"The Best Part of Beauty is that which No Picture can Express."

HAPPY 2 MONTHS IN TAIWAN ! 

Well I have tried stinky tofu folks, and I am not a fan. As horrible as it smells, just like a dirty baby's diaper, surprisingly some of the girls like it. I, however, could not get it down and had to slyly spit it out into a napkin. A stroll through the night market on any given evening will always have it's surprises. We ran into a stand which consisted of large male 'members' being served at your choice of ice cream, corn dog, doughnut, or soap. We also found an alley way fortune teller where my roommate Kelly had her love fortune told. Fortune telling is a fairly common practice here, it's actually recommended as part of the Taiwan experience.

Great news: Finally had our first payday! Hip hip hooray!!

Bad news: I am the last one to have a scooter -_-

Over the weekend, the majority of us teachers joined Uncle Michael and his wife for a 2 hour bus ride North to New Taipei, the Capitol of Taiwan. We left at 6 in the morning and stopped at a temple on the way out of town. We recieved Tao, pronounced 'dao,' which means "the way" or "the path." In English this is referred to as Taoism, related closely with Confucianism and Zen Buddhism. We kneeled while we took our bows, said the words, became blessed by The Master and were given the Three Treasures of Tao. The second treasure is the Tao ancient saying, which consists of five words. We are only permitted to speak the words inside of a temple. We can not share them with anyone who has not recieved Tao or speak them outside of the temple. We should think of these words in time of need, much like a prayer to God. Almost anyone can recieve Tao, but only ONCE in your life can you recieve it.
The temple was beautiful inside. In the front of the room sat three large, mostly golden, statues of ancient Tao leaders. Bright colors, candles, incense all filled the room. Unfortunately, no photography is allowed. Afterwards, we were congratulated and given instructions to weave a ball with 5 different colors and to place a bell inside. The 5 colors and the bell is for luck and remembrance of Tao.

A few of us were extremely tired on the bus and had hoped to sleep comfortably for at least an hour. Not the case. Apparently we were on a karaoke bus.  The entire drive to Taipei consisted of unnecessary loud Taiwanese women and men singing songs that we of course could not understand. I mean unbearbly loud, it was miserable. The karaoke did not stop there, we also endured it on our bus ride home. This was when we decided, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. We enthusiastically sang, "My Girl," "Pretty Woman," "Can't Take my Eyes off of You," and "I Can't Help Falling in Love with You." Only then did we realized we encouraged them to continue singing. Many Taiwanese came to thank us, shake our hand, and record us singing. Quite the experience.

We finally arrived at Jingtong Train Station, were we got to spend an hour eating lunch, walking over a "love bridge" and gift shops. For lunch we had a banana, a seaweed wrap with rice, tofu, corn and some kind of seafood meat inside and a pancake with bean stuffing. The drink was a prune tea, not good at all. At the gift shops I picked out some souvenirs and post cards for family. The Jingtong rail way tracks are the actual tracks left from the coal mining days. Because of this, many people were taking photos on the tracks before the train came.

The train sped on by and we jumped on to take it to our next destination. It was here we walked over the coal miners dedication bridge, which reminded me of a book I once read called, Dragon's Gate. (Great book for upper elementary students.) In this area there were lots of people sending off giant lantern, this got my attention. Erin and I paid 100NT to decorate our own lantern and sent it off into the sky. Each color represented something different. For example, pink was luck in happiness, blue was luck in transportation, there was also one for luck in studying. We chose white, luck for the future.

We ventured to our main destination, the Shifen Waterfall. The Shifen Waterfall is the broadest waterfall in Taiwan, 132 feet. We found many elegant and grade statues throughout the hiking area around the waterfall. While we were here there was a woman who continually attempted to speak to me in Chinese. I finally had it translated and she was telling me I was beautiful. She also wanted a picture with me. The funny part, for the picture she grabbed my waist with one hand and put her other hand on my shoulder. It felt like an engagement photo.

Our last stop was a beautiful lantern night market in New Taipei. (The actual Lantern Festival takes place after the Chinese New Year, it is one of several festivals in Taiwan.) We had one hour to eat dinner and look around. After being blessed in Tao we are not supposed to eat meat for 24 hours. The menu was all in Chinese, (usually there is an English one to look at) but we were pointed to the vegetarian meals and we ordered blindly. I was not surprised 4 out of 5 meals showed up as tofu. We did not finish all of the food, so we boxed the rest up and gave it to a homeless man who was sitting near the front of the market. I could see in his reaction that he was more than grateful for the food. It was a very heart warming moment.

Back in Taichung:
For the past two nights the moon has been more visibly clear than I have seen in many many years. I could not help but stop and stare.
In the night market, I had my first American style bacon cheese burger at an adorable little place called Rabbit Rabbit. I also had my first pedicure which was 90 minutes long!
 


I meant a young Taiwanese man with pretty good English named Sam last week. We went to a great Japanese restaurant where we had a hot pot among other things for dinner. Hot pots are very popular here and are found many places. Basically they have water, soy sauce, and the food you have chosen simmering in a metal pan on a small fire at your table. Very fresh and tasty! Later we went to see my first movie in Taiwan. We went to see Elysium with Matt Damon. Luckily for me, the movies remain in English and have Chinese subtitles. It's unfortunate for the Taiwanese that have to read every movie they want to go see. Sam has been teaching me some Chinese as well which is a great bonus to the friendship. I have learned how to say, "I have a younger sister." "Can you dance?" "I like to shop." "I love my grandma."
The wonderful Chinese staff put on a great surprise pot luck birthday party for our boss Susan. She turned 28. This is her first year as the "principal" of Cornel. Everyone brought a dish. After the surprise and the singing we ate it all! The Chinese staff put great thought into her birthday. They played a video which had a recorded message from her parents in South Africa, former teachers, and her sister. Quite the tear jerker.

Uncle Michael invited the Shang An girls to play the Nan Men girls in a game of volleyball. As a member of the Nan Men Campus I can say that we took a horrible beating by Shang An. It was still a great time. We mixed up the teams and even invited other people into our game which made the day even better.

Fun facts:
Corn is the ONLY vegetable you will find in the canned isle.
The night clubs have major themes, if you abide by the themes you can get in for free, including free drinks. However, smoking is still allowed inside :-(

Taiwan's histororical/original name was Formosa, meaning beautiful island. The name was given by the Portuguese.

It is the year 102 in Taiwan. In 1912 Taiwan was established as the  people's Republic of China, ROC.
Valentine's Day in Taiwan is the 7th day of the 7th lunar month, which happened to be August 13th this year. Also called Tanabata or the Qixi Festival.
Taiwanese are born at 1 years old not 0 as we are. They have birth dates, BUT they do not add a number to their age until Chinese New Year. Therefore, everyone gets a year older at the same time. 

Thanks for reading -K