the typhoon that never ends

here we are, still typhooning...day 3~!!!! there is so much wind and rain that umbrellas are useless. my second one has been laid to rest after a hard fight with the wind (it was sadly no match). in taitung, which is in the southeast of taiwan, a hotel collapsed. you can watch the video here to see a taste of what a taiwan typhoon is like! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAEnz7Qm_jw

today i decided to brave the elements and do a bit of shopping. (of course by the time i got home i was soaked). i went to hola, this really cool taiwanese version of bed bath and beyond. (i hated that store with a passion when i was a kid...funny how now i cant keep myself out of this one!) i wandered around it for serioulsy 2 hours, making a (really long) mental list of the things i am going to come back and buy after payday (WHICH IS TMRW YAYAYAYA). after getting crazy lost on my way out (the taiwanese escalator system is really hard to navigate somtimes!) i decided to swim to one of the shops down the street and have a look. im so glad i did...i found the cutest cell phone case for only $70nt! (thats about $2usd). i love the shopping in taiwan ;) thats very dangerous! but they have so many cute things. cute cute cute.

i guess im crazy, but im really looking forward to going back to work. its been typhoon hols for 3 days! im sick of this typhoon already! so many shops are closed and no one can do anything because of the crazy weather. even some of the scooters cant go on the roads because parts of them are so flooded. needless to say, im getting a little bit of cabin fever! i am ready for the typhoon to finishhhhhh but i am not, however, ready for the heat thats going to return to us once the rain and winds are gone. not looking forward to that at all. at least in the typhoon i can breathe!

i have also discovered something. for some reason, i felt more like a foreigner in the uk than i do in taiwan. which is strange for many reasons: in the uk, i looked like everyone, i spoke the language, i could identify with most of the culture because it was western, i knew what most of the food was, etc. by all rights i should have felt less like a foreigner there. no one stared at me when i walked down the street, no one tried to speak to me in chinese or japanese and i couldnt answer, i never ate any fish with the eyeballs still attached. but for some reason, taiwan seems familiar, almost natural...its very strange! dont get me wrong...i still feel like a foreigner :), but maybe its just because ive lived abroad before or something...i dont know. i enjoy being a foreigner in taiwan :)

so everybody, dont worry! i am surviving the typhoon! just a little bit wet, but surviving :)