how exciting?

change is good, no? =)

well everything is still going smoothly here. getting better and better at this thing they call teaching. I'm getting a little restless though...seems like everyday is like the day before. and the day before was like the day before that, and so on and so on.

so to illustrate my litte predicament here's a quick rundown of an average day (which is to say EVERYDAY)

9:00 - Wake up

9:00 to 3:00 - Kill time running errands, shopping, watching tv, picking my nose, staring into space, etc.. if i'm lucky I'll spend a couple of hours tutoring uni students here and there.

3:30 - leave for work

4:00 to 10:00 - At work, preparing, teaching, marking homework

10:30 - come home, eat dinner (and by dinner I mean candy)/watch movie

?? - sleep whenever

THEN I GET TO START ALL OVER AGAIN THE NEXT DAY! EXCITING STUFF OR WHAT?!

yea so the irony of Taiwan is neverending...every day it's something new. The other day I was at a night market with a friend (african american from chicago) and we were approached by a group of hardcore goth teens - head to toe in black and metal studs - they asked if they could take pictures with us....and here i was thinking THEY were the odd ones. If my Ethio friend from Korea was still here she would've shouted something like "nigga please! I should be taking a picture of your ass. Freak!"

I guess it's all about perspective lol!

Chinese class was interesting today, our teacher asked me to say "The teacher wants to take a cup" so I did, or I thought I did. instead I said, "the teacher wants to take the child." Taken literally that shouldn't mean much right?? Haha but noo, lucky for me there's a special meaning to that - abortion. The teacher laughed for a good minute and finally topped long enough to explain why she was laughing. heh, good times! we say some crazy things in that class.

it's pretty cool though to be almost, kinda, semi-functional in a new language. I'm getting better each day and even though I know I'll never master the writing or anything it's still cool to understand words here and there!

zai chien =)

IT'S TRUE! IT'S TRUE! I heard a lot of ish about foreigners in Taiwan and how they can get away with a lot of crap on the road but it's trueeeee, and I found out the hard way...

I got stopped by a police officer couple of nights ago: I was coming home late and I made an illegal left turn - which EVERYONE does, in the beginning i followed the rules but since then I found it easier to follow the crowd (sometimes it's more dangerous to follow traffic rules)
Anyway, he stopped me and I took my helmet...after taking one look he motioned for me to go on. I thought he meant get off the scooter and he was like 'bye bye!" so I got back on and sped off like a bat out of hell!

I was told that's what would happen. it's hard to believe it actually happens tho. shoot i'm so lucky, I had at least three infractions on me (the illegal turn, my scooter doesnt have the emission sticker AND I was wearing my mp3.) that could've been a lot of money in tickets...

sooo obviously I hadn't stuck to my word since it's been well over a week since my last post. that shows what my word is good for - NOTHING, NADDA, ZIP. yep yep. so for future reference, if I make u a promise, take it with a grain of salt ;p

anyway, nothing new to report 'cept that I have a wicked cold. teaching is same ol' same ol'. they say that no two classes are the same, but dammit I beg to differ! damn the Man. what? I don't know why I said that.

moving on...the weather is getting cooler eh. bad news for us scooterists (i love making up new words. it's so supacious) really bad news for the gazillion stray animals out here. poor creatures. hope the elements are kind to them this year, cause I know that they won't get any kindness from 85% of the population here. I was thinking about joining an animal rights volunteer group or something. we'll see how that goes..

oh and a friend passed me her new Justin Timberlake CD and as much as it pains me to say this...I actually like it?? what has Taiwan done to me? my wardrobe is changing too, the other day I was eying a pair of bright coloured wooly leg warmers (eighties style) shoot :