Christmas

Woke up on christmas morning to make ourselves some pancakes...they were awful...

We also made our own egg nog after not being able to find it in stores. It was awful also...

This is our Christmas tree and our gifts underneath it.

Jake and I spent about $2US on each other. And then played a Monopoly Card game that my parents gifted me. After that we played some video games. MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Santa Claus in Taiwan

陀螺 - Ancient Chinese Spinning Top

Taipei 101

Crooks

4 for 1 - Scooter

This is a very common site to see. Four people on one scooter.

Skating Taichung Fountain

Weekend Warriors Trailer 1

My friend Michael is trying to put a skate video together for fun. Here is the first video trailer he made.

Taiwan Hospitality

I took a trip up to Naili to see my friend Michael and go skate with him. I was hungry from my long trip so I stopped at McDonalds to grab a bite to eat. The line happened to be really long and the service was really slow at the time. When I noticed a lady in the very front of the line, look back at me and point. She then points to the ground where she is standing. I realized she was signaling me to come to her, I walk up to the front of the line and order my food. Unsure of what was really going on, I though maybe all the people in front of me had possibly ordered already. I then asked Michael, "did I just cut all those people?" "Yes." Apparently this isn't the first time it has happened to foreigners...just another day in Taiwan Hospitality.

The Winning Ticket

In Taiwan, every receipt has a lottery number on it. When you buy gum, milk, anything, there is always a lottery number. After saving your receipts for two months they will post the winning numbers online. So after saving hundreds of receipts and searching through the list of numbers to see if any of mine matched I have finally won $200, that is of course $200NT which equals to about $6 in America.

American Treatment...typical day.

I had to go on a 3 hour bus ride to 高雄 (Gaoxiong) to promote SYME at a Christian Christmas (kinda English) concert called "Friends Forever". Around 2:30 I go get a taxi to take to the bus station. I tell the taxi where I want to go, "Gong Guang"(its the name of the bus station). He tells me to get in, then asks me "在那裡" (Where do you want to go). So I tell him again. He seemed a little confused, and it could be because my tones aren't completely correct and my Chinese accent is overpowered with an American one.   He repeats saying some street name, but it seemed like it might be incorrect. So then I tell him "車佔、我要去高雄." (Bus Station, I want to go to Gaoxiong). So he, realizes what I want, and drives me to the bus station.

When I get to the bus station I buy my ticket. I tell the guy behind the counter where I want to go. He gives me the ticket and tells me "Go to information to get your ticket number". I being a little confused, seeing as I already had my ticket and there was plenty of numbers on the ticket already, said "ticket number?" "Yes, go to information to receive your ticket number." Instead of asking questions I just go to see what this ticket number is about. I go up to the counter and hand the lady my ticket and say "ticket number?" She then looks down a list writes the number 12 down on a piece of paper and my ticket. I then realized that it must be some priority order thing for getting on the bus.

After I go sit down a short chubby soft spoken man approaches me and says "The bus will be coming in a few minutes." "Ok how many minutes, like 5 min.?" After he stood silent for a couple moments looking at his watch, he looks back up at me and says "20 min." "Ok, thank you."

When the bus arrives I go to get in line for the bus, I am probably the 5th person in line. The ticket man lets the first 3 people on, then stops at the lady in front of me and makes her stand aside. I try to give him my ticket also, not really sure if it is because he thinks I am with her or not, but he refuses it. During this the ticket man had stopped the line and gotten onto the bus. So my friend from earlier, sees me standing there and comes over to me and tells me to wait a moment. He then goes onto the bus and has a discussion with the ticket man. They get off the bus and the ticket man takes my ticket. I then get onto the bus, with about 3 other people, noticing that there isn't any seats left. They kindly ask the few of us to get off the bus. My new friend tells me, "I'm so sorry the next bus will be coming. "Oh it's ok, what time will it be here?" He leaves to go find out the time, so I sit down. He then comes back over to me and says;

"20 min., I'm so sorry."
"Its fine."
"Sorry sorry sorry."
"Its ok."

Moments later he comes back with a warm drink for me while I wait and apologizes some more. When the bus arrives a line forms and I go to get inline but the man running the tickets puts in me the front of the line. So I can be the first on the bus.

This is just kind of a typical experience I have while traveling around in Taiwan with the language barrier and so fourth.

Taichung Flower Exhibit

About an hour away from home on an almost free bus ride, I went to see flowers with Anne Marie and Joanna. The Bus dropped us off then it was a kinda short-long walk to the flower exhibit. There was tons of people, fields filled with millions of flowers, and also a lot of food stands.

This is their Thanks Giving display. They actually had a mini corn field, kinda funny, but I guess they don't get to see corn everyday like we do in the States.

The walk back to the bus station was really far and hot. We probably walked for half and hour and had a lot more to go. While we were walking a car pulled over to talk to Joanna. Joanna said something and before I knew it, we were getting a ride from a stranger. She seemed really nice and asked us if we wanted to go somewhere. We said sure. We ended up taking a 1:30 hour trip to some mountain for a hike.

滑滑板在台中台彎

Out with the old, in with the New.

It wasn't hard for me to find shoes for really low prices in the US. So luckily I brought a few extra pairs for skating in. But my shoes slowly all got pretty thrashed. I held out as long as I could to find a good price. I could find plenty of really cheap shoes for $15 but would fall apart within a week. I finally found a Vans store that sold shoes on sale for $30 and bought myself two pairs.

Skating in Na Li

Michael Mcdonald - Switch fs 180

Reviewing the footage

Michael Mcdonald - Switch Crooks

Anthony Homer - fs 5-0

Chinglish...No Touch, Please!

What they mean is "Please do not touch." But the funniest part is that this 'Fragile' object is a t-shirt and you need a staff member to help you handle this expensive piece of luxury.

Taipei Voyage

Anne Marie went to work at a Orphanage for a few days near Taipei. So we went up a day early to enjoy the rainy day. This is the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial.

Many people gathered to watch the changing of guards. They went through this long little performance to switch the guards posted. After it was done two guards stood staring, across from each other not moving for anything.

Underneath/inside the building is a art gallery among other things and little souvenir shops.

 We then were taken to this very populated temple. There was lines of people coming here to worship.

A strange feeling came over me, as I watched one of the students that was with me go over to worship while we were there standing with her. It just helped me to realize the reality of it a little more.

We then walked down to an old street. The old buildings were filled with contemporary strange art. The picture to the left was taken in a room down a strange hall way. The rooms only had a chair in them, with headsets hanging from the ceiling. You sit down and listen to the strange noises.

Is that the Shell gas station logo?

This one was my favorite, though it was hard to photograph. It was in a completely dark room. There was merely a little toy train running on a track with the light shinning from the front of him. He would drove through pencils and by other objects to create beautiful shadows on the walls.