Ferris Wheels, Hot Springs and Friends

I just realized that I often think about what to post on my blog and then think it has been posted but never gets put up. That's okay because I know everything will be in a scrap book of Taiwan at some point. As for the National Day of Taiwan I never went out to see the ceremony but heard the fireworks at night were more exciting than the day parade. It was supposed to be very special though after one hundred years.

I highlighted pictures of two places in two weekends that I went to. I put a day and night picture of the ferris wheel located in Jiannan 劍南 which I could go on with a student discount.... if I had the guts to go that high up. While there I saw this one building that brought me back to Barcelona. The building is a restaurant apparently but it is so tall and pops out as a structure of Antoni Gaudi. The day started out at a Japanese Curry "mini fair" where a company was advertising their food with mini games that my Japanese friends and Madrid friend took turns playing until we got free meal packages to cook at home. Of course I couldn't without a stove so I gave mine away. But it was fun nonetheless. Most of the day we spent in the mall window shopping and learning Spanish, Japanese and Chinese. I love talking about languages and in other languages that most of the day was spent rambling back and forth. It's the best for picking up terms. I have been notably picking up lots of Japanese phrases and teaching Spanish ones in turn. It has been great having a friend from Madrid to share my experiences with and find out more about that beautiful country. She has already invited all of us to tour Spain with her and of course we all have offered the same to each other.

Just to ramble on this topic I'm considering doing just that with one Japanese friend who's grandparents own a hotel in Okinawa for very cheap. I can stay there for $10 a night and go scuba diving and what not. At the moment I plan to go on a boat since Okinawa is so close to Taiwan. Why not!? Just an exciting plan at the moment.

Today I just came back from Beitou 北投, which is very famous for their sulfuric hot springs. I shared a hot spring with Shiori that started at 116 Fahrenheit about 48 Celsius. The photo you see is of Hell Valley 地熱舍 which is the source of hot water piped into lovely hotels all over the mountain. All of the guys went into a public single sex no clothes allowed hot spring. I'm happy I had the option to wear my bathing suit and that my Japanese friends where totally friendly about my decision. None of them wear swim wear or as I learned "mizu gi" (in Chinese it's “you yong yi” 游泳衣) when they bathe and naturally my friend choose a bath house modeled after the Japanese tradition and not Taiwanese, which do wear bathing suits. I was initially surprised when I heard, "no clothes" but they asked for other options for me when I said 不好意思 (bu hao yi si) embarrassing.
Afterwards, we took a quick stop at 士林夜市 Shi lin Night Market in order to eat dinner for a second night in a row. Saturdays are more crowded as we found out. We had gone there the night before to go bowling and eat dinner. Fridays are a better time from now on.

In case anyone is wondering why go to the hot springs. I feel 10x more relaxed now than I have all week. But then I've been sore all week too. Now I'm very comfortable. I hope next week I will not be as sore since this week I started up Judo yet again after four years and my body went into a slight shock from the intense work out. I made myself do something I wanted to do for health purposes to stay in shape AND of course be around Taiwanese to speak more Mandarin. So far it's a success! My Judo gi will be in Monday and I'm very excited :)

Spirited Away to KTV

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to update the blog since it has been so long. I have to parts since there has been a lot going on. For one, the cold season is now over. I still have a stuffed up nose but it's been worse.

It feels as though my stay is half way through. I need to extend my visa with Amy for another 90 days since Taiwan gave me a 90 day extendable visa.

Today is the 10 of October, which means the 100th anniversary for Taiwan! It's a National Day with a big parade. I will go to see the fireworks tonight with my school friends. I decided to stay in and do laundry and study in the mean time.

As for the past week or so. My friends have been coming and going. Two just left. One to Hong Kong and another back to Austria right around Salz-burg. I had asked her if she liked the Sound of Music and she told me she had not seen it but that everyone asked her this. I made her promise to watch it soon!

Back to the story, my friend from Austria wanted to go to Jiefun this week. http://wikitravel.org/en/Jiufen
The town is on the eastern coast of Taiwan so I had a first sight of the ocean on the eastern side from the mountains that the well known movie Spirited Away took place at. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirited_Away

I found this to be very exciting because I saw the movie a few times and the place is very traditional. The roads are lined with red lanterns and shops with trinkets of all sorts. We all ate outside at a very nice restaurant that I put a picture of on here. We went in the afternoon to see the shops while they were still open and the spectacular view and then the lanterns were lit as it got dark.

Earlier in the week, I was at KTV with my friends and with Laura's co-worker from Taiwan. It was my first time at a Karaoke. The building itself was a tall skyscraper in the hub of Ximending night market. We were on the 9th floor, lined with rooms that looked like a hotel. The lobby of our floor had an all you can eat buffet and we ate a lot and sang a lot. I think it was very cool because we had people from everywhere so we could sing in English, Chinese, and Japanese. I could read some of the Chinese so I sang along to Jay Chou and Show Lou. But we all sang "We are the World" because it was appropriate. We were Austrian, Italian, Australian, American, Japanese and Taiwanese all in the same room :)