Today started of sort of …eh… and just got better from there.
We met up with Evelyn to go to Taipei for a work thing that was pitched to us as an area fun day - we’d be bowling. I was a little thrown by the fact that we were meeting her at 10:00am (seems a little early for bowling, don’t you think?), but sure, whatever. Then, when we get there, she’s looking for some hotel. Turns out the part they didn’t tell us was that the lunch portion was actually a banquet and mini awards ceremony type thing. Banquet isn’t really the right word - it was buffet style and pretty good, actually (somehow, I never associate good food with banquets, ever). I knew they were feeding us, but in my head, it was pizza, not fancy schmancy stuff. Anyhow, most of the talking was in Chinese, which, you know, we don’t really understand (still working on finding time for Chinese lessons and working on not accidentally saying incredibly innappropriate things), so it was pretty boring.
Then, we finally moved onto the bowling alley around 1:00 or so, and it was … different. The bowling alley was well-lit, with bright white walls and no smoke wafting over from the next lane. Also? The pitchers everyone had were filled with tea, not beer. I mean, sure, we can bowl, it’s fun (I played an almost respectable few games), but it was a little surreal without the seedy element that seems to permeate even the safest midwestern bowling alleys.
After that, we went to Carrefour. It’s a French import that feels remarkably like a super Walmart, given that we were able to buy kitchen appliances and bedsheets and foodstuff in one go. Heh. What’d we get? We finally got stuff to make ourselves feel almost truly settled in, now that we’ve been here over 3 months. Sheesh. Anyway, we got:
- Microwave (~$4700NT)
- Toaster oven (~$1500NT)
- Rice cooker (~$1300NT)
- 2 sets of duvet cover + fitted sheet + pillowcases ($1000NT each)
- Messenger bag for Seth (~$1500NT)
- Shaving cartridges (~$250NT) (I’m sure the inclusion of this one in the list is of incredible interest to you, right?)
- Measuing spoons and liquid measuing cup (~$100NT)
- Plastic corner shelf thingie for the shower (~$250NT)
- Noodles (rotini and pipe rigate {scroll down}) (~$200NT)
- Black bean hot cereal (I’ll have to let you know how that one works out) (~$100NT)
I think that was about everything. We spent about the equivalent of one week’s pay for one of us, but I think it was worth it. I can make cookies! And we can now reheat leftovers, if we ever have any (like, say, if I was to cook up a big batch of black beans - yum!) - woo!
So, now that I’ve set up the cooking appliances, and stripped the old dirty sheets and replaced them with some new ones (that are much nicer, incidentally), and graded two days worth of Treehouse homework, and written on of the longer posts I’ve written in a few days (weeks, maybe?), I think it’s time to go to bed!