Are we there yet?

I'm officially in Taichung City, Taiwan, it is almost 5am and I am wide awake. Although it may sound unideal, my "room mates" (more on that later) and I are taking full advantage of our early wake-up inner clocks to go run on the track across the street from where we are staying.  Gotta get started on the right note :)

The flights over consisted of a mixture of boredom, stress, sleep deprivation, hard-core sleep mode, and movie disappointments (mainly endings where I go "you mean I sat here for 2 hours for this???").  I've always flown overseas on US Airways, but this time I was on China Airlines. Ironically enough, it was on China Airlines that I got a full-size Almond Joy candy bar with dinner... not fun-size... full-size.  I can't even remember the last time I even saw a full-size Almond Joy. In other good news, I have discovered the secret to comfortably flying those long, long flights.... pick a window seat and somehow get an empty middle seat. Now whether that's buying out the middle seat or somehow stealthily disposing of the person assigned there (just kidding!), it will make the plane ride SO much more comfortable (the person who was originally sitting next to me disappeared about 3 hours into the flight and didn't come back until 2 hours before we landed-- seriously, I was asleep, and when I woke up, she was gone).  When sleeping you can turn, lay your head against the wall and stretch your legs into the foot space no longer occupied by the middle seat person. When watching the plethora of free movies, you can movie your carry on items from their squashed, carefully-stored spot in front of you to the seat next to you.  It's a solid set up, and I highly recommend it.

But Taichung.... it was a 2 hour bus ride from the airport after doing the traditional group photos.  This feeling of middle school field trips continued throughout the day as our coordinator and another person from the head Fulbright Taiwan office babysat us. As whiny as that sounds, I was more than grateful to be going around as a group with them.  Although it did feel like we should all be holding hands and moving in a single file line each time we left the safety of our charter bus to go into various stores :) Side note: there are a lot of Mercedes-Benz dealerships here.  I think I saw more here in one day than I have my entire life in the States.

So on day 1, we filled out paperwork to get our Alien Residency Certificates, got sim cards for our phones (I officially have a Taiwanese phone number), and went shopping for household supplies for.... our "apartments."  Since we don't know where we will be teaching yet, they have placed us in temporary housing for the month of August. One group is staying in an apartment, another group is staying in an apartment like thing (I'm still not really clear on where they are staying), and I and my 2 "room mates" are staying in a hostel. We each get our own hotel room essentially. Bed, desk, wardrobe, tv, refrigerator, and full bathroom (well... the shower head/hose is mounted on the wall by the sink and is open to the rest of the bathroom... but it's still there so I guess it counts as full) . No kitchen, but I'm not planning on cooking anytime soon. Too many street foods to try ^_^.

Building I live in! Bottom floor=shops, top floors=hostel

My room! Needs decorations :/

Shower hose coming out of sink, fastened by the mirror.

At first when I heard I was in a hostel, I thought I got the short end of the stick. But since yesterday, we actually have it pretty awesome. It's all really clean, each bed comes with its own comforter and pillow (but I still have my own), the beds have comfy mattresses (the group in the apartment have hard beds and had to get mattress foams), there's solid internet, and there's a water dispenser right down the hallway (you can't drink the tap water here, have to boil it.... but not me! water dispenser and I will be getting well acquainted over the next few weeks.  And so far I have not seen any cockroaches **knock on every piece of wood you can find**, although my room mate has had some in her room. 

Last night my room mates and I went exploring the side streets and we happened upon a long street full of tiny side places to eat (not really sure how much you could call them restaurants).  So it's official, I'm not gonna starve.  And then... we turned a corner... and there it was.... World Gym Fitness (I think that's its name :/ ). I had researched this gym before I came to Taiwan because it's the only gym that carries the Les Mills group fitness classes that I love in Taichung. And it was just around the corner from the hostel! It started to rain, so I didn't have time to cross the couple blocks to get to it, but now I know where it is.  Very soon I will be "up in the gym, just working on my fitness!"  And of course, along these streets, we got bubble tea ^_^... for dinner... yes, I am getting off to a healthy start (side note: one girl in the group said she read that Taichung was the place where bubble tea originated... now that's what I would call ironic or a crazy-random-happenstance). 

First meal in Taiwan = Hotpot!

To finish up, I haven't had an serious meals and can't comment on how amazing the food is yet (although our hotpot lunch was very satisfactory). And I wouldn't say I'm "having so much fun" yet either.  I'm slowly on my way to making my hostel room feel like home (at least for the month of August), the jet lag has allowed me to still have plenty of time overlaps with USA so I've been able to text/call people from home to ease the transition, and our wonderful coordinators have been working very hard to assist us in learning how to live in Taiwan.  So in the spirit of the title of this post, are we there yet refers not only to my thoughts pretty much 50% of the plane ride, but also to making Taiwan feel like home.

And it is very very humid here.