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Saturday, January 22, 2005
And the Earth Moved
Greetings All,
Well, as a special gift for my first night in Taiwan there was a little tremor last night. It was only a couple of minutes long, but the apartment swayed in a gracefully nauseating fashion. It started with a couple of quick pulses followed by a "wave" effect. It was rather novel as I've only experienced tiny tremors before. I guess I can now say - I arrived and the earth MOVED!
I made my first forray into the morning market today. Jeremy showed me how to get there and where his school is. I was able to roam about in kind of a grid patern, always re-orienting on one old man with roasted chestnuts to sell. When I thought he might move his cart, I relocated the school just to be safe. It is difficult not being able to speak the language as I can not even say "excuse me." I must definately pick up some phrazes soon. I did buy a tangerine from a little old lady who said "Hello" in English... she also knew "Thank you."
The market is a bizzare array of sights, sounds, and smells. There really ARE people cutting off the heads of both fish and chicken in the streets. Food stalls emmit the smell of grease, while other places burn incense. And the noise pollution is intense. Almost every stall has somebody with a microphone hawking their wares and the volume of the speakers is quite loud. This competes with the music from the clothing stores and the bells of the monks which walk about with donation boxes strung around their necks. Also amusing has been the amount of sun-shade umbrellas that I must duck under as they are positioned to be above the heads of the asian population and not the odd westerner that happens by. I suspect I'll grow used to all this as time goes on, but right now most of my experience has been as novel as a child learning to recognize his own toes for the first time.
A special night in ChangHua... I've had the opportunity to meet some of the foreigners here. Someone was holding a house warming party and I was invited to tag along. I've met more people in 2 days here than most westerners who come out to work have in 2 months! The general consensous seems to be that is about how long they've had to work/live in isolation. I'm so blessed and fortunate to have made contacts this early. It was nice to meet the "gang" that works at one of the local chain schools... they all seem nice and decent folk. There are people here from all over the world, New Zealand, Malta, Canada and the list goes on... it's very interesting. Strangely enough there a lot of artistic types and I've met 4 other people who do a lot of painting... I suspect my interest in the hobby will grow once I settle down and find a job and home. Oh, the walk home at 2:00 am was interesting... dead quiet. There are hardly any people on the streets at this time of night... which compared to Calgary is quite unusual.
Another thing I got to see today was the view from our building's roof. There's a little garden up there and a couple of picnic benches to sit on. The view is very nice and helped me to get an idea of the layout of the city... no matter what they tell you ChangHua is a CITY, not a town. While it may not be the size of Calgary, I think all the towns here blend together into one big urban sprawl. But that is just my impression based on a brief train ride.
I'm quite anxious to get my act together, but am experiencing some jet lag. It's 3 am here and noon at home and I'm wide awake typing this blog. I'm particularly leary of trying to learn the Mandarin dialect of Chinese... it is very challenging, but I need enough to at least get around the country. I'm just going to have to jump into the fray and risk being wrong! *lol* I guess it happens. Rather be wrong then be mute! For those who know me I've been accussed of being a chatter-box, so speaking is quite important to me. Reportedly that will change once I speak English all day to a group of kids.
Yay to my friends in Canada whom have been on-line with MSN to chat. It's been a degree of normality in the world of change. Hoping that everything in Canada is at least a little warm... all I can remind myself of is that walking down the street in a light jacket at this time of year is a complete luxury considering the -35 C. weather that I endured only a week ago in Alberta!
Oh yes, Jeremy brought me pizza home for supper tonight... it was nice! I remain amazed at the prices of things... our dollar stores must be making money hand over fist... the stuff they sell is 1/3rd the price here.
Wandering in awe... and pleasant confusion.
Love,
T.Destiny
Well, as a special gift for my first night in Taiwan there was a little tremor last night. It was only a couple of minutes long, but the apartment swayed in a gracefully nauseating fashion. It started with a couple of quick pulses followed by a "wave" effect. It was rather novel as I've only experienced tiny tremors before. I guess I can now say - I arrived and the earth MOVED!
I made my first forray into the morning market today. Jeremy showed me how to get there and where his school is. I was able to roam about in kind of a grid patern, always re-orienting on one old man with roasted chestnuts to sell. When I thought he might move his cart, I relocated the school just to be safe. It is difficult not being able to speak the language as I can not even say "excuse me." I must definately pick up some phrazes soon. I did buy a tangerine from a little old lady who said "Hello" in English... she also knew "Thank you."
The market is a bizzare array of sights, sounds, and smells. There really ARE people cutting off the heads of both fish and chicken in the streets. Food stalls emmit the smell of grease, while other places burn incense. And the noise pollution is intense. Almost every stall has somebody with a microphone hawking their wares and the volume of the speakers is quite loud. This competes with the music from the clothing stores and the bells of the monks which walk about with donation boxes strung around their necks. Also amusing has been the amount of sun-shade umbrellas that I must duck under as they are positioned to be above the heads of the asian population and not the odd westerner that happens by. I suspect I'll grow used to all this as time goes on, but right now most of my experience has been as novel as a child learning to recognize his own toes for the first time.
A special night in ChangHua... I've had the opportunity to meet some of the foreigners here. Someone was holding a house warming party and I was invited to tag along. I've met more people in 2 days here than most westerners who come out to work have in 2 months! The general consensous seems to be that is about how long they've had to work/live in isolation. I'm so blessed and fortunate to have made contacts this early. It was nice to meet the "gang" that works at one of the local chain schools... they all seem nice and decent folk. There are people here from all over the world, New Zealand, Malta, Canada and the list goes on... it's very interesting. Strangely enough there a lot of artistic types and I've met 4 other people who do a lot of painting... I suspect my interest in the hobby will grow once I settle down and find a job and home. Oh, the walk home at 2:00 am was interesting... dead quiet. There are hardly any people on the streets at this time of night... which compared to Calgary is quite unusual.
Another thing I got to see today was the view from our building's roof. There's a little garden up there and a couple of picnic benches to sit on. The view is very nice and helped me to get an idea of the layout of the city... no matter what they tell you ChangHua is a CITY, not a town. While it may not be the size of Calgary, I think all the towns here blend together into one big urban sprawl. But that is just my impression based on a brief train ride.
I'm quite anxious to get my act together, but am experiencing some jet lag. It's 3 am here and noon at home and I'm wide awake typing this blog. I'm particularly leary of trying to learn the Mandarin dialect of Chinese... it is very challenging, but I need enough to at least get around the country. I'm just going to have to jump into the fray and risk being wrong! *lol* I guess it happens. Rather be wrong then be mute! For those who know me I've been accussed of being a chatter-box, so speaking is quite important to me. Reportedly that will change once I speak English all day to a group of kids.
Yay to my friends in Canada whom have been on-line with MSN to chat. It's been a degree of normality in the world of change. Hoping that everything in Canada is at least a little warm... all I can remind myself of is that walking down the street in a light jacket at this time of year is a complete luxury considering the -35 C. weather that I endured only a week ago in Alberta!
Oh yes, Jeremy brought me pizza home for supper tonight... it was nice! I remain amazed at the prices of things... our dollar stores must be making money hand over fist... the stuff they sell is 1/3rd the price here.
Wandering in awe... and pleasant confusion.
Love,
T.Destiny
Posted by T. Destiny in Taiwan at 11:51 AM 
