Sunday, January 14, 2007

And it is Chinese...


I have created a name for my pain. And it is Chinese.

I was sitting in the cafe digging through Chinese books and struggling through dialogue when I realized how much work and pain it is just to read a story about a boy and his friends talking about children's mandatory education in Taiwan.

Why do I do this to myself? Look closely and you can see the signs... almost every character is circled and translated or underlined and sounded out.

I must love pain.

Shock...awe...annoyance...!

In an annoying bit of news for today, I was able to experience, once again, the unique way in which these "polite Taiwanese people" can be more rude than any American I know... even in New York.

I rode my bike home to my apartment, from campus today, and parked it by the stairs, inside the apartment building. There is nothing wrong with that, many people park their bikes there, especially if they think it might rain.

Later tonight, as I walked downstairs to go outside, I was shocked to find that someone had taken my bike outside from the apartment and moved in onto the street so they could park their bike inside, in my place! To make it worse, it had rained tonight, so my bike got all wet!

Now, it's true that my bike is not new or beutiful (see "Red Thunder Tofu" post below), but it is my bike, and it has no rust on the important parts (chain, gears, etc). AND I was there first!

So, I just moved their bike outside as well, right next to mine.

I'm tempted to take their bike for a little walk - a block or two away.

This is what would happen in NY if someone had the NERVE to be such a selfish bastard!

Saturday, January 13, 2007

Finally~

For many years of my life, I've lived with and grown accustomed to the fact that as an American, the one thing we don't have is the most technologically advanced cell phones in the world. Since coming to Taiwan, friends and classmates have been happy to remind me of this as well.

But now... for once... we are the ones with the coolest phone around (in my opinion, and for at least a short time). Woo hoo! Take a look~

I would gloat more, but I'm not sure these aren't being made in Taiwan already... or maybe next year...!

The other white meat...










During my first semester at NTU, I saw one of these enormous bugs outside of my classroom, inside the business building! I was pretty shocked, because this is no small bug we are talking about... it's bigger than my nose (which is quite large, I must say)!

Ever since seeing that bug, I always wanted to get another chance to see one, so I could document this thing... I mean, I guess it makes sense, as this is a tropical area, but me being a New Yorker, I've never
seen such a thing!

I never saw another one, until last week, when I was going through the night market to get some food. This time, I was prepared... but decided against eating it...