traffic has its perks. Alas, I bought a facemask:



(The little pink dachshunds on it are an homage to my two dachshunds back home.)

The Little Things
It's really, really humid here. So every closet, cabinet, and hamper needs some sort of dehumidifier. I hung a dehumidifying pack in a small closet when we first got here, and after a month, it was basically a Ziploc bag full of water. It's a little hard to tell but... on the left there's the bag I just removed (flat on top, full of water on the bottom), and on the right there's the new bag (full of dehumidifying stuff on top, empty on the bottom):



Also, I have a fish. This is not unlike my life at home, my summer apartment, or my dorm room, really, but um, it's a different fish? His name is T-Rex.




Well I hope you all enjoyed yet another glimpse into my Taiwan life. Sorry for the post of novel proportions... we're going for a Fulbright conference in Taipei tomorrow, so this post, like my very first, is just another effort to avoid packing.

Talk to you Sunday, when I get back from Taipei!