The Return of the Camera!

Tuesday October 2, 2012

BANZAI!!! I was able to upload not one, not two BUT THREE Taffy posts today! BOOMSHAKALAKA! Why is this? Well I’ll explain later. I just thought I should start off this Taffy with that little moment of celebration. ;D

Beginning with the morning, I became a pack mule. One thing I miss about America is being able to go to the chiropractor. I soooooo want one right now. Either that or a massage because my neck and back has been increasingly protesting lately. XD This comes from both the hunched over naptime position and the recent load of carrying around a laptop. It’s really not that heavy…but after traveling with it on my shoulder for 30+ minutes…my body gets mad at me. XD All for a good cause though! The laptop had a mission later on in the day…a top secret mission. ;) A mission that will never be revealed. It’s so super secret * cough * IneededInternet * cough * that it is classified beyond the FBI level. :P

Apart from the above mentioned pain, I had yet another irritating one. But then again, no pain, no gain right? ;) Its name escapes me currently but it’s the muscle on the back of the lower half of the leg. Hamstrings? Calf? Thingie-ma-whats-it? I’m 100% sure it is a result of the running yesterday. In P.E. class, we do a little routine at the start that is so conveniently impossible for the exchange students to follow along with. Most of the class does it half-heartedly so I can never tell what they are actually doing. Sometimes they are punching. Sometimes they are kicking. Sometimes they do this thing that looks like they’re forming a magical ball that will proceed to explode half the school campus. XD But this routine isn’t really exercising nor stretching. So basically I sprinted around the campus without doing proper stretches, hence the pulled muscle pain. Lovely :P

The class began with English today and I found out why I was left hanging yesterday for the culture exchange. It was because a big exam is coming up for the students and the next two (now one) Mondays will not have our little culture discussion. The next subject of sports confuses me because I’m really not sure what we will talk about. Basketball is pretty darn universal. So is volleyball. So is swimming. So is soccer. You get the picture. There’s not exactly big differences in sports between our countries. All I can think of is horseback riding being more available in America and Taiwan having a badminton club when it’s not as common in Texas. If anyone has any facts about sports in America or questions regarding Taiwan sports, please e-mail me or leave a comment below. I will be sure to include it in the discussion. ;)

<---Eric's classmates presenting the differences of love between Taiwan and Sweden.

Art was up next which I have missed for the past two weeks due to the exchange students being allowed to gather during that time in order to prepare for Teacher’s Day in both performance and cards. I was provided a class drawing book, a black pencil and a big leaf… Pfft! I’m not sure what the reason for the leaf was for but I took it has a hint to draw it. XD Asking my classmate, she said we had to draw four things that are in the Tatung Campus. I’m pretty sure that foot-long+ leaf came from some trees on the campus, so it became one of the four thing I drew. Plus why else would the ART teacher give me a leaf? And allow me to say that I didn’t draw it half bad! I was quite pleased with out it turned out. But then came the challenge of what to draw for the three other things. At first I began sketching a banner of Tatung that’s throughout the campus but I couldn’t remember exactly what it looked like which bothered the crap out of me. Erasing it, I tried drawing the front gate of the campus. Then I got REALLY frustrated because I couldn’t remember if the opening was an arch or was flat or what proportions it was or, or, or… Andrea cannot draw realistically from memory. Irritated at being irritated (I really was only feeling like that for 3 seconds :P) I settled on drawing something that I could physically see.

First up was something that has really stood out to me in my memory of Taiwanese classrooms is the traditional school bag draped over the side of the student desk, something I’ve copied when trying to become a true Taiwanese student. Elated to see-and-draw instead of remember-and-draw, I went to town on the sketch. Thinking it was too plain, I added in a corner of the chalkboard as a bonus with the decorations of an eraser and several pieces of chalk. This by far was my favorite drawing of the set. It did me proud too because when the teacher came around her comment on it was “perfect.” BOOMSHAKALAKA!!! >:D I’m terrible at drawing from memory but if you let me see the object, I will have a blast. :P

Wanting to draw the Tatung symbol in one of the last two pictures, I first thought to draw the school uniform shirt pocket. But it seemed too bland if the drawing would only be a corner of a shirt. After scanning around the class, I found my third drawing. Guess what it was…here’s a hint…it’s above our heads…it keeps the students alive in the summer…it rhymes with ‘man’. DING DING DING! It indeed is fan! Produced by the Tatung company, I got my wish to draw the Tatung symbol as it was smack dab on the center of the device. Not too proud of my drawing since the coloring got askew but at least it was recognizable. ;P

The last drawing was done in an extreme hurry and is not Andrea-approved. Why? I had to draw from memory. No…me…gusta. Since basketball is so popular in Tatung, I thought it would be good to attempt drawing the court on campus. It was either that or a not so exciting drawing of a bubble tea cup that is from the teahouse at the cafeteria. I am not happy at all with the basketball court drawing but at least it was something. The courts also stand out in my mind because every time I walk past there with Erik I always count how many times I hear “ERIKKKKK!!!” Swedish boy sure is popular among the male population of Tatung! Wherever he goes I always here “ERIK! ERIK! ERIK!” My guess for this is he’s the only male exchange student and is a competitive sports player. But 80% of the people who call out his name, Erik has no idea who they are. XD

Speaking of Erik, poor guy. He will soon make the second exchange student that went back to their country. Ironically enough the first student was also from Sweden. No idea why but I never met the other person. Erik is misses his country but also got hired into a job he really wants. I’m sad he’s going but of course I respect his decision, which he has spent a good deal of time contemplating on. But, but…I shall be all alone in the foreigner sense. The six exchange students were paired and put into different classrooms. Eric was my pairing…and I’ll miss the “ERIK! ERIK! ERIIIIIIIIK”s I hear so often. It’s not the end of the world especially since I have numerous Taiwanese friends. I think the male population of Tatung will be the most distraught at Erik’s leaving. XD

Much to my disappointment, I missed naptime again! Noooooo! The reason was because all the exchange students got together for lunch and Erik wanted to make his announcement of leaving. I wouldn’t miss that for the world but I’m still so drowsy and probably should’ve taken the nap. Proof of this was the Military Education class afterwards. This lesson was over assembling a military gun. I wasn’t called to do it since I’m an exchange student so I was just sitting cross-legged the entire period. My back slowly started hunching…my head resting on my hand being propped up on my knee…eyes slowly closing…then becoming unconscious. What?! Don’t look at me like at! I was tired and I couldn’t do anything! Besides, gravel isn’t that bad to fall asleep on as long as you don’t fall over from sitting. ;P

From lunch break, I grabbed a menu handout from a beverage place in the underground cafeteria. If there’s any opportunity to grab a menu from anywhere, I take it because my goal is to learn and study how to read the Chinese characters and vocally speak it. All I really know is iced coffee and bubble tea. I would like to know more because there’s more to this world than just those two drinks ;D So staring at the paper, one of my classmates notices and flies over to help me out. Once one came, I was soon swarmed by several other girls. This just shows you how willing the peeps are to help me learn Chinese, bless their hearts. During the short couple minutes we had before the break ended, they gave me a great head start at decoding the menu. During class (Geography if you must know), I took out my dictionary and dove as thoroughly as I could into research of the pinyin and characters of the drinks. It was a refreshing break of pure memorizing of vocabulary because it hasn’t been very successful when I’m dead tired and can’t retain anything in my mind. So yay for learning extremely useful names of drinks for future use! It was mostly milk tea flavors, smoothies, and hot tea. The next step is learning stuff I find at cafes so I don’t always have to get iced coffee every time. XD

On the subject of my Chinese/English dictionary I brought from America, it is starting to show how well loved its been in my care. That comes from constantly looking up words and always carrying it around in my school bag. There, physical proof of how much I’ve been studying Chinese words. :P

* que James Bond music* The super secret mission began with going to a half dreaded, half beloved place near my school. I am talking about none other than the Artco de Café. Yeah, the naked statue place. XD BUT! But but but, I was able to snag a seat on the first floor, which is statue-free! Booya! The time I went was roughly 4:20 which is pretty unoccupied with customers versus last Thursday at lunchtime when it was packed with people. So I got to choose a table that had pretty strong Wi-Fi, which is exactly what I wanted. Not able to do everything I needed, I still got lot of work done between sending important e-mails, Taffy and GoogleMaps. I wish I could have spent more time there but I was afraid of staying there for more than an hour in case my host family wanted me home before 6:00.

Being courteous and needing to purchase something instead of being a free loader off the Wi-Fi, I went in with the intention of having the Hazelnut Chocolate cake I had last week. I came out with something different that they did not have last time. Chocolate…banana…cake. Duuuuuude, this wasn’t just banana extract. This was actual smushed banana filling of yumminess! And come on, banana+chocolate is a fantastic combination! I had to at least try it once! And I loved it! …I still have to get the Hazelnut Chocolate piece again because I had to scarf it down last time due to being short on time. Yay more calories. :P

Artco de Café has made me forget about the upstairs corner of nudeness and created fond feelings in me. Not only is the cake delicious but the Wi-Fi has been the best connection I’ve had in Taiwan so far. It was super fast and I was able to log onto websites that have not previously connected with other Wi-Fi places (Wells Fargo, Facebook, etc). This may be from the fact that not many people were there, hence less people using the Internet. The best part was that it was at least 40% faster at uploading pictures onto my blog, allowing me to post three posts in one day! That and I’m decreasing the number of pictures on each blog. Regardless, I did a happy dance at seeing the uploading bar go across the screen so much faster than at other cafes. So as long as I stay on the first floor, Artco de Café has become a favorite place for Wi-Fi. :)

It’s been so much fun riding the MTR home these past two days because a new station opened up that changed the lines a bit. I welcome this change because instead of riding in a cramped subway with numerous seats that are always filled, this new line has the design of less seats and more standing room. Score! It’s a lot less cluttered with fewer seats and the best part is it has a metal rack that can be used for placing your bags on and leaning against. So it’s both a rack and a seat all in one. I love it so much! Remember, Andrea was carrying around a heavy laptop bag that could rest on this rack that shut her back up from complaining. Plus I prefer standing on the MTR above sitting but this rack creates a middle happy place of both. Whoop whoop! :D

This has been the second time that a Taiwanese person has come up to me and declared their Christianity. Woah! That’s pretty darn cool! All of a sudden this lady today just approached me, showed me her card of something “Christian University” and chatted with me in Chinese. I tried my hardest to comprehend what she was saying but only picked up bits and pieces. Thankfully she knew some English and translated parts I would have never understood like “Are your parents missionaries in Taiwan.” Small encounters like that can be so wonderful in times of need. They’re quite a blessing. :)

Wanna know another blessing? MY ZS8 BABY IS BACK AGAIN ALL FIXED! :D Welcome home darling! Since I have a ZS20 camera, I shall use the ZS8 as an eye patch! Fear me as I become a technology enabled pirate! >:D The good thing with having two cameras in Taiwan is that in case one decides to die on me again, I can immediately switch to the other one and not lose a single picture. I’m not saying one will break down on me, because if it does I am going to be p-i-s-s-e-d! :P But a back up is always appreciated.

One last thing. Sorry, I know my posts have been long lately. :P For Teacher’s Day, I was an over-achiever and crafted little ‘thank you’ cards for all of my teachers. Normally you only make a big card for your homeroom teacher, but I wanted to show a small token of my appreciation to all of them. …Maybe not the Military Instructor though…he’s scary. XD But making ten total, these are what my little beauties look like. Personalized with a Texan flag, they read “Thank you (polite version)” in Chinese and both my English and Chinese name on the bottom. I think they turned out quite cute! One reason I love Texas is that the flag is so much simpler than the American flag, making my life a hundred times easier with these cards! XD Since I didn’t see many of my teachers on the actual Teacher’s Day last Thursday, I am now distributing them this week when I have their respective classes. It’s such a small thing but I like to think of it as Texas has happily and gratefully invaded their life. ;D

* que Lord of the Rings nerd moment * Something draws near…I can feel it. XD Oh Legolas, you are indeed correct. He is referring to none other than sleep. Cross your fingers that tomorrow I can actually remain awake 100% in class because it’s been ridiculous lately. XD Buenas noches!