Chinese New Year
So I somehow got away with not teaching the English magazine for over a month now. I went from 3 weeks of Christmas lessons to about 3 weeks of New Year’s Lessons. These lessons were interesting because I originally taught the students about American New Year’s and those traditions and they thought the whole kissing at midnight thing was funny and I had them all write out resolutions and then rewrite them because they kept writing things like “want more money” and “want many girlfriends.” After that I decided that I could sit back and relax a little and have the students “teach me” about Chinese New Year. They did group posters about their traditions and presented them to the class and these posters turned out awesome. I learned that one of their main traditions is giving each other red envelopes of money. The parents and grandparents give the children red envelopes and then when you turn 18 or get your first job, you start to give red envelopes to your parents and grandparents. This is probably why they kept talking about getting money for their resolution. I thought I finally was going to be done with the English magazine after this semester but sure enough, Anita approaches me with 4 magazines by the same exact company, and tells me that I need to vote on one for 7th grade and one for 8th grade. Wenli had mentioned that we probably wouldn’t be using these again but apparently Anita didn’t get that memo. My choices were pretty bad considering 2 of the magazines were completely centered around Halloween/Thanksgiving/Christmas and New Years.. and the reason for that is because the school likes to save money on the magazines so they purchase the older issues..but I’m like..ok the entire first semester was already about these holidays! So Anita comes up to my desk before one of my classes and hands me 4 magazines and a piece of paper to tally my vote and I’m like “ok, thanks, I’ll look through these..” and she’s like..”ok..yes..so..you can vote on which one..” basically expecting me to just do it within 30 seconds and give them to her right then and there. I’m like..”yep, I understand..so..I’ll go ahead and do that and give them to you later..” and she’s still standing there as if I could magically read through 4 magazines within 5 minutes and determine which one is ok for each grade, so again I tell her, “Anita, how about I read through them first, and then give them to you later. Otherwise, I won’t be able to figure out which one I like for each grade..is that ok?” and shes like “oh ok ok yes yes of course, just give them to me by the end of the day..” I brought the magazines along with me to my class and figured I’d have Beryl help me look through them. She’s a good teacher with creative ideas and is always on my side when it comes to complaining about the difficulty of the magazines, so I was glad I could vote with her. After looking through them we decided on the two with the lowest level of English and with the most interesting topics for the 2 grades and what I chose, Beryl decided she would choose as well. I’m wondering if all the teachers will do this? See my vote and then just choose what I voted for.
My very first scooter accident
So Saturday the 14th was a day of preparation for me and Shija’s big trip. I attempted to get a hold of my landlord to let him know that I’d be out of town for a week and wondered when he’d like to meet up so I can actually pay him the rent that I once again, owe him. (It’s not like I haven’t tried to pay, the guy just doesn’t seem to have an urgency to collect the money) I’ve literally only paid him once since I’ve been here and that was for the first 3 months and it was because I tracked him down while he was teaching and awkwardly gave him a Christmas card containing the rent money. I’m not sure what kind of card to give him this time for his payment..maybe a red envelope for Chinese New Year and then my next payment will be in the form of an Easter Egg hunt or something.
Before I did a full on apartment clean and my laundry, I had an appointment to get a bikini wax. My very first one ever. On a pain scale, I’d say that got up to about a 3. Sorry for the details, but it helps explain how I already endured pain that day and unknowingly would experience about 3 times as much pain later on in the evening. The plan for the night was to meet with some Dewey friends before we ventured off for our Chinese New Year trips. We met up at a restaurant that I had yet to eat at which was delicious! Fatty's--Italian food. The name is stupid but the pasta and sauces are homemade and if I have to eat one more damn dumpling, my head will explode...so basically you could call it "shitty's" and I'd still eat there. Anywho, the evening was amazing. Good company, good food, and a good hefeweizen beer = great Saturday night. Shija and I headed back to her apartment afterwards, which I don't usually like to do because she lives in the opposite direction of me, but it was late/dark and the buses weren't running anymore because the city stops at 10pm. I also don't mind riding my scooter that way because I get to take a different route home which leads me to a Block buster and I thought about picking up a movie.
Well, that didn't happen the way I planned..we weren't even half a mile away from the restaurant when I got into an accident. It was the most unexpected thing ever (well I suppose most accidents are..) but I was driving fairly slow, maybe 35-40 ("KPH" I just learned that my scooter doesn't go by MPH..) on this main road where people zip by you. But suddenly my scooter started fishtailing like crazy and Shija and I realized it maybe 4 seconds before we fell and we're like "oh shit oh shit," but I couldn't get it under control and my instinct was to press onto my brakes. We collapsed shortly after. Fell over to the right with the scooter on both of our legs. Thank God, we were ok, and we had a very nice man pull over and help us up and move my scooter off the road. We were extremely lucky that the cars and bus behind us stopped. When we looked at my scooter we realized the rear tire was completely flat and off of the rim! Super strange considering for the most part, the roads in Taiwan are completely smooth (because potholes don't exist here) and I didn't run over anything either. The man told us to leave the scooter there and we could get it tomorrow, it would be ok. I think we were in shock but for some odd reason our first decision was to hail a cab and go home. I wasn't really feeling anything right away but after we got into the cab I realized..wait..I feel like my shoulder is out of place..my arm is burning..and my face is numb. Shija had a scrape on her side and her leg was hurting and we didn't think to call anyone super late at night but ironically, Shija received a text from her co-teacher, Patricia, who is like the Wenli of Chong Ching--that's Shija's school..(haha and you thought Yu Ying was funny..) and the text simply said, "Are you ok, I haven't heard from you in a while and I'm worried about you." Shija was like "woah how crazy is that?" and we called Patricia back and she insisted that the cab turns around and takes to the hospital so we handed him the phone and you could like..hear the surprise and panic in his voice..he probably thought it was so strange that two girls just non nonchalantly got into his cab and he's being told "Um they just got into an accident, you need to take them to the emergency room.." So when we arrived at the emergency room we were seen by two ladies right off the bat and they gave us our little emergency bands and took our information and that's when my pain and the realization of what had happened, set in. I started crying and was just upset that we were in the situation. Although it wasn't my fault, I couldn't help but feel responsible for Shija getting hurt.
China Medical Hospital was very efficient. We were given numbers and sent to stations and saw 4 different nurses and doctors for 4 different things and it was basically run like a machine. They asked what was bugging me the most and I said my shoulder because I was certain it was out of place..my arm didn't have much feeling and it just felt odd. Then my second concern was the large road burn on my elbow..They gave me shot to prevent infections, sent me to get an xray, sent me to get my wound cleaned and patched up, sent me back to the xray man where he informed me that my shoulder was ok and then finally we hit up the prescription counter, got our medicine, paid 700 NT..and we were done. Both Shija and I were grateful to not have any serious injuries and parted ways and I took a taxi home. I got back late that night and was in quite a bit of pain. I fell asleep most likely because of the ibuprofen and pain reliever the hospital gave me, but when I woke up Sunday morning, I felt like I got hit by a bus. I wasn't able to undress without my shoulder killing me and my face felt like (and started to look like) I had an abusive boyfriend punch my cheek.. and then the wound, which needed to be cleaned twice a day with saline solution and topped with some sort of cream they gave me, burned like hell. My pain was up to about a 7. And here's the topper, I wake up to NO INTERNET!! GAHHH, Vince I will kill you. Fine.You won't get me a damn tv..but at least keep the internet up and running! What's a beat up scooterless girl supposed to do for the entire day?? I contacted Sam about the accident, he was very worried but was occupied with some plans for the day. He offered to retrieve my scooter that night and take it to a shop to get it fixed up which was awesome of him.
I never got a hold of the landlord about my internet which infuriated me and on top of that, my laundry was damp and spread across the floor attempting to dry which left the room stuffy and messy, and the weather was turning pretty grim so Sam wasn't able to get the scooter fixed until the next morning. Before I had a breakdown, I decided to do what any normal person would do in this situation..I walked on down to the Holiday Inn and booked a room for $90 and had the most amazing, big bed with two types of pillows, a huge flat screen tv with movie channels, and the internet. I was able to contact my mom about the accident and I also emailed Wenli and gave her a heads up even though I didn't have school the next day, and I rested my beat to shit body. I could live in that hotel. When I woke up, my face was a lovely combination of yellow and blue and totally swollen..I got my free breakfast and went back to sleep until check out at 12. Sam finally found my scooter and took it to a shop with another Dewey guy and brought it over to me later that day. He made me promise that I wouldn't try to ride it and I really did want to..but agreed it was a bad idea and I wasn't exactly hyped to get back on the road. He dropped me off at Mode Mall and I got lunch/dinner/hung out at starbucks/shopped/and watched a movie at the theatres. I took a taxi back and by the time I was home, the internet was up and running.
Mr. Jeff Wang
Despite my recent scooter trauma/drama, I needed to buck up and get ready for my friend, Jeff to visit from Chicago. Jeff is a newer friend in my life, but he's one of those guys that you feel like you've known forever! I guess it's one of those situations where good friends hang out with good people..so if he's friends with my friends, then surely we'd get along. I met him last year when I joined a Bowling League with a group of friends in the city..Our team, Balls and Splits (extremely appropriate name..) consisted of, Stacy and her ex, Sarah and her ex, Courtney and her husband, Kari, me, and Jeff ..Naturally, we quickly became friends because A) Kari Jeff and I were the only non-couple on the team and B) He enjoyed drinking several pitchers of beer on Wednesday nights without worrying about the next day at work. So Jeff arrived in Taiwan a day later than expected because of Chicago's disgusting snow, but it was ok, it gave me a day extra to recover but left us with only Tuesday to explore Taiwan. I was scheduled to leave for the Philippines at 4 am that night.
I took the high-speed rail out to Taipei where I would then meet Jeff and his brother, Louis. Louis is older and he's still single so Jeff talked to me about the pressure that's on both of them to go get married off. People REALLY want to get married and have a baby in the Year of the Dragon because it's such a good animal year or whatever..next year is the year of the Snake so everyone's trying to avoid having babies and weddings. So funny to me. We were going to spend half a day in Taipei and then trek out to Taichung so I could briefly show him around there. We ate at Jeff's favorite restaurant which is a popular spot for tourists, Din Tai Fung (no relation to Paul Fung) and ate a bunch of dumplings and fried rice. We then headed over to Taipei 101 and actually rode all the way to the top. Even though I've been to Taipei more than several times, I have yet to go to the top of 101! It was cool, we took a lot of pictures but I forgot to tell Jeff how to take pictures like a true Asian. Rule #1) Always take a picture with any over sized cartoon statue which most likely exists anywhere you go Rule #2) Hold up the peace sign, duh. Rule #3) Take the picture by holding the camera way above your head and look up into the lens 4) don't smile with teeth..in fact..no don't smile at all. Just open your eyes as big as you can and stare into the lens.The top of 101 was awesome and I'm glad I finally saw it and got to ride in the "record breaking high speed elevator.." Jeff and I ventured over to his parents condo which was right next to all of the shopping in Taipei. I wanna live in his condo! His mom was out playing Majiang and his dad was watching Home Alone 6 which was a ridiculously low budget movie with awkward acting.. I didn't realize they've attempted to go past 3 for that movie. His dad was super nice and he was cracking me up every time he laughed at the movie. Jeff was laughing too and was like, "Oh you like this movie dad?" Jeff and I decided to head out to Taichung around 3:30 on the high speed rail. He got Mister Donut at the MRT and I got an amazing blueberry bagel with a ton of cream cheese. Delicious. We played an extremely long UNO game on my tablet and I finally won after literally 45 minutes.
We arrived in glorious Taichung and Jeff was aware of my orthodontist appointment at 6:15 so we decided to wait to eat dinner afterwards and walked around the area for a bit. I was embarrassed by how messy my apartment was (when I had attempted to clean that weekend) because I could barely move my right arm or my body in general, so cleaning was super difficult. I told him we'd just take my scooter over to the night market and go to dinner straight from there and that cast a fear in his eyes..rightfully so..I mean not even 36 hours ago, my scooter was being repaired in the shop getting tires replaced and the siding nailed back in (for only 1500NT!) The ride was smooth but I was a little scared to drive him around..I've never driven a boy before! He's not a big big guy but the difference between him and Shija was very noticeable. I took him through the night market and we got some tea. He thought the market was pretty cool and I agreed even though I'm so sick of Yi Zhong. It is a cool place though..I just wore myself out after going there 3 times a week every week for the first month and now I have my Chinese classes there. So the crowds just annoy me. We go over to my orthodontist appointment and this is where Jeff really got to experience a part of the culture and the lack of communication, which I had mentioned to him and how it's extremely annoying. We walked in in time for the appointment at 6:15 and the receptionist simply stated, "Oh we're not ready for you yet..come back at 7:30.." Of course this infuriated me because I have a guest from a million miles away that I'm trying to hang out with and was trying to be courteous to them by not cancelling last minute when me and Jeff's plans were shifted a day later. Jeff was surprised how they just flat out told me..oh no..we're not ready for you..come back an hour later. He's like,"Wow now I see what you mean about the communication.." We walked around the area more and I got back there for my appointment which took longer than expected and then we didn't get out to the restaurant until about 8:45. I took him to Deluxe Brewhouse so we could get a pitcher of beer. It was great to sit and chat with someone from home but at the same time, it was upsetting to know that he'd be leaving to go back to Chicago, and I'm still going to be in Taiwan until July. Hanging out with him really made me miss all of my friends back at home. He kept reassuring me not to worry and that I wasn't missing anything at home. We called him a cab from the restaurant and parted ways and it was pretty depressing. A friends from home was with me for only a day and it wasn't enough!
Well, that didn't happen the way I planned..we weren't even half a mile away from the restaurant when I got into an accident. It was the most unexpected thing ever (well I suppose most accidents are..) but I was driving fairly slow, maybe 35-40 ("KPH" I just learned that my scooter doesn't go by MPH..) on this main road where people zip by you. But suddenly my scooter started fishtailing like crazy and Shija and I realized it maybe 4 seconds before we fell and we're like "oh shit oh shit," but I couldn't get it under control and my instinct was to press onto my brakes. We collapsed shortly after. Fell over to the right with the scooter on both of our legs. Thank God, we were ok, and we had a very nice man pull over and help us up and move my scooter off the road. We were extremely lucky that the cars and bus behind us stopped. When we looked at my scooter we realized the rear tire was completely flat and off of the rim! Super strange considering for the most part, the roads in Taiwan are completely smooth (because potholes don't exist here) and I didn't run over anything either. The man told us to leave the scooter there and we could get it tomorrow, it would be ok. I think we were in shock but for some odd reason our first decision was to hail a cab and go home. I wasn't really feeling anything right away but after we got into the cab I realized..wait..I feel like my shoulder is out of place..my arm is burning..and my face is numb. Shija had a scrape on her side and her leg was hurting and we didn't think to call anyone super late at night but ironically, Shija received a text from her co-teacher, Patricia, who is like the Wenli of Chong Ching--that's Shija's school..(haha and you thought Yu Ying was funny..) and the text simply said, "Are you ok, I haven't heard from you in a while and I'm worried about you." Shija was like "woah how crazy is that?" and we called Patricia back and she insisted that the cab turns around and takes to the hospital so we handed him the phone and you could like..hear the surprise and panic in his voice..he probably thought it was so strange that two girls just non nonchalantly got into his cab and he's being told "Um they just got into an accident, you need to take them to the emergency room.." So when we arrived at the emergency room we were seen by two ladies right off the bat and they gave us our little emergency bands and took our information and that's when my pain and the realization of what had happened, set in. I started crying and was just upset that we were in the situation. Although it wasn't my fault, I couldn't help but feel responsible for Shija getting hurt.
China Medical Hospital was very efficient. We were given numbers and sent to stations and saw 4 different nurses and doctors for 4 different things and it was basically run like a machine. They asked what was bugging me the most and I said my shoulder because I was certain it was out of place..my arm didn't have much feeling and it just felt odd. Then my second concern was the large road burn on my elbow..They gave me shot to prevent infections, sent me to get an xray, sent me to get my wound cleaned and patched up, sent me back to the xray man where he informed me that my shoulder was ok and then finally we hit up the prescription counter, got our medicine, paid 700 NT..and we were done. Both Shija and I were grateful to not have any serious injuries and parted ways and I took a taxi home. I got back late that night and was in quite a bit of pain. I fell asleep most likely because of the ibuprofen and pain reliever the hospital gave me, but when I woke up Sunday morning, I felt like I got hit by a bus. I wasn't able to undress without my shoulder killing me and my face felt like (and started to look like) I had an abusive boyfriend punch my cheek.. and then the wound, which needed to be cleaned twice a day with saline solution and topped with some sort of cream they gave me, burned like hell. My pain was up to about a 7. And here's the topper, I wake up to NO INTERNET!! GAHHH, Vince I will kill you. Fine.You won't get me a damn tv..but at least keep the internet up and running! What's a beat up scooterless girl supposed to do for the entire day?? I contacted Sam about the accident, he was very worried but was occupied with some plans for the day. He offered to retrieve my scooter that night and take it to a shop to get it fixed up which was awesome of him.
I never got a hold of the landlord about my internet which infuriated me and on top of that, my laundry was damp and spread across the floor attempting to dry which left the room stuffy and messy, and the weather was turning pretty grim so Sam wasn't able to get the scooter fixed until the next morning. Before I had a breakdown, I decided to do what any normal person would do in this situation..I walked on down to the Holiday Inn and booked a room for $90 and had the most amazing, big bed with two types of pillows, a huge flat screen tv with movie channels, and the internet. I was able to contact my mom about the accident and I also emailed Wenli and gave her a heads up even though I didn't have school the next day, and I rested my beat to shit body. I could live in that hotel. When I woke up, my face was a lovely combination of yellow and blue and totally swollen..I got my free breakfast and went back to sleep until check out at 12. Sam finally found my scooter and took it to a shop with another Dewey guy and brought it over to me later that day. He made me promise that I wouldn't try to ride it and I really did want to..but agreed it was a bad idea and I wasn't exactly hyped to get back on the road. He dropped me off at Mode Mall and I got lunch/dinner/hung out at starbucks/shopped/and watched a movie at the theatres. I took a taxi back and by the time I was home, the internet was up and running.
Mr. Jeff Wang
Despite my recent scooter trauma/drama, I needed to buck up and get ready for my friend, Jeff to visit from Chicago. Jeff is a newer friend in my life, but he's one of those guys that you feel like you've known forever! I guess it's one of those situations where good friends hang out with good people..so if he's friends with my friends, then surely we'd get along. I met him last year when I joined a Bowling League with a group of friends in the city..Our team, Balls and Splits (extremely appropriate name..) consisted of, Stacy and her ex, Sarah and her ex, Courtney and her husband, Kari, me, and Jeff ..Naturally, we quickly became friends because A) Kari Jeff and I were the only non-couple on the team and B) He enjoyed drinking several pitchers of beer on Wednesday nights without worrying about the next day at work. So Jeff arrived in Taiwan a day later than expected because of Chicago's disgusting snow, but it was ok, it gave me a day extra to recover but left us with only Tuesday to explore Taiwan. I was scheduled to leave for the Philippines at 4 am that night.
I took the high-speed rail out to Taipei where I would then meet Jeff and his brother, Louis. Louis is older and he's still single so Jeff talked to me about the pressure that's on both of them to go get married off. People REALLY want to get married and have a baby in the Year of the Dragon because it's such a good animal year or whatever..next year is the year of the Snake so everyone's trying to avoid having babies and weddings. So funny to me. We were going to spend half a day in Taipei and then trek out to Taichung so I could briefly show him around there. We ate at Jeff's favorite restaurant which is a popular spot for tourists, Din Tai Fung (no relation to Paul Fung) and ate a bunch of dumplings and fried rice. We then headed over to Taipei 101 and actually rode all the way to the top. Even though I've been to Taipei more than several times, I have yet to go to the top of 101! It was cool, we took a lot of pictures but I forgot to tell Jeff how to take pictures like a true Asian. Rule #1) Always take a picture with any over sized cartoon statue which most likely exists anywhere you go Rule #2) Hold up the peace sign, duh. Rule #3) Take the picture by holding the camera way above your head and look up into the lens 4) don't smile with teeth..in fact..no don't smile at all. Just open your eyes as big as you can and stare into the lens.The top of 101 was awesome and I'm glad I finally saw it and got to ride in the "record breaking high speed elevator.." Jeff and I ventured over to his parents condo which was right next to all of the shopping in Taipei. I wanna live in his condo! His mom was out playing Majiang and his dad was watching Home Alone 6 which was a ridiculously low budget movie with awkward acting.. I didn't realize they've attempted to go past 3 for that movie. His dad was super nice and he was cracking me up every time he laughed at the movie. Jeff was laughing too and was like, "Oh you like this movie dad?" Jeff and I decided to head out to Taichung around 3:30 on the high speed rail. He got Mister Donut at the MRT and I got an amazing blueberry bagel with a ton of cream cheese. Delicious. We played an extremely long UNO game on my tablet and I finally won after literally 45 minutes.
We arrived in glorious Taichung and Jeff was aware of my orthodontist appointment at 6:15 so we decided to wait to eat dinner afterwards and walked around the area for a bit. I was embarrassed by how messy my apartment was (when I had attempted to clean that weekend) because I could barely move my right arm or my body in general, so cleaning was super difficult. I told him we'd just take my scooter over to the night market and go to dinner straight from there and that cast a fear in his eyes..rightfully so..I mean not even 36 hours ago, my scooter was being repaired in the shop getting tires replaced and the siding nailed back in (for only 1500NT!) The ride was smooth but I was a little scared to drive him around..I've never driven a boy before! He's not a big big guy but the difference between him and Shija was very noticeable. I took him through the night market and we got some tea. He thought the market was pretty cool and I agreed even though I'm so sick of Yi Zhong. It is a cool place though..I just wore myself out after going there 3 times a week every week for the first month and now I have my Chinese classes there. So the crowds just annoy me. We go over to my orthodontist appointment and this is where Jeff really got to experience a part of the culture and the lack of communication, which I had mentioned to him and how it's extremely annoying. We walked in in time for the appointment at 6:15 and the receptionist simply stated, "Oh we're not ready for you yet..come back at 7:30.." Of course this infuriated me because I have a guest from a million miles away that I'm trying to hang out with and was trying to be courteous to them by not cancelling last minute when me and Jeff's plans were shifted a day later. Jeff was surprised how they just flat out told me..oh no..we're not ready for you..come back an hour later. He's like,"Wow now I see what you mean about the communication.." We walked around the area more and I got back there for my appointment which took longer than expected and then we didn't get out to the restaurant until about 8:45. I took him to Deluxe Brewhouse so we could get a pitcher of beer. It was great to sit and chat with someone from home but at the same time, it was upsetting to know that he'd be leaving to go back to Chicago, and I'm still going to be in Taiwan until July. Hanging out with him really made me miss all of my friends back at home. He kept reassuring me not to worry and that I wasn't missing anything at home. We called him a cab from the restaurant and parted ways and it was pretty depressing. A friends from home was with me for only a day and it wasn't enough!
