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.
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!
The past three days, I've been at a conference in Kenting. In case you were wondering about my lack of blogging/emailing/calling, that's the reason. As you may remember, I also went to Kenting with Jonathan in October. It is sort of the vacation spot in Taiwan. But it's still January, and it was still a conference, so the visit wasn't all sunshine and beach. Though both played a role.
There's no need for me to describe the conference. It was a conference. Lots of things that are very interesting when presented individually become lost when they are presented one after another, Powerpoint after Powerpoint; though, I think the overall accomplishments of this year's Fulbright group are pretty impressive and certainly worth presenting. In addition to the presentations, there was a trip to the aquarium, some touring of an arboretum-ish area on a mountain, and some good quality beach time. There weren't any other tourists in the water with us, but the water was certainly warm enough for swimming. (The air, on the other hand, wasn't so warm for us running back to the hotel.) To think I went swimming in the ocean and got sunburned yesterday, and will be in freezing-cold Krakow next week with nought but a flimsy fluffy Carrefour "winter" coat... 真奇怪.
Anyway, this conference definitely made me appreciate Kenting's beauty. My visit with Jonathan was during the rainy season, and we were often too overwhelmed by figuring out where to stay or what to eat that we (or at least I) forgot to notice how amazing our surroundings were. This weekend, staying in the fanciest resort I've ever stayed in, feeling less of a need to take pictures and do everything, I finally realized why everyone loves this place.
Now, the pictures. Note: you can click on any picture to see it full-size in a separate window.
A group of high school kids oooh and aaah over the whale shark at the Taiwan National Museum of Marine Biology and Aquarium: Our room at the Caesar Park Hotel: The view from our balcony: Sites from an arboretum area of Kenting National Park: (a garden) (banyan pathway) (view from the arboretum) I could probably look at this water all day: Though, the landscape isn't too bad either: Thank you, Fulbright Foundation, for all that you've given me, and for all that you continue to give.
Before I started playing catch-up, Taiwan's birthday 10/10 or 雙十 (think 4th of July in the US) was coming up. As a Fulbright recipient, I was invited to Taipei for a big parade and banquet on 10/10. Luckily, Jon was able to come with me to the parade that morning under the auspices of dating a Fulbright. Sweet! The banquet was a little more closed-list, though, so he had fun wandering the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial while I half-heartedly, wholly-sunburnedly mingled at a very VIP event.
The parade was certainly the highlight of the day for me. Basically, it was four hours of speeches and performances in direct sunlight (guess who forgot to wear sunscreen)... the president of Taiwan was there, as well as several other politicians and Taiwanese celebrities. Being with Fulbright meant coming as a VIP, and we sat in the front of the parade area, next to the tent where the president/etc. sat, facing the masses of Taiwanese people who had waited in line for hours that morning to get in. I even got interviewed by someone in the Taiwanese media, and apparently some colleagues saw me on TV. The interview was pretty bland... I just played the happy American and said I love hot weather, the line wasn't too long, and the security was reasonable.
The event invitation had stipulated no cameras, so I didn't bring mine; when we got there and saw several people subtly and not-so-subtly taking pictures, I decided it would be okay to use my camera phone. Especially after I took a few pictures and the Taiwanese secret service dude sitting behind me didn't stop me.
So hold onto your internet connections, folks. I have probably 50+ pictures and videos from this event, but I'll try to crop this down into a tasteful, bloggable, slowconnectionable amount.
It began with what you'd expect... soldiers, military music, important people yelling patriotically:
Yes, it was sunny and hot and I didn't wear sunscreen. The only reason my face didn't get burned? Free (patriotic) hats! The parade also had plenty of floats, representing various organizations or regions of Taiwan. And plenty of choreographed performances, like these girls from Kaohsiung promoting the World Games in Kaohsiung, 2009. These girls made a performance at a recent Kaohsiung event, to be blogged later on... And plenty of other performances, many with young children and/or traditional cultural displays and/or, for lack of a better way to say it, strong presence of the Asian "Hello Kitty" aesthetic. Finally, because I believe the 10/10 banquet was more adequately covered in many fellow Kaohsiung ETA blogs, I'll leave you with just a few photos of this outrageous and fancy experience.
Taiwanese President Ma Yingjiu/Yingjeou (spellable many different ways)-- he's the guy between the backs of the Taiwanese Secret Service heads, mixing tea Hakka-style (though not the unidentifiable-but-probably-famous westerner in the middle).
On my way out... The "guest house" where the banquet took place, only open a few times a year for special occasions such as this. Note the red carpet on the left. Someday when I'm home in the US and we're passing a slow afternoon, ask to see the rest of the pictures from 10/10. You probably won't regret it.
I'm currently blogging from Baby Laptop in my hotel room in Taipei... leaving on the HSR (High Speed Rail) in a matter of less than 12 hours. Because I haven't uploaded any pictures and don't feel like typing anything on the tiny keyboard, I'm just writing a quick but necessary blog post.
As many of you know, and the blog indicates in more than one instance, I am in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on a Fulbright Fellowship to teach English. This program is sponsored by the United States Department of State and run by the Foundation for Scholarly Exchange in Taiwan. I am grateful to the Fulbright program, US State Department, and FSE for the opportunities granted to me, but I need to say that in this blog and in any other communications you have with me about my program here, the opinions and observations expressed are my own, and not affiliated with or endorsed by any of the aforementioned organizations.
That being said, because I am here on basically a mini-diplomatic mission, don't expect my blog to become politically controversial. I'm very interested in the politics here and have had several dialogues with Taiwanese citizens about these issues, but it is my duty to stay relatively distanced from any activity that would go against the Fulbright's diplomatic mission of cultural exchange.
Thanks for your reading (or skimming to here), and please, look forward to much more interesting blog posts later.
(Five dollars to anyone who can guess what was in our Fulbright conference/orientation packet...)
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."
Posts
