第十個星期：A Week of Adventures

星期二：Today after class I decided to go on an adventure all by myself, mainly because I had lots of time but everyone else had class. I started out by going back to the grilled cheese place my family took me one time, but, instead of getting a grilled cheese, I got a deliciously unhealthy fluffernutter sandwich. From there I headed to the big park in Aozihdi where I worked on my homework for a bit. After finishing that, I decided to take the metro to xiziwan, the western edge of the city by the beach. I first went to the old British consulate, which is now a museum about British rule in Taiwan. It's a really pretty area with gorgeous views. They even had a cute tearoom where you could sit out and feel fancy and British, but it was quite pricey so I figured I could live just feeling like a not-so-fancy American. That didn't take too long, so I then just took a long walk along the coast. I was trying to find somewhere I could actually stick my feet in the water, but I never found one, so I just took some nice pictures and headed back. While I had an absolutely fabulous time adventuring on my own and really feeling the gap year feels, I did end up walking 8.5 miles, which was pretty painful by the end. Also at the end, I got lost literally ten feet from the MRT station because the sign saying it was the metro stop was on the other side of the building, but a lovely lady on a motorbike helped me out, so thanks motorbike lady. Once I got back into my neighborhood, I headed to a famous Japanese boba shop where I got cactus jelly bubble tea. The bubbles came out hot pink and were delicious.

(studying at the park)

(crossing the bridge into Xiziwan)

(walking to the old British Consulate)

(The old British consulate)

(view of the skyline from the consulate)

(temple next to the consulate)

(view of the lighthouse on nearby Cijin Island)

(walking along the ocean)

(not quite a beach but still lovely)

星期三 Today was fairly uneventful other than I stumbled across a giant Hello Kitty store behind the mall by my house. It was overwhelmingly pink and cute.

(Hello Kitty paradise)

(my apartment building is the one on the far right)

星期四：On Thursdays I would usually have calligraphy class in the late afternoon, but today our teacher all took us to see the Applied Chinese Department's senior graduation play. Each language at Wenzao puts on a performance in that language as part of their graduation requirements and the Applied Chinese Department's (this is for students who want to teach Chinese either in taiwan or as a second language abroad) is known for being the best, and, while I couldn't really understand much and accidentally fell asleep for 30 minutes of it, it was really well produced and fun to watch as the acting was really good and the play was written by the students.

After that I had choir, and then I actually went out to eat with one of the choir directors and another student which was fun.

星期五：Today we all slipped out of class early and headed to the train station as we were going on a NSLI-Y excursion to Taitung, on the eastern coast of Taiwan. The train ride took about 3 hours and the views were stunning, with the ocean on one side and green mountains on the other. Once in Taitung, we rode bikes around a forest and beach park that was really beautiful, and then headed to a night market for dinner. I actually played some carnival games, one where you shot BB guns to pop balloons and another where you used a bow and arrow; I was actually decent and the archery one and won a Snoopy keychain. We also stopped by a drink shop where I got the best drink of my life: green tea with coconuts jellies, passion fruit, and boba. It definitely made all of my dreams come true. The main entertainment of the night, though, was that Heather bought five really sketchy cheap fish, with a fish tank and food to go along. We all teased her about it and made bets on when they were going to die (I won), and lo and behold, two hours later one was already dead, so we gave it a dramatic fish funeral and sent it on it's way down the toilet. After the fish funeral, six of us decided to do face masks at the hotel, which were slimy and I'm not a fan of, but we got creepy pictures out of it.

(on the train)

(beaches on one side...)

(...mountains on the other)

(biking in Taitung)

(the forest park was actually really swampy)

(we became ghosts with our face masks on)

星期六：We woke up fairly early this morning and drove an hour out to a famous mountain valley called Chi Shang that's filled with picturesque rice paddies and small indigenous villages. We rode more bikes around there, ate ice cream and popsicles, and the headed back for lunch.

After lunch we attended a concert by a really famous pop singer named A-Lin. She's aboriginal and grew up in the valley, so she had decided to give a really exclusive coming home concert and somehow we got to attend. Some of the host families even came to Taitung just to see it. It was a lot of fun and cool to go to a famous concert.

The best part of the day though, was when Heather and I were walking back with Jenny and Heather was talking in Chinese about how she was really hungry when a lady right in front of us with little kids turned around and was like "You're hungry? One sec..." she started rifling through a bag but then got distracted by her kids, so we were all cracking up that this random lady was just ready to just give us snacks, when she back turned around and handed us all crackers, not listening to us telling her we really weren't going to die of starvation. So, moral of the story is that Taiwanese people are really wonderful and will even give you snacks if you're hungry, even if you are a crazy foreigner.

(group photo in Chi Shang)

(Becca and I accidentally twinned)

(the views were pretty insane)

(jumping in a beautiful valley, with ice cream, what could be better)

(we biked so much)

(traditional hats in the restaurant we ate at for lunch)

(A-Lin concert)

星期天：Today I got to see my host mom as she was back from Burma and I was back from my weekend trip; it was fun to catch up and see pictures from her trip. We then went out to a Japanese steak house for lunch where I cheated and got chicken, and then just ran some errands, took naps, and I studied.