twirl you all around the floor

it's the first day of fall!
i've been waiting until today to wear my flannel jammies. the leaves aren't changing, but flannel feels like fall. i guess my bruise has been changing colors :P not the same.

i went to take a picture and i noticed a whole bunch of ants on/in my camera. rat bastards! as dad would say. i think i de-anted it, but i'm keeping an eye on it. now i feel kind of creepy crawly though.

jerry and i had chinese today. it's getting considerably harder. now we're learning to write characters. i need to make flash cards because i can't remember what they mean. it's interesting though.
when i was downtown today, i could recognize some characters on the street signs and tonight on the close captioning on tv i could recognize a few too. it makes it seem less like you're somewhere you don't belong and more like everything is in code and you keep getting more and more decoding tools every day.

we got a new girl today, lesley. she's from somewhere in the US. her mom is from texas. she seems pretty down to earth and nice.

we played scrabble tonight and i beat noe by 5 points with a 186. i love scrabble.

and talked until closing time

today was just kind of mixed up in general.
this afternoon, i went to latini's to have a chinese lesson with danny's wife, linda, who's studying to become a certified chinese teacher. she wanted to practice on me, so i went in today and read for her and then she helped me with my tones. it was hilarious. i couldn't stop yawning even though i wasn't tired, and she was pretty strict with me when i wasn't making the right sound and it was just giving me the giggles.
at one point she stopped me and said 'megan, you're trying to say 'i am going to school' but right now you're saying 'i am going to dumpling'.'
so that was literally a comedy of errors. i was there for 2 hoursish and it was fun and very helpful.

this evening i made shortcake with fresh whipped cream and raspberries.
i was so excited that the shortcake baked so well in our finnicky oven:


but then i tasted a little bit of one, and it was inedibly salty. i accidentally used salt instead of sugar. WHOOPS. it was in a bag that looked like the sugar bag, in the place where we keep the sugar, and i didn't even think to check. so i chucked that batch of biscuits and started over.

the second batch was also beautiful, and tasted fine. so i piled one of them with whipped cream and raspberries:
but when i took a bite, i had to run to the sink and spit it out because it tasted horrible. i assumed the whipped cream must have gone bad. but THENNN i remembered that i had ALSO used salt to make the whipped cream! damnnnn!
i used the whole container in the first batch, so i ended up with edible biscuits and raspberries without whipped cream.

gram and spanky and i cracked up tonight when i told them the story on skype, because a few years ago gram and i accidentally made salty macaroons. they were the most disgusting cooking mistake i've ever made, until the whipped cream tonight. that was truly horrible beyond words.

to round out my random day, i went bowling with the guys tonight and bowled a 66 the first game, then a 50 something, then 105, then my last game i magically bowled a 137 and ended up in second place. if i had stuck around for a 5th game i would have gotten to be team captain.
weird day. my bruise has also turned new shades of yellow and purple, but i think we can go a day or two without a visual update.

no good, very bad day

jerry

jerry looking profoundly confused. you have to click the picture to enlarge it to fully appreciate the eyebrow positioning.
ever since 7-11 shut down, this is where we go for all our last minute needs. an old woman works behind the counter so we affectionally call the store 'grandma's'
front of the spa
this is the owner of the spa, nicky
danny, the owner of latini's, in the kitchen
this is the view from where i sit in latini's. i didnt take a picture of the front of the store because some people were sitting in the front and they were acting kind of weird about me taking pictures. so, another day.
one day they wrote it in english for me. what a surprise to see 'cafe americano' up on the chalkboard.
the trash truck and everyone standing out with their trash bags waiting for it to come to them. i wish you could hear the annoying song it plays.
wait! you can. thank you, youtube.
taiwanese trash truck song
now play that video at least three times a day, every single day, and you practically live in taiwan

today was crummy.
-forgot my lesson plans for my 2 classes that require the most planning
-paid my coteacher what she told me her mom had been quoted to get the paint off her car. used all of the money i had saved to buy another scooter
-got overwhelmed at the prospect of somehow getting my potentially broken, in need of being checked out, scooter to a repair shop and then somehow communicating with a guy who definitely won't speak english, while not getting ripped off
-got overwhelmed realizing i couldn't call family or friends to help me and that it's more or less up to me to figure it out
-started a new class today that's literally a catch-all for the worst kids in every class who are seriously behind. i wondered where some kids in my other classes had disappeared to, and they're in this new class. none of them can make a sentence
-started crying on the bus after all of that and everyone was looking at me and everyone on the street was looking at me when i was waiting for the bus and i just wanted to be invisible, which is impossible for me in this city

so it was just an 'i hate taiwan' kind of day. i feel bad complaining but i think it's just part of the reality of being so far from home in such a different place. there are going to be bad days.
tomorrow, i'm watching sleepless in seattle, baking biscuits to top with frozen raspberries and fresh whipped cream. it works every time when i need some cheering up

angel hour

so today, i'm waiting for the bus, and this man is kind of peeking at me every once in a while while we're sitting there. finally, he comes over to me and says hello and he starts telling me that he's a building architect and he lives nearby. then he starts saying how he wants me to help him find this guy at AIT's contact info. i'm pretty confused, but i'm trying to understand him. so then the bus comes, we get on, and we sit down next to each other.

over the course of the 20 minute bus ride, he explains that he studied at a technical institute for college and in the last 3 years, he's invented this thing he's calling the 'perpetual wheel' which is a wheel that doesn't require any energy to spin. so he thinks he could basically solve the whole energy crisis, but he doesn't have a computer/doesn't know how to use one, but he saw this ad in the paper for the American Institute of Technology, and he wants to write a letter to president of AIT, named Steven (he doesn't know his last name). he doesn't know any foreigners, so he figured that seeing me at the bus stop was a sign and he thinks i can help him.

so the man on the bus gave me his address (written in chinese), and now i'm supposed to find this guy Steven's contact info and mail it to the man so he can mail his idea to steven.
it's convoluted, but i'm going to help him.


day 2 of the wound. it pretty much feels like it looks.
tonight, ala dad, i told my class that i was swimming in the ocean this weekend and i thought i saw something moving, so i looked behind me and there was a shark. i started swimming faster and faster but i couldn't get away, and it bit my leg. the entire class was screaming and freaking out. it was hilarious.
then after class, as i was collecting my money, one of my little girls told the woman at the front desk about my shark attack and i showed the office ladies and they all looked at it in horror.
when we were little and my dad would get a cut on his head or some injury, he would tell us that "the doorbell rang, and there were threeeeee ninjas. i karate chopped the first one, i punched the second one, but the third one sliced my forehead before i could get to him." i've probably heard that, more or less word for word, at least 20 times in my life.

those are the highlights of my day. tomorrow i have 3 classes and i'm going to have someone else try to start my scooter and determine whether it's operator error or if the thing is legitimately broken. stay tuned.

all shook up

today in pictures:

this is my outside class at the junior high. this is the side entrance
it looks more like a jail than a school to me.
my class. they're pretty good. today the topic was slang. how would you explain:
-hunk, babe, cool, wimp, loser, nerd, geek, half full, peabrain, loudmouth, sketchy, sweet
this is my wow class. they used to be my least favorite, but they're growing on me. the little kid in the front middle is 'tobby' pronounced toby
peter can do his rubix (rubicks?) cube in 4 minutes

so now, phase 2 of photos. the other day, i slipped and fell on the wet tile and now both of my knees are bruised
then tonight, i went to start my scooter and when i kick started it, it just flew forward. i ended up hitting my coteacher's mom's car. WHOOPS. at that point, i thought it was just me accidentally pulling the throttle. but then i tried it again and the same thing happened. this time though, i went down with it and i scraped the heck out of my leg and my foot :( i also got a hole in my dress and scraped up my new shoes.
my leg before i cleaned it out

after a shower and neosporin
:(

so i left my scooter at school and one of my coteachers gave me a ride home. this weekend i'm going to go with someone to see if the throttle is stuck or if i was just being stupid. either way, i think i'm done scootering for a little while. that didn't last long, huh?
that was my day.

a woman on the go

wooo scooter!
i scootered to school today. it wasn't as scary as i thought it would be. i've figured out how to lean when i want to turn instead of trying to turn my handle bars. it's kind of fun. i imagine it's what riding a broom feels like. you just lean to the side and all of the sudden, you're moving over.
this is keith's helmet. mine is cuter but it doesn't protect my head as much. they have really cute ones that look kind of like an updo though. i want one of those, but i haven't seen them in any of the helmet shops i've checked out.

i showed mom and jeff my picture just now and jeff ran out to get his picture taken on his motorcycle. we are so fancy.

so aside from riding my scooter, today was pretty good. i'm learning how to write characters now in chinese class. i can recognize 'she, him, me, you, nice to meet you, mr., ms., hello, last name, first name, full name, what, country, american, chinese, japanese, and the 'question particle.'' and i can write me, you and beautiful.
the top one is ni (you) and underneath is wo (i)

after that, i went to the hospital to teach keith's hospital ladies. we went over phrases they need when they answer the phones and stuff. 'hello, may i help you?' they originally had 'what feels uncomfortable to you?' and i changed it to 'what hurts?'

what else did i do today. made pork tenderloin for dinner now that we know the oven works. it was DELICIOUSSSS, so delicious. i gave a piece to steve, martyn and noe and we agreed. and it's so easy. martyn's going to buy one and we're going to try stuffing it with bread crumbs and apples. i'm so excited. tonight i just made it with salt and pepper.
ok i'm going to dry my hair and read some before bed. zaijian!

ta shi li aime ma?

a quick list and some pictures.
1. dena graciously offered to take me to e sun bank to wire money home. in the next few days, i'll have $1,538 US ($50,000 NT) more in my bank account at home! woo!
2. drove around a little more on my scooter. i'm learning to lean into turns instead of trying to turn my handle bars so much
3. had lunch at latini's with jerry. no one was there so danny sat and helped us practice chinese. jerry speaks very loud and very pronounced chinese :P it makes me laugh but he's doing very well.
when we started, it was easy:
now, it's all in chinese!
it's not easy. i've named the characters in my head; 'little person with swishy thing next to it', 'little person with tiny washboard', 'thing with little tail', ...
4. i downloaded project runway, episode 9 anddd sleepless in seattle today. time to catch up on tv
5. one of my kids was looking at me today while we were reading the QA and they said 'megan, your (points underneath her eyes) is black.' ..guess i need more sleep