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Thursday, Taipei
(3/30/2000)
Thursday didn't start well. There had been problems at work
for the last several days that I'd been doing my best to assist with, but this
morning I got drawn in for several hours. The time difference was a challenge.
If I woke up at 5:00AM, I could communicate with Arizona - which was at 2:00PM
for a few hours. I had another brief window at about 11:00PM at night.
After the morning work excitement, we went on to vacation
excitement: A trip to the hospital! Once again, Chu-Wan had some form of scaley
growth on her finger, and her mother decided she needed to go to the hospital
and have it checked.
Have you ever been to a county hospital? Apparently, that's
what all hospitals in Taiwan look like. Supposedly they are very up-to-date and
competent, but there was something about the bus-depot style waiting room and
the "take a number and wait your turn" methodology which scared me.
The doctor's diagnosis, I thought, was perhaps altered
somewhat in the translation. Per Chu-Wan, she's "...allergic to housework." She
went on to refine that to be, "...having an allergic reaction to some chemical,
probably a household detergent or similar substance." 
While they were waiting in another line, this time for a
prescription, I headed off down the street for a walk in a part of town I'd
never been to. Down one of the backstreets I got to practice some Chinese. I
found one of those unisex bathroom signs in Chinese, which I wanted for home.
There was no price so I asked the man, "Zeige shi doushou chiang?"("How
much is this?"), He told me a ridiculous price (assuming I heard him right) and
I told him it was "Tai gui" ("too expensive").
This was supposed to trigger off a heated round of bartering
for a better price; however, it was not to pass. I guess he didn't want to sell
me that sign.
Later, at McDonald's, a crazed, toothless woman speaking to
me in Taiwanese harangued me. Finally, after trying to speak Mandarin to her to
no avail, I said "no" and she left me alone. A brief side note: Taiwanese and
Mandarin are not the same language. Mandarin is the official language of
Taiwan, but some people, such as my mother-in-law come from families that speak
Taiwanese first. Mandarin should be understandable by all Taiwanese, whereas
Taiwanese is not necessarily so. (Chu-Wan and her father, for example, are not
very conversant in Taiwanese.)
The only Taiwanese I know is how to say, "my knees are
wobbly from fear." which sounds remarkably like "waterfall" in Mandarin.
This day, there was a big computer show at the Taipei World
Trade Center, so we stopped there for a little frustration - all those
computers, no ability to understand what they were selling.
Later in the afternoon, I set out by myself to the nearest
7-11 to get a soda. After much debate (with myself) I decided that I wanted a
fountain drink, Lipton's Ice Tea. (Soda choices are limited in Taiwan)
I started filling the cup and it ran totally syrup, black as
pitch. About halfway through the process, the soda stream switched to almost
pure water. My estimate was that I had about a 50/50 split, which if I could
stir it up would probably be ok. The problem was, they don't give you the
straws until you pay, so I went to the counter with a nasty looking two-layer
drink... mostly looking like ice-water.
The guy at the counter looked at it and put his hand over
it, trying to indicate that it was no good. He said "not good" a couple of
times. I tried to assure him it was OK, but not so successfully. There was
something else he wanted to tell me. He got the next person working there to
come over; she too could not express what she wanted to say in English. They
brought in a 3rd, then a 4th employee (yes, they had 4 employees working at the
7-11), with no luck. I had the entire staff in a tizzy. I kept trying to tell
them it was really OK. Finally a passerby interceded and explained that they
were trying to say there was no CO2 in the canisters and that my
drink was flat.
I thought this was particularly funny - they didn't care if
the drink looked like it was without syrup, just that it was flat, and, of
course, since it was tea it wasn't supposed to have CO2 in it
anyway.
I decided I could never go back to that 7-11, as I'd
embarrassed the entire staff and caused them to loose face.
Chu-Wan went shopping with her college chums, so they left
me in the care of "Uncle" Jen. Uncle Jen (who really isn't Chu-Wan's uncle, but
more of second cousin, once removed) is the toy collector of the family. He was
apparently quite pleased to discover there's another toy collector in the
family.
Uncle Jen runs a store called Monster Taipei, which
has an impressive collection of toys. He admits his passion is US toys, but he
also stocks Japanese toys because the market calls for it.
We spent some time talking and then went to dinner.
With no where to go afterwards, on a whim I rode the train
up to Tanshui on the NE coast of Taiwan. I had no goal in mind; it's just the
farthest stop from Taipei you can get on the train. The train station drops one
off at the mouth of the Tanshui River where it opens onto the China Sea.
After strolling along the riverbank for a while I noticed a
nearby night market. Thinking I could still find my way back to the train
station safely, I headed out for the market. I didn't find anything, but I did
discover what the young do for fun on a Thursday night in Tanshui... they ride
their damn scooters up and down the night market. Young whippersnappers!
At the train station on my way home I ran into another of
those "toilet moments" that seems synonymous with Taiwan. I stepped into the
men's room to see 3 urinals, (in Taiwan, they are very close to one another
with no partitions between them) with occupants using the far left and far
right one. Meanwhile, the cleaning lady was on her hands and knees scrubbing
the one in the middle by hand. I stopped dead in my tracks as I walked in. The
guy behind me almost ran me over in his way to push the old lady out of the way
to use the middle one.
Friday, Taipei (3/31/2000)
This day was for shopping and nothing else.
Saturday, Taipei/Hsinchu
(4/1/2000)
Saturday morning started off rainy. I went to the bakery
using a thing called an "umbrella" - an interesting device, and quite handy in
the rain. I wonder why they didn't invent them sooner. They're all the rage in
Taipei -- everyone has one.
It was the beginning of the four-day Tomb Sweeping weekend,
even though "Tomb Sweeping Day" isn't actually until April 5.
Tomb Sweeping Day is the annual time when people return to
the graves of their ancestors, clean them, cut away the over growth, place
flowers, burn incense and spirit money and just generally pay respects to their
ancestors.
Chu-Wan, my father-in-law Mr. Huang and I traveled to
Hsinchu, a town south of Taipei where he grew up. We picked up Chu-Wan's
grandmother and went to the tomb of Chu-Wan's grandfather. There wasn't much
cleaning to do, but they arranged flowers, said prayers and burned incense.
I learned that the late Mr. Huang senior had been in the
R.O.C. army and had come over from the mainland when the communists overran the
country; that he had been in the air corps of the Army and had trained to fly
(or perhaps crew) B-29 bombers in Texas during WWII.
After paying our respects, we returned to the town of
Hsinchu for lunch. We ate at a steakhouse that served an excellent top sirloin
steak. The weird part was (There's always a weird part, isn't there? Of course
there is, I only bother to document the weird ones.): The meal was very
formally regimented. The meal included everything: Salad and fruit bar,
aperitif, bread, soup, steak, desert and a choice of tea, coffee or juice.
First we were given time to eat our salad, afterwards they
took the salad plates (even the salad forks) and brought bread. After we ate
the bread, they brought an aperitif. Once we were done with that, they brought
us the soup, then came the steak, then the desert and finally... finally... I
got my glass of tea. The meal took 2 hours and 15 minutes - without anything
substantive to drink!
We headed back to Taipei, but first we had to gas up the
car. Since we got a fill-up, we got a free carwash too. Did I mention it rained
all day? Hey... a free carwash is a free carwash!
Once back in Taipei we had 10-15 minutes before we had to
head out again for dinner. This turned out to be yet another 2+ hour meal at a
nice Japanese buffet on the top floor of the Dayeh Takeshimaya department store
- another Japanese Department store. After the meal it was time for me to look
at Japanese toys and to buy groceries for Sunday's planned trip to Wulai.
Fortunately, Japanese department stores all seem to have grocery stores in the
basement, so we were able to do all our shopping at Dayeh Takeshimaya.
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