Last Week of Orientation gone by... :)

Hello again! This post is going to be really long because I haven't posted in a week! Thinking back to a week ago... Thursday and Friday of last week, we held a summer camp for 5th and 6th graders. They were basically our guinea pigs to practice teaching methods on. It was also a week of political maneuvering (although I did not really participate. This is because after visiting all 24 possible elementary schools and talking with the teachers and practicing teaching with them--we filled out ballots ranking them as potential partners. The Chinese way! So much politics... and drama haha. I kind of just sat back and watched. Today (8/26) at 2:00 we find out who we are paired with! In any case, I took pictures of some of the festivities!

Lunchtime, a special time for talking with teachers and students :) 

The classroom, sin air conditioning (like almost all of the classrooms in Taiwan), in which we held our summer camp. The kids are so cute :) 

On Thursday after our day of teaching and hanging out with the kids, we all went out to dinner with Alex. I still wasn't feeling so well, so I didn't eat too much, but it was a fun authentic Taiwanese restaurant, very local feeling, called A Mei. Fun, but hot and sweaty!!

Everyone talking at dinner! 

More of a view of the restaurant :) 

After dinner, we all went up onto the roof of our apartment building and looked at the view. It was so beautiful! I think I might just go up there and lay down every night :) 

Looking toward downtown Gaoxiong. You can just see the tallest building in the distance. 

The cultural center, which is right in front of our apartment. 

Friday contained more classes and fun. But we got out a bit early and so went out and had some fun :) Me and my roommate Ashley went to the movie theatre to see Wang Leehom's new movie, Love in Disguise, which was surprisingly hilarious. 

...which was way fun. 

Saturday, we took an adventurous route to the beach! It included biking across the city to the mountain by the sea, then through a tunnel under the mountain, and out to the beach. The water was amazingly warm and we just floated around taking in the scenery for hours and hours. The cafe by the waterside was also ridiculously cute, and I had a coke float and chicken nuggets there. Probably one of the funnest things I've ever done. I hope to go back there most weekends! 

The beach and the campus of the National Sun Yat Sen University in the background. Seriously one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. 

My friends Paul, Mark, and Liz. Surprising not the only other white people on the beach. There were lots. 

Me wishing I had a less revealing swimsuit... Also that my sunscreen hadn't expired two years ago (oops)

Looking back toward the cafe and the beach volleyball courts... and the palm trees of course!!

On the way back, we ate the best fruit shaved ice EVER. 

Later that night we went to a ridiculously expensive (25 US dollars haha) and yet pretty awesome Taiwanese/Japanese concert at the Wall in the art district. It was pretty sweet but really long. The first band was Taiwanese. They were pretty good! 

The Japanese band was also really awesome. And spoke some Japanese so then I remembered a lot from class this year (yay!)

After this we went to visit the rest of our friends who were sitting outside in a construction shed just listening to the music rather than paying the 25 bucks. Haha they looked funny so I took a picture. I don't think they enjoyed being laughed at haha...

Sunday I decided to go look at Taiwan on my own. I biked 20 miles around the city, but the prettiest part I discovered was the Lotus Pond way far north. Since its Hungry Ghost month, there were lots of festivities, making offerings to appease the ghosts who had come up from hell, to keep away and let the people live safely. It's kind of like Chinese Halloween. People offer food and burn paper money. Here are some of the pretty sights around the Lotus Pond:

A smaller lotus pond to the north side of the huge pond/lake. 

It kind of reminded me of a Disneyland of temples haha...

Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday were full of visiting elementary schools all day, so we were really too tired afterward to go out and do anything. Wednesday night, however, we went to karaoke with Alex and Fonda, which was fun, because they sang some Chinese songs with me!! 

On the way back, we walked through the Central Park, which was lit up so pretty that you have to see it...

This is a little restaurant (pizza place) right on the corner of the park where there is live music every night.

Lastly, today, Thursday, we had a free morning (whoa) and so I took I bike ride up the mountain to the Sun Yat Sen University. Apart from beautiful scenery, I also saw my first MONKEY in Taiwan. It was just sitting by the side of the road eating. It was very fat haha.

Can you spot the monkey? Haha I was kind of far away... but I shouldn't have worried about scaring it off because it was completely unconcerned...

Here's the view.

So beautiful. Kind of makes me want to go to this university... But the bike up the mountain to the liberal arts building made it less attractive haha... OUCH

Lastly, I went to the Central Park again to learn my flash cards for the Huayu test. It was so beautiful that I had to share a few pictures.

AND very lastly, I went to McDonalds for breakfast (since it was still only 9 by this point) and had pancakes, sausage, a hashbrown. But, awesomely, instead of coffee, it came with MILK TEA. So I had to take a picture :D

And you can also marvel at the size of the stack of my notecards. Ick. And I'm only up to F!!

Haha, anyway, signing off for this week, miss and love everyone!!!! 

A Fun Weekend Until Monday...

Hello again! You might be surprised that I am updating again so quickly--and it's because of the fact that I am bored out of my mind and have been in bed for two days!! But before we get to that, I want to show you all of the fun things I did this weekend!

Friday was a hard day. Orientation was comprised of visiting 6 of the elementary schools at which 3 of us might be stationed (since we are all to teach at two schools, dividing 16 class hours between the two each week). That was grueling! Thankfully, one of the schools gave each and every one of us a blueberry cake, making this day less bad :). In fact, every single school tried to give us food and drink, so I felt so fat by the end of the day!
Later that night, we all banded together to cook food! One of my apartment mates, Mark, made a DELICIOUS Taro seafood dish which was probably the best thing I've ever tasted. If you want to know how to make it, go here to his blog and try it out!

http://maplesintaiwan.blogspot.com/

Here's a picture of the festivities! You can tell how awesome the food is by the look on my face!

Me really excited about a taro dish!

Next, after much pleading on my part, we managed to get everyone to go to karaoke! It was the first time I had ever arranged karaoke, so I was really pleased when I was able to understand everything the people said at the front desk and get a room for us! Then, however, I was stuck trying to come up with songs for everyone to sing since I'm the only one who can read traditional characters. I did manage to fit in a couple of Wang Leehom songs, one of which my roommate Paul very nicely sang with me haha... Here's some pictures of that excursion: 

Not sure if everyone is more excited about singing or the beer... probably the beer haha

This is the computer--i was trying to find good songs, but there weren't that many in English...

Saturday morning I got up bright and early (10 o'clock haha) and went for a bike ride!! I rode first to the bank to activate my ATM card, then rode for a while before realizing that I was heading in the wrong direction. It's been really hard for me because every where I've lived the main feature (mountain, lake, etc) has been to the east. Now that it's to the west (the ocean) I keep getting confused! In any case, I eventually reached the harbor, and took lots of pictures of the pretty scenery! Despite all of the containers and machinery, it's still really beautiful. 

Right where I first emerged onto the seaside biketrail

Gaoxiong's iconic Skytower, right along the biketrail

A new dock which has been renovated into a seaside viewing area, really pretty!!

More of this huge open space area

The ocean, of course! I sat right here and made notecards for like a half hour--the sea breeze was so nice!!

The Ministry of Education gave us free tickets to go see the Anime convention! It was quite overwhelming. There were so many people that you couldn't even get to any of the anime. I liked the one in Taipei last year better. But it was still a good (exhausting) experience. 

Next, Mark's Taiwanese friends came and we had dinner with them! We tried all sorts of fun dishes! And each plate was only 3 dollars, what a steal! Lots of fun speaking Chinese and learning about culture :) 

On our ride back on the subway 

Sunday was full of funness... Mark's friends made a DELICIOUS lunch, and then we ate beijing duck for dinner--but it seems that it was the duck which led me astray because Monday I woke up feeling TERRIBLE and ended up having to go to the doctor. Apparently it was acute gastroenteritis, or food poisoning (or water, or something), so I've been in bed for a couple days now... Hopefully I will be up and at'tem tomorrow, ready to take more photos of more experiences!! 

Signing off!!!

Week Two: Lots of Orientation and Humidity

Hello again, another post from Kaohsiung!

It seems like forever since my last post, just a week ago! I can barely remember all of what I did! Last weekend was one of the ETAs birthdays (Liz) so we had a pizza party for her. The weekend was mostly spent getting to know the area around my apartment complex, so I didn't take many pictures. I did take a few of the complex, however, so you can see how the outside looks!

In the cultural center walking toward our complex, the red building!

A close up of our complex, looking toward where are apartment is on the third floor.

Here is a picture of our party for Liz' birthday: 

This is another group's apartment!

The next morning, on Sunday, as I was requested to report on cardio activities, here it is! Me and my roommate Ashley went for a bike ride along the Love River! Lots of good cardio and beautiful scenery.

Made it to the river!

Biking on my own along the river next to the mountain since Ashley's bike was too small for her...

There was a pretty building across the river :)

Most of the rest of the week, we were just really tired and went to eat and then rested. Such long classes! Here's a picture of us at dinner: 

I also took pictures around the school at which we are having orientation, so you could see what it looks like! It's actually really beautiful, especially the view. 

This is the front of the school...

And this is one of the hallways!

One day after class I just decided to take a walk down the road and see where it would take me. These are some of the pictures I took along the way!

This is a traditional market near the school. I had some AWESOME duck and rice here! 

Still pretty close to the school... you can see the sky was so clear on this day! 

More sky!!!

This is me next to the subway station wondering if anyone will want to go on a walk with me! Yes, Ashley wants to!! Whohooo!!

Palm trees for dad :) 

A pretty river/channel we crossed!!

Some cool architecture--and it looks even cooler lit up, as we found out later (last night haha)

The side section of the central park--it looks cooler from the middle!

Some of the restaurants by the subway station...

We did a lot more, but my camera died the next day before I could take more pictures--but rest assured there is more to come!! 

Miss you all, hope you enjoyed installation TWO!! 

:) :) :)