Tea and SOGO

Well, I'm shocked to see so many interested people.  But, I take that as a good thing, and I'm glad to hear from so many of you.  After all, I do want to have an opportunity to communicate with all of you, and as I'd found the last time I was abroad, email is rather irritating.  Then you get issues of 'I'm too busy to read your emails and you write so much.'  (Yeah, I have writer's diarrhea as some of you know all too well.)

Anyways, I've of course been ridiculously busy.  As much as I'm enjoying the orientation period, I can't say I've had much time to catch up on ten weeks worth of lost correspondence.  But that's okay because I have time to slowly catch up on everything and I hope each of you will understand.  In a sense I had no way to contact many of you for nine weeks and then with two days to pack for a year abroad, catching up was a wee bit difficult.

Over the weekend I, of course, had been busy preparing my level placement test, which went rather well.  Some of the questions were a bit beyond my level, but when I'd taken a look at the reading I couldn't help but laugh.  Reading the questions made me feel bad for the lower-level students though because the test asked some rather sneaky little questions that could easily snag any beginner.  By the time I'd reached the grammar part, I couldn't help but mentally bow to my Middlebury teachers.  I knew every one of the grammar points but one.  Makes me happy to know that despite certain misgivings toward Middlebury, it was a summer well spent.  However, I won't know the results however until tomorrow or Thursday.

After that I had lunch at a little restaurant before attending a little lesson on calligraphy.  For anyone not particularly familiar with the art of calligraphy, an artist's method is quite deceiving.  It is not as easy as it looks, and my 永 was only passable.  However, my little excuse was I'd never touched a brush in my life.  Actually though, I had the artist do my Chinese name in calligraphy.  It looks pretty amazing!  In addition, the class gave me a clearer picture of how calligraphy works.  There are several different methods and each attempts to capture different emotions.  Then you must consider some of the more contemporary stuff.  I actually received a free book with a mix of styles.  If we ever meet up in person and I have the book on me, I'd be more than glad to show you.

Later I went off with my group to the East district and explored some of the food and the department stores.  I, of course, went to SOGO.  It was the classier one of the two on the same block.  My Singaporean friends know just what I'm referencing when I talk about SOGO.  Oh dear, I really am pathetic.  Anyways, I checked it out and noticed the change in the way people there dressed.  They wore lots of expensive name-brand clothing whereas many of the Taiwanese I know can't afford to wear some of the stuff I saw there.  Anyways, a good friend of mine and I went off and found the camera section.  It was really quite amusing, and the poor vendor must have thought we were the perfect representation of American girls because we looked at the cameras and bought the same one, which in his mind we did so on impulse.  But, we really got a good deal--along with a ton of free stuff.  Because I'd given my friend the L'Occitane kit, the vendor gave me a pity notebook and pen.  So this means I'll finally be able to upload special pictures and put them on here for you to see.  Anyways, it was good fun conducting a transaction in Chinglish.  I believe both the vendor and my friend and I each learned new vocabulary.

Anyways, I've found that sometimes my vegetarian diet isn't too compatible with group outings and I either have to get something special or just deal with meat.  It's really difficult for me to eat meat too since I haven't eaten it in so long.  I'm thinking after orientation I'll become a regular at the neighborhood vegetarian restaurants.  I love being a regular, and it'll be good practice for my Chinese.  Though honestly speaking, I'm still a little nervous to interact with strangers in Chinese because I'm afraid I won't understand their 国语.

As for today and the tea, I got to go up into the mountains and explore 猫空。It's apparently famous for its tea and trams.  Let me tell you, it was some pretty amazing tea too.  We went through a semi-traditional tea ceremony; however, something about our mannerisms prevents it from being a traditional one in my mind.  We switched around tea and ate processed food.  Not to mention the fact that our tea was made by ourselves so we weren't necessarily overly familiar with the procedure.  All the same, it was a lot of fun.  And I ate the biggest looking chocolate Cheerio-looking things you've ever seen.  No joke.

Once the tea had been drunk, I went with a few friends upstairs to the little gift shop and made friends with an employee.  She was an adorable little woman that tried to explain to us the different types of tea.  She even gave us a chance to sample the mountain's local tea--both strong and weak versions of it.  I really liked the strong, but if you know me well, I enjoy strong tea.

We also had a chance to see some of the biggest spiders you've ever seen in your life.  Well, maybe.  I love how tropical climates have so many large, crazy looking bugs.  Bugs you never imagined could've existed.

Then we went off for a tram ride down the mountain.  On the way we gave the locals a chance to sample our singing-voices.  How lucky they must've felt as they listened to us sing "Ce rêve bleu" (A Whole New World).  It might be a little sad I know that song in French better than in English.  At least my fellow Americans weren't as odd as me and sang it in English.  

Anyways, the trip down the mountainside was beautiful.  The mountainsides are a mix of forest, housing, temples, and tea farms.  It was incredible to see how many people want to take the tram up the mountain too.  Apparently people that wish to go up must wait several hours when I just hopped right on to make my way down to Taipei.

Anyways, that's probably the big excitement of the last few days.  You're obviously free to come as often or as little as you'd like to read my blog, but I can't promise when I will update.  At the moment, since I'm getting the chance to travel around Taipei, I'll do my best to share what I'm up to, but you might not want frequent updates on my weekdays once class starts.  Just imagaine...

September 1st:

I went to class and....

September 2nd:

I went to class and studied some more.  It was...

September 3rd:

I went to class again and...

....

September 21:

I went to class where...

I worry you might yawn with exhaustion and boredom.

Anyways, tomorrow I get to go to the National Palace Museum and see Ancient China's treasures.  Then I might either go to Taipei 101 or the monastery.