2014-05-29

Nearing the End...

As I near the finish line (only about 1 month left here in Taiwan), I thought I would write a Top 10 Things I'm Going to Miss Like Crazy About Taiwan and Top 10 Things I'm Super Looking Forward to About Going Back to the States.... So let's begin with things I'm missing about the United States.

(disclaimer: I am leaving people off these lists because if I included people, this post would get wayyy too emotional and too long)

Top 10 Things I'm Super Looking Forward to About Going Back to the States (in no particular order)

1. Chipotle: This really needs no explanation.

2. My squishy comfortable mattress: I've gotten used to my harder mattress here in Taiwan, but the few times I've slept in a hotel with a super soft mattress I feel like I'm sleeping on a big marshmallow, and it's an amazing feeling.

3. Carpet: Taiwan is too humid to maintain carpet except in hotels and really rich/fancy places so I seriously have not felt carpet under my bare feet in a long time.

4. American mosquitoes, cockroaches, and other crawly things: Bring it. They got nothing on Taiwan mosquitoes, cockroaches, etc.

5. Wide variety of food without the Taiwan twists: Pizza with ketchup as it's "sauce base" isn't that good, I promise you. And America just does a really good job about having a wide variety of options in terms of dishes and ethnicity that are conveniently located.  Not to mention things like cheese and nuts. No, "cheddar cheese" and "American cheese" are not the same thing, and yes, goat cheese is delicious so I don't know why it isn't sold here. There's pretty much white cheese or yellow cheese (which is pretty much all just plastic style American cheese) that's sold here. If you want anything more complicated, you need to find an international import store, and it'll be expensive. Nuts- You can find almonds, but I haven't had a pecan or a walnut in almost a year.

6. American exercise classes: The classes here have been great (even though they are conducted in Chinese, I can still follow along alright), but I like a really pumped up/high energy type class, and the Chinese don't really make excited expressions (cheering, etc) when they are working out. If you've ever taken one of my gym classes you'll know what I'm talking about.

7. Cars: Seriously scooters are arguably one of the most dangerous inventions ever designed, and I really miss being able to drive myself places.  The bus system is fine, but there's something I really miss about singing along to songs at the top of my lungs in the privacy of my own car.

8. Air conditioning: I have air conditioning in my apartment, but...Schools in Taiwan are open to the outside.... and don't have air conditioning... humidity is at 95% or higher every day even at 8am... need I go on? Although to be fair, I've gotten used to dealing with this kind of weather, living without air conditioning, and taking advantage of the natural air/breezes.  If I can keep this up a little when I go back to the States I'll probably save a ton of money on heating and cooling.

9. Knowing my and having a variety of healthy food options: I can eat vegetables all I want here, but when it comes to selecting eggs from free range chickens (if anything to support how the chickens are raised), Greek yogurt, or having a lot of options for a healthier meal... I miss that. I actually found Greek yogurt at Costco the other day, and it was such a big deal I almost cried. Mostly at how it expensive it was though. I bought it anyway :D
1
0. Having a bathtub/shower that is separate from the rest of the bathroom: Many bathrooms in Taiwan are the open bathroom style where the shower head is on the wall, so when you take a shower, the whole floor (around the sink and toilet and everywhere you might potentially aim the shower head) gets wet. So you pretty much have to wear shower shoes. Not only is this really inconvenient when you need to go back into the shower after you've dried off, put on some clothes (aka socks), and walk back into the bathroom with the floor still thoroughly wet -_-... but I find it a little unsanitary.  I take pretty regular showers at the gym, which has separate shower stalls and keeps my home bathroom nice and dry \^-^/, but I miss not having to hall half my beauty care products and a change of clothes to the gym almost every single day. Seriously, that stuff can get pretty heavy once it's all added up and you've got a full water bottle in there as well.

*bonus* Having an oven again.

Top 10 Things I'm Going to Miss Like Crazy About Taiwan (in no particular order)

1. Tea shops: Yes, the tea shops aided in my gaining 5 pounds once I moved here (and which I have since gotten rid of, but still...), but when it's 90+, you're tired, you're dehydrated, have sweat coming from places you didn't know could sweat, and are just looking for a little pick-me-up, the tea shops are like a shining of beacon of light in the darkness.  I will miss these sooooo much.

2. "Ice" desserts: A very common dessert/snack here is *insert flavor/fruit* Ice. Examples, Mango Ice, Taro Ice, Red Bean Ice.... It's literally your fruit/flavor layered over a bunch of shaved ice in a bowl with some sweetened condensed milk. It's refreshing, light, and delicious. 

3. 7-11/Family Mart: These places are magical, and you can do anything here. They are so convenient and are great for picking up quick drinks, snacks, or supplementing your meals for the week if you just don't feel like dragging your butt to the grocery store. Not to mention food/drinks in Taiwan are super cheap, so I can buy a banana and a carton of milk for $1.50 if not less.

4. Readily available Tea Eggs: My parents gave these mixed reviews, but it seems that most foreigners here in Taiwan grow to love Tea Eggs/ 茶葉蛋. Made by soaking hard boiled eggs in a combination of tea and soy sauce for several hours, they make a great flavorful, healthy, low calorie (but still keeps you full) snack.  7-11, Family Mart, and most rest areas in tourist attractions stock these regularly, so they are super cheap and convenient snack.  However, looking up the recipe online, they can take quite a long time to soak, so if I wanted one in the next 20 min or so, I would be super out of luck :(. I guess I'll just have to keep a steady supply on hand after I go back to the States.

5. Taro: I never really had heard of taro or knew what it was before moving here.  It's a root that is served as a vegetable like a sweet potato in slices or is more commonly used as a dessert but adding a little bit of sugar to "mashed" taro. It's not too sweet and isn't too strong in flavor.  I've really come to love it, and it's quite a common dessert flavor here. I don't know how easy it is to find in the States, but I've never really tried to find it before, so we'll see how it goes.

6.  How it takes me 5 minutes to walk to 10 different restaurants and my grocery store from my apartment: Seriously, there's a mall right across the street from my apartment with Taiwan's Walmart equivalent in the basement.  So not only is my grocery store super close, but there are a lot of restaurants to eat at in the mall and surrounding the mall (and a movie theatre too for that matter).

7. The Night Markets: these places are really cool, fun, and have a ton of awesome things.  The shopping is super cheap and has quite a selection of accessories (from hats to jewelry to bags to glasses) and food for sale, and is just a fun place if you wanna get a variety of unhealthy yet oh so delicious food.  Although without Night Markets in my life, I'll probably be way healthier.

8. The cheap health care: It cost me USD$1.50 to get my teeth cleaned last December, and just about any visit to a doctors office is only about USD$5 (no matter what the problem is or what you're getting done). Traditional Chinese medicine clinics are also covered by the health insurance which is pretty cool too since it's the "alternative health care" style that some people like to use as a prevention method to illness or as opposed to just popping yourself full of pills when you're sick (I still prefer the pill method when I'm sick though, but it's there if you wanted it).

9. Using Chinese everyday: I truly enjoy studying Chinese, and I will miss being immersed in and being able to use the Chinese language every single day. However, I have also never appreciated English as much as I have after the past 10 months here.

10. The Taiwanese Fauna: Sometimes it is like you are in a movie or a completely different planet when you're in the Taiwanese wilderness.  Even my school has a huge variety of flowers in different colors and sizes blooming right now... truly it's almost like it's a botanical garden just at my school alone. 

Granted, I'm sure I forgot some things on both lists, but these are some of the common ones that I've been thinking about lately. Let the last month countdown begin!

2014-05-15

Of Weddings, Rain, and other things...

Continuing on with some fun culture posts....

Mother's Day:

First off, Happy belated Mother's Day to any mothers reading my blog. I was very sad not be able to be with my mother this Mother's Day, but I think she had a nice day with my Dad none the less.

Mother's Day in Taiwan falls on the same day as Mother's Day in the United States (Father's Day does not).  However, what we do for Mother's Day is slightly different than what they do in Taiwan.  In the US, I feel that Mother's Day is more of a give your mother a present, and then it becomes a "we do what Mom wants to do today" type of day.  In Taiwan, Mother's Day traditions consist of giving a present (like we do in the United States) in addition to a cake and carnations.  Specifically carnations.  All the Mother's Day cards I found here had carnations on them, and I was really confused as to why until someone told me that you give your mother carnations on Mother's Day in Taiwan.  Why is this? It seems that no one really knows.  A friend of mine here thought it was a western tradition, but I had never heard of it being significant in the United States.  Am I crazy? (if it really is a Western tradition, I'm about to be really embarrassed...)

Weddings:


Bride's first dress
So as some of you know who have been following my blog since at least October know, I have been to a very elaborate Taiwanese wedding before.  However, recently I was invited to go to another one that was a little more traditional.  This time around, I learned a lot more about the significance of the wedding practices here in Taiwan.  So in the United States, the more traditional Western style wedding is based on Christian traditions of pronouncing your union to God, family, and friends.  In Taiwan/more traditional Eastern style weddings, the traditions are based on the fact that the bride is literally leaving her family completely and becoming a part of her husband's family.  If I remember from my Chinese culture classes, back in the old days, sometimes the bride would never see her family again after the wedding, especially if her own family lived far enough away from her new husband's family.  That is definitely not the case now, but the customs and wedding practices are based on this concept.  So from what I learned, there are 2 major parts to a Taiwanese wedding.  The first is the engagement party which is completely put on and paid for by the bride's family (we did not get to go to this part because the bride's family lives in Taipei).  The engagement party is essentially them announcing their intention to get married.  The second part is the actual wedding ceremony and banquet.  This is all put on and paid for by the groom's family.  We unfortunately did not get to attend the ceremony because that is reserved for family and very close friends.  From what I understood though it is not like a Western wedding with an aisle and stuff.  It consists of the bride and groom paying respects to the ancestors and elders, asking for blessings from them, and being wished lots of happiness and luck.

Bride and Groom walking in (2nd dress) 
Bride and groom being presented on stage
Then comes the wedding banquet which we attended.  During the banquet the bride changes dresses anywhere from 2-4 times.  This is possible because the Taiwanese rent their wedding dresses, which honestly makes a lot more economical sense.  I was wondering as to why more Americans don't do this as we only wear our dress once, but the thought of wearing a dress I just rented and was worn "who knows how many" times before.... well I was horrified at the thought.  I suppose it's just engrained in our culture.  We also discussed how in Western culture the bride will then pass her dress down to her daughter to wear, but since that never happens anymore, I wonder why we didn't switch to renting dresses more often.  

The food is also very elaborate with almost 10 courses served family style on big plates.  In Taiwan, wedding food is traditionally seafood based being an island.  Oh, and did I mention there is lotsssss of alcohol? The main alcohol is beer that gets poured into little tiny shot glasses.  But with all the toasting that happens, after taking 20+ shots of beer.... well it's gonna be a party.  However, this type of partying is expected and even encouraged.

There is always some sort of entertainment during the dinner, and for us it was a live band (piano/vocals, saxophone, and violinist).

The wedding banquet was held outside under a huge tent in a small city on the outskirts of Taichung (hence why we were invited).  And the whole village was invited.  Like I said, the groom's family paid for everything, and out of respect for this, the bride's family will traditionally keep their "tables"/family members down to 1-2 tables to help with the cost of the banquet.
Some mussels with the salad and sashimi dish

Tiny dried fish with peanuts...
why did they have to ruin the peanuts?
During the banquet, the bride made her main entrance with the groom with a tiny flower girl throwing petals in front of them.  She started off with a white dress.  After eating for a bit, she changed and appeared again in a red dress at which point she and the groom got on stage with their parents.

I have no idea what type of fish this was,
but I have seen all its internal organs
Now, after this lots of Taiwanese was spoken (which consists of a mix of words I don't know and Chinese), so I only had a vague idea of what they were talking about.  I believe lots of it was related to presenting their son and daughter to the guests (in olden days this was probably presenting their newest family member (the bride) to the village as part of their family.....wishing them happiness, etc.  This "presenting the bride now as part of the groom's family" I was told is actually very important because now, to the eyes of the Chinese community, the groom's family is fully responsible for her... health, happiness, food, shelter, clothes, etc.  Granted, this had a lot more significance many years ago, but the traditions still hold true.

After this the bride and groom along with their parents visited each table and made toasts with everyone thanking them for coming.  And in return we made them toasts for happiness.

Overall it was a very nice wedding.  Compared to the other wedding I attended, it had a lot less air conditioning and a lot more bugs, but it was more traditional and I really appreciated that about the whole thing.  It felt more like what I expected from a wedding.  The other one had felt more like a "show" than a wedding, and I appreciated all the cultural knowledge I gained at this one.

Side notes:
  • At one point, I was also told about a tradition where the brother of the bride has to go inspect the wedding bed to make sure there's nothing weird about it and that the conditions are acceptable for her.  Apparently, if there is no brother or if the brother is too young to perform the duties, then there is a very well established list as to who comes next in line to do the inspection.  
  • There really isn't a dance floor or opportunities to dance to the music like there are at Western weddings, but that doesn't mean people don't a little after the alcohol has kicked in.
  • The engagement party and wedding banquet dates are all chosen by a fortune teller who can tell you which days are the most advantageous and will create the must luck/happiness for the new couple.  Now this means that the dates can fall anywhere between a year apart to a day apart.  It all depends on what the starts and other signs say.

Weather:

You know "April showers bring May flowers..."?  Well in Taiwan it's "May showers bring lots and lots more rain."  Recently it has been pouring on and off between sunshine and torrential 30 minute downpours with lightning and thunder for about a week now.  Apparently May is the rainy month in Taiwan and it is living up to it's reputation.  I haven't seen rain this intense since the typhoons I experienced back in August.  Granted, it only lasts for short periods, but when it pours, it pours some more.  In fact, it has been raining so much that a friend of mine posted a picture on Facebook of a fish out of water.  Literally, it has been raining so much that fish can come out of the water and be alright on land for a bit.  One of my co-teachers told that when she was young, during the typhoons, the streets would become like rivers with all the water and there would be fish.  And they would catch the fish "in the streets" and eat them.  Yes, the below fish is edible as well.

The land fish... (not my photo)
Swimming:

Also, I now get to go with my students to swim class every Monday morning.  They don't really need my help, but I am enjoying swimming in a pool again, and it's been fun trying to use my Chinese to ease the fears of first time swimmers.  A surprising number of people in Taiwan don't know how to swim.  Almost half the Grade 4 students who I go to swim class with on Monday mornings can't swim.  At first I was really surprised, but if you think about it, most Americans know how to swim because of summer league swim team.  They don't have summer league swim team here, so I think it's really great that the schools organize swimming classes for them since it is such an important skill to have.

*******
And as promised from many posts back, here are a couple pictures with literally "the whole family" on the scooter...
Baby in scooter high-chair, father, and mother holding a baby to her chest in the beige cloth... so scary...
It might be hard to see, but there is a baby in front of the Dad in the leg area in a scooter high-chair.

2014-05-06

Sun and Stares

Currently, I have less than 2 months to go until my return flight home.  Although I know it's so short and the time is gonna fly by, it still feels like there is a long way to go.  I know that I haven't been posting as much this semester, so I'm gonna try and do better about that these last couple months.  Since I don't have any current grand adventures to share, I thought I would share some observations/experiences I've had lately.

Staring:

When I return home to the States, I will be much more self conscious about when I'm staring at others. Taiwan, like most of Asia, is a homogenous society, so when someone comes along who looks nothing like the common set of features that most people see every day (aka me), naturally people are curious.  Long story short, I get stared at a lot.  I've grown used to it, but for some reason recently I've been getting more stares than normal it feels like.  Maybe I grew a mustache on my face that I can't see or something.  My friends here assure me that nothing new is wrong with me though.

Due to these recent stares, I was reminded that this is a lesson that I will take back to the States with me.  It is hard enough to be different as it is sometimes, but when you catch people staring at you over and over again (with children, it's no big deal-- that's understandable, but when adults are doing it....) it can drain your energy and patience very quickly.  Most people just want to be accepted, and when people stare at you... not in a "oh you're so pretty way" but in the "you look super different and you are so strange that I can't believe what I'm seeing" type of way... it can be very depressing.  It makes you feel like a spectacle or an animal on display.  Especially abroad, the stares make you once again aware that you are the "these" of the "which of these does not belong?" question.  It can make you feel very lonely.  I think sometimes we get so caught up in our own curiosity that we forget that we're also staring at someone who is probably consciously aware of multiple stares, not just ours.  Instead of staring, when I see someone who is different, I will try from now on to either 1-treat them as I would anyone else or 2- reach out to them and try to make them feel more accepted.

Personally, I've experienced both ends of these gestures from some kind people (even if they didn't' know it).  I've had people who have come up to me and asked me questions about my appearance, and I'm more than happy to answer any questions they have ("Yes, my hair is real. No, it's not a perm. Yes, my eyes are blue. Why you ask? Because my mom and dad both have blue eyes.").  But when the pointing and "look it's a foreigner" comments come out that the situation becomes harder to handle.

Staying Out of the Sun

One of America's favorite past times (that I have always struggled with) is tanning.  We love the tan skin look, especially during the summer.  Well in Asia, it's the exact opposite.  The paler, the better.  Much to my delight!  Everyone here makes comments like "wow your skin is so white!" (they technically mean pale but that's a more advanced vocabulary word).

Why is it this way?  I think it's a combination of a couple things. 1- farmers and "country folk" are usually out in the fields and sun working more, so their skin is tanner.  Thus, tan skin is seen as being poorer.  2- over glorifying western culture.  Perhaps it stemmed from wanting to seem more western or more "white."

Seriously, people go through all kinds of trouble to keep their skin out of the sun.  In 80+ degree weather, I have seen women and girls of all ages in long sleeve shirts, gloves, and extreme hats.  People use umbrellas on extremely sunny days as often as they do on rainy days.  Umbrellas even come with the advertisement that they are UV proof.

Naturally, I'm already very pale.  So I've definitely been enjoying not having to worry about people jokingly saying, "Amanda, you're so pale! You should go tan!"  With the prevalence of skin cancer now-a-days, I simply don't want to.  I've never been pressured into going tanning, but the remarks still don't feel awesome.  And I personally think I look better a little pale rather than tan.  Besides skin cancer, sun exposure can lead to premature wrinkles and signs of aging.  Seeing as I hope to keep my youthful skin for as long as possible, upon returning to the States I plan to keep and even adapt some of the techniques I've learned form the Taiwanese and stay out of the sun as much as I can.  I'm going to wear more sunscreen, do better about wearing hats outside, and maybe even bust out an umbrella now and again when I'm going to be out in the sun for a very long time.

Below are some pictures of an incredibly sunny day in Taiwan and all the umbrellas that are out...




Side note: did anyone catch my Game of Thrones reference in the title of this post?