Chapter Five

Sorry it's late...Week Five!

Monday, July 20th

The weekend will never be long enough—they come and go too fast and then it’s back to work. School was school…nothing too new. The computers were acting up today, I wasn’t able to print off my tests—the kids loved it, but I had to improvise…. kind of a bummer, but it worked.

We got the cutest new girl in SPE’s today—she is so smart, as many of the kids are. Her name is Evance. I don’t know why, but I love her name! You may already know, but most Asians have an English name as well as their Chinese name, just to make it easier on us Americans….oh the names they come up with. One of my students is named Engine; his brother is Yo Yo, so crazy right. I have to admit, it doesn’t even phase me anymore.

After work I took Sammy to the Tree House. We talked to Julie and her husband for awhile. I think we’re forming some kind of ‘unspoken agreement,’ she always ends up teaching us a little Chinese in exchange for some English. I always end up staying at least a half hour after eating just to talk language…it’s fun!

Tuesday, July 21st

With Sarah back I didn’t have to go into work very early today…it was sooo nice. I was able to talk to Jen and mom for a bit on Skype, I even had a chance to blog—I’m not all caught up, but it’s coming along. I hope you’re enjoying the pics!
At lunch today, Sue (our school cook) made us yummy dumplings, I love when we get dumplings; it’s a nice change from the everyday rice bowl. She also served us some fruit, YAY! We do have a fruit stand just around the corner from our house, but I don’t make it there as often as I would like. Sue cut us up some fresh papaya and pink dragon fruit. Yes, the dragon fruit was really bright pink! It tastes like kiwi, just not as sour. I really enjoyed it.

Teachings SPE’s today was sooooo fun—they are the cutest darn kids, especially Jimmy. Whenever he starts to laugh his little eyes just squint up like little half moons—it reminds me of Buck when he was young. Well, we were in drama talking about different kinds of animals: pigs, foxes, ducks, crocodiles…..all the sudden, Jimmy busted out in his wild duck call. With both hands over his mouth, he was making the funniest duck noise, then went MiMi with her pig snort. Gary joined in, howling like a fox, not sure how a fox howls, but it was funny. I tried the duck call myself, it sounded more like a ‘barking spider’…wink wink….the kids all started laughing, and Jimmy hurried over to help me with the call. He was just shaking his head back and forth, “no teacher, no.” He grabbed my right hand and placed it over my lips; he then took my left hand and helped me wave it back and forth over my mouth….he was such a big help… if anyone needs a good duck call, I am no longer a novice.

After work Sarah, Sammy, and I rode our bikes down to the movie theater. They wanted to see Harry Potter, and although I haven’t read all of the books nor seen all of the movies, I didn’t hesitate to go—I always enjoy a good movie. We bought our tickets early and then walked over to a pizza place called ’50 Qui Pizza’ for dinner. I ordered a vegetable pizza with some onion rings and an orange juice, it was an interesting combo. You’d think by now I should know to ask exactly what I’m ordering, but with a ‘veggie pizza,’ I thought I couldn’t go wrong….WRONG….I was totally surprised to find my pizza covered with corn, broccoli, and pineapple, not exactly the veggies I had expected, but it wasn’t too bad. Corn on pizza is actually pretty good. No worries, everything tasted somewhat ‘normal.’

Movie time! The Asians are very particular about having things just so….due to this fact….the movie theater = assigned seating. I think up north, near Salt Lake, the theaters have assigned seating, but unlike the Asians, at least they allow your whole party to sit next to each other. I got the shaft. Sarah, Sam, and I all tried to sit next to each other, so we just sat in random seats. People kept coming and kicking us out of our seats. I’m sure they thought we were the most confused American’s they’d ever seen because they kept getting out their tickets, showing us the seat numbers. We knew fully well where our seats were, we just wanted to sit by each other. We should have known better, Harry Potter has been out for less than a week, there’s no way we could sit wherever we wanted. So, as I said, I got the shaft…..I sat on the complete opposite side of Sarah and Sam, by myself—keep in mind I know nothing about Harry Potter. It was funny, and not too bad watching it by myself, quite relaxing, even though I had to piece my way through what was going on.

Wednesday, July 22nd

So far I’ve been coming along on my goals pretty well. I found some barbells in our apartment that old teachers left—I took them in as my own and have been working out in my room….YAY! We’ll see how long that actually lasts. Sammy got Rosetta Stone, so I started that as well. Wahoo, here I come Chinese; 15 minutes a day is about all I can handle right now. I’m going to start language exchange the first of August so hopefully that will work well.

I have two new students in my older class. Oh man, the older kids are great! It’s nice to just sit down and have a conversation with them. They are so curious about everything. This week JoAnna asked me what a pervert was….she then proceeded to ask me some other colored questions, which I’m not sure I can repeat, ha. It’s hard to keep a professional teacher-student relationship with these ones. It’s always funny when the younger kids swear too. Us teachers have to try and not make a big deal out of it because then our kids will be swearin’ left and right—they get a kick out of it.

Thursday, July 23rd

Wow, more free time! Hanna told me not to get too comfortable with the extra time I’m having because the school usually gets more students in August and September….until then, I’m just enjoying and trying to catch up on life.
I didn’t have to work this morning, so I just came in for the afternoon. My second graders were answering their ‘question of the day’ when we heard some crazy Chinese music going on in the streets. I have a balcony off the side of my room so the kids and I went to see what was going on. We saw a parade of old men dressed in very elaborate, gold robes—some wearing head dresses too. The street vendors had set out food and some small trash can looking things for the burning of spirit money. It looked like a funeral maybe? I asked my kids what was going on, but they were as clueless as I was. Megan clasped her hands together and started nodding her head as if she were praying. Oh! I thought, “Is it Bai Bai,” I said? My kids started pointing at me and yelling, “Teacher, no Chinese, no Chinese!” The kids aren’t allowed to speak any Chinese at school, and if they do….and get caught, they get sent to Sherry. She has them do wall sits for five minutes with their hands in the air. When they’re about to cry, she mumbles some Chinese, then hands them a cookie and sends them back to class.

Alright, so maybe I’m becoming an old lady, but after work Sarah and I were looking into some family history. I’ve always been curious! I went to familysearch.org, which is all knew to me. Mom, I looked up Grandma Grace, Grandpa Bill, Grandma Emma, and Grandpa Henry. Wow, looking at all their pedigree charts is sweet! So many of our ancestors were living in America before the revolution! Dad, I looked up Moses Clawson and his pedigree goes all the way back to the 1300’s…..someone’s been busy! I can’t believe all that work. Moses had some greats who lived in Plymouth too! Sarah showed me this cool site called ‘digital roots,’ it’s a BYU site; you type in your ancestors AFN number and it shows you everyone you’re related too: prophets, presidents, kings, queens…..we had William Shakespeare on the list! Alright alright, I’m sure everyone knows about this stuff and it’s probably totally boring, but that’s what these Taiwanese nights will do to ya. Let’s just say it was a good pre-celebration for the 24th of July—I was just trying to be patriotic. Dad, do you have Grandpa Wes’s parent’s names? Any dates? I want to look them up.

Friday, July 24th

It’s Friday, its Friday, my favorite day of the week! So, I figure it’s just easier to correct my kid’s homework outside of class rather than on their break. Break time gives me a way to really get to know my students. Lately, Annie, Megan, and Vickie want me to play ‘ghost’ with them during the break. Basically, its blind tag, they love it. They even tried bribing me with some dried seaweed to play with them. “It’s sweet and delicious!” they said…..I tried it, sat there for a moment, and thought to myself, not so sweet, and not so delicious. Let’s just say it’s not my kind of snack.

Sammy, Sarah, and I went to a little Japanese restaurant for dinner, it’s about 20 feet from our apartment complex, and pretty tasty too. I’m beginning to love curry! I had white rice, potato and carrot curry, with some fried pork on top, yummy…such a big meal for 80 NT ($2.50 US)….can you say C-H-E-A-P! I kind of had a headache that night, so I didn’t do much after dinner. We basically hung out at our apartment all night, it was nice.

Saturday, July 25th

Temple Trip! Saturday morning Tabbi and I got up early to go with the English branch to the temple—it’s in Taipei, about a three hour bus ride from Changhua. Molly came with us too. We rode our bikes down to the train station and took the train to Tai Chung where we met up with Elder and Sister Douse, along with the Branch President. From there, we took the bus to Feng Yuan and picked up the other ILP teachers. We had a fun ride up to Taipei—I always like getting together with the other teachers. President Baklyon brought some movies too, so we watched The Best Two Years on our ride up. The scenery was gorgeous, super green and lush.

When we arrived at the temple everyone was going their different way so we all set a time to meet back on the bus at 4:00: some people were doing endowments, others were doing baptisms, and then there were those who were just along for the ride. I was with the baptism group! It was so crazy…I mean, everything was just as I expected inside the temple, which was beautiful, but…..on a much, much, smaller scale. We had to take off our shoes right when we walked through the temple doors. Then we went to the baptistery that was just down the hall. The dressing room had two changing stalls which were also the showers, and there were maybe 15 lockers that could hold a small purse. The baptistery was tiny too, there wasn’t much space inside. Ha, it was great. So, I did confirmations in Chinese and baptisms in English. The brothers confirming me spoke so fast I couldn’t understand a word, not even the ‘Sister Glauser’ part! So, I would have never of imagined this, but the one smell that reminded me of home was chlorine….I was just thankful for a few hours away from stinky tofu.

After baptisms, us girls had planned to go to the Shang Hai Shek memorial, so we freshened up…. blow-dryed our hair and got all ready—the moment we got to the front doors of the temple….thunder, lightning, and rain….so much for looks! When it rains, it pours. We ran to the distribution center and then to a little Mormon handicraft store to keep cover, but we were soaked! Unfortunately we weren’t able to see the memorial. We did have extra time before we needed to be back to the bus, so we headed down the street to grab a bit to eat—worst decision ever! The food was too expensive, horrible tasting, and….we lost Shannon, another teacher. One minute she was next door, the next minute, she was gone. There were about seven of us. We all headed back to the temple and then to the bus to see if she had gone on before us on her own, but she wasn’t there. Joseph (another teacher), President, and Elder Dowse went searching….after about 40 minutes of sloshing in the pouring rain, there was still no Shannon. We said a prayer and decided to put together our own search party. We split up in all different directions, Elder Dowse circled the area by taxi….it was still pouring, we were dripping from head to toe, and still….no Shannon.
After searching for an hour and a half, President made the call to head to Taipei 101, hoping Shannon may have taken a taxi there…everyone knew it was our next stop after the temple. Where’s a cell phone when you need one. Someone was able to get a hold of the Feng Yuan house, and with much relief, Shannon had taken the train home when she couldn’t see the bus—she must have been in the wrong place at the wrong time, apparently. What a day!

With the search party being over, we were able to go and see Taipei 101 in the Xynie District. This skyscraper is the 2nd tallest building in the world, after Dubai. It has 101 floors above ground, 5 floors underground, and its 1,670.6 ft high—that’s amazing considering all the typhoons and earthquakes here. The bottom floors consist of lots of shops, and the top floors are mainly offices, but much of the building is empty because renting space is too expensive. Lisa and I tried desperately to get a good picture of the whole thing, but the building is just too dang tall!

Now, Taipei is Taiwan’s capital so it is a big city. There are lots of foreigners and lots of everything going on everywhere…it’s just like another Vegas. I didn’t feel like I was in another country for a minute. The huge shopping center next to 101 has lots of restaurants such as Chili’s or Macarroni Grill, but they are extremely expensive. Instead of spending all our money, Lisa and I walked around, sat down, and listened to some bands—we had a fun time exploring. I liked Taipei. All of us teachers want to plan another trip there sometime so we can see more sites. I hear there are lots of famous museums and memorials.

I decided to stay the night with the other teachers in Feng Yuan so I could just go to church with them on Sunday and save an extra train ride. These teachers actually live at their school on the 4th floor. Their place is much larger than ours, but they have a lot more teachers as well. They all have shared rooms…kind of like a studio apartment. They even have three fridges, but I gotta say, they don’t have a clothes dryer and that’s one thing I don’t know if I can live without. Anyway, Lisa and the others were very generous offering their things considering I had not planned on staying the night!

P.S. Mom, Lisa introduced me to a new drink….and it wasn’t mango….ha. Dun gua nio ni. It’s some maple melon drink with milk…I think! It was sure yummy.

Sunday July 26th

Well, I went to the English branch with the other teachers today. As we were walking to the bus we crossed Love Bridge. Love Bridge has tons and tons of lockets locked around the fence. Lovers will come to the bridge, lock their hearts, and throw their keys on the passing trains….oh how romantic, ha! I’m so cynical.

Once again, the branch is sooo small! The missionaries pass the sacrament and we have a piano that can play by itself because no one has any musical talent, none who can actually play a hymn all the way through anyway. Relief Society consists of about 10 sisters. Any other sisters in the branch are teaching the three primary kids or tending to our two nursery children, ha.

Let’s see, after church, Evonne gave me a ride to the train station….she had no idea where to go, I was giving her directions, odd? Ya, crazy driver, I feared my life, but was so grateful for the ride since I was the only one going back to Changhua. I even took the train all by myself for the first time. My Chinese may not be good, but at least it’s good enough to get me the right train ticket.

The rest of the day I’ve just been chillin. Sammy told me I missed an earthquake while I was gone, apparently there have been over 20 earthquakes in Taiwan just within the last month, nothing big though really, I haven’t noticed a thing.
I think my head is started to hurt from writing sooooo much! I love you all! I can’t believe a month has already passed—my journey is 1/6th of the way over. Zai Jian and wan on….good bye and good night!