在家的某些感想

我每次回家，都迅速就覺得生活步調變化。我在臺灣時，要六點半起來，七點左右就出門到學校，六點才離開圖書館。如果我想跟朋友碰面，都得先安排，要不然我很忙的朋友不行。不過，我在家時，我的時間卻都有空，平常早上九點半起床，十點洗澡，十二點吃飯等等。

假使我在家時不想一直很無聊，要主動地出去找老朋友或休閒活動，並不會有人在我前門出現說“寶銳在不在，我可以約他出去嗎？”比方說，我今天中午打給我朋友的媽媽，問他願不願意跟我見面聊一下天。儘管她的年級比我大四十年，我們卻很有共同點，而且我很喜歡聽她講的故事和意見。她今天邀請兩個老朋友，他們是一隊七十多歲的夫妻，先生是一個退休的工程師，太太是一個快失去記性的人（她不告訴我她在哪一行工作過）。

我跟他麼講了一個小時的話，後來我們倒兩杯咖啡，準備兩盤起司糕，在他火爐旁邊坐下開始聊東聊西。不久之後，我們聊到我對臺灣生活和念國語的計畫。我一說我越在臺灣越想留在那裡，她就看起來覺得很錯愕，開始反問很多問題。當我說出理由，她都唱反調，問我到底能不能相信一個臺灣小姐真的愛我，或者卻只想藉著我拿到一個美國綠卡。她也提起另一個問題，就是我跟一個臺灣女朋友雖然前兩三年可能非常幸福，但是我們能否跨越隱藏的文化隔閡，只有天知道。最後，她問我想不想要永遠住在臺灣，因為大多數的臺灣人女孩並不願意遷到美國去，打發掉她們的家人。

我果然覺得她說得很有道理。所以，儘管我認為在臺灣交女朋友很可能治療我的一些孤獨感，這麼做也很可能引發更嚴重的併發症。我最好小心翼翼去找一下，對嗎？

一個新的任務

哎呀，今天又吸取了一個痛苦的教訓，就是我得睡覺。昨天晚上我幫一個朋友準備英文的面試，準備好之後就跟她聊很久。

其實太久。我回家之後休息兩三個小時，突然之間發現已經到了清晨三點。糟糕！如果隔天要上好幾個小時的課，然後跟語言交換見面，三個小時確實不夠。我的鬧鐘響起來是，我翻過來看牆上的錶：六點半。我就按下snooze，開開心心回睡覺。

早上九點才上第二堂課時，老師開我的玩笑說，“寶銳，你看起來很累，也沒有刮鬍子。而且我問你問題的時候你好像都想不起回答來，就像你的頭腦短路了。怎麼樣？”

美國生日快樂！！！

Happy Birthday America!!! I'm the only Yank in my class that remembered the Fourth though; the rest are slightly hippie-ish.  Ex-pats are an odd group; sorry about that.

I think it's been exactly one week since I was here last, and it's been a pretty busy time.  Let me fill you in.

First, and most awesomely, my apartment now only has three housemates.  The two college kids (for more information, see this post) moved out on July 1st, and its been nothing but piece and quiet since.  Fittingly, they did little to clean up after themselves, as their living space was unswept, and the wall stained with dirt from their feet.  We'll be repainting soon.  Punks.

Additionally, I had a pretty enjoyable Sunday, mostly because I met up with and British guy I know, and spoke nothing but English the whole day.  Lovely.  We decided to head north to Taipei's most famous museum, the National Palace Museum (故宮博物院), which houses the thousands and thousands of artifacts the Guomindang took from the Mainland when they retreated to Taiwan starting in 1948.  This fact apparently irritates the Chinese to no end, since Taiwan played little to no role in ancient China's cultural development, and there's not the slightest chance Taiwan will give up the museum's wares.

Once inside, there are three levels to the main building, and the first exhibit rooms feature picks, trowels, daggers, etc. dating back almost 8,000 years.  Museum officials are quite proud of this longevity, and they let their feelings be known publicly.  In the first room, there's a large sign proclaiming the glories of Chinese culture, the world's "longest, most vital, and most important."  Take that, Smithsonian.

The exhibition halls progress chronologically, and begin, as mentioned, with the pre-dynastic times, transition into the Zhou Era (周時代), the Spring and Autumn Period (This is when the classics of Daoism emerge), the Warring States Period (Confucius, Mencius, and Lao-tse), and finally into the 2,000-year Imperial Era.  It's pretty cool.

The museum‘s most famous piece is a piece called, roughly, "The White Cabbage Jade:"

The picture's not mine (note the watermark at bottom right), but you still get an idea of how cool this thing is.

After the museum and after some food, the Limey and I decided to hit up "Kung Fu Panda," or 功夫熊貓, at the main movie theater in Taipei's XiMenDing area, the city's rough equivalent of Times Square.  It's hilarious, and highly recommended to all and sundry.  Fat noodle-selling pandas trained by rodent kung fu master to defeat world's greatest tiger warrior makes for some seriously good viewing, trust me.  I'm not going to say anything more.

I'm about to wrap this up, but I'm feeling the itch to write about some of the still-visible remnants of the Guomindang's "One China" pretensions, as well as about some of the funny English one sees around town.  I'll be taking some pictures to help make my point.

Now we've got evidence

ALERT:  This is an all-cars notice on two (three?) John Does suspected of annoying the living crap of out Bryan.  Biographic data is as follows:

Suspect Names: We've never bothered to find out.

No. of Suspects: Two.

Sexual Orientation: Other dudes.

Current Location: In Bryan's living room, watching his TV.  Or in Bryan's dining room, sleeping.

Offenses: Being the most two annoying people this side of Bryan's other roommate in DC; signing and giggling until the wee hours of the morning; always being around; being 19 years old and making me fear that maybe, just maybe, I used to be that annoying.

Evidence: Thanks to some stellar sleuthing work, we've turned up photographic evidence of the crime scene.  Due to high risk of contamination from the enormous amount of useless junk piled up, all officers are advised to enter with restraint, and not until having received proper protective gear and vaccinations.  The evidence is in the form of two photos, which are to be treated as classified:

This just in!  Photos of the perps at the crime scene, taken at 7 p.m.:

Verdict: Suspects are to be considered guilty until proven innocent.  Use of force authorized.  Station OUT.

A long-delayed update

Apologies to my readers - all three of you - for my many, many day absence.  There's no excuse; were this a reputable news outlet, I'd most certainly have long since been fired for neglect of professional duties.  Thankfully, it's not.  I'm still the boss of me.

Also, before I jump into this, a note.  I just a massive plate of "chicken leg rice" at a restaurant down the street, and am about twenty minutes into a carbo-coma.  So, please have patience with any typos or incongruous sentences.

By now, I'm pretty sure everyone who reads this is aware I've started classes, and switched into the intensive class Friday before last.  I'm still struggling to get back on my feet after the initial full-body language blast of the first few days.  It's a no-holds-barred, all-Chinese-all-the-time, ego-bruising three hours of fun.  Last week, we turned in our topics for the semester project, which is a full-length report on a series of street interviews we are to do on a selected topic. Mine is a semi-awkward mix of the topic I originally chose, Sino-Taiwanese relations, and that suggested to me by my teacher, Taiwanese views of foreigners and foreign nations.  The latter seems like it might simply degenerate into a topical study of Taiwanese prejudice, and I'm not too interested.  So,  I'm hybridizing.  Our list of proposed questions is due to the teacher tomorrow.

Speaking of school, as I walk to and from everyday, I pass through an all-Chinese neighborhood on foot and, while most people ignore me or stare at me when I'm not looking, there's one fellow at an appliance store who's taken a (non-homosexual) shine to me.  It started with an innocent "Ni hao," and by this past Friday, had progressed to a point at which he feels comfortable talking to me about all sorts of inappropriate things.  That day, as I ambled past, he stopped me to talk, and shortly thereafter began asking, "you have girlfriend Taiwan?"

Nope, I don't.  Nor, since seems to be offering his matchmaking services, am I interested in anyone he might plan to send my way.  He was amazed that I was/am single, and expressed with certainty that getting a lovely lass at my side would take little more than a snap of the fingers. As he was saying this, he attempted to reinforce his argument by pointing out the hair on my chest, a sure sign of a "real man," he said, and a big draw for the ladyfolk here.

Then, strangely, he switched the conversation to the the topic of corn.  Yes, the delicious vegetable.  I couldn't figure out why, but after he began a long series of vulgar gesticulations and started grabbing his crotch in a most gruesome manner, I finally understood his meaning. He believed himself to be pointing out one of the physiological advantages of Western birth. 

Yikes.  At this point, I'm hideously weirded out, and more than a little wary of what might be coming next, so I forced a graceful dismount and walked away, beet-red in the face.  As a parting shot, the fellow tells me about his old college major, "zuo ai,"  or "love-making."  I might have to find a new route to school.

* * *

What else, what else...

Oh, the language.  Also known as "The Reason I'm Here."  I think I've been making some decent progress, especially recently, since I'm able to understand ever more of Taiwan TV broadcasts, and am become much more adept at eavesdropping on the conversations of passersby.  Why, just this afternoon, as I went for a sweltering, muggy, cramp-inducing run in a riverside park, a young kid scooted past me on his training wheels, turned and saw me, and started singing.  The song had only one word: "Laowai, laowai, laowai."  Or, when translated, "foreigner, foreigner, foreigner."  Classic.

Like I said, to boost my language abilities, I've been forcing myself to watch a lot of TV. Recently I found a pretty cool sitcom, very popular here on the island, called "mingzhongzhuding wo ai ni," or "I Was Predestined to Love You."  It's a standard story of the meek, beautiful girl rescued by the super-cool-but-confused Mr. Right, except that in the first episode, she got dizzy from cold medicine, and he from being poisoned, and they mistakenly ended up in the same room (they're on a cruise, but don't know each other) and and lost their respective virginities.  Each assumed that the other was their lover, and not, as it turned out, a total stranger.  Oops.  The second episode involves an unwanted pregnancy, so I'm stoked to see what happens next.

* * *

Ok, that should be enough to satisfy the critics.  I'm exhausted, and still have to get some more work done on my questions for school, as well as recommence the vocabulary and grammar review I started earlier.

Bryan, out.

I though I felt this last night...

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/351292/1/.html

Dinner failure

I just wanted to write this down. I live with two guys, both of whom are in the habit of sleeping past 11 a.m., even after going to bed at midnight. There's not a yet a real, grown-up trash can in the place, even though they housemates have been living continuously here for nearly two years. Readers may have also noticed that there is no furniture in the place.

None of this bugged me at all, not one bit, until tonight. At 10 p.m., I walked down to 7-11 (there is literally one every two blocks in this city - 3,700 in all of Taiwan) to pick up some instant noodles, figuring I'd heat up some water in the apartment microwave to make them when I got back. Well, oops. There's no microwave. There's a contraption above the sink where the microwave should be, but it serves no such purpose.  I, with both my BA and MA, am totally at a loss as to this thing's purpose.  I tried to heat water in it, but to no avail.

After casting about for some minutes, I finally broke down and used the hot water from the bathroom faucet.  BTW, I don't want any comments on this - if I get cholera, it'll be sufficient punishment.  The noodles were delicious.

I'd have taken pictures to document my frustration, but, as we all now know, my camera is throwing hissy fits.

I'm eating out from now on.