hi, remember me? its been awhile... :)
and WHOA, so much crazy has occured since the last post! let's see...where to start? i will attempt to start at the beginning if my poor brain can reach back that far...
american visitor #2 arrived on friday night (mar26) in the form of a shelby girl herself, jennifer gold. if you had told me 3 1/2 years ago when we were terrorising england that in a few years we would have progressed to asia, i would have laughed. anyway, saturday we left to taipei for some touristy sightseeing (i have lived in taiwan for nine months and am usually burning up the road between hsinchu and taipei, but this was the first time i had taken my camera, taken 2348029348 foreign tourists photos, and spoken english really loudly. we went to a party with my friends saturday night and then did the tourist route the rest of the time: craziness at the top of taipei 101 (the world's tallest building) in the form of a crazy old asian man who kept trying to take his photo with us and a million tourists trying to go under the ropes that were clearly blocked off...we saw all the temples, blah blah blah...how strange to be a tourist/interpreter/tour guide in taipei. ps thanks jen for these photos...my camera was once again dead.
after taipei we were off to chiayi, a town toward the south of taiwan. the second we stepped off the train, this grandmother came up to us, and, speaking the fastest chinese my brain has ever attempted to keep up with, led us to a hotel that i bargained to get really cheap (i have gotten quite good at haggling in chinese ;) anyway, next thing i know, the woman has me sitting on some benches in the lobby of the hotel trying her darndest to get us to go on this van trip to alishan (some really famous mtns near chaiyi) for "only $500nt! so cheap!" i kept trying to tell her that she was leaving much earlier than we wanted to go and that we weren't staying the night there, but she wouldn't have any of it. "i want to take you because you are a chinese-speaking foreigner! your husband taught you very good chinese!" then, i kept trying to tell her that i didn't have a taiwanese husband, and that my chinese wasn't good. i really could barely keep up with what she was saying because she was speaking so fast and so loud and she had a really strong accent that i'm not used to listening to. somehow, i finally convinced her that we would think about it and she could call us in the morning. easy out, right? NO... in the meantime, we went out exploring the city. i love chiayi very much! it was really different from any city in the north, but that's part of why i liked it so much. but, it was full of many bizarre things: i saw people getting haircuts in what appeared to be an outdoor beauty shop in the middle of the park (i also need to add that this city has a salon literally EVERY TWO FEET.) we ate dinner in a really traditional restaurant that serves the traditional food of rice and flowers wrapped in bambooo (mmmmmmmm!!!!!). we met a really nice girl who told us all about the city and what we could do there (she even helped me buy motion sickness medicine. she wanted to practice english with us of course, but i never cease to be amazed by the kindess of strangers here. we got on the subject of tea, and next thing i knew, she was on her motorcycle going to buy us some plum tea that is really famous in chiayi. so sweet! after that it was pretty late so we headed back to the hotel for some much needed sleep... but our phone rang at the crack of dawn but both of us were too delerious to realise what was happenning because it was so early, so we didn't answer. thinking we were safe, we headed to the train station to start the journey to alishan sans crazy grandmother, but the second we got to the station, there she was! running over to us with the biggest smile i have EVER SEEN ON A GRANDMOTHER BEFORE. "the foreigners are here!" she shouted, and next thing i knew, there was a huge crowd of taxi drivers (who i still don't know what their significance was...) and she was loading up the van ready to haul us to alishan "for only $500nt!" she pointed to the people who would be joining us on the journey...and what do you think i see when i turn to look? the saddest looking teenage boy i have ever seen who has on a blue sweatshirt. not just any blue sweatshirt, mind you. a blue sweatshirt that read "RUTHERFORD COUNTY BIBLE CAMP." assuming there's only one rutherford county bible camp in the world, and that its the one in forest city, i took it as our sign to flee. i knew the second i tried to pop up alishan in a van with a sad boy from bible camp and that crazy grandmother, i would get the worst motion sickness and puke everywhere (if you know me well, you know that for me, vans and mountain ranges most certainly do not mix.) anyway, i'll never know how we got out of that one, but we ended up scratching the trip to alishan and going to tainan instead.
ah tainan...i have always heard that it is the best city in taiwan, and maybe i can't argue. it was hotter than blue blazes, but it was certainly awesome! its the oldest city in taiwan, and its full of tradition. we were there during the 15th day of the lunar month, so everyone had offerings of food and incense set out for the ancestors. we looked at about every single temple there, and there are sooooo many that i'm pretty sure we covered every square inch of that city. however, the temples are beautiful, and everytime we'd get lost, there was a friendly local around to help us. i love tainan very much...its just the right mix of city and countryside without being too much of either to be obnoxious ;)
after jennifer left, i was headed down to kenting with some friends for a nice wknd at the beach and a music festival that we had tickets to. AWESOME! some really good bands were playing (namely magic power and van fan) and we saw both their shows, ate lots of thai food, spoke lots of chinese, spent lots of time at the beach, enjoyed the southern sun...ah, it was so nice :) but, the best moment came on sunday night...
after watching van fan's wonderfully awesome show, we wandered out of the venue to find the exit and head home. *ok side note: for those of you who don't know who van fan is, he's a taiwanese singer/actor who i am in love with and have been chasing around the island at a pretty sucessful rate since i got here.* anyway, my friend kristen said "wouldn't it be funny if he was standing in his booth?" we laughed, knowing it was impossible. UNTIL WE LOOKED DOWN AT THE BOOTH THAT WAS PROMOTING HIS NEW ALBUM... AND THERE HE WAS!!!!!! naturally i took off running in that direction. one of his staff popped up out of nowhere and started raving about the "foreign fans" who were here, and for us to "wait, wait, you are foreign fans, i help you! wait, wait!" next thing i know, i'm standing NEXT TO VAN FAN getting my photo taken with him. he turned to shake my hand, but i couldn't even speak. every single word of english and every single word of chinese i have ever known fled from my brain, and i couldn't do anything but gasp and giggle like an idiot. he was also smiling, but i think he was just confused why these foreigners were here, and how we even knew who he was much less why i rampaged the booth and begged for photos. anyway, true to form, i can't do anything normally. can't just go say "i'm a big fan of your work," take the photo, and leave. no. not possible. i felt my arms go out in front of me, i felt my hands latch onto his shoulders, then i felt myself start shaking him. my brain kept trying to signal my arms to please stop shaking the movie star, but they wouldn't have any part of it. THEN, i heard my mouth start shouting in the loudest english i could muster..."IIIIIIIIIII LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU." his face was priceless (as i'm sure was mine and everyone else's.) about this time my friend mary grabbed me and dragged me away and we all fled. i was still in shock as we wandered to the bus stop...when we got to the bus stop, i spent a lot of time trying to convince them to let me go back down to the tent and have a do-over, after all, we hadn't even gotten an autograph!!!! so, we went back down. this time was much more calm, however. when they saw us coming back, i can only imagine what was running through their heads...but the crazy album promoter called out our names and announced that the foreign fans were back (which was probably code for "EVERYONE GET PREPARED.") i got an autograph, many posters, and had a conversation and a photo on my own with van fan :) it was the best best best best day in my life, one i'm sure that i (and van fan...) will not soon forget. it was just like that episode of i love lucy where they meet john wayne...though thankfully, i resisted the urge to dump out my purse and put it on my head.
so all in all, the holidays were excellent :) i love taiwan so much. the time is passing too quickly.................
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