Last night's intention had been to eat at Foster's because it was close to the produce market and we could pop out to buy some veggies after dinner. As it turned out, after a couple of beers (Lee) and a lychee sour (me) we didn't have the motivation to look for carrots and onions. There's always today.

We did, however, spend time at the bar talking to an expat Brit who is a lawyer and has been living in Kaohsiung for 12 years. It's odd to run into other expats. I'm not sure of the appropriate acknowledgement. Do we give a hearty hello, as though we already know each other because of some perceived shared background? I wouldn't greet a stranger like that on the streets back home and yet there is some sense of commonality. Hey! someone else who speaks English! In fact, I usually make an attempt at eye contact and give a subtle head nod or ignore them, depending on their response to me. More often than not, we just ignore each other. It's odd.

On a completely different note, we did finally make it to the post office after work on Friday. Not only did I send my package to Amherst I also bought stamps for postcards:

Now I can finally send my thank you cards to my Green Room families at the Children's Center. It turned out not to be a long wait at the post office but it is not cheap to send packages. I probably won't be doing much of that. I'll be packing really efficiently for our Christmas trip instead. After all, none of the clothes I have here will be appropriate for December in New England. All the clothes I need will be waiting for me in the box I left behind.

The weather here, though, really has changed. I've actually changed from wearing a tank top to a t-shirt on the bike ride to school because it's a bit chilly in the morning. The highs are only reaching into the mid-80's and the humidity is in the 60's and 70's, way down from the 90's a month ago! Too soon to switch to long pants but that may actually happen before winter arrives.

Once a month the faculty at KAS gets together for a potluck breakfast in the cafeteria before the students arrive. Today was the October day and the spread was quite impressive. About a dozen people are assigned to each month so people only have to think about bringing in something once, which is quite civilized. There were Chinese dumplings and French quiche plus these:

It's a Japanese donut and comes in a box with the same color scheme as Dunkin Donuts. I'm not a big fan of donuts (give me Dunkin muffin anytime though) but this was pretty good. Chewier and not quite as sweet as a Dunkin donut.

In general the bread here is sweeter than back in the States and desserts, like cake and cookies, are less sweet. We've found sausage to be sweeter and every drink at the 7-11 to be really sugary as well.

Tonight we're taking a break from Asian cuisine and eating at the expat bar near us. Sometimes it's a nice change to have wings and fish and chips.

After dinner we went on a walk to the "plastics store" to find some glue for a project at school. On our way back I took some photos of things along the way. I feel a little like the boy in Dr. Seuss' book "And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street." I'll not to embellish too much....

I didn't actually take this picture tonight but we did pass by this spot on our walk. In fact, we either walk or bike past it every day since it's right next door to our apartment.

I like to think of it as a living billboard. It's an advertisement for the new highrise apartment they're building but what's different from back home is that the center is surrounded by little pots of plants. The wall has a grid attached to it and each pot is stuck in a hole in the grid. These billboards are all over the place. It's a pretty cool way to add a little greenery to the city.

We also walked past a school with this kiosk in front:

As far as I can tell, it's for publicly displaying grades. Nice (not...).

General elections are coming up soon. I know it's not for president or mayor of Kaohsiung but I don't know who it is for. These little trucks drive around all day long blaring campaign slogans and generally slowing down traffic.

It's really nice being in a place where you can't understand what's being said during an election. Election campaigns are definitely something I do not miss. 

We have been teaching for nearly 10 weeks and I'm beginning to have some perspective on the beginning of the school year. Gone, mostly, are the days of sheer panic of being prepared to teach five classes. Gone also, mostly, are the days of feeling completely incompetent. Most of the time now I feel ready for each class, ready to face all those eager, and less than eager, children in my care.

The flip side of that is the realization that we're only a quarter of the way through the school year! There's something about having to work so hard at the beginning of the year that doesn't allow you time to look very far forward. Now that I'm beginning to feel comfortable there's a certain drudgery that comes with the job. It's still satisfying and exciting and fun and hard too, but now there's also the sameness and predictability that comes from the familiar.

One of the nice things about getting comfortable in the job is having a little more energy at the end of the day. I got home at 4:45 today and by 5:00 Lee and I were on our bikes for an hour's ride before dinner. A month ago I barely had the energy to get through dinner before collapsing on the couch with the intention of getting schoolwork done but only managing to fall asleep. My internal clock is still skewed to the early morning wake-up call so I'm out of bed by 4:30 but at least I'm up a little bit later in the evenings.

Tomorrow we start a yoga class which will hopefully add to our sense of renewed energy. I'll let you know.

This evening we have a couple friends coming by to watch the Patriots play their Sunday afternoon game. It's nice that the NFL gives us the option of watching our team play at our convenience. Of course it works fine for them since we gave them a chunk of change for the privilege, but that's okay. We have Pizza Hut delivering dinner, Taiwan beer in the fridge and a couple bags of snacks so we have everything we need.

The funny thing is that everything is just a little bit off. It's Tuesday evening, not Sunday afternoon, the pizza flavors include kimchi and the snack bags include dried fish. Plus there are no Cox/Sheldons around. It's a new life. Hopefully there will be a game we can see with CT friends during Christmas break.

I came across an unexpected delight when I biked into school Sunday afternoon: a field of zinnias in the middle of a city block.

We had such a busy day yesterday I'm going to need to get back to school just to get some rest! Simona took us on a whirlwind tour of Tainan then back to Kaohsiung for a truly spectacular dinner.

We had our first trip on a Taiwan train and I was glad to have a Chinese speaker with us. There was limited English and there were no maps on the train to tell you that you're on the right train or how many stops to go until yours. That was a problem on our return trip because we got on the wrong train and had to get off at the next station to get the right one. Maybe it wasn't all that helpful to have a native speaker after all! (Just kidding, Simona.)

Our first stop was outside of Tainan city at the Salt Museum.

It showed the old process of evaporating the sea water in pools and harvesting the salt. It looked like incredibly hot, hard work although in all the dioramas the people were smiling and the exhibits tried to convince us the workers had good working and living conditions. The area was beautiful in that desolate, stark way and the wind was strong and constant. Living around there had more of a forced-labor-camp feel than planned-community.

Nowadays the area is a tourist attraction with a salt mountain to climb, go-carts, pony rides, food stalls and an arcade. All out in the middle of a wind-swept, flat as a pancake area a half hour's drive from the city. A bit surreal.

Here's the salt mountain:

And the view from the top:

Lee channeled his inner black faced spoonbill:

  

After that we headed back into the city to see the old sites. Tainan is the oldest city in Taiwan and still shows some of its old Dutch roots as well as being home to hundreds of years old Buddhist, Taoist and Confucius temples. 

Every little aspect of sightseeing was so much easier having Simona with us. Where to go, how to get there, what to order for lunch. I'm all for immersion tourism, figuring things out on your own, making mistakes and learning from them. But we've been doing that every day for two and a half months and will continue to do that every day for many months to come. It was a treat to take a break from all that. We even got the insider perspective of Tainan in that Simona's father grew up there and we made a stop to look at his old home.

But first, we visited Chihkan Tower, first built by the Dutch in 1653. 

The grounds were beautiful and the tower gave a nice view of the area. There were even some signs in English talking about the various rulers of the area, including the Ming, Qing, Japanese and Kuomintang (the KMT, China's Nationalist Party, which still has a strong influence in Taiwan).

The next stop was the Confucius Temple. The temple is surrounded by parkland and was peaceful and serene despite all the bustle and traffic on the other side of the stone walls. There were even a couple of concerts going on in the park including this orchestra of traditional Chinese instruments. 

After the stop at Simona's family's home and a quick, one-of-a-kind-in-Taiwan dessert of crepes we hopped on the (wrong) train to come back to Kaohsiung and shower before dinner.

And what a dinner it was! It was a tiny Japanese restaurant with one seating, in front of the chefs who prepared one piece of sushi at a time for 12 or so diners. Every bite was exquisite. I've never before had a meal like this one. I'm at a loss of how to describe it so I won't even try. You'll just have to imagine it for yourselves. Thank you, thank you, Simona!