Some background:
Q) Why am I in Taiwan?
A) To study Mandarin
Q) Why not China?
A) Many reasons. Keep business and school separate. Weather. Comfort. Food. Have more friends here. NTNU is the oldest Mandarin school in the world and writes many of the textbooks.
So.. what's happened thus far?
I had the great fortune of being picked up at the airport and shown to my place by the head of the Taiwan office of a manufacturing company. This connection was made through his business partner who I had the great fortune of meeting on a flight from Chicago. We had some local food and he has graciously invited me to where he lives in Danshui (end of the river) next week. What a great start!
My place turned out to be pretty much on the dot from the pictures, except all the nice furnishings (i.e. pillows, linen, etc) were not there. Fortunately, I had some help there as well. I had a pen-pal/MSN friend for the past 3 years who I narrowly missed meeting last time in Taiwan due to her being in the USA for a conference. We finally met and although we were both completely exhausted, we managed to go shopping for things at the local night market - picked up a pillow at midnight!
The next day, I got a cell phone, and gym membership - the cell phone I managed to do entirely in Mandarin, but the gym membership was a little complicated for that. I was quite happy to bargain down from a $300 up-front payment, $250 deposit and $125 monthly fee to no up-front, no deposit, and a $75 monthly fee. Still steep compared to Canada, but what a gym! Looks like a night club and brand new equipment. Plus, it's more motivation to go there daily to get best value. The people there are extremely fit and I suspect that people either drop out very quickly or feel enough pressure to work out hard enough to look in top shape - I hope I fall into the latter category!
Today (day 3) I really needed to get my ticket to Beijing, so my aforementioned friend recommended ezTravel by Zhongxiao Dunhua station. According to Google Maps there was also a Mr. Brown's coffee there, that offered free WiFi (which I need given my lack of a desk here, rendering working/studying at home quite uncomfortable). Getting the plane ticket took a little longer than desired (no English), but the staff were extremely patient and friendly... I only hope I'm this lucky in other areas. I spent an hour looking for Mr. Brown, and kept walking up and down the street like a fool. I finally swallowed my pride and asked for directions, only to find that Mr. Brown's was on the 5th floor of a department store - didn't think to look up. While at Mr. Brown's, two things happened. First, an earthquake hit. It was small -- 5.9 and epicenter was in central Taiwan, however, Taiwan is a very small island. I never had motion sickness before, but this actually made me feel queasy. Second, because I had a funny looking webcam, I met the former director of sales of Cisco Asia, and will be meeting him in Beijing. How random!
Observations thus far:
1) Taiwanese people are very nice and polite
2) Night markets are probably the best place to get anything
3) 7/11s do not sell toilet paper
4) The sweet travelling music you hear at night does not come from ice cream trucks - they come from garbage trucks and people rush out to drop off their garbage, not eat ice cream
5) It either sucks or is very fun to be illiterate - everything I eat (and papers I sign) are complete mysteries
6) Taipei is small enough with sufficient diversity that very interesting people can be found in high concentrations and knowing where to go can make a real difference in networking
Ok - this was long. No more of this.
you better get into top shape otherwise i'm going to make fun of you when you come back. and give you a gingerbread house to eat.
ReplyDeleteWow Joe! Your place looks pimping! It's great that you've already made so many contacts! I think you know more people in Taiwan than I do in Paris already! Oh, and love the eating mystery goods and signing mystery papers part =) One funny story of a friend of mine here who ordered rognons de veau, thinking that it would be veal (which it is) but we didn't know what the first word was...and it turned out to be kidneys of veal....yum =p
ReplyDeletewe have a "pure fitness" in hk, sounds like same owner :P
ReplyDeletelast time i was in the night market i saw a rat.
i hear its not hard to spot them