Soon we’ll have internet access in our apartment and be able to post on a more regular basis. We’re really wishing we’d already had it, because it would have made this past Saturday much less boring. Because seriously, if you can believe it, typhoons are just damned boring. You buy some extra food, you sleep in, then you sit around the house all day. You can’t leave, because you’d be blown out to sea, even if you live 20 miles from the coast. Two or three times an hour we’d hear a noise that is remarkably similar to the one that would, in Kansas, have meant we’d waited too long to go to the basement. But here, if you go to the basement, you might drown. So you stay up on the eighth floor and deal with the wind. Eventually you decide you just can’t take it anymore, your legs are about to atrophy and you need a Coke, and doggoneit you’re going to the convenience store. You don’t make it 30 yards from the front door of the building, but as soon as there seems to be a lull in the storm, you try again.
So I did. I tried again, I made it to Family Mart, and we relished Coke Zero (because the only shop within typhoon time walking distance doesn’t carry Coke Light, which is what Diet Coke is called here) and Doritos and some other stuff I can’t quite remember. In retrospect, beer might have helped the time to pass more quickly, but that might have incited plans like trying to walk to a store that did have Coke Light, and it turns out the lull really was just that. Five minutes after I got home, the wind picked back up to full force, and I would not for anything have been out in it.
Damage was minimal though. The storm was bigger than the island, but thankfully only one person died, and four of the five people who were injured were blown off of their motorcycles while attempting to ride through it. The fifth was hit by falling rocks, while walking, during a typhoon, through a posted falling rock zone. Kind of feels like being at home, except only five people got hurt by doing stupid stuff, rather than numbers that could be the populations of small towns.
So, today is our third official day of teaching, and I’ve got no voice. Every morning, I teach (well, attempt to corral) 9-12 3- and 4-year-olds, and that generally involves lots of repeated requests, such as “Please stand on the yellow line,” or “Get out your pink bowls, please,” and, to no one’s suprise, “No running - please walk!” Of course, the need to repeat these sort of instructions is pretty common for kids this age - but sheesh, these kids don’t actually have much idea what I’m really saying. I mean, they haven’t really figured out yet that I don’t know what they’re saying when they speak to me in Chinese! So, I’m sort of wondering how class will go today, since I can’t talk at all. I guess I’ll rely on my Chinese co-teacher and lots and lots of motions. Heh. Wish me luck.
In other news, I’m still losing weight! During training, I hit my initial goal of reaching 185 lbs. Since then, I’ve lost an additional 6 or so, putting me at 178.2 this morning. Granted, some of this is due to dehydration, but I’m gulping down water as fast as I can! Some of the loss is likely also because I’ve hardly got an appetite - it’s so hot here! Hot and sticky, thanks to the humidity. I wake up sort of hungry, but then by the time we can get breakfast, nothing really interests me. Sometimes I have lunch, sometimes not. Same for dinner, really. Usually, if I have lunch, I don’t eat dinner, and vice versa. This sounds sort of awful, but I’m sure once I find more foods I really like and the temperatures come down (which should happen, oh, sometime in December, I hear), I’ll start eating more. In the meantime, I’m well on my way to my second weight goal of 165 lbs - my high school weight (well, my 9th and 10th grade weight, anyway - after I began working at Dairy Queen, I packed on a few). Also? All of the new shirts I got look really, really good on me, although lots of the pants I brought are already beginning to feel a little big. I guess this is a good problem to have. But, I worry that even having lost this much, I still won’t have much luck finding clothes here - the market as a whole is just smaller all over, not just thinner. Fair warning, mom - I may need a care package from the Gap in a few months!
I’ve been promising everyone a post and somehow not getting around to it, so here’s a quick breakdown of what’s up with us.
Taipei is gorgeous. The city is great, there’s a seemingly infinite supply of stuff to do, and when you just need some comfortably familiar surroundings, walk a ways, that’s here, too. BB, Naomi, Jez, Rosalind, Lisbeth and I went to Outback steakhouse a couple of nights ago after class let out early for the first time. We’d been to Ikea to ogle furniture and other flat-packed sundries, and a mall so half of us could drool over computers and such-like while the other half were trying on shoes. We’d had out final demos that day, so we had a couple of drinks at the Outback, which had a surprisingly cosmopolitan selection of beers. It was also happy hour, in which drinks are two for the price of one, so I had two Boddingtons and Lisbeth had two margaritas. Funny thing, after a couple weeks of eating far less than we’re accustomed to, and nearly no fiber or protein, two drinks behaves a bit more like four. Fortunately we have no vehicles, and taxi drivers don’t care what shape you’re in if you have cash.
Today we’re packing up our hotel room to go to the town we’ll be settling in for the next year. It’s a pretty small place, and very different from Taipei, so there’s more culture shock in store for us if we understand correctly. Well, in addition to the big one that’s supposed to set in about three months after you move to a new country. Also today, after joking around last night about all the Brits we’ve been hanging around and absorbing each others’ phrases and manners of speaking, we were mistaken at breakfast for Canadians by a couple of American guys who “just assumed, because of how you sounded, ya know?” I was tempted not to correct them, but I was afraid then we’d have to figure out how to celebrate Boxing Day, and Lisbeth would feel pressured to try to like Red Green. Meh, it’s just too much effort to maintain the “I’m not really American” facade.
Okay, we’re headed to Taipei 101 - tallest building in the world!!!!
I’m going to be getting postcards to send to my nearest and dearest, but I don’t have many addresses! So, send them to me! If you don’t have my email address handy, leave me a comment and I’ll mail you for your address, mmkay?
I’ll be back later with a recap of the day and maybe even more pictures!!!