One Month Down

I've been in Taiwan for about a month at this point, so I thought I would write a post reflecting on my time here so far. It has been a pretty good first month. I think that's because everything has been so new and different from the states. I've had a lot of fun so far, and had many experiences I never would have thought I'd have. 

I've really enjoyed being in a place where I understand nothing. I thought it would be really stressful, but it is kind of a freeing feeling. I thought it would be more embarrassing trying to order food and things and not knowing Chinese, but people are generally friendly and work hard to help you out.  I like that I can't understand what any one is saying about me. 

I am surprised that I like the food here. I've never been one to eat vegetables, but I love the way they prepare them here. The thing I eat the most here though is fried rice. I love some chicken fried rice. And I still really, really love iced green tea. 

I have discovered that teaching is not something I want to do with my life. I am not as good at teaching children as I thought I would be, but I'm learning. It is exhausting being a teacher. I have so many friends in the states who want to be teachers, and I give them so much credit now. It is a hard job. 

I've been somewhat learning Chinese, but I need to get more serious about that now. That is an important part of this journey for me.

As much as I have liked being here, I am still really homesick. This experience was the right thing to do, but I do not think I would go abroad for a year again. This has been both the shortest and longest month of my life. And I think I miss my family, friends, boyfriend, and cat more than I like being here. It will be a long 11 months, but I still have so much to experience here. 

Sunday Fun Day

I really like Sundays here in Taiwan. Every Sunday, I've done something different and super fun. This Sunday was no exception. Sunday afternoon I went to this little city called Lukang with my teacher friend Julie. It was about a 15 minute scooter ride away. I went to two beautiful temples while I was there. The first temple we went to is called Chenghuang Temple, and it is small but gorgeous. The lanterns that were everywhere was my favorite part. Here are some pictures:

The temple at night

Temples have the prettiest ceilings

The walls outside the temple

The other temple we went to was much bigger and it is called Tien Ho Temple. It was STUNNING. I learned how to pray properly at the temple. According to an adorable little boy who taught me, you think about your name and age and then wish/pray for something. After that, you bow three times and put three incense sticks in the ornate incense pot (I know there is a better word than pot but I can't think of one). There were five of these pot-like things throughout the temple, so you start out with 15 incense sticks and place three in each pot. It was a very relaxed and therapeutic experience. There is a special god for each year, and a nice Taiwanese man helped me find the god for my birth year, 1991. Here are some pictures of Tien Ho Temple:

This god is the god of 1991

My favorite part of the temple was the area that was for worshipping the love god. It was beautiful. We left offerings because we were told it will give you luck in love. Here are all the pictures I took of the area dedicated to the love god:

Love God Shrine

Love god

Beautiful wall

Ceiling of the love god area

Here are some other random pictures of Lukang, and a few of the purchases I made:

Lukang

Ripley's Believe it or Not!

Gourds are good luck

New rings and bracelets!

Sundays are always fun for another reason. Every Sunday, my friends and I go to the Thai/Vietnamese part of town and hang out with a big group of Thai guys. It is so much crazy fun. They act like we are celebrities. It's really fun and silly. They just take pictures with us and tell us how beautiful we are and that we should go visit Thailand. I've earned some street cred with them because of my tattoos, and the fact that they think I'm a "rocker" chick. They call me "little sister". Here are a few pictures of my Thai guys:

It was a jam packed day but it was amazing. It definitely put me in the mood to have a good week. 

Last Night

Last night, I went out with a few teacher friends to a bar called Johnny Pub. It's a bar here that a lot of foreigners go to to hang out. It's really small, but a really fun place. After the bar, I walked home with a friend and it made me realize just how beautiful this city is. It's a very cramped city, but it has so many beautiful temples and funny things everywhere. Here is a picture of Johnny Pub and some pictures from my walk home:

My Job

Its about time I wrote a post about my job. That is, after all, the reason I am in Taiwan. I am an English teacher at a cram school called Leader Language School. I teach kids from about age 7 to about 18. I work at two different locations of the school. One of them is called Chang Tai Leader and the other is Min Tsu Leader. The Chang Tai Leader is about a 15 minute bike ride from my apartment. It is a pretty easy ride, and I pass a beautiful 300 year old Confucius Temple every time I go to work there. The Min Tsu Leader is about a 4 minute walk from my apartment. Here is a picture of the Min Tsu school building and here is a picture of my desk:

Last week was my first full week of teaching here and so far it has been enjoyable, but not what I expected. I teach 30 minutes to an hour in 26 different classes. It is really weird to just teach part of a class for 30 minutes before running to a completely different kids who are a completely different age group. One reason for this is because they have Taiwanese teachers that speak English to teach the hard grammar parts to the students, and they use Chinese to do so. Here is a picture of my schedule:

The good thing is, the lesson plans are more or less made up for you. It tells you what to teach, and you just have to decide how to teach it. I'm learning that with the little kids, you have to play games the whole time otherwise they will just yell in Chinese and not listen to you. I get along really well with the high school aged kids though. All my students are pretty quite so far, and I think that's because they just don't really know me yet. Some classes are really frustrating and won't do ANYTHING you tell them to do.

The students are very interested in my nose ring and tattoos. The TAs have told me that the kids talk about them in Chinese all the time, especially the nose ring, because it is not common here at all. I think its really sweet when they ask me questions about my piercings or make up or clothes.

I usually work from around 3pm-9:30pm everyday. I love that because I get off early enough to do things after work, and I can sleep in. So, so far so good. I'm just ready to get in the routine and habit of prepping for and teaching all these different classes. It was a very exhausting first week, but a good one.

More Random Information I've Learned Here

I've learned a lot here in my two and a half weeks so far. So here are some bullet points of information I have learned or experienced (Note: not all of it is factual, I'm sure):

- All electronic stores are called 3C. All of them. I have no idea what it stands for.

-If you are not from New York City or Hollywood, then no one really cares where  in America you're from. Most conversations about where I'm from go like this:
      Them: You're from America?
      Me: Yes
      Them: Hollywood? New York City?
      Me: No, I'm from.....
      Them: Ok (walks away)

-The one English word everyone knows here is "okay". I've had many conversations while trying to buy things where the person and I just keep saying ok to one another.

-The stoplights here have countdowns, and I think it is super cool. It lets you know how much longer the light will be red for. Super helpful. Here's a picture:

-They have the cutest take out boxes ever. They call them "lunch boxes". Here are a few pictures:

-Most restaurants close for two hours from like, 2-4pm. I've been told it's because people like to take a nap around then. I find it pretty inconvenient.

-I have recently been informed that ghost month is a holiday, but more like a really scary holiday. I thought it was a nice happy month celebrating the dead, but apparently it is the month where the ghosts are released from Hell after a year of pure torture. So, no one wonder people leave out food and burn paper money to get on their good side.

-It is bad feng shui to own a business at a T in the road, unless the profession deals with knives. So most places at the T's in the roads here are barber shops. It is horrible luck to live in a place at the T, so you could buy a place for pretty cheap here if you didn't care about the bad feng shui.

-Everyone wants to be pale here. You are considered ugly if you're tan. People always wear long sleeves, jackets, hats with big rims, gloves, etc. to cover up as much skin as possible. Also, a lot of their skin products have a bleaching agent in them. I've seen so many commercials for lotions that will make you pale and beautiful. Here is a Hello Kitty bleaching mask I found:

That's pretty much all I have for now!

Taichung

Saturday night I went out with friends for someone's birthday. We went to a city nearby named Taichung. It was a great time. We went to an Italian restaurant that was really good, a Spanish bar, and a club called 18TC. It was awesome, and I made a few new friends too so that was good. We had so much fun, but it definitely required a full day of recovery. We left at 6:30pm and didn't get back until around 6am. Here are some pictures of the inside of the club:

Night Markets

Tonight, I went to my first night market. Night markets are kind of like little carnivals with lots of games, food, booths selling things. It was really, really fun. Here are a bunch of pictures:

After we went to two might markets, we then went up to the giant Buddha and drank watermelon juice.  Normally, there are lots of people hanging out at the Buddha on the weekend nights, but since it is ghost month, NO ONE was there. Apparently the place is haunted. Here are pictures of the Buddha's red third eye, the temple, and a view of the city:

Tonight made me realize that I have made the best decision of my life by coming here. I can't believe I ever thought it was a bad idea.