The Sunday Evening Post

Greetings all, and welcome to what should be the first issue of a recurring weekly publication: the Sunday Evening Post (with styling italic font). This should deliver the week in summary, slightly more concise & relevant than before -- though I don't know if I can promise anything about verbosity. In fact, this might better be considered an "executive summary."

'Executive Summary'

The past week, on the whole, was fairly positive, though at times coloured by slight illness. I was not so ill that I couldn't sing, run, play tennis, or do push-ups, as I engaged in all of those activities this week; however, sometimes I was excessively cold or hot, or needed to blow my nose. That is not to say, of course, that it is very cool here... today was positively sun-tanning weather, when in Nanaimo it is no doubt bitingly cold.

Choir: Another progressive week has had in choir. We are making progress in all our songs, though we have not finished work on any, or completely learned No. 26 "All we like sheep have gone astray." The choir sounds rather good and I would say Handel is definitely not spinning in his grave at this point. I got hold of a recording of the songs we are singing and have been listening to it extensively. On Friday there was mild flooding in the choir room (due to a water line leak) but other than that, unremarkable.

Culture: In culture class we again did Chinese Gong Fu. Unfortunately, we also discovered that we will be performing our routine during the Tea Tour. Of course, this is a part of Taiwan culture & must be accepted with a baring of the teeth that hopefully resembles a smile. Of course, Gong Fu is far less emasculating than the dance we did earlier (Scott confirmed that the cloth finger twirling is traditionally a women's dance). Some tidbits... people don't confront each other directly with their problems, but instead tell a third party who acts as messenger; in culture class a Rotarian (instead of announcing things), just tells Scott to tell everyone something, while everyone is looking at her; friends just treat each other to things (like burning a CD or some food or lunch) but of course we foreigners always pay each other back.

Language: Language class is good, we continue to learn much. There was no class on Monday due to a surprise Typhoon holiday. I am progressing, ever so slowly, and can sometimes (with a lot of creativity) learn new Chinese words using Chinese. Talked to a guy on the bus yesterday who didn't know bopomofo, found it odd.

Events: Went to the mall & bought shoes last week with Alice, they are excellent & sporty runners. Had sushi + tea with Alice & her mother... bought Twining's of London Earl Grey tea. Rested and read Virginia on the typhoon holiday. Slept from 8:40 PM Tuesday to 7:20 AM Wednesday. Was thrown to the ground by several girls in Gong Fu class. Went trick-or-treating / sang a song with my classmates for an English class Hallowe'en exercise. Went to the National Palace Museum with Scott, and then went to see "The Forgotten" with Scott, Tiffany & Ivonne. Went hiking on the coast (very nice, but I got a sunburn on my neck) with Scott, English Claire, & my father.

Next weekend is the Tea Tour, & the weekend following that we three shall move families (which means I will be farther away from school)... until then I hope this format is enjoyable to the intended audience.

Also: note to all, I need a couple people (pref. girls) for Tiffany's native-English-speaker survey, so I was wondering if a few of you could help me out. E-mail/ post a comment if you are interested (Alleah, Amay, ... Barbara... Brad ?) thanks.

Happy Hallowe'en you all

Well, as I mentioned today I am celebrating Hallowe'en by going hiking on the coast all day with Scott & English Claire.

As for yesterday it was indeed pretty good. Scott just randomly called me on Friday & said "hey want to go to the national palace museum," then something in chinese which meant: "and then afterwards go watch a movie with Ivonne & Tiffany?" Ivonne & Tiffany being two of my 4 favourite middle-aged women, I was definitely stoked. The day began with choir, the flooding mostly having subsided. I had to open a lot of doors and windows that other people lacked the initiative to because the room was surprisingly hot.

Practise was good... the guy from TaiDa came again to help tenors practise. We keep adding more little layers of interpretation; articulation & dynamics. The problem is it's a little slow because some people aren't so good. Like I'm not sure how much they sing (esp. the guys) before right now, because I think the junior high school choir is more for unchanged voices. Not sure though.

Came home then headed with Scott to the museum. We bought this dessert which is one of the few things he can eat, and then headed in. There wasn't much new stuff, but we saw some (apparently) famous calligraphy that was REALLY messy cursive (we could only make out 2 to 5 characters of all 700 or so on it). Also there was a nice long painted scroll that was new that I thought was sweet. We got in free because we're foreigners and it's "Vist Taiwan Year."

Met up with Ivonne, Tiffany & her husband David. We all decided (because Ivonne was really keen on it) to go see "The Forgotten" as "the Incredibles" is not yet in theatres, gr... Had dinner at Subway, which was pretty good, and talked with them a lot waiting for the show to start. I saw this hilarious sign:

The people at the store didn't want me to take a picture because they thought I would use it with some fakes factory so they could manufacture phony copies of the new styles at the store. Because apparently that's actually a bit of a problem here.

The movie was good in that I got really into it... I would say the ending was weak, but by that time it was all that I could take. I am not, as you may know, cut out for these scary types of films. I would have preferred Dodgeball, even if "you feel stupider when you come out of the theatre than when you go in." (scott's friend) Afterwards we talked a while longer then headed to our respective homes. On the MRT we were talking about how at Rotary, Scott is a "leader" of exchange students and I am "vice-leader..."

This basically means that Vino, a Rotary woman, who is standing right in front of everyone and whose English is good, will turn to Scott & say, "Will you please tell them all to do [something random & stupid]." He must then parrot it to them, but they're standing right there. Which puts him in a dumb position, because not only are things often random &/or stupid, but she could really do it herself. It's Taiwan culture though. Now it's hiking time.

Hey, 50 posts, how did that happen?

Well, here it is... the pentecostal of this blog. Here is my classmate (wearing my tie) making a face:

There should be quotes around 'quality,' but there aren't, so I suppose I flatter myself. Anyway, yesterday was o.k. I can't exactly remember what happened any more, but someone gave me a CD so I can practise the CTHD song, and also choir was good as usual. We played tennis in P.E. & domestic science was decidely random.

As for today, Chinese class was good, we just keep on learning. It's funny because Scott has already finished the first textbook they gave us, but he just focuses on talking and hardly write. But he can actually communicate verbally, so more power to him. It was hallowe'en day, so I dressed up as did some of my classmates, and we had to sing this weird song from our English textbook called "Jack'o'Lantern" to the administration for marks and candy. I brought my guitar and used Harmony skillz to make up chords for it.

In computers we did some visual basic stuff, more calculator work. I'm not sure exactly what the point was, but I think it's so you can only type numbers into the little boxes. Also, some choir-stuff... Here, they have real cheerleading. Guys from my class are in it, I saw some pics and it's hardcore like American competition style. But I just happened to see this outside of choir:

Also, it just so happens that the room we were practising in had some random flooding, so we were seperated from our teacher by a moat. We made a bridge of stools though:Tomorrow promises to rule a lot, but more on that later...

Platypi, among other things

Disclaimer: This article actually has surprisingly little to do with platypi; however, if you are actually interested in them, Wikipedia has a good article.

It has come to my attention that my mother has made a habit of reading my blog out loud to my grandparents on Sunday evenings. As a rather entertaining consequence, she encountered difficulty upon crossing a certain quote from Alleah pertaining to human ejaculate & eternal devotion... as a duller consequence, further Sunday Evening Posts will probably be more grandparent-friendly. But to pick up where I left off...

Sunday (Part the Second)

I met up with Alice & her mother, and we headed to Genki Sushi (if you just read the Chinese, it sounds completely different...silly Japanese) for lunch. It is one of those places where you sit kind of like at a bar on really high barstools, and little plates of Japanese food (mostly sushi) scroll by you, and you take the ones you want. It was fun and the stuff was for the most part very good. All-you-can-eat wasabi & pickled ginger + green tea at no extra charge too.

That was at Ximen ("Teenager's Heaven" of many clothing & good food stores/ other fun stuff), where I somehow have only been twice, with middle-aged Rotarian women, w00t. We then went to a department store (I think 12 stories) outside Taipei Main Station. I found some shoes that I liked--not too uncoventional and very comfy, not to mention ideal for hacking and running--in a short while. Rotary, happily enough, was paying for it, which means my parents don't need to buy me new shoes this year; lucky them. We had to wait for a while afterwards as Alice's mother insisted on trying on many an article of clothing before deciding she wanted to buy nothing. Here are the shoes, by the way:

Following that, we had tea. It was even around 4:30... not quite a proper British tea, but I had some sort of cheescake with cherry glaze & waffles with cream/syrup. Had "Royal Tea" (a weird milk tea) and Earl Grey. I was pleased to discover bag & leaf Earl Grey tea for the purchasing. Alice bought me some, out of the kindness of her heart, and what's more it was Twining's of London, my preferred brand. Were I a snap pea, I would say I was "a very contented snap pea;" however, as this is not the case I shall refrain.

That evening I read several chapters of "The Voyage Out." I think I'm now at 16. Being fairly sick, even though a typhoon holiday was declared for Monday, I went to bed around 10.

Monday (Typhoon Holiday 3)

No school for me, which was very nice. For most of the day I was quite happy, eating chocolate, drinking tea & reading on the internet. Played the piano a bit and for the most part had a very nice day. I think there was exercising in there somewhere as well. Partway through the day I wasn't feeling too well, because it was really hot. The typhoon kind of wussed out and headed towards Japan, so it was a little rainy and windy outside, but not cool at all. I wanted to buy more postcards but the bookstore was closed.

Tuesday

Tuesday was an interesting day. Once again, I was part of the Taiwan government's mass medical testing in my school. Instead of P.E. we all had chest x-rays, yay. So I learned the word for X-ray, but other than that it was dumb. Choir was good as always, we just keep adding more subtleties and interpretation & dynamic insanity to all the pieces. And she keeps training everyone's voice and demanding everything be perfect. Somewhere in there Ivan knocked over her teapot & kind of broke it; I don't know why he was in the music room though as he's not in choir. Scout was random as well, the first half we did flag games, and the second half nothing at all.

I heard about some karaoke competition or something in the middle of the day. I was interested, so they asked me if I knew any Chinese songs. I thought I didn't, then I realized I can sing the end theme from "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon..." though I don't know the Mandarin lyrics (as of yet). In Art class, we just had a really dull lecture in the library so I talked to a girl about music (she "likes very much punk music").

When I got home I had a headache (should have slept through the lecture like Alex). I was also feeling pretty sick. So, like a dumbass, when I got home I ate chocolate until dinner. Then I had a few bites of dinner, drank water, and headed to the bathroom to vomit up all that chocolate. Subsequently, I ate dinner. Went to bed at 8:40 PM...

Wednesday

...and got up at 7:25 AM. That was a good sleep. I noticed something really hilarious on my chocolate sauce package while I was eating breakfast too:

Headed off to Zhong-Lun, this time the bus was unusually crowded... both Tuesday & Wednesday the subway at Dingxi involved me being jam-packed against a bunch of people (fortunately fairly good-looking women, not men yay). Gong Fu was again good, we spent a lot of time on different counter techniques and they showed us a bunch of weapons. Also, some ways to counter holds, someone grabbing your shirt, or the master guy had his students attack him with a sword and a knife and used bare hands to beat them. I finally caught a pic of Wil & Alex wrestling (unlike Kyle, Alex was smart enough to tap out):

Language class was o.k., I was really frustrated 'cause I was having problems with tones. Plus Alex & Yu Gyeong pwn a significant amount. I don't think I will be able to catch up with their pace under any circumstances. When I came home though I managed to talk to my mom in Chinese a bit, convinced her that I was a little sick, had already taken medicine and didn't want to go to choir that evening. So I didn't and went to bed early.

I am also going to bed now, so I will get back to you all with today & Friday's happenings at a later date... Hallowe'en related activities tomorrow.

success! victory is mine

At 5:16 PM Friday evening (that's 2:16 AM that morning for you) the three postcards were simultaneously dropped into a mailslot. They will all travel by airmail, so now it is a race to see which will get to whom first (or if they will likewise arrive simultaneously. Please note I've taken the liberty of photoshopping out people's addresses for their privacy.

Wednesday

In culture class we did Chinese Gong Fu (a.k.a. kung fu in Wade-Giles romanization) and it was excellent. Our teacher studied with a personal bodyguard of Chiang Kai-Shek, former longtime president of Taiwan. At one point Kyle managed to pants Wil... he forgot that Wil very much liked wrestling and played it all through high school. Conseqently:

Choir was good, started in on a new song and I liked it... classical 4-part a capella church stuff. An Ave Maria I believe. I managed to go without my mother because her mouth was frozen from dental work.

Thursday

I forget what happened on Thursday, except that during school we practised relay running. Then after school I actually ran a relay with my classmates--we took third which was not bad I guess. Kenta & I watched a lot of the races, but then we went to my house and had dinner. He went with my mother to her Chinese traditional instrument band, and will begin learning Chinese fiddle.

Friday

On Friday, in the afternoon we had to perform the awful dance for the old people. It was made worse because we then had matching outfits... kind of like South Park's "Getting Gay With Kids" thing. Afterwards we shook hands with five centenarians... I hope they don't get sick. Afterwords, Scott & I went to his house, he filled out his ballot for the presidential election, me witnessing, then we went to the post office. You can't lick the stamps here, you must paste them (again addresses photoshopped out)... see picture for details:

Afterwards I watched "The Hours" with my host parents... of course this got me interested in Virginia Woolf. So now I'm reading all her work online in chronological order (currently just into The Voyage Out).

Saturday

Woke up a little sick Saturday morning, but choir was good... I maintained my voice by drinking about 4 bottles of water. Came home for a little while, then in the evening was the ROTEX-run Hallowe'en party. It was pretty fun and random, the food was pretty good. There was this one game where you had a group and one person had to collect stuff from others in the group (i.e. x watches, x socks)... so it went watches, glasses, shirts, socks, jackets, shoes, lipstick and then balloons. Then the tie was resolved by the groups yelling a lot. So we won, but I was a little hoarse afterward. All in all random and fun though.

Now I'm off to do some shoe-shopping with Alice & possibly see a movie.

I hate office hours (3 days in a row)

You know that saying about how 95% of bank robberies are people trying to get their own money because they work while the bank is open? Well, the post office reminds me of that. It's so proximitously tempting, but on weekdays it's open from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM. Maybe tomorrow I'll get home before it closes but I won't be catching the open anytime soon. The postcards are done though.

Saturday
"What's your favourite opera?"-Andy

This Saturday I was rather busy. As usual, went to choir in the morning, & we actually sang until around 12:45; our teacher's kids were there randomly as well. I had agreed to wait outside Wanfang High School's gate at 2:00 PM to go shopping with Ivonne (the woman effectively in charge of all exchange students) & Tiffany (a Taiwanese English schoolteacher working on a university degree). At this point, I had over an hour to kill, so I decided to hang out with a guy from my choir:

Meet Andy. He is from Taiwan, and sings bass in the school choir. He also likes classical music a lot. Consequently, he can play piano pretty well (though he has been studying percussion for 11 years) & knows a lot of songs (the sound thereof / how to play). This also means he wants to know what kind of classical music I like... which sonata? Which symphony? Which opera? (Incidentally, the answer to that is "Don Giovanni," which I insist on calling "Don Giovanni & Leporello") We talked about stuff & had lunch:

Lunch was beef noodle (fairly cheap, about $3.00 CDN, but it's cheaper to eat at school on weekdays). At 2:00 I met Ivonne & Tiffany as planned, and Tiffany's husband drove us to Costco. It was remarkably like the one in Nanaimo... the only really different thing was there was a whole section for wine. The prices at the eating-part (for lack of a better word) were even the same. Ivonne was hilarious, because she really loves to shop, and was delighted by oh-so-many things. I bought a 1.5 Kg jar of chocolate raisins for a good price (less than $1.00/100g).

In the evening I met up with Alice (my handler from the Rotary club) and she took me to a "housewarming party" or the equivalent thereof for her friend, Stacey (who also came to the National Palace Museum). The concept is more like when a building is new, you can make it have good energy by jamming a lot of your friends into it (related to ying-yang creating an imbalance in favour of good living) & thus avoid future misfortune. For some reason, we were meeting at a restaurant, but I went to the restaurant & Alice went somewhere else. So Stacey, about 15 of her family members & I all had dinner together. It was actually not too bad (the event I mean, though we never got to the house)... but some of the food I really disliked (i.e. most of the intestine-based meats, nyugh) though there was a good spicy noodle from mainland China and shrimp balls.

Sunday
"Do you have a girlfriend?"-choir girls

On Saturday evening I was feeling kind of badly, but then I got a good sleep so I was feeling really optimistic Sunday morning. I finally had all the postcards done & was about to head off to the post office around 4 when my father told me it wasn't open on Sundays. After a brief bout of invective, I hopped on the MRT to 那個... the school gate again. This time, Wanfang's exchange students were to meet our music teacher (who is extraordinarily awesome BTW) to go to see a pop/a capella concert. But the first order of business was dinner, and the order before that was getting from Wanfang (East Taipei) to Banqiao (West Taipei) during rush hour traffic... it took a while, but Kenta & I listened to music -- turns out two of his favourite songs are "Scarborough Fair" & "The Sound of Silence" by Simon & Garfunkel. w00t

We had dinner on the 12th floor of a 13 floor shopping mall, at McDonald's (less greasy here & they have recycling as well as garbage). Alex also had a photo with the girl from the table next to us. Then we headed over to the concert hall... we were sitting REALLY far back, but some other people from the choir there. In the intermission we took pictures:

I have some more pictures of various females with the sexy uber-bass from this group (talented but only mildly entertaining) but I'll MSN them to people. Also, they sang "Kiss from a Rose" which I must admit to enjoying thoroughly.

Monday
"Do you like 'SM'?"-Music Teacher

Monday morning was dullish as usual, I can't remember what happened. Noon choir practise, then Music class. Kenta played his kickass Japanese guitar-thing again, then we watched part of "The Pianist." Somewhere in there my music teacher asked me if I liked [BD]SM, as I had taken off my belt for the purpose of singing. Chinese class was ok--Anna gave me a really, really cool picture--but now it's been shuffled so some of the slower people left & american Alex and the Korean girl come. But they pwn us all.

In the evening I had a choir concert with my mother's choir--thus I didn't get to return home to mail postcards. At first we were backup choir during a catholic mass... but then we walked to the Vatican Embassy. It was quite the ritzy event. We sang Taiwan's nat'l anthem, then the Vatican National Anthem. Afterwards, it was just socializing with Catholic elite and eating really good food. The desserts were labeled "assorted fine French pastries" and the food was really good... penne & pesto plus a couple good meats. A lot of people were drinking though, and I had to try to defend my not-drinking to this Catholic priest guy (in English) but he pwned me. So my debating skills suck, but I stand by in which I believe.

Tuesday
"Today we go look at the pretty girls."-Ivan

PE was random, but I got a bit of a workout. At lunch I wanted to practise for the choir test--we can't go to the competition unless we demonstrate our ability on each piece in quartet form. Unfortunately, the altos were all sucking, so they were doing a group practise & I got only a trio going on. Ivan also declared it was the day to look at pretty girls. On a completely unrelated note, according to Alleah & Mel it is possible for ejaculate to taste like eternal devotion. Not being a man of science, nor one who loves men, I can neither confirm or deny that contention.

Anyway, if any of you are native English speakers (& didn't speak other languages in your home for the first 5 years of life i.e. French or Mandarin), Tiffany would like your help in filling out a thing for her uni project. I can send it to you if you want, just drop me an email or comment. Also, if you want I can email you my mailing address if you're curious or want to send me your cat's latest hairball.

"And here we go again...

we know the start, we know the end; masters of the scene."

Those of you on the mailing list will be relieved to know all postcards have been secured and inked with their recipients' addresses. I also spent a good hour deciding what to write to each of you. Then I looked at the cards and they seem small. I almost want to write letters, but my mind isn't quite in good enough shape.

Friday

I stayed up a little late (around 2:00 AM) on Thursday, because I knew today I didn't have anything except language class at 2:00 PM. "So," I thought to myself, "I'll get plenty of sleep if I go to bed 12 hours in advance of my appointment." And thus I drifted off to sleep... Suddenly, I awoke bleary-eyed to a tremendous clamour. It persisted, rhythmic and ridiculously loud. I checked my watch and discovered Taipei had deigned to bless me with around 6 hours of sleep, then ran to the window:

My confusion rapidly metamorphosized into anger as I beheld a train of drummers pulled by a truck slamming out drumbeats at the head of a long procession. The thought running through my mind was from Llowyn's words, except focussed this time on culture. On my windfall day off--a day of rest--I was allowed less than usual sleep.

I spent a goodly amount of time into the West Coast primetime talking on the internet, reading blogs & the likes. Sent a few people pictures and videos. Partway through, my desk started trembling, then shaking. "Hey wise guy," was my first thought, "Stop messing around." But of course no-one else was home. Soon the floor began to vibrate, as if I was sitting atop a washing machine. Eventually, I realised I was experiencing an earthquake. But by that time it had ended and nothing had broken. Let this be an example of the ineffectiveness of school "earthquake response training:" in the face of the real event, I did not hide under a desk, nor count any number, nor watch out for aftershocks. Stupid social engineering.

Anyway, eventually I had to head off to school. Unfortunately, I didn't anticipate that the subways were temporarily shut down (not to mention the huge traffic jam in front of the station) for fear of further seismic activity. Luckily I only was obliged to wait a little while, and finished only five minutes late (due to some sandal-running). All in all I got there faster than usual. Class was good, the teacher explained to...certain members of our class that they were being relocated to another class (due to their extreme slowness). We should move quicker in the future, yay.

Dinner was good, something with noodles. I did a little laundry, and also bought a postcard for Laura. Then I spent about 90 minutes writing Alleah's because I had a lot to say; however, the postcard was small, so I had to write really small. I hope it is legible, but she'll be the judge of that. I haven't dropped it in the mails yet as I'll do them all at once. It will be a race, to see if three addressed to proximitous locations dropped off at the same place will take the same route. I am also wondering if international postage is expensive. And that's just about all I have to say about that. TGIF I suppose

gratuitous amounts of photos + thursday

"A mind is a terrible thing to waste." -United Negro College Fund

I've got a few pictures to show you all from the past couple days. I hope this sates (not whets) the appetite of those who have clamor'd.

But first, let me introduce my friend Kenta. Kenta is from Japan. Furthermore, he is crazy skilled and awesome--by the Foo definition. He's good at everything: kip-ups, bar gymnastics, arm-wrestling, chinese dance, spinning things on your fingers, japanese traditional instruments. He can even play the Mononoke-hime theme on Japanese flute. Here he is, on Wednesday, beating Scott at arm-wrestle so fast it blurs:

Did I mention he won with the other arm too? Anyway, Wednesday was the last day of Taiwanese Folk Dance, so next culture class we do Gong Fu. That also means we have to perform for hundreds of old people, including 5 cenetarians, on October 22nd. Hopefully it won't be too bad. As for language, it was again excellent with our new teacher. I still managed to find time to draw a little 'tattoo' on Anna's arm:

Don't get any ideas though:p Actually I'm getting ahead of myself speaking of tattoos. I don't think anyone's got any yet--though some have new piercings--but I got some free temporary ones from a store with my purchase of a 2L pepsi. So, on the bus to the MRT, I watched in awe as Anna used pop and a tissue to apply the tattoo to her face, on the moving bus.

Brad may be glad to know this is yet another person who likes Nirvana. On the subway, she unilaterally declared (possibly in realization of his sheer excellence) her marraige to Kenta. We explained it to him in Chinese, though I'm not sure he quite understood what was happening even though he knew what we were saying. I think they make a cute couple though...

We also learned at Language Class that next week the classes will be redistributed so that those who suck severely are separated from those who only consistently suck. Luckily, my favourite people will still be staying in my class, with the addition of hardcore American Alex & the Korean girl who, it seems, is never to be seen wearing anything but a skirt--that's become something I rely on as much as the pregnant women. It's a constant in my life. Speaking of constants & weaknesses, Kenta does have one weakness (seemingly shared by other Japanese nationals): being suddenly and quickly dragged across the floor by one leg. The perpetrator? Aforementioned hardcore American Alex. Witness the carnage below:

Also, in the evening was choir. There was another foreigner there, a chick from America. She knew a lot of Chinese, but when I asked her if she was a soprano she said she didn't know, so at the start I thought she was a n00b. But she's more starting out singing than speaking Chinese. We sang through the whole Gospel Mass & for the most part it was really awesome. Choir people be forewarned--I might foist it upon you in 2005!

Thursday

Today I had no school in the morning, so I just read stuff on the internet for a while. I was meeting a Rotarian at the MRT station to go to a Rotary meeting... but I was almost late -- I had to shower & dress in like 15 minutes because I slacked too long. The meeting was o.k.; I enjoyed the food and the guest speaker was talking about spinal disorders or something. They made me talk about my life, but someone advised me earlier not to prepare a speech, so I just wung it. That's right, I made up natural-sounding sentences explaining my current activities in Chinese on the spot (within the limits of my vocabulary of course). So that went pretty well. Came home and played the piano a bit & did laundry.

Dinner was good, I had like 7 sausages because they're somehow better here. Then I spent like an hour at the stationary store looking for postcards. But it turns out they don't have any & that I should have gone to the bookstore... I already have the good ones from the bookstore though. This might turn into an epic quest.

Hopefully the w00t is gone now, I too was tired of it. In response to comments: I've listened to some Muse, it doesn't do much for me; I practise conversation & drums with a drummer, but it's not my primary instrument now; the concept of buying a new CD (except BG) is pretty foreign to me. They're out of my price range. 5 to 10 CDs = cymbal too, drummer's math.

Some stuff that happened

(If you can come up with a duller/less dull title, post a comment)

Monday was an unremarkable day. Military training was cancelled and we 'got' to study for the whole time instead. Some girl I know said that, "It's not fair you guys get to study while we have to take Army Nurse." Even some of the other students took askance at that.

The reason everyone is studying their asses off to some extent or another is that there are exams coming up on Thursday & Friday. They're midterms, & there are two sets of midterms; however, I think they still matter somehow. Language class Monday was good as well, we have a new guy teacher who is very good (one of our old ones quit because we're terrible in more ways than one, or at least some of us). In the evening I listened to Linkin Park's [hybrid theory] and worked out (push-ups, crunches, tricep work, light biceps & pecs & forearms). Earlier in the day I'd done some pull-ups and ran laps at school.

Today, there was a Grade 10 assembly in the gym. Except it was before school and the gym is on the 4th floor. After the usual militaria, saluting and standing in ordered ranks in various postures, we sang the Taiwanese national anthem: "San Min Zhu Yi." Though we do it every time I thought I'd mention it, because this time (though I didn't remember all the words) I sang quite loudly. Now, normally, I don't really have any volume; however, recently I've been developing my voice and learning how to sing loud without strain. Also, the kids--hundreds all told--are actually surprisingly quiet. So I stood out a bit, but whatever I was also a head taller than the guys standing next to me (there's one guy in my class as tall & they're all younger though).

There was a bunch of stuff giving out awards to top students in each class... but I was confused, because the big exam is coming up in a few days. Whatever. Scout today was o.k. - we've learned numerical flag code, & have a codebook of about 9000 Chinese characters, so the teacher was sending us messages. Then we had to encode something, but the order is by radical not pinyin. So guess who figured out dictionary technique by radical in about 3 minutes? That's right, now I can look something up even if I don't know how to pronounce it: bye bye, children's newspapers. w00t.

Anyway, in Art most people were studying, and I ended up doing something kind of crappy which I am not too proud of (though I misspelled "blue" in Chinese then fixed it). A girl lent me a Simple Plan CD though. After the upcoming exams she'll send me a scan of the well-received piece I did last week, so you can maybe all see it. This evening I cleaned my room good (as the family was cleaning house) while listening to aforementioned Simple Plan. Also I called Scott & we talked for most of our conversation, including all information exchange, in Chinese. it was neat. Also, my dad was teaching my little sister English, so I reverse-engineered his lesson and learned a present-continuous in Chinese. & that's about it

drive carefully

What happens when you're walking through a beautiful forest park on the small mountains outside Taipei, heading to a grassland 1000 metres above sea level, and you come across a sign about driving? Take a picture!

Unfortunately I didn't get one (we were in the car) of the numerous "Owl Crossing" signs, but I plan to go back later in the year. Anyway, things have been o.k. the last couple days. Saturday was random, went to a Rotary planning meeting in the morning, and we saw not two but EIGHT Mormon missionaries. I had already asked some about D&C 89:9 so I had nothing to say but they waved at us. Then was the choir concert; however, nobody told me that there was a FULL CATHOLIC MASS beforehand. So, for an hour and a half (90 minutes) I sat through that, in Chinese of course. I don't even know the things that everyone says at the English ones, mreh. Managed to avoid communion (yay).

Helped Jack, the accompanist's bf, pack up his drums and then we went to his house. Set up the drums (6th floor, but there was an elevator most of the way) in his music room and played a bit. One time he left the room and I started playing and he came in right away and made me show him how to do a single-stroke triplets fill. Then we taught each other sticktwirls and stuff. The best part was when I learned the names for all the different drums and cymbals in Chinese, and taught him some English as well. So we're conversation partners. In the evening I talked to my sister a bit, and it was instructive.

Today we went to Yangmin Mountain park and hung out. Some nice forest hiking and then a pretty high-altitude windswept grassland. Scott & I talked theology, roleplaying & revisionist history the whole way. No Chinese for us! On the way out we drove to a place where lots of sulphur gas was coming out of the ground & that was pretty neat too. I have a fair number of good pictures of most of this, because the light was terrific today, very bright so lots to work with. Also one picture of me with my family. I don't feel like uploading any more pics now though, maybe a picture post later... also Scott agreed to burn me stuff basically at cost with his laptop, so I no longer have to worry about hard drive space.

Let me say now that I fear for Scott when he is living with my family, because man does my mother not understand his food allergies... of the two snacks today that she said were "ok" for him to eat, one contained 'Soy Sauce' [not for eating by Scott] & the other 'Milk' [likewise]. And the concept of "a little bit is not ok" does not get to her, in any language... like sometimes she will give him stuff, then he feels sick, and when pressed she admits it had "only a little bit" of soy or w/e in it. Also at dinner, we told her that he couldn't eat egg & that I didn't like it so to order our meals without. Of course, mine came fine sans oeuvre; however, Scott's had a big fried egg with it. So we made them take it back, but then they brought the same dish back with it scraped off, leaving plenty of obvious deadly residue. The second time the lied and said it was a new one, but they really just did a better scrape job, so he wasn't feeling too well after dinner.

That's about it for now. What's with this Drew thing? Does he never die or run out of people to befriend & betray? Also, the lyrics are from "Systematic Failure" by Genetic Drift's untitled album. Too bad they broke up, but I hope Sean & Quinn's new jam band is working well... also I wonder how the Smoke-dogg is down in Victoria.

Wake up, undercover systems...

...that erase your will to live,
so just get in place it's too late
the vaccine has been destroyed;
our disease will render humans void.
Distress, lost inside my mind.
End this, and show me what you find.
Technology defines your life,
lose it all--beginning with your strife.

A catscan to your soul (into my soul)
designing destiny (on the run)
collect your thoughts and start again (start again)
your eyes are still on fire (and burning)

Fear the end, you know it's coming soon,
the years spin, locked inside your room.
Hit the gas, you're going to make me break:
one more is all that I can take.
Don't think, sleep & drink today,
eventually it will happen anyway,
when your frame is crack dead on the floor.
I just don't feel the same way any more.

I challenge any of you to name the song, the band that played it, the album it is from, or composers :p Anyway my life has settled [after a fashion] into that pace where days flow into weeks and the time passes without one noticing. Really... a while ago I said to my classmate, "holy crap, it's October." Well, I actually said "十月" but that's beside the point... because now September is quite passed.

Anyway, as to new developments in the past week... hmm... it turns out my church choir accompanist's boyfriend is a drummer, and that furthermore he is impressed by my drumming to the point of calling it "fierce" & consequently I have access to some free drums soon I think (though there's the transportation). Choir is good on all fronts, church choir's got a concert on Saturday. I also got delegated into doing another solo from a different part of the Gospel Mass [w00t/lol]. School choir is good, the classical music is teaching me a bit of vibrato, volume & proper high notes. When I go to that choir I can sing for 3 hours and have my voice not be fucked, it's really cool. & our teacher rules a lot

For the most part I've been doing a lot of reading & having my mind sift through things and intellectualizing. In the past week I read Steal this Book and now I've gotten into educational philosophy. At first I was interested in the homeschooling movement and methodologies, then it was classical education and now a book by John Gatto called The Underground History of American Education which I am partway through. If you want to know what Gatto is about check out this oft-quoted speech of his.

Did a bit of jogging recently around our school track... a kilometer here, a mile there, but I want to get in better shape. Exercise alone just makes me feel good, but if I could get some real lung capacity, my singing would rock a lot more. Also, our school had a mass medical test where all the students filled out forms, had height & weight measured (on a cool automatic machine) and had their hearts monitored. It took me a long time to figure out the machine screwed up when I talked.

Some stuff about Taipei: My game to avoid boredom on the subway is to count pregnant women. I used to count foreigners but there are too frequent, like you might see 5 or 10 in a day. So every day since I've arrived, I have seen at least one pregnant woman, sometimes two or three. It is now a random source of comfort and happiness for me... my father says there used to be more. Also, the garbage trucks (which come twice a day) play "Fur Elise" constantly. And by that I mean the first 12 bars, except in a higher key. And you have to bring your garbage out to the trucks, they don't pick stuff up.

I'd like to leave you with this quote from another American exchange student:
"Alex - 何立德　(Insert some witty name here) says:
true or false: a lot of Taiwanese women are hot"