A different take...

Day two of session B: Family/Relationships and Personalities day. I had the whole class draw out their family trees so they could get up and present what their family is like. One by one, each student went up to the front and described how many uncles, aunts, cousins, brothers and sisters they have, but things switched up and took a little turn when Sabrina stood up and started to tell us about her family. When telling us about her Grandfather that passed away a few years back, she nonchalantly mentioned that this Grandfather still lives with her and her family. I usually pass up little moments like this, assuming that something is getting lost in the translation and that she just used the wrong word and it had different connotations. But the other students were also confused by this statement. "What do you mean? He lives with you?" they asked. Without skipping a beat, Sabrina cheerfully smiled and told us, "yeah, he lives with us. He's a ghost. And when I see him, he's usually moving around like this," she says, rocking her hips in a circular motion and waving her arms around gently. My eyes, without a moment of hesitation, widened as far as they go. But I looked around and found no response from everyone else. They just gently nodded as if it was the social norm to have the ghost of their grandfather dancing around their house. In fact, one of my most hilarious students, Vivian, chimed in, in her adorable, loud but sweet voice, "Oh yeah, me too! My Grandmother's ghost visits us too! She's crazy!" Sabrina and Vivian just went back and forth, back and forth discussing their ghost-family-members, talking about how they both were vegetarians because of their religion but how God himself told Vivian's grandmother that it really was OK if she ate meat. But the others could not because God had not spoken to them. This little conversation between these girls just made me realize, that the cultural divide is so great, and it escapes no bounds...ghosts and all.

By the way, the picture is of my hilarious Sabrina...one of my personal favorite pictures of her!

Taiwan TV...entertaining even if I don't understand it...

A month is a long time to be away from not only home, but also the American culture as well. At the risk of sounding like an "outside culture hating" individual, I have to admit that one of the things that I do miss is my couple TV shows. So, a few days into the trip I turned on the TV in my hotel room in desperate hopes of finding something in English...you know, for that little "touch" of home. Sure enough, I found HBO and a couple other movie channels, but in my scan-through, I found some pretty interesting shows/channels. One of the first things I came across, was the Karaoke TV..which is exactly what it sounds like. It's just individuals standing in front of a green screen, singing a song karaoke style as the words span across the screen. I guess they take their karaoke seriously...they have to practice at home. There are many channels with 'childrens' programs, which include crazy cartoons whose voices don't match (not even close) the mouths and possessed looking traditional chinese puppets. Of course, one of my personal favorites, is the home-shopping!! Their choices of jewelry and techniques of selling, has me rolling!! American home-shopping is all about the cheesy fake enthusiasm while here, it is insane, over the top excitement. No matter how funny some of these shows are...I still miss Project Runway, So you think you can dance, and Sex and the City!

WHAT is the theme?...

Out to dinner at our favorite dumpling house last night, conversation took a turn to other restaurants. We got on the topic of unusual products or themes that we've come across in our time here. Someone mentioned that at Danshui, the Coney Island-like place in the city, one of the prizes a person could win at one of the game stands was a two-foot tall, inflatable, brown swirly pile of poop. The 13 year old boy part of my crazy sense of humor immediately found this hysterical. Then Theresa told us about a restaurant somewhere in the city that one of her students had told her about. Apparently, this restaurant's theme... is the bathroom. The chairs are toilets, the table is a giant sink that has a glass top that looks like it's filled with water, and the food is all served in miniature toilets. Is it bad that I want to go to this restaurant??

It's Kind of Hard to Mime That...

Today was day one of session B. Waking up at 6:30am to get ready for the opening ceremony, first of all, is not my favorite thing in the world. But the response I received from my group made up for my lack of sleep and immediately gave me that burst of energy that I needed. Standing in front of these 150 students, giving my small introduction to myself, I asked, "So where are my group H people?" Expecting nothing more than a few reluctant hands to be raised to eye-level, much like every other person's group, I stumbled backwards from the sudden loud screams from about a dozen girls from the back row. I knew from that moment that this group was going to be amazing.
When I got to our new rooms, I immediately realized...cripes...it's freakin' hot in here. The air conditioning was O-U-T, out. I felt like a donut...my skin was glazed with sweat from the most extreme heat that we have experienced yet. The humidity today was ridiculous. That would have been an interesting introduction..."Hey everyone! Don't worry, your teacher isn't melting. Just ignore the puddles!" Thank goodness someone got it fixed before everyone showed up.
As the class progressed, I realized that my assumption that this class would be crazy and rowdy was totally and 100% correct! Some of these students had such lively and robust personalities. I was in shock--my previous students would barely speak, even when I called on them. These kids are actually volunteering and are just spilling their guts. I'm so excited for the rest of the class. I discovered, through the last couple weeks, that when they don't understand something, I generally have to mime a word or phrase for them. A student had given me a Taiwanese magazine to look through during lunch and on an ad for Valentine's Day, there was a phrase with the word "dung" in it. I just had to giggle to myself. I asked them how to pronounce it here to see if it was the same, mainly because as you've probably read, I have really discovered the importance of pronunciation here! Sure enough, it was pronounced the same. I told them, "It's just kind of funny, because in America, 'dung' is another word for poop." They gave me the look; the look I was dreading after uttering that sentence. The look that said, "I don't have a freakin' clue what you just said." Oh great. How in the world a I going to get them to know the word poop. Thank goodness I could describe my way out of that one, because miming 'poop' might ruin my integrity as their teacher. I can just hear them now, going home to their family or roommates; "You will never believe what our teacher did today..." Oh good lord, the mortification.
Later in the day, showing my pictures from home, one of my students asked me about my friend Jeff's shirt: a Hooter's t-shirt. She asked me what it was. Again, what in the heck am I going to say or do to describe that "classy" part of American culture?? But once again, after a few key phrases, I got her to understand. Once she understood, she mentioned that there was a similar kind of restaurant in Taipei. Ten bucks says that it's not considered a "family restaurant" like Hooter's pretends to be. Ahh, the education that I'm giving... poop and boobie restaurants. Classy.

This City Loves to Sleep...

I walk around the city, stopping at all sorts of famous buildings, temples, museums, and stores--some days, we are out almost the whole day. I feel slightly worn near the evening rush hour, but I catch my second wind right around supper. But it seems like everywhere I go, I see random people catching a short little snooze in the most public of places! The MRT seems to be the most common that I see. Little old men, business men in their pressed suits, school children, mothers, everyone seems to be able to fall asleep sitting completely upright; a skill that I have never been able achieve. But what baffles me about these dozing people, is that the seem to wake up completely alert moments before their stop. If I was to, on the rarest of chances, fall asleep on a mode of transportation, I would be the crazy fool that falls off the chair and curls up in the fetal position, snoring like a ban saw.
What kills me, to the point of hysterics, is the fact that I was at the Sun Yut San Memorial today, and I saw three men sleeping in an informational movie viewing room...and the movie wasn't even playing. There were people snoozing on benches against the wall, their shoes off and up resting on the other end of the bench; there was a man sleeping on a park bench, sprawled out as if he was on his bed at home; people randomly taking naps on the floor and on small chairs in the book store. Why are they so tired?
I wonder sometimes, what does the world know that we Americans don't. It seems like the people from around the world take a portion of their DAY to dedicate to sleep, and yet we quit this wonderful concept after the age of 6. I remember times when sleep was a form of punishment. But now, I would give my right foot (or maybe the left) for a good solid nap every afternoon. So maybe, next time I'm coming home on the MRT, I'll try to catch 3 or 4 ZZZ's...even at the risk of falling off of that plastic blue chair, snoring loudly on the panelled floor.

It Pays to Know the Language...

Pushing myself to go to a country where I don't speak the language is probably one of the biggest challenges I have faced. Sure, I've been to France, but at least their language is written in the same alphabet where you can try to decipher what it possibly means. But here, exploring the authenticity of Asia, the Chinese characters, after a while, all end up looking like a picture of a house. Setting out and yet another day of sight-seeing, I found it almost comical the situations we get ourselves into when 'trying' something since we have no idea what the description or directions are. My personal favorite moment from today was when Anna and I were at the Taipei Main Station underground mall and we saw a line of 3D viewfinders. Looking them over, they each had a title written in Chinese characters on them, but obviously, we were SOL on that one. We looked at each other--"Want to?" "Sure, why not?" We stuck in the coin and bent forward to see the what this viewfinder had to offer. My slides began going by-- "huh, it's the zoo." They were all pictures of all sorts of animals. But from my right, I hear Anna, "Oh my gosh! It's a girl in a bikini!" Anna had accidentally chosen the "Men's entertainment" slide-show. We laughed as the slides continued to roll. Soft-core porn pictures flipped by one by one, but we could barely see them, our eyes were glossed with tears from laughter.

The Trouble with Gongguan

When being told about the city sights and places of interests in the first days of this trip, I was told about a place called Gongguan Station. In fact, we made a quick stop there on our second day, just to see what it had to offer from a quick glance. Throughout the last week of class, my students had been asking me what I was interested in seeing in the city, wanting to take me around and show me the city themselves. When one of my students, Ray, asked me that question, to which I responded, "I would really like to go to Gongguan Station and Night market." Ray almost choked on his drink as he looked at me through the smudged lenses of his black-rimmed glasses, his eyes radiating shock. I couldn't understand this response. I was told it was a good place to go. After getting his swig of green tea down, he repeated my request, followed by miming the actions of flashing his chest as if questioning if he heard me correctly. Now extremely confused, I said it again. "Gongguan Station...the shopping district? Right after Wanlong Station?" It clicked. His chest rose with a sigh of relief. "Do you mean Go-ng-guan?" he asked me. I had said it incorrectly. I pronounced it gone-guan. He proceeded to tell me the difference in pronunciation. 'Go-ng-guan' was the shopping district off of the MRT. 'Gone-guan' is the word for stripper pole. That's right, I had inadvertently asked my student to take me to a strip club instead of a respectful shopping part of Taipei. "Oops, my bad," has become a part of my daily conversation here.
Now knowing of its abundance of shopping options and proper pronunciation, I set out to take it in all that the district had to offer. Keeping me company and helping me navigate, is Anna. We pass store after store, each selling clothing, jewelry, purses, and eye-wear. After a while, the clothing stores begin to blur together. But the occasional hilarious store name keeps us entertained. "Oh My God" "I Swear" "The Dancing Cow." Anything in English here, whether it be on a store-front sign or spelled out on a t-shirt, is more than likely grammatically incorrect. My favorite from Gongguan tonight, was "Is Coffee Always Fresh." As a person who dedicates so much time to the language and words in general, these signs hurt my soul. :) All the more reason why I am here, spreading the knowledge of proper English--someone has to put an end to this insanity. Then again, everyone needs a few funny things to take a picture of and send back home!