I woke up in a bit of a funk yesterday. Some days are just like that. It's like a Monday morning in the rain, except that it was Tuesday and the rain was a typhoon. It wasn't much of a storm for us in Kaohsiung - Lee called it a typh-izzle - but it shut down pretty much the rest of the island. There were hopes that we would have school cancelled, but no.

I think part of my funk was that I knew in my heart that it would be bad to have school cancelled because it would mess with my lesson plans. Ugh, I sound like a grown-up. How dull.

But today is another day. It's weaving day with my middle school club, yoga in the evening and kung poa chicken at the snack bar. It's all good.

We are anticipating yet another typhoon. This one is named Dujuan, it's currently classified as a category 4 super typhoon and it's heading for northern Taiwan. They got slammed about a month ago with Typhoon Souldelor. Down here in the south we should get a bunch of rain - the forecast is calling for about 5 inches by the end of Tuesday - but we'll probably still have school tomorrow.

At least the storm held off for the Moon Festival fireworks last night. The holiday is also called Mid-Autumn Festival but that seems like a misnomer since it's hardly the middle of autumn. It's celebrated on the full moon towards the end of September/early October and involves barbecuing with your family, eating moon cakes and setting off fireworks. Our next door neighbors entertained us with theirs.

We've just come back from a very lovely weekend in Hong Kong. Lee surprised me by booking the flights and arranging the plane tickets without my knowing. I knew something was up when I started suggesting things to do for this, our first long weekend, and eventually guessed his plans. It's a very romantic, and much appreciated.

We may have set a record for the least amount of shopping by anyone in this mecca for shoppers. We came home with a refrigerator magnet and one postcard. We also came home with some wonderful memories and some stories to tell, with photos as visual aids in the telling of said stories.

Let me start my story telling by introducing you to a woman we met on the bus on our way to Victoria Peak. We got on a city bus to take us to the tram but didn't know either how to pay or how much it cost. This woman sitting near the front of the bus rummaged around in her purse for some coins and paid for us, told us where our stop was, how to walk to the peak tram and then wished us a lovely stay in Hong Kong. I thought all the nice people lived in Taiwan but it turns out there are quite a few who live in Hong Kong too.

I could also tell you about how we got lost on the subway but I'll save us the embarrassment. Suffice it to say, it was all our doing as the subway system is fabulously easy to use, clean, with excellent signage.

We spent the whole morning on Saturday walking around Victoria Peak. The peak tram takes you up to the summit and we then followed the path that circles around the peak. About halfway around the mountain we turned off the main trail and spent a couple of hours walking through the woods and over streams. Here are the photos to go with the hike.

The tram station at the summit.

Lee taking in the view of Victoria Harbor.

Hong Kong in the foreground, Kowloon in the background haze. 

The summit trail was beautifully maintained.

The second section of our hike was less traveled and a bit more rugged.

Later in the day we walked from our hotel down to the harbor and admired the Hong Kong skyline.

Daytime view with Victoria in the background.

The same view after sunset.

Across the street from the hotel was Kowloon Park, where we spent Sunday morning before our flight home. It's a fabulous space with statues, ponds, a series of swimming pools, an aviary, fitness equipment and lots of people exercising. Here are your visual aids.

The avenue of cartoon character art.

Flamingos

We finished our trip with our first real airport snafu since we started all of this traveling. We've been lucky with all of our flights (in our first 12 months in Taiwan we flew on about 20 different airplanes) and this mess-up was pretty minor, all things considered.  Our flight was cancelled and we had to hang around the airport until they found us a new plane, which took about three hours. Considering the flight is barely more than one hour it was annoying to have to wait for so long. But we did get a flight and now we're home in time for the Moon Festival fireworks. More on that tomorrow.

Monday is Moon Festival and in honor of the event some of the parents at school have sent gifts to the teachers. Yesterday we came home with these:

The tubes are little tiny apples imported from somewhere and the three fruits in front are pomelos. Pomelos are an important food this time of year because they look a bit like the moon and they're the favorite food gift for moon festival, along with moon cakes. Moon cakes are kind of hit-or-miss for me. The "cake" part can be flaky, gummy or dry and the fillings can be fruit jellies (yummy) or bean paste (not so yummy) so you never know when you first take a bite if this particular one will be any good.

The pomelos are a much better choice. They're a bit like a grapefruit but sweeter with very thick skins. They're a commitment of time and effort to eat but worth it since they're delicious. The skins are apparently a good odor reducer when you let them dry out under the skin. We'll see.

Many families celebrate moon festival with barbecues. It's a chance to gather family together, get outside, and watch the full moon rise. There's a typhoon heading our way which may dampen some festivities but will probably effect Taipei more than Kaohsiung. It won't be a problem for us in Hong Kong.

Our little nod to Moon Festival was to buy themed cupcakes for dessert last night.

The one on the left is a little barbecue and the two on the right are pomelos. The chocolate one in back is just a mound of chocolate because how can you say no to a mound of chocolate. They were a new finale after a fabulous dinner of Vietnamese food.

We have a long weekend starting tomorrow - first one since school started seven weeks ago - and Lee made plans for us. He told me not to worry about the weekend and he booked us a flight to Hong Kong with two nights at an upscale hotel in the swanky section of Kowloon, overlooking the Hong Kong harbor and skyline. We'll leave work at clock-out time, go home and pack, be on the plane at 7:00 and in Hong Kong at 8:30. Well, the Hong Kong airport at 8:30. They put the airport 45 minutes outside the city so we won't get to our hotel until a bit later but who doesn't want to arrive in the eastern city-of-lights when the lights are all a-sparkle?

Unfortunately, my camera, which also happens to be my phone, is showing signs of age and just isn't taking the photos it used to. We've bought ourselves a new camera, which happens to not be a phone, but it doesn't arrive until October 8. There are some things better bought in the US and this camera is one of them. There are certain brands that you just can't get here but, of course, delivery charges are astronomical so that can be a problem. But since Josh will be visiting soon we had Amazon deliver the camera to him and he's bringing it along with him. Josh bought his own ticket so it's like free delivery for us and we get a son as a bonus!

I bring up the camera issue because my pics from Hong Kong won't be great and I'm apologizing ahead of time. I guess that means we'll have to go again so we can't get the photos we want. This trip we're planning on checking out the hiking trails and Victoria Peak. The views should be spectacular. Mediocre photos to follow.

Today is Lee's day to have his tooth pulled. He is not a happy man. The price is right and it needs to happen but nobody wants to have it done. Whoever called these teeth wisdom teeth had a sorry sense of humor. There is nothing wise about teeth that don't have enough space in our mouths so they cause nothing but problems.

I'm planning on serving up soup and ice cream for dinner.

Cijin Island has become our bike ride of choice for our weekend morning ride and today was a great day for riding. Little by little it's beginning to cool off and this morning I could feel an almost-chill in the air as the air swirled by me on my bike. It felt a little like an August day at the beach when there's just a hint of Canadian cool air seeping down from the north.

On the return trip we stopped at a new cafe we'd seen along the harbor. The location was very nice - the balcony overlooks the Cijin Island ferry dock - and the decor was lovely.

We had a funny experience on the ride back home. We were downtown heading back to the bike path when Lee's back tire suddenly went flat. We stopped and I pulled out my phone to see if we could find a bike shop nearby that could fix it. I have discovered the obvious, that one's smart phone is only as smart as its user and I fail pretty completely on that front. After figuring out that there are no shops nearby we look up from the phone to discover that we are standing next to - right next to, mind you - a bike shop. The people there could not have been any nicer or more efficient, just like every Giant bike shop we've found in this city.

We have visitors coming so it's time to do some reconnaissance. We keep thinking that a hike on Monkey Mountain during the week is a good idea - exercise mid-week, a little less crowded than the weekend, a good excuse to leave week on the earlier side. Son #3 will be here for a short visit and we'll be away for the weekend he's here, so we have to show him our favorite haunts in Kaohsiung midweek.

So on Wednesday we left school right at 3:30, hopped on our bikes and headed to the trail head. We learned quickly that it's not less crowded mid-week. It's not that it's wall-to-wall people, it's just that there is no solitude in the woods. If you've done much hiking on the trails around Simsbury then you know how quiet it can be. Here, there's almost never a time that you are alone on the path. Often people are carrying small radios so you also get the sound of Chinese music or talk radio mixed in with the bird calls and insects buzzing.

We hiked about a half hour up the trail before we turned around and had only seen a couple of monkeys. It's pretty disappointing to go to Monkey Mountain and not be rewarded with lots of monkeys. Maybe it was that we saw more dogs wandering the trail and they were keeping the monkeys hidden. Or maybe it was the storm brewing and the sound of thunder. But, as it turned out, the monkeys were just waiting for us near the bottom. In the last fifteen minutes of our hike the trail was covered with monkeys. They were sitting on the branches chewing leaves, lounging in the middle of the path grooming each other, sprawled on the railings of the wooden steps. Success! You can go for a hike after school, get exercise, see monkeys and still be home in time to make dinner.

The thunder and storm clouds never developed into anything of interest. It's so disappointing to have the humidity and heat build in the afternoon and then get no release with a thunderstorm. That's just not how the weather goes here. Even if there is rain, the humidity doesn't drop after the shower passes.

The other day I got all ready for a swim, even Lee was coming along, but when we got downstairs the pool was closed. I assume one of the elevator notices informed us of this but, of course, they're no help to us. They're been washing the windows of our building and it turns out they were working above the pool that day. Window washing here involves a lot of water pouring off the building and that day the pool was where the water fell. I wondered what they were going to do about cleaning the pool water. After all, who wants to swim in dirty Windex water? The solution? Empty the pool and refill it with clean water.

I'm not sure if I've just been ill-informed about these sorts of things or if Taiwan does things differently but I'm constantly learning new things here. Don't walk under window washer without a large umbrella and if your pool water gets dirty just throw it out.

We explored a new spot in the city today - the old Sugar Factory Museum.

We took the MRT further north than we'd been before. As an aside, when the subway was first built about ten years ago someone had a brain burp and named the northern terminus of the red line "Gangshan South." It's confusing when you know you want to head north to get on the train going to the station labeled south. Duh.

Anyway, we went one station south of Gangshan South and wandered around the grounds of the old factory. It feels like they just shut down a few weeks ago and opened it up to the public the next day. In fact, it shut down in 1999 after 100 years of operation. Apparently sugar making was a big business for awhile, especially when the Japanese took over the country. It was interesting to wander through this big empty factory, even if we couldn't read much of the signage.

There are touristy spots that have sprung up around the grounds, including the required koi pond with lotus flowers.

There were also sculptures scattered all around. There was one sculpture that was made up of faces that people from the community made. The rest of the sculptures were made from factory pieces.

We bought popsicles at the snack bar and listened to a woman performing great classics like Grandfather's Clock (see the post from a couple weeks ago - I heard this in the subway too) and Simon and Garfunkel's El Condor Pasa on an ocarina. 

There's always such a mix of familiar and uniquely Asian when we go on expeditions like this. This place reminded me of a park I visited with my dad, sister and niece when we were in China fourteen years ago. There was also a koi pond, although it was much bigger, and the park had the same sort of shabby but funky happy feel to it. Families having a good time together but everything a bit run-down and unkempt. There is no Disney, squeaky-clean-ness to tourist spots around here. Some might call it more "authentic," less sanitized. I think there's just a different sense of beauty. 

An interesting item we found on the grocery shelf today: Ritz with lemon filling.

I've seen peanut butter sandwich crackers and crackers with cheese but this one was new for me. The verdict? It's a little odd. We won't have any trouble finishing the box but I doubt we'll buy it again.

Yesterday we went straight from school to yoga, then out to eat at our favorite Korean restaurant, followed by a stop at a sweet little mango ice shop. We got home more than twelve hours after we'd left for work. Today we had a professional development day so no teaching but a (good) day full of meetings. We went straight from work to the Wakey, followed by dinner with friends at a new western style restaurant. We got home more than twelve hours after we'd left for work. Good thing these weeks finish with a weekend.

One should not go grocery shopping when one is hungry. It leads one to purchase things one would normally be able to walk by. But who doesn't want mochi, peanut butter and chocolate? It seems like a match made in heaven to me.

Aaah, the delights one can find on the grocery shelves. It was every bit as delicious as I expected.

I finally got around to getting my hair cut in Taiwan. I'd really meant to last year. I had recommendations of who to go see back last winter but I liked having my hair long enough to pull back into a ponytail and out of my face. Then I got in the accident and had a gash in my head that needed to heal before I was letting anyone near my scalp with a pair of scissors. Eventually, at the end of the summer I visited my sisters' hair dresser and had it cut short. But, of course, short hair requires regular maintenance and it was driving me crazy having my hair in my eyes so I went to visit Felix yesterday. It's seriously shorter and I love it.

The best part about getting your hair cut in Taiwan? The 20 minute scalp massage, of course.

What a difference a day makes. Yesterday was hot but the humidity was awful. Today the humidity wasn't so bad but boy was it hot! Instead of killing ourselves on a hike we opted for a walk to breakfast with friends with an extended route home so we could stop at Costco. It seemed as though half of Kaohsiung had chosen that moment to also go to Costco but we found what we wanted and made it out in a reasonable amount of time. We even managed to renew our membership without too much trouble, given the lack of a common language.

This afternoon we biked down to the harbor for mango ice. There are closer places to get mango ice but the store next to the Cijin Island ferry is our favorite. It's where we were first introduced and, believe me, you will always remember your first mango ice. It's worth the hour long bike ride down there and back and you can almost convince yourself that you've burned off all the calories by the time you get home.

Before...

and after.

We had a lovely time at the beach yesterday with some friends. We stripped down to our bathing suits and immediately covered up with towels underneath our umbrellas. In the middle of the day at 22 degrees latitude the sun can burn awfully quickly. The beach sand is black and blistering hot. It felt like my flip flops might melt as we crossed the 20 feet of sand to the water's edge. The water was slightly cooler than the air temperature so not refreshing but nice none the less.

As we ate our lunches we got to talking about upcoming trips we're all planning. One of the reasons we're here in Taiwan is to do some traveling in Asia so we're constantly planning one trip or another. On the docket at the moment is the east coast of Taiwan for a long weekend in October, Taroko Gorge in November, Japan in January and China in April.

We keep going back and forth about what to do for Chinese New Year in February so that was the main focus of our conversation over lunch. The friends we were with are going to Myanmar and have invited us to join them. Myanmar was not on my short list of places to visit but we've been wanting to travel with other folks (traveling with just the two of us is great but can get a little old. Who knew?) and we've come to enjoy their company quite a bit. A couple hours on the beach worked out really well, so why not a week visiting pagodas and hanging out on another beach for awhile? Myanmar, here we come.

We're about to head out on a morning bike ride and then a picnic lunch at the beach - weekends are great, aren't they? But before we do here are some random thoughts from the week.

I had left my bike at school on the day I went to the dentist so the next day I walked to work. When I came out of my building I could see a rainbow hanging over the sky in the direction I was heading. Rainbows are lovely and all but they usually mean it's raining nearby and I had forgotten my umbrella - very un-Taiwanese of me. But since I walk by four 7-11's on my commute I just popped into one and bought myself another umbrella. Now I have a sunshade for my afternoon duty on the playground. Of course it hasn't rained since I bought it.

Here's what mail delivery at school looks like.

Scooters, the Asian workhorse.

The subways in Kaohsiung are such an interesting place. Often there are kids dancing in front of mirrors in the hallways. Some of them have elaborate group dances with a dozen people doing precise, synchronized moves. They're not busking, just practicing, I guess. On Tuesday after the dentist I was on the subway in the middle of a school day and had the opportunity to hear the piped in music since the kids where off at school. Imagine my surprise to hear the wonderful classic, "My Grandfather's Clock." I've had that tune in my head ever since.

Today was back-to-the-dentist day. I went in to school and taught A block then took a taxi downtown. I can tell that living in Taiwan is making me cheap. Seven US dollars for a half-hour cab ride was ridiculous. Who pays that much for a taxi?! Oh yeah, the rest of you.

I'll save you the gory details from the dentist's office. Actually there aren't any gory details. I was in and out of there in less than 45 minutes, with a new filling to replace a silver filling that was probably 40 years old, and one less wisdom tooth. The wisdom tooth took all of about two minutes. For this I paid about US$3. Yes, the taxi ride cost twice as much as the dental visit.

I got home around noon and have spent the rest of the day warping my loom. Not a bad way to spend a Tuesday. Lee is making me soup for dinner and I have pain killers for when the Novocaine wears off. Tomorrow is my easier day at school so I should be fine. If all goes well with the healing I'll make an appointment in a month to have the harder tooth pulled.