Current music: Papillon by The Editors
It is the end of my first full day in Taiwan. Prepare for an over-informative account of my adventure thus far. I don't want to forget anything.
First impressions: simultaneously the wildest and coolest place imaginable. I have the feeling I will be right at home here once I get over the jet-lag and the inevitable confusion of the first few days. Picking up some Chinese won't hurt either.
Let's start from the beginning.
Immediately after the sublimely wonderful wedding ceremony and reception of Laura and Rafal Szymczuk, of which I was the MC, I was driven to the airport by the fabulous Dina Hawari who saved me both my sanity and about $40. I had also lost my voice, which brought many questions from everyone I spoke to. After being told how crazy I was by the delightful United Airlines man, he mercifully let my giant pink suitcase on the place a few pounds overweight. They confiscated my jar of peanut butter while scanning my carry-on, even after I pleaded with them that I needed it to live. My flight left at 7am. I did not sleep the night before, having woken up at 9-ish.
The flight to Chicago lasted about an hour.
O'Hare airport is the largest in the world, and you can tell once you're there. It's confusing and required a train ride to find Japan Airlines. I bought a Mountain Dew which brought my voice back. The wait was around 3 hours.
The flight to Narita airport in Tokyo lasted twelve hours.
I watched Alice in Wonderland, two episodes of Spartacus: Blood and Sand and read several chapters of 'The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets Nest.' I slept about four hours. No exaggeration, both of my ankles were swollen to twice their size from the sitting and are still puffy today. I laugh whenever I look at them Airplane food was surprisingly good, but that may have been just because it was food.
Current music: Desperation Song by Carbon Leaf
Japan looks like someplace I would want to explore but I can't see ever living there. It's full of bright colours and animated characters. Flying over it is a sight that I won't soon forget. The toilets are a hole in the ground, much like here in Taiwan. I bought a shot glass and a bottle of grape Fanta which had an amusing label. I called my parents, which probably pissed them off cause of the time difference. The wait lasted about 4 hours, and I learned I can sleep on my backpack. I also was the only non-Asian person on my flight, and I didn't expect people to stare as much as they did. Maybe they did because I was sleep-deprived and looked irritable.
The flight to Kaohsiung, Taiwan lasted 3 hours.
I swear, I got the only plane at Narita that wasn't a 747. I slept the whole way, except for to eat my Kobe beef dinner and drink some much needed coffee.
I arrived in Kaohsiung a bit before 10 p.m. I was met at the gate by the director of my school, Victoria. She is a very nice woman, but she is very overworked and is trying to do about 10 things at once, so she gets a bit confused sometimes. She drove with me to Tainan in a hired car, which took about 45 minutes.
Current song: Dominoes by The Big Pink
The first thing that hit me here was the heat. It is so very humid here, and I don't think I ever fully appreciated the benefits of central air before now. Needless to say I was a sweaty mess before I got here, and it only got worse. But the palm trees help. The pollution isn't bad either, and my migraines have been controlled thus far.
I arrived at my hotel in Tainan at a bit before 11pm on the 30th of August. My total travelling time was a little under 29 hours. I should have spent more of that time sleeping.
I have a room at the Ying Dai hotel in the heart of Tainan until the day after tomorrow. It is a charming little hotel that looks quaint and rustic. It doesn't look like it belongs in this city. I had a much needed bath and went almost right to sleep.
This morning I woke up at 7am and got my complimentary breakfast offered by the hotel. It seems that rice and vegetables are standard for every meal in Taiwan. I had two pieces of toast and three cups of coffee.
I met Eric, the man who hired me, in the lobby. He was here for orientation, but lives in Taipei. I doubt I'll be seeing much of him from now on, which sucks, because we get along very well. He's American and has my sense of humour. We were both driven to the Jump Start School by Jonathan, a Taiwanese man who works with Eric in Taipei.
Current music: The Backseat by The Gaslight Anthem.
There are four English teachers at the school. I am by far the youngest and least experienced, but I am oddly not bothered. Two Englishmen, Ben and Hopi, have been here for four and three years respectively. They are both very friendly, but seem to do their own thing most of the time. Elissa is Hawaiian-born, and arrived a week before me. She is my new hero and best friend. She had a few days to be able to explore the city, and also speaks enough Chinese to get by. Hopi introduced me to the sweet tea here, which they make with real fruit. I sense a new obsession coming on.
Orientation lasted until about 4 today. I will be teaching two different bilingual classes, called Bi-1 and Bi-5. Bi-1, also called the 'babies', are 3-4 years old. Bi-5 are ages 5-6. I get the Bi-5 class in the mornings and the babies in the afternoon. I met both classes briefly today, and they are the cutest little things you can imagine.
Current music: If You'll Be Mine by Babybird
A little bit worrisome, is that the school did not have a copy of the curriculum for me to see today. So it seems for the first day I will just have to wing it. Apparently "that's just Taiwan," according to Ben. I'll just try to learn names and go over classroom rules tomorrow, and hopefully we'll get some structure later. A bit crazy for my first real classroom time, but I guess this whole thing has been crazy thus far. I can handle crazy.
After orientation, Ben and Hopi took off, and Elissa offered to show me around the bit of the city that she knew, because she was in this hotel last week. She showed me a few blocks, and wrote some translations on my Chinese map, which will be awesome for the future. I now know where to find the train station, and thankfully, a grocery store, where I was able to buy an overpriced jar of peanut butter and an iced tea. Heaven. The kid who was working at the store (who looked about 7 years old, but wasn't) told me that my Chinese was wonderful, even though all I said was thank you, and I am sure that I said it incorrectly.
Random sidenote: everyone is driving scooters around and apparently don't seem to abide by any coherent traffic laws. I know it will be a necessity to get one, but I'm pretty sure I will be killed. I'm going to look for a used one on the Internet.
Elissa is living in a house in the southeast district of Tainan for the first little while. She is renting from two bachelors who are going to be out of the country for about a month. She is going to ask them if I can take one of the rooms in the house, which would be amazing. If that doesn't work out, she found me a hotel that you can stay in for really cheap, and you can rent the rooms every two weeks, which would be perfect for me, because I only get this hotel for free for one more night. It won't be expensive to stay in longer, but I'd like to get settled somewhere, at least for a little while, so I can find either a bike or a scooter.
Current music: Moving to New York by The Wombats
So far, this has been exhausting and wonderful and crazy. I have to plan out my classes tomorrow now. After I take a bath. The next blogging won't be nearly as extensive.
'Night all...I guess for Canada it's morning...\
Jess
(DLS people: current stage of acculturation is obviously the first, excitement and euphoria. I'm scared for the next one.)
No comments:
Post a Comment