Stamps

January 6, 2010 Postcards from Taiwan

I finally got around to putting stamps on postcards. I could have done it days ago! The post office is literally a minute walk from my grandparents' house!

Later that day, I got my hair cut. It was really, really tragic. But I let it happen. I'm not going to think about it because another 1.5-2 years will pass quickly, and my hair will be near my waist again. Haircuts really aren't so bad. I just wasn't ready, and I didn't even get to donate it.

Adoption

January 5, 2010 Kittens at an anime store

I went back to Taipei to visit my brother for a last time. The other one already flew home on Tuesday because school started on Monday. After a meal at Din Tai Fung in Taipei, the four of us (Girl, Brother of girl, my brother, and me) walked through a night market. My brother let me go to the anime store which has stray kittens available for adoption. We went before, but only spent a few seconds there last time.

Baby

January 4, 2010 Baby biting a ball

Baby is my grandmother's youngest sister's dog. My grandaunt owns the wedding photo studio that I went, too. The studio is amazing. My father's side had a family reunion 7 years ago, and we all had glamorous photos done. Ah, I wanted to get some photos with super Asian-y ancient attire, but I didn't think of it at the time. I had two shoots in casual clothes and three shoots wearing some of their fancy dresses. The make-up artists are incredible. They also do weird but cool things to my hair.

Pancake

January 3, 2010 Oyster Pancake

I spent many hours at a hospital today (non-emergency, my mom was getting her health checked). It is an interesting system they have at that hospital. You take a number for everything. There were a lot of people...coughing...and I'm surprised I didn't get sick.

Afterwards, we went for a late lunch. We had some delicious mi-fen, ba-wan, and oyster pancakes.

Market

January 2, 2010 Traditional Market

After a delicious breakfast during which my brother wouldn’t let my finish my fantuan (he said it was too oily for my face), Grandma took us to a traditional market, much like a farmer’s market. She bought lots of vegetables for the hot pot that we had at night. In the afternoon, we went to what is translated to “department store”, but is really more like a mini-mall. Well, it is kind of a department store…it’s just different in some way…Our grandpa dropped us off to have lunch in the food court in the top floor. Haha. We should have just had food on the streets because the food court food wasn’t that great. We meet up with my brother’s gf, and we went to a bookstore where I finally bought postcards! Taiwan was the most expensive effing postcards in the world! The nice ones were over $1. The nice, but not as fancy, were about $0.66. Blaaahhh.

After dinner, my brothers left. My grandma started dressing me, and actually, she’s better at dressing me than I am. My mom eventually arrived (with her gaggle of girls). D: Eventually, they left, but one is staying with her throughout the trip. * sigh *

Bullet

January 1, 2010 HSR/Bullet Train

I returned to Taipei with my brother because he needed to get a change of clothes. We took the high speed rail (bullet train) to Taichung where we met up with my other brother and later my mom and her gaggle of friends. After dinner, my brothers and I left for Hsinchu for our grandparents’ house. It has changed a lot in the past 8 years (a lot of remodeling). It’s really nice. And there are bathrooms everywhere! My grandma feed us almost immediately although it was already 10 or 11. It’s my brother’s fault. He said he was hungry. It’s okay though. The food at my grandparents’ house is always delicious.

Duck

December 31, 2010 Duck at the Red Lantern

Today’s activities: breakfast at the apartment, short walk in a park, some driving around, another fancy lunch with more new faces, shopping, dinner, fireworks.

Fancy lunch was quite tasty. We had this duck dish that everyone at the restaurant was ordering. Must have been the signature dish. The duck becomes three dishes actually. The first resembles a duck taquito, the second a duck taco using a cabbage leaf shell, and the third is a soup.

In the afternoon, my mom spent too much money on me, but considering I did get a lot of nice clothes, it’s not that bad. And then, she bought some expensive coats. We had dinner with some different friends. Then went back to the apartment where we watched fireworks with what seemed like my mom’s entire junior high class. Haha, not really. Just some 6-7 people that have been joining my mom and I for travels. They are her classmates though, and they talk sooooo much. My brother came in from Taipei. After the fireworks, we played cards with the random children of some of the people.

Yilan

December 30, 2010 Food stalls at the Yilan Night Market

We arrived in the Yilan Township the night of the 29^th after a long day at the Flora Expo. I think we were in a city called Jiaoxi or something. It is famous for its hot springs. We stayed at my mom’s friend’s guest apartment where outside there were pool/tub type things made so people could bathe their feet in them. Apparently, I don’t have pictures. :P On the 30^th, we went to many places. We went to the top of some mountain to see the view from the Mr. Brown Coffee Castle. We also went to a strange looking museum nearby, but didn’t have time to look inside because we were meeting more friends for a fancy lunch buffet.

After lunch, we went into the mountains, went to a farm and had some fruit (tangerines and guavas), stopped by mom’s friend’s friend’s home to pass some time, and then went to the night market. I never really know where we are because everyone speaks Taiwanese around me and rarely Mandarin. But at some point we were in SanXing (Three Stars?) which is a place well-known for its green onions. Therefore, the green onion pancakes in this area are supposed to be amazing. Unfortunately, I only got to try one during my time in Yilan, and my brother said I went to the wrong one. Still delicious though. I was going to share with my mom, but I ended up eating the whole thing. It was awesome. We had been eating all day that by the time we got to night market, we were so full. We just had stinky tofu, and that was “dinner”.

Night markets are insane. They are very crowded, and there are so many stalls. In Shilin where I went a few nights ago, there was a big eating area kept separate from the shopping area. In the mainly shopping areas, there are also a few snack stalls and such. The games also had their own area.

Audience

January 7, 2010 | RC Lounge

Left to right: people I don't know. Some of them are administrators, some might be direct family members, etc. Second-to-left is out new director. Left is Ian, old EEPer.

This is only part of the audience, of course, the other was us, EEPers and Acads.

Vocal

January 6, 2010 | RC Lounge

Left to right: Acad I don't know (9.0, I think), Jake Hertzog, our director Nancy Hertzog's son, and Aryn, 6.0 Acad.

Aryn is the only person present at the time whom I don't characterize as shy and boring. She's singing to Bad Romance - one of two people other than Jake who performed in any way while I was there (the other was a quite-popular TS instructor).

Guitarist

January 5, 2010 | RC Lounge

After class (which I have with Kevin), we went to his new apartment, and then I went back to the RC. I was initially reluctant because of this: they had an open mic - which typically means everyone has to sing or something.

I didn't realize this at the time: we, RCers, are shy. And boring. I also didn't know about our new director's son. Apparently he is a guitarist, and here he gave us a history lesson. Which was really cool, and we all liked it lots. We're just shy and boring.

Mooncat

January 4, 2010 | RC Lounge

Rebecca Mark, our counceling intern for 2010-2011, is "on a mission" and will be "back in approx 90 min". Interesting.

And the cat, what is it doing? Eclipsing the moon? Playing Cheshire? I don't know the history of this mural.

Icecubes

January 3, 2010 | Lake Drumheller

It's been sub-freezing these past few days, and bodies of water iced over. Here's an interesting phenomenon: some blocks of ice don't thaw during the day and add ice during the night, so they rise above the thin layer of water that's not sure whether it wants to be ice or liquid. It looks like ice on top of other ice!

I now know (as a result of gossip, of course) who the Acad was that accidentally fell in one day last Winter ;)

Saved

January 2, 2010 | 15th and Pacific

This is where I typically get off the bus. (Granted, next week is Zombie week, so I might have to consolidate.) They're going to at the least repave this road - seems urgent with the number of potholes, dents, cracks, etc. It's going to take a lot of closures, and some bus stops are closed as a result.

Trees like this one have been inspected by the city, and will not be hurt by the construction. Yay!

Physics

January 1, 2011

It's 2011! My mom decided a few weeks ago to start teaching physics to my sister. They'd go to a coffee shop and my mom would write things on paper, and my sister would try to follow. This is approximately what happens.

And I got a camera remote for New Year's! Exciting, now I can put my camera on a tripod, walk away, and press the button, and the camera would shoot. I'll show it to you sometime.

Cybersupper

December 31, 2010

We greeted 2011 with our traditional New Year's supper, including food, a tree-shaped cake, and a laptop. The last one is because my grandparents wished to see us (on Skype).

I'm full, and going to sleep after I upload my 2010 collage - it's going up soon because I'm tired.

Happy New Year!