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Tuesday, Taipei (3/28/00)
I took sleeping pills to help me sleep after my long nap
Monday. That seemed to work, but it remained to be seen if it "fixed" my jet
lag. We were still without phones.
I decided to start looking for cheap airfare to somewhere.
Since our Japan plans got washed out, I hoped to find inexpensive tickets to
Hong Kong. My initial results suggested it might be inexpensive enough that we
could afford to make a 2 or 3 day trip there. I would know more in a few
days.
I had more hot dog croissants for breakfast. Apparently, I
was beginning to get used to them. Then we went looking for Chu-Wan's
breakfast.
I finally got to see a Chinese "wet market" or "traditional
market". It's wet because they hose the floor off to drain off the blood from
the freshly slaughtered animals. I think they only actually "off" the chickens
in your presence, the rest of the meat hangs "fresh" on hooks. I did get a look
at the fantastic Chicken-Machine: a laundry-dryer-looking device with big
rubber spikes on the inside. Kill a chicken, drop it in the tub, turn it on and
"presto" - plucked chicken. 
Taipei's subway system had improved considerably since my
first visit in May 1998. They'd almost completed installing their TRTS (Taipei
Rapid Transit Systems), and they've done a great job. Apart from the
French-built first train they put in, all the other lines are virtually
indistinguishable from Singapore's terrific system. The trains, the stations,
the labeling of signs, maps, etc. It was now possible for me or anyone to
circumnavigate Taipei on a train (speaking only English) without resorting to
the Chinese-only bus system. The TRTS made a significant improvement to my
enjoyment and independence in Taipei.
To test the trains, we set off to the former residence of
Chiang Kai-Shek of which the grounds are now open to the public. They consist
of a huge flower garden, which is quite pretty, but not really thrilling.
Chu-Wan had an apointment for a facial, so after we
returned to town, I was left to my own devices. I was supposed to meet her and
her mother at Pacific Sogo Department store at 3:30PM. Sogo has been my
favorite store in Taiwan because it carries all the nifty Japanese toys.
Having nothing else to do, I headed out by train, intending
to go somewhere else first to look around. I really had no particular
destination in mind.
During one of my train transfers, the air raid sirens
started up. No one else paid attention, so neither did I. I hoped it wasn't the
mainlanders. I decided I'd better check the newswires the next day to make sure
Taiwan hadn't been invaded.
More daunting than the potential air raid was a real setback
to my confidence in Chinese language. A little boy came up to me at a train
station, grabbed my leg and said "Ni you mei you [gibber gibber gibber]"
- I substitute "gibber" for words I didn't understand. In essence he was asking
me if I had something, but for the life of me I didn't know what. I tried
explaining that I only spoke a little Chinese: "Woa jio hui shou yi dian
dian zhongguo hua" - but he looked at me with those "huh??" eyes. I tried
again, slower... no luck. I tried "Woa jio hui shou yingguohua" (I only
speak English). No luck -he just kept asking me the same question, and finally
ran back to his mother who was having a little chuckle at one of our expenses
-- I'm not sure who.
I ended up at the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial building, which is
two train stops past Sogo. I managed to walk past a camera crew shooting
something outside the memorial. It wasn't a news program. It seemed to be one
of those shows hosted by a couple wacky hosts with no specific agenda. Although
I tried, I didn't manage to see myself on TV later that evening. They probably
wold have cut my head out of the shot if I had been on camera.
I made my way back to Sogo on time, but Chu-Wan wasn't
there. Her mother showed up with a note from her saying that she'd be late and
that her mother would show me to the toy department. Unfortunately, the note
didn't say how late she would be, so I really didn't have any idea how long I
was supposed to hang around the toy department.
The problem was: I didn't really need an escort to find or
look at the toys and Chu-Wan's mother, not being interested in Japanese toys,
tired of the toy section rather rapidly. We had a few comical moments as she
tried to explain that she was going to the 4th floor. I couldn't understand
enough of what she was saying in Chinese, and she had extreme difficulty
expressing herself in English. Finally we worked it out, but there's something
particularly tiring about standing around in a Department store not being able
to go anywhere and not knowing how long you're going to be waiting. I don't
like being tied to one spot.
An aside on my Chinese: periodically, my in-laws tried
speaking Chinese to me, which was goo dpractice for me. The problem was I'd yet
to have them say a sentence I fully comprehended. It may have been the speed at
which they were speaking or a lack of vocabulary on my part, but I just wasn't
capable of fully understanding even simple sentences.
On the other hand, in many cases, I could understand 50-75%
of a sentence that they would speak to me. It was enough to glimmer at their
meaning, but not enough to fully understand. The only advantage was, sometimes
I understood snippets of conversations that they had in my presence. They were
secure in the knowledge that I could not understand even simple sentences that
they addressed to me, but the were wrong. Sometimes I knew what they were
talking about.
Upon our return the phones and Internet connections were
again working, and I was finally able to contact the outside world.
Wednesday, Taipei
(3/29/2000) 
This was a family outing day. My mother and father-in-law
packed us into the car and drove us to Yangmingshan Guojia Gongyuan
(Yangmingshan National Park). I had been to Yangmingshan on my first trip to
Taiwan, so I knew what to expect.
I was wrong.
I learned that there are several "areas" inside
Yangmingshan; I was only familiar with the area comprised of dense jungle and
sulphurous fumeroles. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that our first
stop, Chiangtiangang, was referred to as "the grasslands." Instead of
jungle, with the overcast sky that day, it looked all the world like pictures
of Scotland's green rolling hills. It was hard to believe that we were in the
same country.
I tried taking a series of pictures in a complete circle so
that they could be stitched together by computer, but ran out of film before I
finished. The resulting picture (above) is a panorama of about 180 degrees.
Chiangtiangang had the distinction of coming totally
unexpected and leaving a complete mystery. What was the mystery? The Cows of
Chiangtiangang -- I broke away from the family to make a quick return to
the car. On my way I encountered a group of Americans. One of them, a woman,
stopped me and asked if I was returning from the hills. I said "yes" and then
she asked which 'side' of the grasslands I'd been at. She wanted to know where
I'd been and if I'd seen 'the cows'. I said I hadn't and she replied with, "OK,
well, I know where they hang out on the other side, we'll look there, then.
Thanks!"
She left me with the nagging curiosity as to what the heck
the big deal was about a bunch of cows.
 Once at the car, I
began to notice that the maps and signs in the air all had drawings of cows on
them.
On my way back, I noticed another thing: The grasslands were
strewn with the biggest cow pats I'd ever seen -- easily triple the size of a
home grown variety back in the States. What monster cows these must have been!
After Chiangtiangong we headed to a park area inside
Yangmingshan National Park called (confusingly enough) Yangmingshan Park.
Before we had to cancel the Japan portion of his trip, I had
ben looking forward to Sakura (cherry-blossom) season there. Yangmingshan Park
was redemption... it was Cherry-Blossom season in Taiwan too and the park was
overrun with them (and people, too). 
When my in-laws said it was flower season, I had no idea
this is what they meant. We spent an hour or so walking around the gardens and
then down to a waterfall.
On the way back, I chanced to try a hand-made corndog at a
food vendor's stand. I was rewarded with the most repugnant, repellant, awful
corndog the world has ever known. Beware home-grown corndogs in Taiwan. Stick
to the ones that say "Foster Farms" on the stick!
After returning to Taipei, Chu-Wan and I stopped into the
nearby Subway. Not the underground TRTS suway, but instead the American
sandwich chain shop.
In it's own way, this Subway lent a lot to my enjoyment and
independence in Taipei just as the TRTS did. As a place to go, it was very
foreigner-friendly. An American and his Taiwanese wife run it. The Taiwanese
staff all speak passable English and the menus are fully bilingual. I found
myself thinking that this is the kind of store I'd run if I lived in Taipei. I
particularly like the little thoughtful "touches" for us foreigners. For
example, many, many places in Taipei are two and three stories tall. The stairs
are steep and the design tends to make it necessary for me to duck or clobber
myself on the head. At this Subway, there are warning signs about the low
ceilings - in English only. It's thoughtful little touches like that that say,
"Hey, I'm an American and I undrestand your experiences in Taiwan." Another
touch that I liked was that he has placed rubber padding on all the low ceiling
corners so that if you did hit your head, it was a bit softer than drywall.
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