end of taiwan

I went to Kenting right at the southern tip of Taiwan one weekend towards the end of my stay on the island. Kenting is sort of the resort town in Taiwan, but they haven’t quite got the resort thing down yet. There is one actual resort right off the beach, but the town itself hasn’t really got it’s money making thing together yet. At night, the town becomes basically one big night market, but it is more like a state fair than a night market. Chintzy games and cheap (really cheap) merchandise. The beach was nice though, and we got a taxi to drive us out to the rock that looks like Nixon’s head. It’s funny- you don’t think that you know what Nixon’s head looked like until you see this rock, and then you’re like, hey, yeah. Huh. How about that. That does look like his head. Guess I do know what that looks like.

Taichung. I think I never got around to mentioning the underwear store “Easy Shop.” That lingerie shop has a strangle hold on Taichung. I must have seen 15 of those stores around that small city. I don’t know what must be going on to support that many sexy underwear stores in one town. I mean, what kind of job do people have where. . . oh.

There were many hair salons in Taichung as well. Many. More than you would think. People like to get their hair done there. And one dentist’s office that I saw in Taichung was set up like a salon, with people in chairs in a line and other people waiting around reading magazines. That was strange.

A few last things about Taipei.
I loved the city. There is a lot to do, and most of it is really accessible. Taipei is a metropolitan city, almost European in a lot of ways. You can get almost anything there- at least, almost anything that I could think of. And even though it is definitely an Asian city, with weirdo dried squid snack things for sale at 7-11 and tuna flavored candy and terrible beer and tiny clothing and questionable bathrooms, it is also very much like other big cities around the world, with it’s crowded public transportation and taxis everywhere, the boutiques and high end shopping, the variety of people and the ubiquity of Coke and Starbucks.

One thing that I didn’t like about Taipei- the Caucasian-ness of a lot of the ads. There was a lot of American and European stuff in Taipei, which is fine, but there were a lot of billboards of Caucasians selling those things; more than I would have thought. It just seems like a strange way to try to sell a product. I didn’t like that level of cultural hegemony. Mingling is fine; there are lots of Asian products in the US, but we don’t see Asian models trying to sell us Toyotas. It was sort of like the Starbucks dichotomy. I love it, because it is a familiar oasis and I can get soy lattes and I can be comfortable there, but I am also really irritated that I can listen to the same Etta James song here that I might listen to in a Seattle Starbucks. The 2 coffee shops really are the same, one in Taipei and one in Seattle. Starbucks is a direct import. But how the hell does anyone know that people in Taiwan want to listen to the same jazz stuff that plays well in the US? Or that they want to see the same coffee graphics everywhere? Or sit on the exact same plush couches? (The only Asian concession that I saw in Starbucks was the coffee jelly. You can get tapioca balls in iced coffee here, like the crap they put in bubble tea.) It was strange, I both appreciated and resented the familiarity of Starbucks. I like my soy lattes, but I was uncomfortable with the strength of the cultural influence.

I think the thing that I will miss the most about Taipei is the people. I have met some really amazing people over here, and it was sad to end the summer and say good bye to a lot of them. I will also really miss the accessibility to people. Even with friends working long or weird hours, with such good public transportation, it was easy to go meet people for an unplanned beer or a late supper or movie or whatever. Seattle is not cut out for spontaneous plans. It takes a while to get to places. And it is more of a pain when you have to drive yourself. Oh well.

I also got used to having a cell phone, so maybe I will get one when I get back. Maybe. I bought some cell phone bling just in case.

There were potted plants everywhere. Even though Tp is a big city, with concrete and asphalt and buildings everywhere, there are also tons of potted plants. On street level it felt very green: it was like apartment buildings had their own little front-yard-in-a-pot. And there were always plants growing on balconies, huge trees growing out of pots and hanging off the sides of buildings. I mean, you wouldn’t get confused and say “Hey, wait a minute, how did I stumble onto this jungle?” or anything, but it was a lot greener than I would have thought.

Mopeds are the transportation of choice for many people in Taipei. Makes sense, they are cheaper than a car, and easier to park than a car. It was funny to see them jockeying for space at intersections. I once counted about 60 of them going through one light during rush hour. People even stack their 3 person families onto them, mom and kid in the back with dad driving, or mom driving with older kid in the back and little kid standing in the front between her knees. What is great is how safe that is. Especially since mom is usually the only one with a helmet.

I think that taxis comprise approximately 40% of the cars on the city streets.

The difference between a typhoon and a really bad rainstorm seems to be how hard the wind blows. I only saw one typhoon. It wasn’t huge. It was fairly wild, with umbrellas being pulled every which way and lots of rain, and it was hard to walk in, but you could still go out. Work never got cancelled on account of typhoon. Stupid typhoons. Not living up to their reputation.

Apparently when typhoon days are called, work for most people shuts down, but movie theaters, shops, and restaurants are still mostly open.

I took a few Mandarin classes with a tutor that a woman in the office hooked me up with. She was great, but I don’t think I was a very good student. I didn’t study very well. Also, I had a hard time getting the tones right. In Mandarin, the meaning of a word is affected by how you say the vowels. There are 4 ways of saying each vowel, and changing the way you say the vowel is like changing a consonant in English. If you go from “bat” to “cat,” you are saying a new word. If you go from “bat” with the sound going up, like when you ask a question, to “bat” going down, like at the end of a sentence, you are saying a new word. Anyway, I was good at repeating the sounds, but not at generating them. I could say a phrase right after my tutor, but I couldn’t say it on my own a few minutes later.

Another reason I didn’t learn much was that a friend of mine came with me a few times to work with the teacher as well, and the sessions quickly devolved into a Chinese insults class. I learned fat, ugly, boring, skinny, stupid, and smelly and that the way to say “very ugly” is translated as “ugly to death.”

Another time we talked about why my friend had had a beer before the session. So we learned phrases like: Why do you need to drink beer? Are you lonely? Why don’t you have a girlfriend? At least I picked up some interesting vocab at those meetings.

Also, the apartment that I stayed in had fabulous minty green couches.