I'm sorry Indiana, apparently Taiwan decided to take all your rain away from you! I've heard it's been very dry over there recently, which is certainly not the case here! The lightening last night was pretty incredible, with several bolts literally striking right outside my window. The rain poured nonstop from evening all the way through the next day. The flooding has gotten bad enough that when I got to the zoo, there was a city wide shut down, closing all the schools, universities, and goverment facilities. So we all had to leave early. I asked if this is something that is common here, seeing as typhoon season is approaching. They said no, but I think it occurs just about as much as we have snow days at home. I heard on the radio that they had to evacuate about 3,000 people out of one area of the city because of the flooding. And typhoon season starts in July... I have no idea what that's going to be like!
It's been a pretty good last couple of days, to everyone's relief I'm sure :) I got to go shopping with Christina Huang, a fellow Columbus native who is here visiting family. So nice to have something in common with someone here! I did quite a bit of exploring and am taking advantage my independence.
After a great deliberation with my zoo coworkers, I finally have a Chinese name- something I have been wanting since I arrived. From now on you can just call me Lán Yuan. Brownie points for you if you know what it means! Take a guess.
Random cultural things I've discovered in Taiwan-
- When showing the number 6 with your fingers, instead of using all the fingers of one hand and the index finger of the other, you use the thumb and pinky. 7 is the thumb and index finger.
- I hardly ever see any colored cars here, other than yellow taxis. It's either black, white, or maybe a silver car here and there.
- People will wear pretty much anything with English on their clothing, and it is sometimes apparent when they have no idea what their clothes are actually saying. When discussing this with my Taiwanese friends, I found that Ameicans are just as guilty when getting Chinese symbols as tattoos- getting the "prettiest" looking symbol is probably a bad idea.
- There is never a day here when ladies do not go without their umbrella. It could rain that day, or the sun may shine that day, and unlike the American obsession with being tan leather bags, Asians have an obsession with being as transparent as a ghost. Looks like we all just want to be what we aren't...
- People here will eat anything, and I mean ANYTHING.
- There are very few trash cans anywhere outside or even in buildings, which is always inconvenient, yet there is hardly any litter to be seen. I guess Americans are literally trashy people, no pun intended.
- abc= American born Chinese
- Everyone here knows about Purdue University, and everyone here believes it's an Ivy League school. I'm ok with that.
Christina and I
Some pictures of the area around my dorm. I live right across the street from the Taipei water park
This is under a bridge near my dorm. They have a rock climbing wall and a giant slide that I never knew about until I went exploring.
Looks a little like Columbus, IN
711 next door to me. These things are like Starbucks, they're everywhere!
Memorial burial site for a past NTU president
Entrance to the farmer's market I went to
This is what I meant when I said they'll eat anything...... please don't stare at it for too long...
Baby mangoes- up there on my favorite food so far!
NTU sports center
They were getting ready for the NTU prom when I was looking around. At first I thought they were setting up for a fashion show. Red carpet Harry Potter theme, I'm pretty jealous
Not sure who was going to be playing, but setting up for a live band.
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