I'd like to share a little commuting home story. I was sitting at a red light, waiting patiently with the rest of the crowd. I was on my bike, of course, with about 10 or 15 scooters. It was a long light so there was plenty of time to take in the sights, so to speak. Oftentimes the lights have countdown timers so you know exactly how many seconds you have to wait. This one was counting down from around 90 seconds, which is a really long time when you're waiting for the green.

Anyway, one of the scooters that was waiting had a dog sitting at the driver's feet. That's a pretty common way for people to transport their dogs. They've got the dogs pretty well trained. I've seen scooters stop at a light, the dog jumps down and pees on the curb, hops back on and they're ready to go before the light turns green.

This evening, however, was a different story. The dog on this scooter was just hanging out, waiting for that green light, just like the rest of us, when a stray dog wanders down the street and stops to investigate the interloper. It starts out with just a little growling but by the time the counter is down to 20 seconds or so the snarling had begun. I decided to get myself out of the middle of the dogfight before it really got out of hand and was ready to high-tail it (get it? High tail) as soon as the light was green.

I didn't turn around to see but I could hear the fight escalate. No one else was quite as quick as me across the intersection and the woman with the dog never did catch up. It certainly livened up my ride home.

We went to the International Food Festival at the Dream Mall yesterday. It was pretty forgettable. We almost missed it because it was only a couple dozen tents set up near the back of this massive mall. There were craft booths, jump houses and sand castles packed around the front so it was easy to miss the food tents stuck around the corner.

We often see these random statues at events like this. It may not be so random if you know what it says on the base of the statue, which I obviously don't.

 Lee and I did have a couple of tasty hot dogs. Lee's was salsa and mine was teriyaki with seaweed and sesame seeds. It tasted better than it sounds.

We spent a wonderful morning with our friend Junior up in the mountains about an hour or two outside of Kaohsiung. Way back when we first came to Taiwan the school sent the new staff on a day trip up to Sandimen, one of the centers of the aboriginal tribes of Taiwan, and today we went back to that region to the Maolin National Scenic Area.

The mountains in Taiwan are pretty impressive since they rise out of the plains at not much higher than sea level and reach over 3000 meters in the center of the island. What that means is when you drive into the mountains it's one switchback after another and pretty soon you're several thousand feet up. Driving (or sitting in the passenger seat) around here is not for the faint of heart. But, boy-oh-boy is it beautiful.

Junior has a favorite spot to stop for local pork barbecue and steamed rice. Unfortunately we arrived too early for the sweet potatoes to be ready.

The rice is steamed inside bamboo stalks with millet and spices and it was delicious. Lee and Junior didn't care for it so I got to eat it all. The pork was also delicious, especially with the chunks of onion and garlic. Part of what made it taste so good was the location. We hiked a little ways from the car and were rewarded with a lovely waterfall and swimming hole.

 I assure you that's not a dead body I'm watching over, just our friend enjoying the cool water. There were a few other people who made the hike in and they were dumbfounded that we were actually in the water. The Taiwanese do not swim. They don't even seem to wade very much, although a few people we saw did stick their toes in. We, on the other hand, explored a series of swimming holes downstream that felt like no one had ever been to before. It was magical.

This morning I had leftovers for breakfast.

From the Indian restaurant we ate at last night (notice the writing on the bag is in English, Chinese and Hindi, or at least I assume it's Hindi) I had pumpkin curry and from Wednesday night's Korean dinner I had a kimchi pancake. It was a breakfast of champions.

To round out my international eating experience today I had a Subway sandwich for lunch, courtesy of the school during parent-teacher conferences, and ate dinner at a new Israeli restaurant nearby. Lunch was quite forgettable but dinner was absolutely fabulous. I am loving living in a a big city with so many cuisines to choose from and Taiwan does the Asian food choices so well.

Tomorrow we're taking a road trip up into the mountains with a friend and will pick up Taiwanese barbecue on the way. It's good to change things up every now and then and eat some of the local cuisine. I'll be sure to take pictures.

A year ago in October I remember asking a colleague whether or not the humidity ever changed in Kaohsiung. It seemed to me that it was always hot and sticky, although by mid-October I could tell the average temperature had dropped at least a little bit. As I recall, this colleague admitted he wasn't sure about the humidity because he didn't really notice it at all once the highs were no longer in the 90's. I thought, sure, you don't notice it. You must not get out much without an air conditioner around.

Well, I have to admit that the humidity is really not that much of an issue this year. Sure, there were times that it was hot and sticky but mostly it's not so bad. I mentioned to Lee this afternoon that the air seemed dryer than it had in the last few days - we have the remnants of a typhoon working its way past us right now - even though it was still overcast and occasionally spitting a few raindrops. My definition of too humid has changed. The weather is just the way it is. So what if you get to your destination all sweaty. So did everyone else and no one seems to care.

This week Kaohsiung is playing host to the Taiwan National Games so I took the opportunity to go watch a swimming competition. It was mildly interesting. I could pick out a few words over the loud speaker and one or two of the characters on the message board - 100 m of some stroke, women, what city the swimmer was from. Like many second-tier sorts there were more competitors and support staff than there were spectators.

They were very efficient with running the meet. Women, men, awards, next event. 

It reminded me of the many gymnastics meets I went to to watch my lovely niece Cady compete. Organized and well run.

Speaking of Cady, happy birthday! 

The days at work fly by so when the weekends roll around it's such a pleasure. Sunday we lolled around for awhile then went produce shopping, came back and did some housework. I wove for awhile and had another cup of coffee. By then it was 10 am. It was amazing to find we still had so many hours left in the day.

We headed out again to do some errands and ended up back at Lotus Lake to watch some of the kayak races. This week Kaohsiung is host to the National Games and there are sporting events scattered all over the city. With the races going on at the same time as the folk festival, Lotus Lake was jammed with people and a lot of fun to wander around. It seems that the world over people love to eat fried food and throw darts at water balloons.

To finish off a relaxing weekend we went with friends to Nanzi, the northern area of Kaohsiung, where there's a nice little beach. We ate a picnic dinner and watched surfers in the waves as the sun set.

Once it got dark a group down the beach set off their fireworks and lit their sparklers. It was all very lovely. In contrast, I hear that Connecticut and Massachusetts were having a little snow squall. I got chilly enough on the beach to wrap my towel around my legs.

I have delivered Josh to the airport and he is now winging his way back to the western world. To send him off in style we spent his last evening here at Lotus Lake. He walked from our apartment and met us after school, then we headed over to the lake, a very short walk from KAS. Some of the more famous temples in the city are scattered around the lake edge, such as the Dragon and Tiger Pagoda, the Spring and Autumn Pavilions, the Temple of Enlightenment and the largest Confucius temple in Taiwan.

There was also a street fair going on. It's the Wannian Folklore Festival and will be going on all week. The roads around the lake were lined with booths with food and games. Lee indulged in a couple of skewers of stinky tofu.

I love the colors and vibrant details of the temples around here.

We finished our walk at the Wakey for drinks and dinner. Because the bar is so close to school it's a favorite Friday afternoon gathering spot for the KAS faculty and last night did not disappoint. We joined a dozen or so colleagues on the deck and watched the sun set and the lights along the lake come on.

It was a lovely evening and a nice way for Josh to spend his last night with us. For his eight dinners here we dined on Taiwanese, Japanese, western, and Chinese cuisine, plus one meal of hamburgers at home. Not bad for a quick trip to Asia. It was true joy to be able to share our love of our home here with someone we love. Thanks for coming, Josh!

Another adventure with Josh. After school we took the MRT to the harbor and wandered around. First stop was the art pier. We haven't walked (or biked) through there in awhile and it was interesting to see the new sculptures that have been installed. It was nice to see some of our old favorites as well.

(My apologies. I'm still figuring out the new camera and can't yet figure out how to rotate photos.)

Next on the walking tour was a stop at the mango ice store next to the Cijin Island ferry. We haven't been down there in the evening before. There's a different feel to the place after the sun has set. Not better or worse, just different.

After our snack, which was divine, as always, we headed over to the sunset pier. The sun had already set so we got to admire the lights of all the ships floating on the horizon. We climbed the stairs up to the British Consulate but didn't bother paying to go in. We could see the city lights without having to spend any money.

Our last stop took us down our favorite back alley.

"Dinner" was at a little art cafe Lee and I had stopped at once before. It's more a bar than a restaurant. Lee had a hot dog, which some would consider a perfectly fine dinner food. They were out of the pretzels Josh wanted so we shared some nachos and chips with salsa. The staff spent many seconds, I'm sure, tearing open a Doritos bag and pouring the contents into two bowls, then opening the can of chili and pouring it over one of the bowls of chips.

We were hungry (mango ice only sustains you for so long) so we ate all of it but we had a chuckle over the loose definition of nachos.

Yesterday Josh met us at school and we taxied over to Monkey Mountain. The weather has cooled down a bit so it was a really pleasant temperature for hiking at 3:30. We saw a few monkeys early on but were rewarded with more than we could count when we took a side trail we hadn't been on before. We apparently found the family zone (Lee called it the Children's Center). There were moms and their tiny babies plus small, impish "teenagers" scampering all around us. This photo is an example of the sheer numbers.

It may be hard to count them from this shot (I forgot the new camera and had to use my no-longer-very-good phone) but there are 20 monkeys here. And that was just the monkeys along the path. There were also monkeys next to the trail in the woods and over our heads in the trees. We must have seen a hundred of them.

The first time we hiked on the mountain and we saw monkeys both Lee and I said we hoped we'd never lose the feeling of joy at seeing them on our hikes. And here it is, over a year later and many trips up here and we're still loving it. There were plenty of other people out hiking but nearly all of them seemed completely uninterested in the monkeys. We, as westerners, seemed to be more interesting, given the blatant stares we sometimes got. Usually a friendly "ni hao" flummoxes them enough to stop the staring but it's still disconcerting. Maybe that's how the monkeys feel about us.

Josh and I went to the night market last night. Lee was feeling a bit under the weather and bowed out. He declined our offer to bring him back any stinky tofu.

It turns out Josh is quite talented in the ring toss. With two buckets of wooden rings he managed to win himself a little bottle of coke, a bottle of "vodka champagne flavor ice fire," a squeaky toy and a pair of tiny plastic snails. Not bad for a night market novice.

I also introduced him to some of the finest delicacies one can find at the market. We started out with the familiar - fried cheese - then had chicken on a stick. We opted for the less exotic thigh meat and skipped the heart, head and feet. Next was stinky tofu because you can not miss this classic. It really does taste better than it smells. We naturally picked up my favorite scallion pancake with basil and egg and washed it all down with a fruit smoothie. We both went with the pineapple, kiwi, pear and watermelon mixed fruit.

By then we were pretty full but made one last stop at the fruit stand. The fruit is all cut up into nice sized chunks and served in a plastic bag with a small skewer to eat while walking. Pretty much everything at the night market is served in a plastic bag with a skewer. Josh chose asian pear and I got some guava, which we carried down to the park and snacked on sitting at the pond's edge. All-in-all it was a lovely evening.

Here's the rest of the weekend.

From our hotel Lee, Josh and I walked down to the beach and watched the waves roll in.

We drove up the coast toward Hualien and found this bridge to an outlying island.

It's called the Dragon Bridge of the Three Immortals and was spectacular. The waves were impressive, the rocks formations were fascinating and the views were stunning. We crossed the bridge and walked around the island and found that the crowds prefer to stop partway across the bridge. You can't tell from this photo but it was pretty crowded. Lots of tour buses but also the infrastructure that goes with that - lots of bathrooms, vendors and food stalls. So after our walk we got a pit stop and ice cream cones.

For food we found a pizza place for lunch that was quite tasty. I had the "purple rain" with blue cheese, purple onions and artichokes - delicious! Dinner was at a funky little fusion Japanese/Taiwanese cafe/bar next to the sugar factory that's been converted into a sort-of artists' space in Dulan. Dulan is a quiet little surfing town that's quite the little gem. Well worth another visit if we can manage it.

It's hard to believe that just eight hours ago we were standing on this beach.

After a very nice long weekend away we're back in Kaohsiung, psyching ourselves up for another Monday morning. But for now I can tell you about our wonderful little piece of paradise.

We took Josh, fresh off the plane the night before, along with four friends and drove to the east coast to the small city of Taitung. This was our view of the coast after we crossed over the mountains.

There are endless miles of deserted beaches at the base of the mountain cliffs. The waves crashing along the shore look, felt and sounded like they had been picking up steam all the way from Hawaii. The weather was definitely overcast but not particularly stormy which makes me think these waves were the every-day kind of waves for the east side of the island. They felt big and strong enough to swallow the car we were in.

On our way home today the same section of coast was different because the wind had really picked up. The waves were being blown so much that they were constantly being pushed against the shore and they didn't swell and crash the way they did two days earlier. Waves are fascinating to watch, right? Or maybe that's just me.

Anyway, we stayed at a nice little six-room hotel across the road from the coastline that came recommended by some friends. The place was lovely although we all felt the dinner was perfectly fine but way over-priced. The top floor was worth the price of the rooms. It was open on all four sides, full of comfy seating where we could hang out and the views were spectacular.

We spent Saturday driving up the coast to some of the tourist sites that the guide books suggest. The first stop was the Water Running Up. Someone on Trip Advisor referred to it as a "mediocre drainage ditch" but I found it to be a mildly interesting optical illusion that was worth stopping at since we were driving right by. I wouldn't recommend going out of one's way to take a visit but sometimes you have to see the kitchy oddities just to say, "I saw the water that runs uphill."

The next stop was the ancient stone walls that were just rocks in the jungle as far as I could tell. But again, worth a drive-by. Some of us took the opportunity to walk the rest of the way up the road to the oddly named Moonlight Inn. Along the way we saw rice paddies with egrets, orchards full of custard apple trees, and a dung beetle pushing his poop across the road (as Lee says, he's got a really shitty job). We were rewarded at the top of the roadway with a sweeping view of the Dulan Valley.

(Sorry about the lack of photos here. Part of the reason is that there wasn't much to photograph, i.e. rocks in the woods, part because I'm learning how to use a new camera. Keep reading tomorrow and you'll see more pics. But right now it's time to take Josh to one of our favorite western restaurants, Fosters, for some excellent wings and nachos.)

We'll be picking Josh up at the airport in about 24 hours. I am very excited. Not only do we get to spend time with one of our sons but we also get to show him around a country I've fallen in love with. I hope he gets plenty of sleep on the airplane because he won't have much time to sleep once he arrives.

Friday is a holiday - Double Ten Day, Taiwan's Independence Day - which means no school, so we're taking Josh with us to drive with some friends to Taitung, a small city on the east coast of Taiwan. As the crow flies it's about 75 miles from Kaohsiung but because there's a string of the mountains down the spine of the country it's virtually impossible to drive from west to east without having to go way out of your way. What that means for us is a four hour car ride on Friday morning.

We'll be back on Sunday in time to do a little neighborhood touring then Monday morning Josh will come to school for awhile. (I hope I mentioned this to him.) The students in two of my classes have been working on presenting interesting Taiwan attractions using Google maps and their budding oral language skills. It should be fun.

With Josh only here for a week we're going to have to cram a lot in in a short time. I'll make sure he drinks plenty of fluids and suggest he naps while we're at work. I'm sure he'll be fine.

Before I trundle off to bed I want to send a shout-out to our fabulous friend Nicki. I found a surprise package in my box at school today - candy all the way from Connecticut! Lee's favorite, Swedish fish, as well as one of mine, candy corn. Thank you, thank you. A surprise and a delight. What a nice combination.

Taiwan is surrounded by typhoons this weekend. Mujigae just passed over the Philippines to the south of us and Choi-wan is on its way to Japan to the north. This is what the surf looks like on our coast.

This morning's bike ride made me long for fall, real New England crisp-air autumn. Usually there's an army of people out sweeping the leaves off the roads but no one had gotten to the bike path this morning so we were treated to the sound and smell of fallen leaves underneath our bike tires. There's something unique and memory inducing that happens when you hear the crunch of the leaves and smell that wonderful dried leaf smell.

I was reminded of days when the kids were young and we'd take them apple picking. There would finally be a nip in the air and I'd insist that the boys wear long pants and bring a jacket along. By the time we'd get out to the orchard the sun would have burned off the morning mist and the air temperature would be climbing into the 80's. We'd all be hot and sweating but still came home with bushels of crisp delicious apples. Today Lee and I got the hot and sweaty part but no apples.

We did do some great shopping later in the day though. We went with our friend Pearl to Meinong, the center of the Hakka culture of Taiwan. We went shopping at the umbrella store where the traditional hand-painted paper umbrellas are made. I admired some of the fabrics decorating the store and the shopkeeper told Pearl where we could find a little fabric store that sells the traditional Hakka designed fabric. Meinong isn't very big but they were celebrating an important deity so the streets were quite crowded.

The celebration included lots of firecrackers, a parade of people carrying little temples on palanquins, and a stage on the back of a truck with scantily clad women dancing to traditional Chinese music. It was pretty raucous. It also made driving through the little streets adventurous as we tried to avoid the parade. We did finally find the fabric shop where I indulged in one of my favorite pastimes. Without Pearl I would have been lost. But with her help I came away with yards of beautiful fabric that may never do anything more than sit folded on a shelf looking gorgeous. I may some day make some pillows with it, but mostly I just wanted to own some Hakka fabric.