Okay, so I forgot to mention a few observations about Taiwan that I really found interesting. First, I only briefly touched on the whole motor scooter army. My favorite thing about the motor scooters has to do with protective gear and/or the dress code. First of all, both women and men ride, often with children and the days groceries hanging on to the scooter every way imagineable (I saw a mother and three children plus groceries on a tiny scooter). You see ladies in high heels and a skirt cruising around on their scooters. You see dudes smoking cigs or talking on their mobile phones all while the madness of driving in an asian metropolis happens around them. But attire, that was my favorite part. I saw one guy I could have sworn was Bobofet (spelling? Anyway, it is a Starwars reference). This guy was cruising a beat up silver scooter with a helmut and mask just like Bobofet. Add the all gray suit including gloves and it was a hilarious site. Otherwise protective gear consists of the optional face mask to keep out exhaust; helmuts of all types and descriptions and my personal favorite, the oven mits on the handles (the thumbs of the mits are cut off so the gloves will stay on. I guess it provides some extra protection. Oh, and flip flops are common footware for riding. Unbelievable.
Then there was the mosquitos. I made the mistake of opening my bedroom window the first night in Taichung (just for a few seconds to put my shoes outside to air out). In with the mosquitos. Amy and I go to sleep. I wake up to buzzing in my ear. I wake Amy up. We turn on the light. The skeeters are lined up on the wall, taking turns dive bombing us. I wacked about 5-6 of them only to see mine and Amys' blood. The next morning we wake up and I have no marks (I don't get welts from most skeeter bites) but Amy has about 25! After a few days Amy starts telling me she thinks she has milaria. *Please note Amy is a hypochondriac. Needless to say, Amy is well, the welts are mostly gone.
We spent a few days in Taipei and I was really impressed with the city. Public transportation is a breeze and we used the metro to go just about everywhere. We spent one day with Amy's paternal uncle (#2) traveling to Amy's grandparents and great grandparents resting place. It rained a lot. Besides visiting with family and eating, always with the "Sit. Eat. Drink." we went to the National Museum, Taipei 101 the world's tallest building, for now, where we were unable to access the observation deck (closed) but did access the Western style shopping mall (6 flipping floors), and the Chiang Kai Shek memorial. The memorial was cool but the highlight was looking at pictures of CKS with Amy's greatgrandfather (see pictures). My favorite questions to ask in Taiwan include "which way to Chinatown?" and "Does anyone know where there's some good Chinese take-out?" Now if only I could have learned to ask in Chinese someone might have understood my humor. I really did learn some Chinese and I am convinced I could have learned a lot more had I spent a month more there. I even started dreaming in Chinese, I just couldn't understand anyone. Sadly we left Taiwan on Monday for the Kingdom of Thailand.
Bangkok is a sticky sweet city, those of you who have been fortunate enough to visit know what I mean. It has been upper 90's for a while and our arrival didn't change anything. I want to give a shout out to August and Marlowe for sending us to the Guest House Suk 11. The place is cool (other than our first room air con conked out on us) and the people are great (http:www.suk11.com). We were in country for about 5 hours and I already had a massage ($5 for an hour) and good eats off the back of a street cart. What can I say about Bangkok after 1.5 days? It is an amazing city with the friendliest people on earth. Everyone wants to be your friend or help you out (for a small fee). It is nice to be greeted by smiling faces everywhere but sometimes I wish I could put on a face of Siamand just once walk down the street without being harrassed by Tuk-Tuk, taxi, and/or motorcycle taxi drivers, or order a beer without being propositioned by a Thai lady for more than a beer. Anyhow, it all works out. Today we went to Chinatown (I know, we just left Taiwan to come to Bangkok to visit Chinatown? What the hell?) and took the Skytrain and river taxi to do so. It was quite pleasant as we avoided, for the most part, all the nausiating gases of the streets (except while walking around Chinatown). On the way back to the Suk 11 we made arrangements for travel to Hanoi (we leave 05May04, my birthday is 06May04!). Amy and her mom have returned for another massage and I have jumped on line. That is about all there is to report from Thailand for now. Hope all is well and hopefully we can get some more pix up soon (no promises). Cheers!
Finally, after all that planning and the dramatic good-byes, we have departed the States and made our way to Taiwan. The flight was long and boring, long and cramped, long and etc. We flew into Taipei and took a bus directly to TaiChung where we spent 4 days with Amy’s eldest maternal aunt. The drive down introduced me to this subtropical island of lush green. There is plenty of agriculture, even in the major city centers every open space is planted. It is kind of pleasing to break up the concrete with open gardens everywhere. Then there is the traffic. Driving in Taiwan is an art form, the art being to keep moving and not hit anything/anyone. No small feat when you consider there must be a million motor scooters and bicycles vying with automobiles for the right of way. Combine that with the ‘lose’ interpretation of the road rules (I haven’t figured out why red only means stop some of the time, left turn yielding, and lanes that no one uses) and it is an adventure. I wanted desperately to ride a scooter and to not ride a scooter. In the end, I leave the driving up to the peeps who no best, the locals.
“Sit. Drink. Eat.” That’s what I heard often in TaiChung. Amy’s family was very hospitable and we had a great time. My favorite meals were home-cooked by Amy’s cousin, ‘One-eyed-brother’ a fantastic cook in his own right. Thanks to everyone in TaiChung for everything. In TaiChung we also had the opportunity to visit a night market. WOW! Let’s just say capitalism is alive and well. There were so many people buying and selling wares, everything from plastic toys to knock off Prada bags, and hawking food (I even saw a white dude selling burritos) and everything else under the moon. Truly an amazing experience. Good times in general. We also took a little time to travel out to the coast to an old Taiwan port city Lukang, where there has been an effort to preserve the old structures and alley ways (pictures are forthcoming, I promise).
Recently we made our way back to Taipei and Amy’s younger maternal aunt’s house. We only spent one night in Taipei before heading down the East Coast to Hualien. It was a beautiful trip through coastal mountains and along the Pacific Ocean. We are spending two days down here touring the area including the Gorges. It has been pleasant (again, pictures forthcoming). We will be headed back to Taipei on Thursday evening where we will spend time with family before moving on to Thailand. Hopefully we can get those pictures posted before we move on.
Well, that is all to report for now, I just wanted to post something while I had a chance.
It's so nice to feel welcome. The hospitality here rivals that of any other place. We stayed with my mom's oldest sister in TaiChung for the first four days, and whenever we'd visit at one of the family's houses or friend of the family's house, there would be a plate of fresh fruit and many smiles to greet us. We'd be treated out to eat almost every meal, and dinner would include so many courses. Shark fin soup, oysters, fish, crab, shrimp, vegetables, mushrooms, raw onion salads, coffee gelatin, mochi, stuff I can't translate into english, stuff I can't remember since there were so many dishes, and stuff I can't remember because they were too exotic and weird.
When we don't go out to eat, we've been treated to One Eyed Brother's cooking, which was impressive with the different types of dishes and flavors that he could conjure up. (One Eyed Brother is my cousin who lost one of his eyes in a bike accident when he was 17.) Dining has been a large occupation for us since we've arrived here. Since Tyler doesn't speak the language, it's even more the case for him since conversation doesn't occupy much time for him. For those of you who know him well, you know that must have been driving him crazy - not being able to communicate.
The weather has been decent. It only rained once since we've been here. It is more humid here, but it is tolerable. The main mode of transportation is scooter bikes. In Taipei they are like schools of fish that weave in and out of the car traffic and wait patiently at the front of traffic for the light to turn green. The traffic situation and rules of the road are pretty interesting, and I'll leave that to Tyler to expand on. To my surprise, it is very green here. The big cities are like big cities, but not far outside the cities, it becomes easily apparent that Taiwan is a tropical island.
We took the Taipei MRT (mass rapid transit) to the train station, and then a 3 hour train ride along the eastern coast of Taiwan to Hualin. In Hualin we were greeted by the tour guide of the tour company that we signed up with, and in a private car, she escorted us to various points of interest in Hualin. The best was the last stop of the day - the new government funded aquarium where they feature the sun fish. One of the associates at the aquarium spoke some english and was kind enough to take us on a tour. He actually got up at 3am just this morning to go to the beach to catch the sun fish to put into the exhibit. Today was the opening day for this place. According to the guide, there's a lot of sun fish off the shores of Taiwan.
Now I'm at the internet cafe at our hotel in Hualin. Once we're back in Taipei, where my cables are, we'll finally put some pictures up.
On Thursday Amy and I left NorCal for sunny SoCal, that is, sunny when the smog isn’t choking out the sun and lungs of 8 million peeps. Driving down the Golden State highway I realized how dangerous travel in the first world can be. Californians drive as advertised, poorly. Apparently, Californians do not know what it means to merge or be merged. In SoCal, compound that generalization with the fact that turn signals are often optional and the “power swerve” is the preferred method of lane change and you begin to understand why the traffic in the LA basin is crippling. NorCal drivers are no better, in NorCal before you get in the driver seat you apparently have to shove your head up your posterior until your shoulders are firmly touching your buttocks. In NorCal driving is the second or third priority for everyone behind the wheel. Two other Californian driver stereotypes: 1) Californian’s think they are the only one on the road and drive accordingly. Here’s a tip, vehicles have mirrors, USE THEM! When a car comes hauling arse up on your bumper, don’t just sit there in its way, get over, for the love of god, get over! 2) Californians Luv their SUVs. Update: you DO NOT need a sport utility vehicle to haul your kids to soccer and groceries home from the store. Besides the horrible gas mileage these vehicles are the most dangerous on the road, just check the safety test results, and they make it impossible for people driving smaller vehicles to see around you. Blah!
With all that said, you are probably thinking to yourself, ‘great Tyler, you’re a horrible driver, so why don’t you tell me something I didn’t already know and, beside that, what the hell does this have to do with this trip of yours?’ Well, I will admit, I’m not the greatest driver, but I am far better than most Californians, which makes me an okay driver, comparably, at best. The reason I bring up driving in California is two fold: driving is dangerous no matter where you are in the world and you never know how good you have it until it is gone. I’m going to miss driving, even driving in LA and I can’t imagine traffic, smog, or driving skills will be much better in Hanoi or Sydney or anywhere else our trip takes us.
On a final note, I would like to say thank you to my parents and family for all of their love and support. Amy and I really appreciate everything they have done to help us make our dream a reality. From storage space to a permanent mailing address, thanks! and you will hear from us often.
Here's a bit late thank you to the homies for the hardy partys and putting up with my teary goodbyes. I'm going to miss Professor Marty and his hot tub, bugging August when it's most busy at Jups, my lil sis' joint operation, Marlowe's unexpected very unPC comments, Alyssa's off handed but wonderful laugh, Brian's endless espousal of ponderous info, Marty saying BLAH, Keith's phlegm cup, Steve's loser gesture in 3D, Will getting competitive at wiffle ball, being Annie's B of A (Bank of Amy), river rafting on Cache Creek, Alyssa trying to organize a backpacking trip at the last minute, beating everyone at Mind Boggler, Matt's philosophical and stalking tendencies, playing Kings even though Tyler and Martin rig the games against me, August trying to force food on you, Nils' racist jokes, tag football at Lake Anza, trying to teach Ann that beer tastes good, Alyssa & Will's wedding, hours of tivo on NAM's (Nils, Aug, Marlowe) new big flat screen, Brian L's banana-ism, twinkie-ism, whatever you want to call it, Halloween costumes....
Ahhhh, good times. I'll miss you guys.
It has been a while since I posted here, so I thought I would take a moment to review. It has been a busy period of preparation. Amy and I have become vagabonds, vacating our Berkeley residence of the last 7 years, or more. Everything I own was either sold, donated, trashed or boxed up for storage. It is interesting how we, humans that is, attach significance to the most inane items. Attachment involves desire, desire leads to suffering? Well, I’ve fixed a lot of my desire by liberating my possessions, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
What else has kept us busy? Mostly preparing gear for the world tour (first aid, toiletries, sewing kits, etc). Amy and I even did a ‘dry run’ with all our gear packed. I had to delete some items and add some others and I am 100% confident that what I have now will not be what I return with. We will post some pre-departure pictures and let me tell you, it looks like and feels like, I am taking everything but the kitchen sink.
We have survived two nights of Berkeley good-byes along with a day or two of Rio Vista good-byes and some family pictures. Amy and I will miss all of our friends and family and encourage anyone and everyone to travel out there and meet us somewhere, anywhere. That is all for now more to come from smelLA before we depart.