Routine

My daily life in Taiwan doesn't seem extra ordinary to me but it differs from life in the States. One of my priorities while I'm here is representing the United States and painting an accurate picture of Taiwan for family and friends who aren't here.

At 6:00 my alarm clock goes off and I rise from my deep sleep. Within a few steps I'm in the kitchen and I go straight for the coffee percolator. After my breakfast of peanut butter toast and coffee I'm out the door. On my way out I grab a water bottle and slide off my indoor sandals. I put my shoes on outside of the apartment door and take the elevator down to the first floor. The gate keeper says good morning ( in Chinese) and I reply. On my way to the MRT station I pass the old woman's taichi class. Which involves paper fans, red uniforms, music, and a series of dynamic movements. Most shops and businesses are closed this early in the morning but the twenty-four hour convenient stores like 7Eleven remain open. After avoiding dog feces, motor scooters, and any collisions with bicycles I arrive at the MRT station. The new MRT line whizzes me to the National Taipei University of Education where I take Chinese lessons. I'm in class with Brazilians and Mexicans and I hear about the same amount of English and Spanish with a heavy dose of Chinese.

Class ends at 11:30 and everyone is hungry. Local food shops know our faces by now. Especially the dumpling shop. With dumplings at 5 NT a piece, it's one of our favorite venues. Menus are in Chinese, but it poses no problem now because we've mastered the art of ordering and almost anything that we happen to order by accident ends up tasting great.

When our belly's are full we head back to our high schools. For me this means another MRT ride and a bus ride. While waiting for my ride one day I watched an elderly man hobble off his bus and make a phone call in the middle of the road. He then proceeded to walk off the road unzip his pants and urinate on a fence.

I arrive at Dunxu Technical and Vocational High School around 2:00. At school I spend my time reading anything I can get my hands on. The last book I read was the Theory of Knowledge. In between classes if the weather is nice I play basketball with my classmates. School ends at 5:00. I climb onto bus 508 and head back to Sanchong. I'm home at 6:00 and eat dinner at 7:00. Dinner is always white rice with various vegetables, and meats and is always eaten with chopsticks. Tofu and oyster omelets frequently make the menu and no matter how hard I try my host mother won't let me help with cleaning the dishes. Dessert is always chopped up fruit. Taiwan cooking relies heavily on sodium based flavors. Many Taiwanese don't like sweets and much to my amazement my friend doesn't even like pancakes. Apples are even served with salt on them.

I do my laundry by hand at night. It hang dries outside my bedroom window. When the sun goes down the fireworks light up. The city doesn't sleep which means I've learned to ignore or accept fireworks serenading me to sleep instead of crickets.

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