Chapter 14

Monday, September 21st

Last week was a bit trying for Tabbi and I, so today we decided to switch up the SPE schedule. Because we have a three hour block of SPE’s, we teachers have decided to teach the same half hour classes over and over, just with different children. Well, I was in charge of Drama/Art, and Tabbi was in charge of Gym/Kitchen….for some reason, it just wasn’t working out for us. Today I took over Gym/Kitchen and Tabbi took over Drama/Art—it was a glorious day. I think we made a good switch. I really like teaching Gym, even though the students go crazy when they hit the gym floor, and who wouldn’t want to teach Kitchen, I mean, come on…snack time is always good!

Little kids pick up the darndest things, who knows where they get it! For some reason, one of the cutest little SPE’s, Scott, who doesn’t know a lick of English, has been saying ‘Oh my GO…’ you know the rest. We aren’t sure where he picked it up, maybe TV or the movies, but it’s spreading like wild fire pretty quickly. We’re trying to break the kids of the phrase, but I accidently slipped and said “Oh my gosh” today. Scott got a surprised look on his face, covered his mouth with one hand, and pointed at me with the other, “NO teacher,” he said. Ha, it was so funny. Now we’re teaching him and everyone else to say “On my gosh” rather than the other….emphasis on the ‘gosh.’ We laugh about the whole thing because we know the teachers after us will just think….who taught you English, Mormons?

In my 7A class tonight, I had another student swear, Alex (my new student)….I totally called him out on it. He played dumb, it was sooooo funny! After class, I was telling Sherry that I had to have a talk with my students about profanity. She asked me what time it all happened, I was kind of confused why, then Sherry proceeded to tell me that Alex’s mom was watching my class outside the door, ha…a part of me kind of wishes his mom would have been there at the right moment to hear everything, but it’s probably for the best she wasn’t. Poor guy, he’s just a little socially off, but he wants to fit in so bad!

Moon Festival is coming up next weekend so Martin and JoAnna brought me some moon cakes and a giant green grapefruit with a thick, thick rind (supposedly more sweet than what we have back home). My students are just too good to me. I tried some of the moon cakes tonight, they were not really happening… I like the flaky floury bread on the outside, but the mystery meat/bean on the inside isn’t my favorite, ya know what I mean? The grapefruit was alright, but it almost tasted like perfume to me.

Tuesday, September 22nd

Once again, I love Tuesdays with just Minnie and Jimmy—they are adorable! I’ve almost forgotten what Minnie looks like because she’s been sick and wearing her facemask for about the last month in a half. I’m starting to get worried about her. Basically, on Tuesday, I just let Minnie and Jimmy teach me. Minnie likes to be the teacher. She bosses Jimmy and me around—she totally has attitude, and when Jimmy gets a taste of her attitude, he gets all worked up and starts to stutter, cutest thing ever!

More moon cakes—Joy and Kevin (2A students) brought me some yummy flaky moon cakes today: sweet potato, taro, and red bean. These flavors are very popular in Taiwan. I like all three too; however, I feel red bean is bit of an accustomed taste, especially those red bean popsicles.

Well, language exchange is officially over. I enjoyed going to class and learning, but us teachers all felt that once a week just wasn’t cutting it. I just wish six months was long enough to become fluent in Chinese, but when you teach English everyday, it’s just not going to happen. Oh well, I’ll still learn English—we learn a lot just by chatting with random people on the street.

With our extra time, Tabbi and I went to eat at the Tree House and then shopped around town. We found some cool little shops, but didn’t buy anything special. At the Tree House, we did meet another expat, he’s from Germany. We tried to talk to him, but I don’t think he was too fond of Americans. We told him if he needed any help he could call us, but what do we know, he thought, we’re just foreigners. His story is kind of interesting. He came to Taiwan to study Mechanical Engineering, yet he doesn’t speak a lick of Chinese. He has to speak in his second language wherever he goes, which is English (he has such a thick accent), and the Chinese have to do the same. He said he wants to challenge himself—boy is he doing so….his textbooks are in English, his professors speak Chinese, and his tongue hurts from speaking English too much. I wish him the best of luck!

Wednesday, September 23rd

For Kitchen today we were making pancakes. I wanted to set up before class started since making pancakes requires a little more prep than the usual utensils and napkins. I went to reach for the school’s little stove top burner and bugs started crawling out everywhere…..oh gag me! It was disgusting. I was hitting bugs left and right….ok, maybe there weren’t that many bugs, but I even had to take off my shoe and start squishing them because they were running all over. Well if that doesn’t make you want to cook, I don’t know what does. I was itchy the whole rest of the day. Well, I guess the bug scare was bound to happen sometime, I just wish it hadn’t been in the kitchen, around all the food….YUCK!

This new SPE class gets cuter everyday! We hardly have any girls, so the three SPE classes are a bit crazy at times, but I have a few rule enforcers who help me out a ton, Scott being one of them. He didn’t have any English background before coming to Maryland, but he is picking up the language so fast. Everyday in Kitchen he helps me clean up….I’ll watch him take all the dishes over to the sink and he just sings as he goes, shaken his little tush…so cute! After leaving class today, he latched onto my waist and wouldn’t let go….Sammy had to pry him off of me. I think I have another Asian crush, haha!

Hank and the older kids wanted to come and play soccer with my little SPE’s today. I told them they could play under one condition—if they made one of my SPE children cry, I would kick them out. The ‘big’ kids (their only ten) agreed and we had a fun time. Hank was so sweet with SPE Flora; she got shy with the other kids in class, and kind of shut down, so every few minutes Hank would get the ball and have Flora come kick it. He was so good with her, especially with his competitive spirit, I was so impressed with him sharing the field and all.

My 7A class just gets funnier and funnier, especially with Alex. The kids know I’m not married, but Alex must have been day dreaming when we had that discussion. He asked me about the topic again tonight. He was so surprised that I wasn’t married yet. “Aren’t you a little old?” he said. Totally taken back, I asked him how old he thought I was, bad mistake, he replied with, “like 30!” WHAT? Boy, you have another thing comin’! Ha, he’s a character! There’s never a dull moment with him in class.

Thursday, September 24th

Not much happened today, it was pretty low key. All I gotta say is that SPE Kerry has a bit of a belching problem. Everyday, without fail, he’ll burp in class…..and everyday, without fail, I’ll have him say, “excuse me,” but he just doesn’t get it yet. It’s so interesting here; manners are very different, especially table manners. When out to eat, people don’t usually wait for everyone to get their food before they start eating, they just dig in; however, most groups share their meals. Also, people talk with their mouths full all the time. I can handle little kids who do this, but the adults, come on….oh, and did I mention that picking your nose seems to be socially accepted here? Because we teach English, us teachers are also trying to incorporate some American manners…No talking with your mouth full and no picking your nose, ewh gross!

Friday, September 25th

This week my in my 2A class we were talking about clowns, the circus, and skills and talents, so I thought it most fitting to have a talent show. My kids were psyched! I was worried the show was going to turn into a regular ole’ show and tell, but I had a lot of kids actually participate. Hank told a joke, Kevin played the violin, and Samuel brought his lego monster. Joy, Megan, and Vicky all brought some artwork. We had a lot of fun! I popped some popcorn for the kids and Hank was just loving it because I had ‘two’ bags of popcorn instead of just ‘one.’ I was really impressed with my girls’ artwork. I feel like all the kids know how to draw pretty well here, but then again….writing in Chinese is practically an art itself.

Now that the SPE’s are starting to get a broader vocabulary, they enjoy picking out words that sound very similar. Whenever I say ‘cherry,’ they say ‘Sherry’ (she’s the boss). They just giggle because now they can actually tell the difference between the words. Whenever I say paper, they say pepper, mustard, monster….and a new one….vanilla seems to sound like banana…um, I’m not so sure.

People are being super careful about H1N1 here. I think I mentioned this once before, but everywhere we go, peeps are wearing facemasks. Did I mention that temperatures are being checked in every business as well? Just tonight, us girls went out to dinner and before entering the restaurant, we had to get our temperature checked to make sure we were in good shape. Our school checks all the students too. Go Go for Her? Check! Better safe than sorry!

Saturday, September 26th

It’s Tabbi’s Birthday weekend, so we took a day trip to Sun Moon Lake today. Everyone raves about it, so we figured we better get out there. Sun Moon Lake is the biggest lake in Taiwan and it’s located right in the center of the island. Tabbi has some friends of a friend who live near the lake, so we called them up and they came with us (they were great tour guides).
1. We woke up and headed to the train station around seven this morning. From the train, we made a quick switch to a bus for a two hour ride up the windy mountain to where Sun Moon Lake rests. After getting dropped off, we met up with Shawn Fen, Christina, and Melody, our new friends! They picked us up on their scoots and we were off. Thank goodness for scooters….there was no way we’d get around the whole lake without em!
2. There is so much to see and do at Sun Moon Lake. You have hiking and biking trails, old ruins and temples, shopping, etc. We had to pick and choose—we just let our good tour guide pick our route for the day. First stop, Wunwu Temple. It was originally built in 1938, but reconstructed in 1996 (not too old)….it was just gorgeous—one of the biggest temples I’ve seen. We toured the temple for a good hour and a half….we even found some stairs that took us to the top of the building so we could look out over the Moon and see the pretty landscape.

At the temple, we also got our fortunes…AKA ‘wishes.’ At each Buddhist Temple, there is a can of long skinny sticks, each with an engraved number. When you approach the sticks, you are supposed to shake the can the sticks are sitting in to see which stick stands the tallest. You pick up the tallest stick from the group, read the number, and then go find your wish on the wishing wall. We did this twice at two different shrines. My wishes:
- Wish One: Play it cool and safe, be careful the double games. To be meticulous at every step can triumph in every battle.
- Wish Two: Life-long fame and wealth. Victory in litigation. Illness cured speedily. Ideal marriage. To have a newborn son (as you know, having sons was very prized traditionally). Travelers to return home soon.
Sounds like two great wished huh? Fake out! As I was reading my wishes to the girls, Sarah looked down at my paper and said, “Tanier, didn’t you pull out stick number 37, not 36?” Whoops, I grabbed the wrong wish! Silly me…alright, second time around, real wish
- Wish Two (for real): Litigation be compromised. Ailment be prayed for peace. Wealth begged only a few. Seeking fame be secured scarcely. Marriage may be matched. Travelers be sent back. To incline toward charity be assured as round as the full-moon.
Haha….so my ‘real’ second wish isn’t as great as the first I picked up….eh….it’s sixes. After reading our wishes, Christina directed us over to the ‘wish interpreter.’ He asked what I had wished for….a little reluctant to tell him, I did anyhow….”Ugh, will I ever get married?” Haha, what a wish eh! His reply, “Open your heart and don’t be sooo stubborn!!!” No the answer I was looking for!
3. Passion Fruit popsicles, YUM….Easily my new favorite fruit since Mangoes are out of season. After the temple, our scooter brigade headed up and over the hills to a quaint little shopping area. We found some natives to the area, took some pictures, and had an enjoyable lunch—home made dumplings! After three months, you’d think I’d know how to eat the food here; I went to make my dumpling sauce, not knowing what anything was, I just mixed a whole bunch of stuff together—good idea? NO. I covered my first dumpling in sauce (I’m definitely a sauce girl), took one bite, and……ah, mouth on fire…red peppers! You live and you learn…
4. Cihen Pagoda. Chiang Kai-shek (first President to Taiwan) had the towering Pagoda built in memory of his mother. It is nine stories tall and is 1,000 meters above sea level. Much like the Buddhist temples, you can pretty much find pagodas anywhere. The hike to actually get to the pagoda was a hot one, as usual, but once we reached the tower, it was well worth it, even more so when we climbed to the top of the pagoda itself. We snapped tons of pictures of the towering, misty mountains and the blue, pristine lake. We even got the chance to ring the bell that echoes all the way down the mountain. On our way down from the pagoda we saw some kids swinging from tree vines… fun, I thought! Acting much like children, Tabbi and I decided to swing from the vines too…wow, so much harder than I thought! Must be all the rice—holdin’ up my body weight on those vines lasted for about two seconds!!!
5. Peacocks. Who would have thought, peacock farm at Sun Moon Lake. They were everywhere, and so beautiful too! I started tossing a bit of my half-eaten apple toward the birds and they all came swarming around. I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to do that, but hey…we got a good look at the pretty feathers!
6. Bringing our day trip to an end, we did a little shopping, ate passion fruit bing (ice cream slush with passion fruit, so yummy), and then took a ferry boat around to Shueishe Warf and Lalu island. We actually ate lunch at the Warf earlier in the day, and by the time we had gotten to Lalu island, it was too dark to see anything, but nonetheless, we had a fun boat ride—wind in the air, fresh air….we did see some fun things for pictures though…floating docks and floating hotels, COOL! We also passed the most expensive hotel in Taiwan, $400 U.S. a night….WOW, I can only imagine what the inside looks like!

Sunday, September 27th

Church was good, always is….afterward, Torry came and picked me up on the scooter and we went back to her place for Sunday dinner. Torry’s sister-in-law just had a baby boy so Torry’s mom has come to town for the month….yes, the month, to help out with cooking and cleaning! It’s so interesting….it’s Asian culture that the grandmother come take care of the mother if possible after a new baby is born. The grandmother basically cooks all day long and catered to the new mom. Torry’s mom has bought only the best food for her daughter-in-law. It’s so funny….after lunch/dinner, Torry and I took a good ole’ Sunday nap….when we woke up, Torry’s mom was cooking yet again, another meal for the new mom. Also, it’s in the culture not to let anyone, but family, see the baby for about a month, so the babe can be healthy and strong; therefore, I didn’t get to the new Asian baby, so sad!

Well, Torry and I had a good Sunday. We enjoyed momma’s home cooking… rice, battered and fried pork, some mushroom soup, black peppered beef, shrimp and vegetables, grilled fish (yes, the whole fish was on the plate….Torry’s nephew ate its eyes…sweet!) Lots and lots of meat, it was good! So, I found out after dinner that Torry’s mom isn’t too fond of foreigners…I think she’s had some unfortunate run-in’s, but luckily for me, I can eat Taiwanese food, so her mom likes me…thank goodness I’m not picky!

Another great week has gone and past!

Side note: I find the changing generations so fascinating here in Asia…globalization is really happening with the growth of the internet, TV, etc…and the cultural divide is looking less and less definite. Back in the day, the Taiwanese people only spoke Taiwanese….as time has gone on….people now speak mandarin….as time keeps pressing forward, all the young children are now learning English. Grandparents speak Taiwanese, parents speak Taiwanese and Mandarin, and children speak all of the above, plus English….amazing! I wish I was trilingual.