Hey there, I don't know what I gotta say but I need to stay committed to my little blogueing effort and so I must write a little something something here. Let's see, things have been ok. Life has been a series of minor ups and downs but nothing outrageously exciting. I guess that is how normal life becomes wherever you live.
Probably the most amazing thing that I have witnessed since I have been here has been the wild effects of the Chinese medicine. I was battling with some serious ear ache problems and it was really messing with my professional judgement. I mean when your ears really hurt it doesn't really screw with any part of your body except the two small holes that go straight through to your brain. It was like the sickness made everything I heard or witnessed turn into some sort of irritating babble. Imagine having to go to class with a bunch of crazy loud ass Chinese lookin' kids with the feeling that your brain is going to explode. It was like that except that it was real and it was real sucky. I tried to be an ok guy but I was one cranky son of a bitch.
But hey I got off the subject of the medicine. I had another fantastic "what the hell am I doing" experience when I went to a "Medical clinic" (or so I thought) to talk to a doctor and/or get doped up on some feel good pills. I first gave it a shot and walked in to a sterile bright white room covered in shelves piled with different bottles of mysterious pills. I went up to the lady who was already looking at me like "please don't talk to me and ruin my whole day. I am just about to get off." I asked her as physically as I could, hands all in the air and whatnot, "can you help me? My ears are so hurt and I want to see a doctor. I don't know what to do." Normally I have to yell at Taiwanese people because somehow I think that screaming a foreign language into someones ear can make them understand this unknown language better. However, you add the fact that at this point my ears are so backed up with sickness that I can barely hear anything, and I am practically screaming at this poor woman.
She brings out someone else who makes me feel a little better because at least she has snappy glasses and a white lab coat. I go through the same awkward and loud description of my misery and she simply replies, "you no want heeya. We heeya makeah Chinee medcin. You wan go to oddah doctah." She continues with this to the best of her abilities. I mean I can't complain because all I could do was prepare about fifty cheh chehs (thank yous) upon my departure. She then wrote a bunch of hieroglyphics onto a piece of paper indicating some place. Who knows.
I continued to wonder around almost deaf at this point with no luck. At one point I thought I might have arrived into something right but it turned out to be some sort of third rate dentist on the forth four of a dilapidated building. I can honestly say that I just peeked in and saw a guy writhing in a chair with some sort of dentist over his face. It was scary and lets just say that I have added a third brushing to my daily schedule just to avoid any encounter like that in the future. I think that guy might have been involved in the inspiration for the hostel movie.
In the end I gave up for the night and spent the night pissed off on my couch feeling crappy and deaf.
The next day I tried to call off work because I felt even worse and what do you think my boss says? "How about you come to your first class (which is the worst and the loudest) and then I will take you to the doctor." Ok, sort of unfair trade but I guess I really did need some sort of interpreter.
Basically my boss, who is hot and young and I want her to get a divorce and run away with me, took me to another craptown clinic with coughing and wastebasket vomiting gallor. In Asia things like that are no problem to preform in public. You often hear loud burps and farts all over while on the busses here. Wonderful. I waited about 30 minutes before I was finally taken into a room that really did look like a torture chamber just with more lighting. My boss had left at this point because I kept saying how stupid I felt and how I really needed to grow up and figure shit out for myself. The doctor was hopefully a qualified doctor but in no way an English prof. He did a little "inspection" of my ear holes and then made his diagnosis; "Well, I see some information in there."
"Excuse me?" I replied.
"Yeah, I can rearry see some information there," he insisted.
"Well what kind of information?" I was really wondering what sort of information this man had found. Had someone placed some microfilm in my ear in the night only to be discovered by this mask wearing doctor of misinterpretation?
"Yeah, redness and information," he says.
"Oooohhhhhhh," I say, keeping off the upcoming laughter, "you see some inflamation do you?"
"Yeah, inframation," he said so wonderfully coherently.
Half of the appointment was us going through difficult and funny conversations like that one. In the end he sent me the wrong way towards a pharmacy.
I found the place and was given a wild "cocktail" of pills that the Asians are known to prescribe. All sorts of stuff and even some eye drops that I was instructed to drop in my ear.
In the end, the funniest part was that after only 30 minutes of dropping my crazy concoction of pills I needed to take a quick pee. I peed and almost fell over in shock at the sight of what had just been polluted out of my body. My pee was school bus yellow. No that doesn't even do it justice. Have you ever had that orange Gatorade? Well I was pissing that out and it scared the hell out of me. I couldn't believe it. I thought if I were to cut myself my blood would be a solid bright green goo as if I truly was turning into some sort of monster. It was crazy and I made sure that over the next four days, while taking this bizarre medicine, everyone I knew here had either seen the magical pee or at least heard about it. I was truly fantastic and I hope that it will never part from my memory.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Road trippin' with my favorite allies.
It is pretty hard to try to remember and recount happy moments when you feel as shitty as I do right now but I am going to try. (I have gone back to feeling like a six year old again with not one but two ear infections. It doesn't feel good at all but I supposed I would be really dizzy if was only sick in one ear.) I think it is going to be a really long time before I can actually be sick and have any idea as to what I am supposed to do with myself. Most of my sick moments have been eased by my mother patting me on the head while serving me any type of feel good material I have would have need for. Now I am in China land and it makes going to the doctor about as appealing as drowning while getting kicked in the nuts by a steal toed boot. I went into the doctor's office today and was roughly told that it was a Chinese medicine place. Maybe they could give me some sort of tea and a cockroach to crawl around my brain eating up the illness. Who knows?
DAY ONE
Now I don't want to end up depressing you fellow readers so I will give you the details of my first weekend spent outside of Taipei. I and several of my comrades assembled a hodge podge of scooters and took ourselves a road trip into the mountains. We had wanted to go somewhere for the "vacation," and when all the buses to the beach were sold out we picked the music festival in the waterfall littered forest option. We were not disappointed in the end.
After an invigorating and beautiful 2 hour cruise up into the heart of the island we arrived at a makeshift campsite where we would spend the next three days doing all the fun, wild, and horrible things one does at a music festival. (Rest assured though, it was a drug free weekend. Not for everyone else, but yes for us.) We set up our tents under the designated "camp site" and deplorably awaited the time when we would decide to retire to our homes resting under a concrete foundation. We all decided that this weekend would just have to be about something else besides sleep.
Some of the features included in this "festival" as they would like to call it were a 18, no-name, but often talented, band lineup, 24 hour bar, three swimming pools, two hot springs, lots of girls, and all for the low low price of 20 dollars for the whole weekend. (camping included.) Not too bad if you think about it. Hell even you don't!
The first night was like any first night of a three day binge: way too much alcohol, dancing and making an ass out of one's self in front of all sorts (good and bad) of girls. In general we call it overexertion. It would sort of be like running a marathon the day before you do the iron man except there is no honor in what we did. We told jokes and stories, pushed people we didn't know into pools, and watched others on hallucinogens run around climbing trees and trying to tell you which star was their favorite. Oh by the way, you know which group was the easy majority at this hippy festival in the mountains?........that's right, the wi go ren as they call us, or as we are more commonly know: dirtbag white folk.
DAY TWO
Going to bed at 330 am in a tent laying on a concrete foundation turned out to be just a terrible idea on our part. This was because only 2.5 hours later while taking a quick one tenth awake pee break I ran into a group of crazed out South African Asian bitches screaming at me while laughing at the same time. These girls were claiming that I had both thrown up on them and into the pool in some sort of drunken rage. Now I know for a fact that this was not me because I was sleeping at the time and I also was still clear headed enough to know what I had or hadn't done. That and the fact that these girls were acting like they had eaten horse tranquilizer hamburgers before talking to me so I wasn't sure their judgement could be trusted.
Luckily the daemon women left me and what do you know? I couldn't return to my slumber. I don't know if it was the general discomfort of the rock hard tent or the fact that I was frighteningly shivering under my Kleenex blanket, of which was my only sleeping material at the time and now still, but I just couldn't go back to dream land. So I ran barefoot on the gravel filled ground as pathetically as I could to the hot springs where I spent the next 1.5 hours watching the crap end of the party people crashing over each other and the dudes in the collared shirts still trying to muster up the courage to simply say to their girls, "so you wanna check out my tent?"
My saving grace was in those hot springs where I met the only other person awake for the morning. It was a friendly 30 something woman and her 7 year old daughter. I split my time talking to her about her life in New Zealand and throwing her daughter into the air much to the wee one's delight. The best moment was when a Taiwanese woman who had joined the fun said, "why don't you get your daddy to play with us?" in reference to yours truly. Ever so politely I shouted, "oh oh ah ah ah no she isn't mine!" (oops) The best part was the Asian woman not wondering how two white people would make a half black child like the one in question. I guess she wasn't paying attention.
After my "bath" I went and tried to rouse my compatriots once again (only 7:30 now) to the same "what the hell are you doing awake?" and a nice middle finger for a finish. I thought instead, since the sun had risen, I would take a nice scooter ride to get some well deserved coffee. Only about 800 metres into my ride I saw a girl walking on the side of the road, and what do you think I did? I pulled right over and said nothing more than, "hop on and lets have some coffee baby." I even added baby just so I could tell it in the story later. Cheese dick to the rescue!!!
I thought maybe I recognized her from the party and when she screamed from behind my hog, "you're Andrew right?" I knew I probably had met her. Me and my meeting too many people at parties. So we took a nice ride down the mountain, stood by the water falls, talked about our families and music and got some coffee and lunch. I must say, it all made for a nice morning and I was delighted to have risen at such an early hour.
The rest of the day I tried to cling to some sort of deep rooted energy no one thought I had. I continued to jest and have fun with everyone as I always do. Sure, I was a little loopy but no more than anyone else who had slept little or none that night. After a while we thought we would take a break from the party world and scoot on down into town and visit our French friend Guillame.
Andrew and Graeme (the South Africans), Dunkle, David and Jennifer (the cool work couple), Francheska (the girl who made fun of me all weekend for some reason), Leslie (the new girl from the campground), and myself strapped on our helmets and peaced up out for the day.
We ate and we walked around, took pictures (which I will eventually post), and I quickly became the foot dragging complainer I can sometimes be after nights like the previous one. The highlight of the day was when Guillame and his friend took us down to the locals only hot springs. Man let me tell you, walking in there I could not have felt more out of place. Half naked Asians taking hot showers and laying in boiling pools of water, and they all couldn't stop looking at us, the wi go rens. But this feeling only stayed for a brief moment until I took a shower while using old laundry detergent bottles to pour scalding water all over myself. I think the most fun we had was when all of us poured twelve bottles of lava water onto one person. You could have cooked a lobster in this stuff and off course we are throwing it around and laughing like a bunch of idiots. I probably laughed the most when I helped an old man by pouring water on him while another Asian guy poured water on me. Maybe we are descended from monkeys. It was great and once again we realized that getting all the attention here really is pretty great.
After that we ate at a place where they serve you whole cooked chickens and then you wear gardening gloves to aid in ripping the shit out of the recently diseased bird. Graeme, my new partner in crime, saw how quickly we were fading after dinner and made an affirmative decision. There was no way we could try to soberly sleep on the concrete tents again, so we would simply have to go out wild again techno dancing in the rain with any girl and all girls. We also got squirt guns that turned out to be rather effective ice breakers.
So that was the weekend and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact I enjoyed reliving it so much that I actually feel a lot better. I mean my ears still feel like someone took a shit in them while jabbing a hot poker in my brain, but no worries. That was the first really good weekend I have had since Thailand and it reminds me that maybe a person can adapt to any place.
DAY ONE
Now I don't want to end up depressing you fellow readers so I will give you the details of my first weekend spent outside of Taipei. I and several of my comrades assembled a hodge podge of scooters and took ourselves a road trip into the mountains. We had wanted to go somewhere for the "vacation," and when all the buses to the beach were sold out we picked the music festival in the waterfall littered forest option. We were not disappointed in the end.
After an invigorating and beautiful 2 hour cruise up into the heart of the island we arrived at a makeshift campsite where we would spend the next three days doing all the fun, wild, and horrible things one does at a music festival. (Rest assured though, it was a drug free weekend. Not for everyone else, but yes for us.) We set up our tents under the designated "camp site" and deplorably awaited the time when we would decide to retire to our homes resting under a concrete foundation. We all decided that this weekend would just have to be about something else besides sleep.
Some of the features included in this "festival" as they would like to call it were a 18, no-name, but often talented, band lineup, 24 hour bar, three swimming pools, two hot springs, lots of girls, and all for the low low price of 20 dollars for the whole weekend. (camping included.) Not too bad if you think about it. Hell even you don't!
The first night was like any first night of a three day binge: way too much alcohol, dancing and making an ass out of one's self in front of all sorts (good and bad) of girls. In general we call it overexertion. It would sort of be like running a marathon the day before you do the iron man except there is no honor in what we did. We told jokes and stories, pushed people we didn't know into pools, and watched others on hallucinogens run around climbing trees and trying to tell you which star was their favorite. Oh by the way, you know which group was the easy majority at this hippy festival in the mountains?........that's right, the wi go ren as they call us, or as we are more commonly know: dirtbag white folk.
DAY TWO
Going to bed at 330 am in a tent laying on a concrete foundation turned out to be just a terrible idea on our part. This was because only 2.5 hours later while taking a quick one tenth awake pee break I ran into a group of crazed out South African Asian bitches screaming at me while laughing at the same time. These girls were claiming that I had both thrown up on them and into the pool in some sort of drunken rage. Now I know for a fact that this was not me because I was sleeping at the time and I also was still clear headed enough to know what I had or hadn't done. That and the fact that these girls were acting like they had eaten horse tranquilizer hamburgers before talking to me so I wasn't sure their judgement could be trusted.
Luckily the daemon women left me and what do you know? I couldn't return to my slumber. I don't know if it was the general discomfort of the rock hard tent or the fact that I was frighteningly shivering under my Kleenex blanket, of which was my only sleeping material at the time and now still, but I just couldn't go back to dream land. So I ran barefoot on the gravel filled ground as pathetically as I could to the hot springs where I spent the next 1.5 hours watching the crap end of the party people crashing over each other and the dudes in the collared shirts still trying to muster up the courage to simply say to their girls, "so you wanna check out my tent?"
My saving grace was in those hot springs where I met the only other person awake for the morning. It was a friendly 30 something woman and her 7 year old daughter. I split my time talking to her about her life in New Zealand and throwing her daughter into the air much to the wee one's delight. The best moment was when a Taiwanese woman who had joined the fun said, "why don't you get your daddy to play with us?" in reference to yours truly. Ever so politely I shouted, "oh oh ah ah ah no she isn't mine!" (oops) The best part was the Asian woman not wondering how two white people would make a half black child like the one in question. I guess she wasn't paying attention.
After my "bath" I went and tried to rouse my compatriots once again (only 7:30 now) to the same "what the hell are you doing awake?" and a nice middle finger for a finish. I thought instead, since the sun had risen, I would take a nice scooter ride to get some well deserved coffee. Only about 800 metres into my ride I saw a girl walking on the side of the road, and what do you think I did? I pulled right over and said nothing more than, "hop on and lets have some coffee baby." I even added baby just so I could tell it in the story later. Cheese dick to the rescue!!!
I thought maybe I recognized her from the party and when she screamed from behind my hog, "you're Andrew right?" I knew I probably had met her. Me and my meeting too many people at parties. So we took a nice ride down the mountain, stood by the water falls, talked about our families and music and got some coffee and lunch. I must say, it all made for a nice morning and I was delighted to have risen at such an early hour.
The rest of the day I tried to cling to some sort of deep rooted energy no one thought I had. I continued to jest and have fun with everyone as I always do. Sure, I was a little loopy but no more than anyone else who had slept little or none that night. After a while we thought we would take a break from the party world and scoot on down into town and visit our French friend Guillame.
Andrew and Graeme (the South Africans), Dunkle, David and Jennifer (the cool work couple), Francheska (the girl who made fun of me all weekend for some reason), Leslie (the new girl from the campground), and myself strapped on our helmets and peaced up out for the day.
We ate and we walked around, took pictures (which I will eventually post), and I quickly became the foot dragging complainer I can sometimes be after nights like the previous one. The highlight of the day was when Guillame and his friend took us down to the locals only hot springs. Man let me tell you, walking in there I could not have felt more out of place. Half naked Asians taking hot showers and laying in boiling pools of water, and they all couldn't stop looking at us, the wi go rens. But this feeling only stayed for a brief moment until I took a shower while using old laundry detergent bottles to pour scalding water all over myself. I think the most fun we had was when all of us poured twelve bottles of lava water onto one person. You could have cooked a lobster in this stuff and off course we are throwing it around and laughing like a bunch of idiots. I probably laughed the most when I helped an old man by pouring water on him while another Asian guy poured water on me. Maybe we are descended from monkeys. It was great and once again we realized that getting all the attention here really is pretty great.
After that we ate at a place where they serve you whole cooked chickens and then you wear gardening gloves to aid in ripping the shit out of the recently diseased bird. Graeme, my new partner in crime, saw how quickly we were fading after dinner and made an affirmative decision. There was no way we could try to soberly sleep on the concrete tents again, so we would simply have to go out wild again techno dancing in the rain with any girl and all girls. We also got squirt guns that turned out to be rather effective ice breakers.
So that was the weekend and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact I enjoyed reliving it so much that I actually feel a lot better. I mean my ears still feel like someone took a shit in them while jabbing a hot poker in my brain, but no worries. That was the first really good weekend I have had since Thailand and it reminds me that maybe a person can adapt to any place.
Monday, October 6, 2008
Is Hungry a country or a state of mind?
To answer that question I would say that for me Hungry is a state of misery that I find my myself meandering through almost every day. I am now in my second year living below the poverty level and I think it is starting to mess with me. Or at least it is starting to mess with my stomach.
While in France I was forced to survive off of not much money at all. When you consider that Paris is one of the most expensive cities in the world, I was most certainly on the poverty line. I once saw one of those exclusive "le Dateline" shows in France that did an expose on people who were poor in Paris. I kept thinking, how do these people live like this? How can they survive? I then soon found out that most of the "victims" made almost twice as much money as I did. Now that seems odd.
There are many ways to dealing with one's poverty and almost all of them rely on you feeling bad in some way. You may feel unhealthy, you may feel guilty, or you may feel rotten for all sorts of reasons.
Food is something we all need. If you try to say otherwise you are a complete idiot because like water and air, it is just something you gotta get once and while. When you are trying to salvage your money it seems like anything but your food should be what you skip out on. Every day I find myself between the option of the shit behind an alley food or some legitimate good stuff. I always go with the first option because it always seems like a good idea at the time to save a little green. So I have found myself day after day eating this retched food that really does make me feel sick at times. I find that if I keep it cheap maybe I will be able to use that leftover money for something else that I need. I have really gone with this philosophy for around a year now.
The option that I don't recommend is simply to stop eating all together. The nice part about this is that if you just don't eat, you don't have to pay for food at all. At first I wanted to try my own version of "fasting" simply because I new that others had done it and survived and had actually felt changed in some way from it. I can honestly say that giving up food for so long a time did make me appreciate my meal once it was finally steaming in front of me. The smells were more potent and I could feel the tasty morsels filling the empty voids in my body. It was really rejuvenating.
But I mean that was a long time ago when I would waltz through the lively streets of Paris wondering how much longer I could go denying myself the carnal pleasures of food. (In the end I almost always chose doner kebab too, so it really wasn't that much of a step up.) Those days were good because as I stumbled from cafe to cafe I could imagine myself as one of the hunger crazed artists who's barren stomach released sparks into his brain which thus aided his creative genius. But that was how I felt. I acutally looked like some stinky bum wondering around aimlessly with nothing else to do. I guess I sort of was that description.
The difference is that now I am here in Taiwan and I am much much poorer. I had come to this wonderful island believing that I would make my big payday and I would be able to begin my ascent/descent into real life adulthood. What has actually happened is that my whiskers grow quicker, my clothing has become less diverse, and my hunger more profound. The other day I set a new record; a 30 hour hunger strike. It is miserable but I have begun to acquire quite the endurance for hunger because I hardly eat. I don't know why I choose to save money on something I love so much and need so badly but every time it happens the same way.
I said that when you give food a break it seems all the more delicious later, but here it isn't always true. You can either eat some really great food and some food that makes you want to throw up just writing about it. Of course I wouldn't be able to throw much up because I haven't eaten in about 18 hours.
I try to keep myself on a regular cycle of eating and I take advantage of free food whenever it comes by but that just simply doesn't do in this hunger lifestyle I have begun to acclimate to. I will often hope that I get to my school early enough to steal some of the cafeteria food and I almost always miss the deadline. This means that for the rest of school I have to maintain a positive and patient attitude while my stomach begins to absorb my muscles because the fat is already gone. That is the edible fat. My boss has on several occasions informed me that I need to do some work on my "tummy." The Asians here are such a kind and honest people.
There are two types of hungry people in the world. There are those types of people who do not have food and they do not know when their next meal may arrive. They go about their day to day activities just the same as anyone else but they do it without any food based energy inside them. The same people who would give a bit a food to someone else before consuming it themselves. These are the people that you and I should admire because while they have no choice in what they eat, they still survive.
There are also people like me. Now I will tell you, I really am poor and even when I do start to make any real money that money will have to go back to other people who have had to hear me say over and over "just help me a little bit and I will get it back to you." I have to borrow money in order to still look poor which gives no satisfaction to those who loan the money. People like me are hungry because they don't know what the hell they are doing and they make impulsive decisions that put them in the position of having to deny themselves sustenance in the first place. These are the people that you probably won't be sympathetic to but you can at least laugh at their slightly less miserable predicament.
So is Hungry a country or a state of mind? Well I travelled to hungry by myself and I was so poor then that I had to sleep in a bus station with a bunch of hobos who smelled like rotten pumpkins and I can tell you for sure that I had some hungry times then as well.
While in France I was forced to survive off of not much money at all. When you consider that Paris is one of the most expensive cities in the world, I was most certainly on the poverty line. I once saw one of those exclusive "le Dateline" shows in France that did an expose on people who were poor in Paris. I kept thinking, how do these people live like this? How can they survive? I then soon found out that most of the "victims" made almost twice as much money as I did. Now that seems odd.
There are many ways to dealing with one's poverty and almost all of them rely on you feeling bad in some way. You may feel unhealthy, you may feel guilty, or you may feel rotten for all sorts of reasons.
Food is something we all need. If you try to say otherwise you are a complete idiot because like water and air, it is just something you gotta get once and while. When you are trying to salvage your money it seems like anything but your food should be what you skip out on. Every day I find myself between the option of the shit behind an alley food or some legitimate good stuff. I always go with the first option because it always seems like a good idea at the time to save a little green. So I have found myself day after day eating this retched food that really does make me feel sick at times. I find that if I keep it cheap maybe I will be able to use that leftover money for something else that I need. I have really gone with this philosophy for around a year now.
The option that I don't recommend is simply to stop eating all together. The nice part about this is that if you just don't eat, you don't have to pay for food at all. At first I wanted to try my own version of "fasting" simply because I new that others had done it and survived and had actually felt changed in some way from it. I can honestly say that giving up food for so long a time did make me appreciate my meal once it was finally steaming in front of me. The smells were more potent and I could feel the tasty morsels filling the empty voids in my body. It was really rejuvenating.
But I mean that was a long time ago when I would waltz through the lively streets of Paris wondering how much longer I could go denying myself the carnal pleasures of food. (In the end I almost always chose doner kebab too, so it really wasn't that much of a step up.) Those days were good because as I stumbled from cafe to cafe I could imagine myself as one of the hunger crazed artists who's barren stomach released sparks into his brain which thus aided his creative genius. But that was how I felt. I acutally looked like some stinky bum wondering around aimlessly with nothing else to do. I guess I sort of was that description.
The difference is that now I am here in Taiwan and I am much much poorer. I had come to this wonderful island believing that I would make my big payday and I would be able to begin my ascent/descent into real life adulthood. What has actually happened is that my whiskers grow quicker, my clothing has become less diverse, and my hunger more profound. The other day I set a new record; a 30 hour hunger strike. It is miserable but I have begun to acquire quite the endurance for hunger because I hardly eat. I don't know why I choose to save money on something I love so much and need so badly but every time it happens the same way.
I said that when you give food a break it seems all the more delicious later, but here it isn't always true. You can either eat some really great food and some food that makes you want to throw up just writing about it. Of course I wouldn't be able to throw much up because I haven't eaten in about 18 hours.
I try to keep myself on a regular cycle of eating and I take advantage of free food whenever it comes by but that just simply doesn't do in this hunger lifestyle I have begun to acclimate to. I will often hope that I get to my school early enough to steal some of the cafeteria food and I almost always miss the deadline. This means that for the rest of school I have to maintain a positive and patient attitude while my stomach begins to absorb my muscles because the fat is already gone. That is the edible fat. My boss has on several occasions informed me that I need to do some work on my "tummy." The Asians here are such a kind and honest people.
There are two types of hungry people in the world. There are those types of people who do not have food and they do not know when their next meal may arrive. They go about their day to day activities just the same as anyone else but they do it without any food based energy inside them. The same people who would give a bit a food to someone else before consuming it themselves. These are the people that you and I should admire because while they have no choice in what they eat, they still survive.
There are also people like me. Now I will tell you, I really am poor and even when I do start to make any real money that money will have to go back to other people who have had to hear me say over and over "just help me a little bit and I will get it back to you." I have to borrow money in order to still look poor which gives no satisfaction to those who loan the money. People like me are hungry because they don't know what the hell they are doing and they make impulsive decisions that put them in the position of having to deny themselves sustenance in the first place. These are the people that you probably won't be sympathetic to but you can at least laugh at their slightly less miserable predicament.
So is Hungry a country or a state of mind? Well I travelled to hungry by myself and I was so poor then that I had to sleep in a bus station with a bunch of hobos who smelled like rotten pumpkins and I can tell you for sure that I had some hungry times then as well.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Lazy Typhoon Days
Let me tell you something. While the idea of a typhoon may sound scary (especially with the complicated ph instead of the simple f) it really isn't so bad. Basically the storm began today when I arrived home at about 7 in the morning. It was as if each cloud were a giant sponge being squeezed dry and therefore crapping out pounds and pounds of rain on me. Actually I think it might be a little more technical but that should be close. It has been raining all day today and while I don't mind a little rain it is weird being trapped in one's house all day. The funny part is that even if it were nice out today I would probably still just lay around my house not doing anything. But that isn't the point. The forced confinement is way worse than the voluntary confinement that I often subject myself to each weekend.
So that is what's going on right now, besides the fact that I just lost at cards and got sore about it so I had to leave. Now I can tell you faithful reader, I am trying hard to not simply make a record of my weekend adventures but rather give you something new and intriguing each week. So what I am going to do this time is tell you a small story from an excellent weekend that made many great moments. Than after I do that maybe I will try something else. Maybe I will complain about something or tell you about how much I miss tacos to the point where I would eat one if I saw it laying on the ground. That would be something new right?
Well either way this particular story gave me a bit of a tickle in my funny bone. Well at least it did the next day when I could get over the slight awkwardness of it all.
On Friday night Dunkle and I went to a club/bar with some friends that was called Hips. This particular club is a Latin club in the middle of China where you can be assured to find people from all over Latin America. People have tried to explain to me the complexities of why there are so many Spanish speakers around here and I think I sort of understand.
You see back in the 1950s when tension was growing between China and Taiwan a man named Julio Gonzago came from Panama with an offer that none could refuse. He was determined to sell his famous "Chickititata" plant to the neighboring Chinese people. The Chinese and the Taiwanese were in talks of making a trade embargo that would put them on the map psychologically and fiscally. When the "Chickititata" plant arrived in both countries there were mixed reviews because the plant had very strange ingredients that would make one very slow and unresponsive. While the Chinese did not embrace this plant Julio Ines received rave reviews by the Taiwanese and was elected "chairman of agriculture" for Taiwan. Thus the relationship was made and since then many have come from afar to live, eat "Chickititata" plant and dance salsa in this one club that Dunkle and I went to. Ok I don't really know why there are so many Central Americans here but it is pretty cool because the girls are hot and me like dat much.
Dunkle and I were having a pretty good time and we had met a good amount of people in a quick amount of time. We were having drinks and telling jokes and really just enjoying ourselves. I began talking to a pretty little lady named Leslie and was subsequently dragged onto the dance floor for a little rug cutting and what not. It was a little intimidating because Latin girls always know how to dance well and they can tell that my jumping around throwing my hands in the air is not a rehearsed move I got from my days working with Timberlake. Nevertheless, we were having fun and I was pretty happy with how things were going. Suddenly a girl came up to us with Jorge or Alfonso and I was startled. It appeared that this girl happened to have a twin sister. She tried at first to introduce me and her sister very quickly brushed me off and started talking to Leslie a bit abrasively. After only a minute Leslie ran off like there was a damn fire in the building. I stood there watching her run off and was like, "and who the hell are you making her run off?" I was trying to be somewhat cordial but it seemed like she had said something fiery (as latins often are) to her sister. So I said screw this and walked off.
After pondering what had happened Leslie came back. I started with "What happened? You just ran off."
"Me. You ran off from me. What it that all about?" she retorted.
"Are you kidding I was just standing there and then you just peaced out."
This went on for awhile and we moved on to other things and they were all clouded by this somewhat crappy attitude on her side. I talked to her for a good twenty minutes with many confusing looks made by both of us. I mean it felt like I was talking to an entirely different person, what had happened?
Ahhhhhh, I very lately realized. I had been talking to this girl's sister the entire last twenty minutes. I was completely flabbergasted. I really felt stupid and yet somehow she had not detected that I thought she was someone else. I can't imagine what she said to her sister later but it was probably something along the lines of "that dude is completely off his rocker and has no idea how to communicate with girls."
So I felt pretty stupid about that happening and now that I just wrote the whole story out I am going to have to apologize for it not being very interesting. I guess I thought it was funny at the time but some things grow old with time, even if it is just a weekend. Well they can't all be gold.
The rest of this weekend was followed by many fun times and new people and it ended last night with me stumbling into some Asian people's karaoke birthday party. They immediately invited me in and I sang some duets and drank some of their whiskey. It was fun and we all stayed together until 630 singing and laughing and hanging out. Very fun.
This is quickly becoming an adventure that I will certainly continue to enjoy more with each day. We have now entered a new season and that means new things to look forward to. Who knows what will come with the next day.
So that is what's going on right now, besides the fact that I just lost at cards and got sore about it so I had to leave. Now I can tell you faithful reader, I am trying hard to not simply make a record of my weekend adventures but rather give you something new and intriguing each week. So what I am going to do this time is tell you a small story from an excellent weekend that made many great moments. Than after I do that maybe I will try something else. Maybe I will complain about something or tell you about how much I miss tacos to the point where I would eat one if I saw it laying on the ground. That would be something new right?
Well either way this particular story gave me a bit of a tickle in my funny bone. Well at least it did the next day when I could get over the slight awkwardness of it all.
On Friday night Dunkle and I went to a club/bar with some friends that was called Hips. This particular club is a Latin club in the middle of China where you can be assured to find people from all over Latin America. People have tried to explain to me the complexities of why there are so many Spanish speakers around here and I think I sort of understand.
You see back in the 1950s when tension was growing between China and Taiwan a man named Julio Gonzago came from Panama with an offer that none could refuse. He was determined to sell his famous "Chickititata" plant to the neighboring Chinese people. The Chinese and the Taiwanese were in talks of making a trade embargo that would put them on the map psychologically and fiscally. When the "Chickititata" plant arrived in both countries there were mixed reviews because the plant had very strange ingredients that would make one very slow and unresponsive. While the Chinese did not embrace this plant Julio Ines received rave reviews by the Taiwanese and was elected "chairman of agriculture" for Taiwan. Thus the relationship was made and since then many have come from afar to live, eat "Chickititata" plant and dance salsa in this one club that Dunkle and I went to. Ok I don't really know why there are so many Central Americans here but it is pretty cool because the girls are hot and me like dat much.
Dunkle and I were having a pretty good time and we had met a good amount of people in a quick amount of time. We were having drinks and telling jokes and really just enjoying ourselves. I began talking to a pretty little lady named Leslie and was subsequently dragged onto the dance floor for a little rug cutting and what not. It was a little intimidating because Latin girls always know how to dance well and they can tell that my jumping around throwing my hands in the air is not a rehearsed move I got from my days working with Timberlake. Nevertheless, we were having fun and I was pretty happy with how things were going. Suddenly a girl came up to us with Jorge or Alfonso and I was startled. It appeared that this girl happened to have a twin sister. She tried at first to introduce me and her sister very quickly brushed me off and started talking to Leslie a bit abrasively. After only a minute Leslie ran off like there was a damn fire in the building. I stood there watching her run off and was like, "and who the hell are you making her run off?" I was trying to be somewhat cordial but it seemed like she had said something fiery (as latins often are) to her sister. So I said screw this and walked off.
After pondering what had happened Leslie came back. I started with "What happened? You just ran off."
"Me. You ran off from me. What it that all about?" she retorted.
"Are you kidding I was just standing there and then you just peaced out."
This went on for awhile and we moved on to other things and they were all clouded by this somewhat crappy attitude on her side. I talked to her for a good twenty minutes with many confusing looks made by both of us. I mean it felt like I was talking to an entirely different person, what had happened?
Ahhhhhh, I very lately realized. I had been talking to this girl's sister the entire last twenty minutes. I was completely flabbergasted. I really felt stupid and yet somehow she had not detected that I thought she was someone else. I can't imagine what she said to her sister later but it was probably something along the lines of "that dude is completely off his rocker and has no idea how to communicate with girls."
So I felt pretty stupid about that happening and now that I just wrote the whole story out I am going to have to apologize for it not being very interesting. I guess I thought it was funny at the time but some things grow old with time, even if it is just a weekend. Well they can't all be gold.
The rest of this weekend was followed by many fun times and new people and it ended last night with me stumbling into some Asian people's karaoke birthday party. They immediately invited me in and I sang some duets and drank some of their whiskey. It was fun and we all stayed together until 630 singing and laughing and hanging out. Very fun.
This is quickly becoming an adventure that I will certainly continue to enjoy more with each day. We have now entered a new season and that means new things to look forward to. Who knows what will come with the next day.
Saturday, September 20, 2008
What a life to lead.
Well I am still here somehow and I am still alive. That is good enough news I suppose. Things are quickly becoming comfortable here in little old Taipei and I think just maybe I am going to be able to survive here. Let's see I suppose a lot of pretty interesting things have happened in the past couple of days.
Let's start all the way back at yesterday. Yesterday was a pretty fun day and it was my first time since I have been here that I voyaged to some other distant part of this island. It wasn't even very hard because I simply had to take the metro all the way down from my house. You wouldn't believe it but if I take the metro, that is directly outside of my house, and I ride it for about 30 minutes, I will arrive at the edge of the island and thus the ocean. It is pretty amazing to consider because I have never lived so close to something as wonderful as water. Now if I actually wanted to go to a swimming beach I would then have to take a bus or something for about ten minutes. But still, there is nothing like eating spicy squid while walking down the fisherman's wharf. And to be honest I don't even know if it was a wharf or if it was the beachfront walkway but it was nice.
I went down with Dunkle yesterday with the intent to meet up with some of his friends from El Salvador to take a nice leisurely bike ride along the river. Now I would have been interested in doing something like this except that it was the hottest point in the day on a day that was already around 94 degrees. Too hot. So instead of trying something that could have easily killed us, we decided to just keep it real in the air conditioned apartment of Flora and Mercedes. This was pretty fun because I got to shyly practice a little bit of some old school Spanish while having a good time with some pretty girls.
After a game of pool in their lobby (which also has ping pong, a movie theatre, a bowling alley, and a library) we decided to go out into the hot ass world in search of some sort of food and drink. This is always the key motivator here in Taipei because it just gets soo hot here that it sometimes hurts to go outside. So it was the two American dudes and the now four Latin girls on a quest to just go hang out somewhere. I can tell you nothing noble but it was all we really needed to do at this time.
After walking around trying to fluff my shirt every five seconds I was getting a little restless. As my shirt developed more and more sweat rings that made me look like a lactating pig rotating over a roasting fire, I desperately needed to go somewhere that would release me from this embarrassing condition I found myself to be in. We found solace in an ideal little shore side restaurant called....... well I can't remember but it was really nice and we were able to get a little food and some ice cold beer. We had a very nice time just hanging out and talking and telling stories about this and that.
After some chit chat and some well deserved shade, we sat in big comfy couches and watched a bright red sun descend into the water. It was a very beautiful sunset on this particular Saturday evening.
Now that we had started the party, the only other thing we could possibly do was to go to a real party. Let me tell you this was a great capstone (or so I thought) to our evening because we had a rooftop party with nachos and good friends. Actually, I had just met all these people but maybe they will be my good friends someday. The best part was being able to see the whole city and bay from the top of the building. By now the sun was gone and a nice wind blew across the balcony and it reassured all of us that maybe life wasn't so bad.
We spent quite a few hours laughing and talking and eating before we realized that it was still only about 9 pm. The girl from Hong Kong had gone as well as the El Salvadorian and Mexican Girls. I was finishing up my conversation with a Turkish couple and a Swedish guy so Dunkle, our Thai friend Steven and I went off to new and interesting adventures.
I will let you know, there was no real reason for any of us three to be going to some other "social" environment except that of our own beds. But certain times, all times, call for just doing whatever you feel like. So after running home and changing into our "sweet douche bag" clothes we were ready for an evening at the uber sheik Club 19. When we arrived to this place, that I could never find again on my own, we were overpowered by a barrage of young go getters excited to spend their next hour waiting in a line in the hopes that their ticket would come and they could go buy overpriced drinks while yelling into peoples ears for an attempt at conversation. I can't say that this place was in anyway my style but considering the fact that I only have one backpacks worth of clothing now, I don't know if I even have a style to stick to.
Nevertheless, I was certainly not about to stand in some line waiting to go to some place. That was when I saw a young gentleman climb out of his Ferrari and go right in. Why couldn't I do that. After some smooth fanagaling, by our friend Steven, we were in da club. No line, no hassles, no pissed off Andrew complaining in a line for an hour. Perfect!
The club was just like any other one where you go in and try to talk to some girl and are finally used to the loud music only to have the volume turned up the second you were going to say something you really thought would win her over. I tried this many times to limited success. The best part of the night was when the three of us said screw this, let's just have a good time. If you can imagine three buzzed up dudes in a club about 8 times too shee shee for them dancing like maniacs to some crappy techno music, you would be accurately picturing us in some Taiwanese club at 330 in the morning. Sometimes I amaze myself. All in all it was the best way to get off all that steam from our earlier stressful day of relaxation and slight flirtations to any girl that would have it.
After arriving home at an hour most certainly too late, Dunkle desperately desired a bit of sleep before he woke up at 7 to take a flight out to the Philippines for a little "visa run." We of course made sure that he was sound asleep before running in his room screaming followed by a nice doggy pile. If only Drew had been there we could have added to our long list of pissed off sleepy people who's only defense is "grow up, you're not a kid anymore." Well I beg to differ. The last part of the night was spent with Steven and I eating Mack's Lounge breakfast (which I totally did not know existed here). He left, and I, eyes closed, stumbled into a most uncomfortable pink bed. A day well spent in Taipei.
Let's start all the way back at yesterday. Yesterday was a pretty fun day and it was my first time since I have been here that I voyaged to some other distant part of this island. It wasn't even very hard because I simply had to take the metro all the way down from my house. You wouldn't believe it but if I take the metro, that is directly outside of my house, and I ride it for about 30 minutes, I will arrive at the edge of the island and thus the ocean. It is pretty amazing to consider because I have never lived so close to something as wonderful as water. Now if I actually wanted to go to a swimming beach I would then have to take a bus or something for about ten minutes. But still, there is nothing like eating spicy squid while walking down the fisherman's wharf. And to be honest I don't even know if it was a wharf or if it was the beachfront walkway but it was nice.
I went down with Dunkle yesterday with the intent to meet up with some of his friends from El Salvador to take a nice leisurely bike ride along the river. Now I would have been interested in doing something like this except that it was the hottest point in the day on a day that was already around 94 degrees. Too hot. So instead of trying something that could have easily killed us, we decided to just keep it real in the air conditioned apartment of Flora and Mercedes. This was pretty fun because I got to shyly practice a little bit of some old school Spanish while having a good time with some pretty girls.
After a game of pool in their lobby (which also has ping pong, a movie theatre, a bowling alley, and a library) we decided to go out into the hot ass world in search of some sort of food and drink. This is always the key motivator here in Taipei because it just gets soo hot here that it sometimes hurts to go outside. So it was the two American dudes and the now four Latin girls on a quest to just go hang out somewhere. I can tell you nothing noble but it was all we really needed to do at this time.
After walking around trying to fluff my shirt every five seconds I was getting a little restless. As my shirt developed more and more sweat rings that made me look like a lactating pig rotating over a roasting fire, I desperately needed to go somewhere that would release me from this embarrassing condition I found myself to be in. We found solace in an ideal little shore side restaurant called....... well I can't remember but it was really nice and we were able to get a little food and some ice cold beer. We had a very nice time just hanging out and talking and telling stories about this and that.
After some chit chat and some well deserved shade, we sat in big comfy couches and watched a bright red sun descend into the water. It was a very beautiful sunset on this particular Saturday evening.
Now that we had started the party, the only other thing we could possibly do was to go to a real party. Let me tell you this was a great capstone (or so I thought) to our evening because we had a rooftop party with nachos and good friends. Actually, I had just met all these people but maybe they will be my good friends someday. The best part was being able to see the whole city and bay from the top of the building. By now the sun was gone and a nice wind blew across the balcony and it reassured all of us that maybe life wasn't so bad.
We spent quite a few hours laughing and talking and eating before we realized that it was still only about 9 pm. The girl from Hong Kong had gone as well as the El Salvadorian and Mexican Girls. I was finishing up my conversation with a Turkish couple and a Swedish guy so Dunkle, our Thai friend Steven and I went off to new and interesting adventures.
I will let you know, there was no real reason for any of us three to be going to some other "social" environment except that of our own beds. But certain times, all times, call for just doing whatever you feel like. So after running home and changing into our "sweet douche bag" clothes we were ready for an evening at the uber sheik Club 19. When we arrived to this place, that I could never find again on my own, we were overpowered by a barrage of young go getters excited to spend their next hour waiting in a line in the hopes that their ticket would come and they could go buy overpriced drinks while yelling into peoples ears for an attempt at conversation. I can't say that this place was in anyway my style but considering the fact that I only have one backpacks worth of clothing now, I don't know if I even have a style to stick to.
Nevertheless, I was certainly not about to stand in some line waiting to go to some place. That was when I saw a young gentleman climb out of his Ferrari and go right in. Why couldn't I do that. After some smooth fanagaling, by our friend Steven, we were in da club. No line, no hassles, no pissed off Andrew complaining in a line for an hour. Perfect!
The club was just like any other one where you go in and try to talk to some girl and are finally used to the loud music only to have the volume turned up the second you were going to say something you really thought would win her over. I tried this many times to limited success. The best part of the night was when the three of us said screw this, let's just have a good time. If you can imagine three buzzed up dudes in a club about 8 times too shee shee for them dancing like maniacs to some crappy techno music, you would be accurately picturing us in some Taiwanese club at 330 in the morning. Sometimes I amaze myself. All in all it was the best way to get off all that steam from our earlier stressful day of relaxation and slight flirtations to any girl that would have it.
After arriving home at an hour most certainly too late, Dunkle desperately desired a bit of sleep before he woke up at 7 to take a flight out to the Philippines for a little "visa run." We of course made sure that he was sound asleep before running in his room screaming followed by a nice doggy pile. If only Drew had been there we could have added to our long list of pissed off sleepy people who's only defense is "grow up, you're not a kid anymore." Well I beg to differ. The last part of the night was spent with Steven and I eating Mack's Lounge breakfast (which I totally did not know existed here). He left, and I, eyes closed, stumbled into a most uncomfortable pink bed. A day well spent in Taipei.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Long time no blog!
Well life is starting to sort of work out here in Taipei so I am feeling pretty good. Now I have an apartment, my job pretty much has a regular feel to it, and I have even begun to make some friends if you can believe it. You would think I would try to make the excuse that I am so busy but I still have way too much free time and struggle with getting up before 10 each morning. Most of the time I am not able to get up that early.
So let's think about some stuff that I really miss about my wonderful home in the United States of America. Well lately I have really been craving some good spicy Mexican food and they just don't seem to know at all what it is. I talked to one guy who said he went to a "Mexican" place here and they gave him noodles with crappy salsa atop. Not really what I am looking for. I want that big giant burrito that looks bigger than my thigh, or so many tacos that they look blurry when I try to see the end of them, and lets not forget the authentic marg. I mean that stuff is just classic and so great. Oh and I forgot how much I have been wanting some nachos. I would even settle for some gas station style stuff but no goes. In the 7-11s here they have hard boiled eggs soaked in tea and I can tell you I would rather get kicked in the balls 8 times than have to eat one of those turds.
I also really miss just the general variety that we have in our country. I mean you want some of this you go that way and if you want some of that you just go the other way. Taipei has a lot to offer but there really isn't much outside of maybe Chinese or Japanese culture. What does it take to get some real hamburgers or some quesadillas? Maybe I am just hungry. And you know there is one thing that is great about eating here.... it is so cheap. Well actually it isn't soooo cheap but it is cheaper. I still like the food here but I just want some MFin' Mexican!!!
I had a little celebration last night because it was my first day as an illegal immigrant in Taiwan. You see, before I came here I was supposed to get a 90 day tourist visa and then illegally get my real stuff once here. My problem was that I was in Thailand and while I could have gone to an embassy there, I was too busy hanging out on the beach and keeping it real. So when I arrived I was only issued a 30 day visa which I guess just doesn't cut it. But someone is in the process of doing some sort of magic so I am confident that it will all work out. And if it doesn't maybe you can keep the light on for me because my ass will be getting deported. Oh well life is boring when it is legal. I was actually illegal in France for almost two months and that worked out ok.
Overall though I am really enjoying myself here. My job is probably my favorite part to be honest. I really like my classes and they are proving to be a real challenge. Of course a positive one. I am already being emailed by parents who like to give me tips about their kids and one mom called the school and said that because of me she would make sure that all her friend's kids got into our school. Now just let me try this charm in the real world. The strangest part is trying to keep calm because some of these kids are so crazy that I want to slap them across the face. I would never do that but I think if I did it to some they wouldn't even know what had hit them and they would just continue singing while having a seizure and crapping out butterflies. (That crazy.)
Sorry this blog sort of sucked but I am back to writing with a hot ass computer on my lap and all I can think about is the song "chestnuts roasting on an open laptop." I am dying. If you have never had that feeling don't try it cause I am sure I will end up having some three eyed children because of it. Fare well and I will contact you soon.
Oh I forgot to mention that I went to this huge pool party this weekend and it totally rocked because there were movie stars (Chinese movie stars) and all sorts of hot model chicks there. And this weekend I might take the metro to the beach. Life ain't so bad.
So let's think about some stuff that I really miss about my wonderful home in the United States of America. Well lately I have really been craving some good spicy Mexican food and they just don't seem to know at all what it is. I talked to one guy who said he went to a "Mexican" place here and they gave him noodles with crappy salsa atop. Not really what I am looking for. I want that big giant burrito that looks bigger than my thigh, or so many tacos that they look blurry when I try to see the end of them, and lets not forget the authentic marg. I mean that stuff is just classic and so great. Oh and I forgot how much I have been wanting some nachos. I would even settle for some gas station style stuff but no goes. In the 7-11s here they have hard boiled eggs soaked in tea and I can tell you I would rather get kicked in the balls 8 times than have to eat one of those turds.
I also really miss just the general variety that we have in our country. I mean you want some of this you go that way and if you want some of that you just go the other way. Taipei has a lot to offer but there really isn't much outside of maybe Chinese or Japanese culture. What does it take to get some real hamburgers or some quesadillas? Maybe I am just hungry. And you know there is one thing that is great about eating here.... it is so cheap. Well actually it isn't soooo cheap but it is cheaper. I still like the food here but I just want some MFin' Mexican!!!
I had a little celebration last night because it was my first day as an illegal immigrant in Taiwan. You see, before I came here I was supposed to get a 90 day tourist visa and then illegally get my real stuff once here. My problem was that I was in Thailand and while I could have gone to an embassy there, I was too busy hanging out on the beach and keeping it real. So when I arrived I was only issued a 30 day visa which I guess just doesn't cut it. But someone is in the process of doing some sort of magic so I am confident that it will all work out. And if it doesn't maybe you can keep the light on for me because my ass will be getting deported. Oh well life is boring when it is legal. I was actually illegal in France for almost two months and that worked out ok.
Overall though I am really enjoying myself here. My job is probably my favorite part to be honest. I really like my classes and they are proving to be a real challenge. Of course a positive one. I am already being emailed by parents who like to give me tips about their kids and one mom called the school and said that because of me she would make sure that all her friend's kids got into our school. Now just let me try this charm in the real world. The strangest part is trying to keep calm because some of these kids are so crazy that I want to slap them across the face. I would never do that but I think if I did it to some they wouldn't even know what had hit them and they would just continue singing while having a seizure and crapping out butterflies. (That crazy.)
Sorry this blog sort of sucked but I am back to writing with a hot ass computer on my lap and all I can think about is the song "chestnuts roasting on an open laptop." I am dying. If you have never had that feeling don't try it cause I am sure I will end up having some three eyed children because of it. Fare well and I will contact you soon.
Oh I forgot to mention that I went to this huge pool party this weekend and it totally rocked because there were movie stars (Chinese movie stars) and all sorts of hot model chicks there. And this weekend I might take the metro to the beach. Life ain't so bad.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Beef Fried Noodles
This really isn’t a guide to eating here in Taiwan but rather how I have come to survive each day. Like many of you I have just arrived into Taiwan so my knowledge of the language and culture here is at a bare minimum. This makes things like eating a little more difficult but much more interesting.
The key to my limited success has been to be sure to wait about 10-12 hours between my meals. This allows me to be so hungry that I can hardly even think straight. When I am in this condition it makes for some very interesting restaurant choices. Before I embark on a live or die mission to eat I have to decide, “Do I want to try a night market? Should I just walk into the restaurant with the most people inside? Should I let my fear overtake me and just eat a snickers bar from 7-11? Or should I really wuss out and just point to a cheeseburger picture at McDonalds?” I am happy to say that I have only lowered myself to the last option once since I have been here.
Once I am out in the street I really start to feel strange. Not only is my stomach a barren wasteland but I also feel like a cake roasting in an oven. I need food FAST so that I can retreat into my lair of AC. Around the corner is my token noodle shack followed closely by someone yelling for me to try their new deep fried liver sausage (at least that is what I think that is). Hmm… not today. I venture forth.
The places that really intimidate me are the ones that only have a menu in Chinese characters and some old guy cooking on a grill. These places always seem attractive because the prices are often quite low, but require a lot of pointing and unintelligible hand gestures until some sort of agreement is reached. In this way I have had varying degrees of success (hey I am still alive!), but a lot of times I am so hungry that I confusedly wander from restaurant to restaurant hoping that someone will simply say, “I know exactly what you want. Come on in and we’ll get you feeling better.” This might actually be happening to me all the time and I just don’t know it because I can’t understand anyone.
After I have walked for about 45 minutes to an hour around these new streets I realize that a new problem has arrived, I am completely lost. But before I can have a freak out session about finding where I could possibly be, I really need to get full. This is why knowing the phrase for beef fried noodles is so very important. This wonderful dish is good, cheap, and can be found on almost every street. This dish is a safe bet to getting me feeling like a human again and thus being able to take on the new challenge of getting back to wherever it is I came from.
Getting to eat new and exciting things in Taiwan is one of the best parts about it. But sometimes you just need something that will work and will get your brain and stomach back into proper order. Maybe one day I will tire of the beef fried noodles but it is not this day. While living in Taiwan the thing I have found to work best is to not be picky and to always have a fallback plan.
The key to my limited success has been to be sure to wait about 10-12 hours between my meals. This allows me to be so hungry that I can hardly even think straight. When I am in this condition it makes for some very interesting restaurant choices. Before I embark on a live or die mission to eat I have to decide, “Do I want to try a night market? Should I just walk into the restaurant with the most people inside? Should I let my fear overtake me and just eat a snickers bar from 7-11? Or should I really wuss out and just point to a cheeseburger picture at McDonalds?” I am happy to say that I have only lowered myself to the last option once since I have been here.
Once I am out in the street I really start to feel strange. Not only is my stomach a barren wasteland but I also feel like a cake roasting in an oven. I need food FAST so that I can retreat into my lair of AC. Around the corner is my token noodle shack followed closely by someone yelling for me to try their new deep fried liver sausage (at least that is what I think that is). Hmm… not today. I venture forth.
The places that really intimidate me are the ones that only have a menu in Chinese characters and some old guy cooking on a grill. These places always seem attractive because the prices are often quite low, but require a lot of pointing and unintelligible hand gestures until some sort of agreement is reached. In this way I have had varying degrees of success (hey I am still alive!), but a lot of times I am so hungry that I confusedly wander from restaurant to restaurant hoping that someone will simply say, “I know exactly what you want. Come on in and we’ll get you feeling better.” This might actually be happening to me all the time and I just don’t know it because I can’t understand anyone.
After I have walked for about 45 minutes to an hour around these new streets I realize that a new problem has arrived, I am completely lost. But before I can have a freak out session about finding where I could possibly be, I really need to get full. This is why knowing the phrase for beef fried noodles is so very important. This wonderful dish is good, cheap, and can be found on almost every street. This dish is a safe bet to getting me feeling like a human again and thus being able to take on the new challenge of getting back to wherever it is I came from.
Getting to eat new and exciting things in Taiwan is one of the best parts about it. But sometimes you just need something that will work and will get your brain and stomach back into proper order. Maybe one day I will tire of the beef fried noodles but it is not this day. While living in Taiwan the thing I have found to work best is to not be picky and to always have a fallback plan.
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