I love Daunce- Travels of Sweden and Greece Part 1

There are many things in this world that I love.
I love family and friends. Duh.
I love coffee and books and movies and boys with glasses. Double Duh.
Even more rare, I love the combination of coffee with banana, the way that water sounds you’re your ears are underwater, the way that Spaniards talk with a lisp, eating ice cream when I said I was going to go for a run, and oddly enough, I love writing.
But there is something that I realized in my travels to Sweden and Greece. Something I knew I loved but didn’t know to what extent, to what extreme.
Now I realize.
Now I know.
Thanks to my traveling buddy Raleigh, thanks to the clubs in Santorini, thanks to a French singer named Stromae, I now know, that among other things in this world, I love Daunce.

Not just dance. Not the typical hippity hoppity kind of dancing. Not the kind of swaying or side stepping- none of that. More of the soulful, deep-voiced, authentic body thrusting kind of DAUNCE where nothing is going through your mind except for the power of the music and how awesome you look in that moment even though you just look like a white girl stuck at a junior high dance with awkwardly closed eyes and even more awkwardly swaying hips. That is what I realized I loved to an extreme this summer.
Bus alas, that was only a part of the trip, for this was an epic two week trip rounding from Taiwan to Sweden to Greece and sadly back to Taiwan.
Going to Sweden to visit grandfather and grandmother was a whiff of something that had been utterly lacking in my life in Taiwan- family! Oh to be around family, around Armenian, around Armenian food, around loving and nurturing people, was such a drastic change from my daily life that I was able to soak in and truly appreciate my time there.
And you know there are those moments in life when you look back and say, man, those were the good times and I wish back then I knew how special that moment would be later in life. The day we went to my grandpa’s dacha was that kind of special moment. Well it was that kind of moment except for the fact that while I was experiencing it, I already knew it was that special moment. So in this way, I could live it enjoying it in the present, knowing how important it would be in the future when that moment would become the past. I think it was a glance of what eternity feels like- when the mix of past, present, and future coalesce into one moment, one meal, one hug.
We arrived at the dacha in the afternoon and spent the next few hours picking berries, digging up potatoes, and watching my grandpa barbecue juicy eggplant, tomatoes, pepper, and fresh beef. Oooo Gooood Lord. It was soo good to be around such good company, such fresh air, and such delicious food. After picking thousands and thousands of raspberries and linden berries,


Rals and I walked to the lake, had a sword fight, went to the bathroom next to each other on dual porter potty seats, and we just smiled knowing that we were partaking in a day that would last us a lifetime.

We came back from the lake just in time for the most amazing meal of my life- eggplant salad, fresh tomatoes with basil and onions, boiled and seasoned potatoes, and juicy steak, followed by fresh mint tea and coffee.

All grown and prepared on the little plot of land built and cared for by my grandparents.

Is there any need to continue with the rest of the trip? …….ok Yeahhhhh.

Don’t you want to know about Greece??? And why I love Daunce?
Stay tuned...

Hey Taiwan, I want an Umbrella for the Typhoon

It’s funny to look out of my window in Taiwan and see that uneasy yellow upside down W. Funny that on a typhoon day in Asia, all I see is a sign for McDonalds. Funny that I am in Asia at all.
Today the government called a “Typhoon warning” which forced the schools and most businesses to be shut down for the day- AKA, a reason for me to stay home and eat and watch gluttonous amounts of The Office.
Well then,somehow I have ended up on the sixth floor of a fancy apartment building, listening to Wyclef, and observing the ruckus this Typhoon is causing. For this reason (the constant rain, not Wyclef), the country is green- a luscious green dare I say. But not like the luscious red lips you might automatically picture, but luscious like the jungle is in Tarzan, or like the Amazon, or like apple flavored Jolly Ranchers. But this is not entirely true because I live in the city and here in the city, McDonalds has stolen the greenery and added McLuscious to the menu (corny yet true), leaving this city balding. Tarzan would be very sad here.

But alas, let’s get back to my story. So here i am in Taiwan for about a year to teach English to little rotting-toothed witty Taiwanese kids. Let me tell you a few things about these kids who can be quite the little cheeky ones.
You know how when something is gross we say, “eewwwww”. Well here they don’t say ew, they say something like this, Hiiiyyuuuuu, with a really whiney voice.
Or sometimes when on a test, a six year old girl has to write, “He has a big duck”, but unintentionally writes, “he has a big dick”, you have to slap yourself and laugh and remember that this is an unusual life you have chosen and it should not be taken too seriously, especially if you have a big duck.

Sometimes when you go around to three year olds teaching them one key phrase, “May I go to the bathroom” and you repeat it over and over and go to each child saying, “may I go to the bathroom” and waiting for them to repeat and then kneeling in front of 3 and a half year old William, asking him to repeat “may I go to the bathroom”, and waiting in silence for him attempt his inquiry , when he looks at you with his sad thoughtful puppy eyes, discomfort from his diapers peeking through, and he replies in all seriousness, “yes.” Yes teacher, you may go to the bathroom, he is allowing me. Thanks little buddy.

And the most important lesson to survive in Taiwan with children is to learn that there is no such thing as Rock, Paper, Scissors here. Oh no, it is, prepare these items and choose wisely from: Paper, Scissors, and Stone. And this Confucian method is used to decide EVERYTHING- from who gets to roll the dice, to who hit whom in this acciden. You can also find pockets of little children standing in groups playing Paper, Scissor, Stone. And it is beyond me how you can play this probability game with a group- and yet, in Taiwan, they do.

In Taiwan, Things you never dreamed are possible. Things like meals for under $2, a gross misuse and waste of plastic bags, a family of six riding on a tiny scooter, girls dressed in clubbin skanky dresses with their hair done at a salon just to go Karaoke in a private room with their friends ( KTV as it is known here and is considered the hub for youngsters), and even things like shirts that break upon first wear yet apartments that outlast vicious tropical storms. This is Taiwan and oddly, it has somewhat become my Taiwan, my comforting little Asian fortress.

I have learned a lot about myself, a lot about Asian culture, yet sadly, very little of the Chinese language. My word, I have tried, but my Chinese gets me far enough to order food, say where I am going, that I am hot, and that "I want my iced American coffee to go- and that I don’t need a bag, but thank you very much". I sometimes wish I could speak Chinese so I could overhear conversations and get by easily but this grand communicating obstacle can be a source of patience, of learning, of using every other sense to act out and recreate my desire or need. I have become quite the actress.
Cue senses reenactment at the local 7-11:
Sound: “I would like an umbrella”.
Touch: Point and tap on counter.
Sight: Show a “hypothetical” girl who is caught in the rain holding a device in her hand to protect her from the torrents of water leaking from the sky.
Taste and Smell: These two sense are reserved for your imagination. Go wild.
So there it is. I went to buy an umbrella because the typhoon began yesterday while I was out buying mangos. They never can assume what I want- Taiwanese people can be kind of unimaginative when it comes to putting two and two together, sorry to say. It’s pouring, I’m wet with no obvious protection…”No, I don’t want cigarettes. Not an egg dipped in tea. Not a condom, but getting closer. Yes, Yes, umbrella! Bravo! Xie Xie.”
AAaaaand Time: 3 minutes and 24 seconds
For my next language exchange, I will try to memorize the word for umbrella, but it is highly unlikely I will get a chance to impose It into my mind deep enough to remember next time I need one. Plus, how many umbrellas can one girl have? Sheesh.

The not-so-silent Silent Retreat

The most recent of my escapades.

Kaohsiungliving.com has been my saving grace while I have been here. It is the online key to finding out everything that is happening in our big city and around Taiwan including but most definitely not limited to: moving sales, festivals, swap meets, job opportunities, and best of all the silent retreat that was opened to all the foreigners living around this area.
The reason for the retreat was for ex-pats, teachers, and students to have a “getaway weekend” at the most peaceful and beautiful location, Fo Guang Shan, one of the biggest Buddhist monasteries in the world.
It rests on top of a mountain separated by the business of Taiwan, much as I would picture Tibet to be.
Running on its own resources, the place exudes a healthy lifestyle and discipline.


What I did learn in this peaceful environment was refreshing; it was the importance of silence- to release, to think about the present, not the past and not the future. I have forgotten to breathe. To be alive.
We spent time writing, walking, eating in silence with all the monks (which was a crazy experience because all of your needs for more food of less food are done by placement of your bowls and plate), we listened to a prominent monk speak about some of his experiences, and we relaxed, taking the time to just breathe.

Now do not be fooled, I was not fully able to be serious and contemplative the whole time. I am a talker, and apparently so were the two other girls in my room and we stayed up much of our “supposedly silent” night giggling and being very un-monastic. But, to me, laughter is part of meditation too, and especially when I laugh really hard because I tend to get really silent and my face distorts a bit, and I look like I am going into silent convulsions. Now that is what I call silent meditation.

Spring Scream and karl

Southern Taiwan hosts one of the biggest music festivals EVER at this tiny beach town called Kenting. Normally, it is a pretty quiet beach town minus the one club that hogs all the attention by parading around their “stars”, a questionably buff man and an equally questionable woman who shoots fireworks out of her leather boobs.

So we drove about two hours south on our motorcycles with tents and sleeping bags safely secured atop them. I like to imagine that we looked much like a scene out of a really cool movie where these two girls ride around on their motorcycles, exploring the world and saving lives. Minus the exploring the world part...and saving lives.

For two days, we wandered around the festival, dancing, learning the greatness of Taiwanese Reggae, singing along in Chinese, and enjoying yet another strange and awesome Taiwanese festival.
I would say that the only thing I regret about that weekend was setting up our tent right next to a rooster. Baaaaad idea.

Then on our last morning before we headed back to life and work, we stopped by the beach and I met Karl. Everyone, I would like you to meet Karl.


He is from Sweden and it is 10:00 and he is just so Karl.
He sprawls out next to me and asks in his heavy accent,
“doz my chezt hair offend jou?”
“Not in the least.” I reply
“Great! So vat are you reading? Do jou read a lot? Good, good. (long pause) So, vill you marry me?”
“Yes of course.”
“Really? I have asked a lot of peoples and jou are ze first to say yes. Actually jou are ze only one I vould really vant to marry so it is quite perfect.”
I guess it really does happen when you least expect it...when you least expect HIM.

We planned our lives together and about an hour later after plans for 3 weddings and a place to live, he looked at me seriously and said,
“Now, I do have a very serious quvestion to ask jou. Please do not offend but it is very important that I know. Just prepare yourself for zis….Vat is your name?”
And we lived happily ever after.

Tutoring Catastrophe

Oh man, forget every embarrassing story you have heard because have I got a story for you. Well, how do I even begin? And pictures in this post will not be necessary.

Ah yes, it is Friday morning 10AM, the normal time when I drive my little motorcycle half an hour south to a small company for a two hour tutoring session with a group of Taiwanese businesspeople. It is a pretty legit session as I sit at the head of a conference table, leading discussions, writing important things on a whiteboard as they copy it down in their little notebooks, believing everything I say.

This particular day, the boss finds out I drive a motorcycle and is saying how cool and rare it is to see girls driving them (he speaks too soon). I usually have about five or six regular students but this day, for fate would not have it any other way, people keep trickling in and soon the room is full of businesspeople asking me how to make fight someone and make good threats. I walk up to the board and write, “I’ll kick your ass.” I explain that if you want to have a comeback to someone mocking you, you can say that or even, “kiss” instead of “kick”. So discussing and having everyone practice the phrase, we delve into a pretty deep discussion.

This day, Friday, I am wearing jeans rolled up to my calf, some pretty decently heeled shoes that my mom bought from me from Macy's, and a nice top- professional clothes for the professional that I am. Ahem. That is when I sit down and feel something odd on my right leg. A few days earlier I had gotten a burn on my leg from the muffler on my motorcycle and had bandaged it up pretty recklessly, so I figure it must be the bandage having come apart and stuck to the side of my calf. But when I reach down to touch my calf that is not what I find, not in the least bit.

What I feel is something quite soft, yes, soft and lacy, soft and lacy like underwear. Holding my breath, l look down and sure enough I see yesterday’s dirty underwear sticking halfway out of my rolled up jeans, dangling like some kid sticking its tongue out at me. Oh the fear and humiliation that accumulates in me this second, as I realize I have been walking up and down the conference room with my dirty underwear sticking out of my leg! I guess when I had showered the night before I had just thrown my jeans on my chair and then put them on again this morning, not realizing that the underwear was still inside, traveling down from the zipper to the right leg. Blast! No time to panic, NO TIME TO PANIC!

I keep the pace of the conversation, reach down and extract the foul embarrassment from my leg, and settle it on my lap as I causally reach for my small purse, open it and try to make room for my underwear and my pride. I manage to discreetly do that, though I am sure everyone has already seen everything, and I continue the rest of the two hour session a bit more nervous and twitchy.

Well if they didn’t get a good look at my shame then, they sure see it when, now, at the end of the session I open my purse to put in the money and resting on top of my wallet are those unabashed panties, singing songs of mockery.
I have no shame anymore because I have no pride, it disappeared the day businesspeople saw my dirty underwear displayed artistically on my pitiful bare leg.

Running is Dangerous...

I went on a run the other day to one of my favorite parks in Kaohsiung. It is pretty close to my house and has really cool and strange art including but not limited to: a tree house on the ground, a “pull my finger” statue, and other odd shapeless structures. So excited about exploring the cool park, I began my run back home and as I am running, alongside me wheeled an old barefooted man on a motorized cart going a little faster than my running speed.

He looked at me, passed me, and decided he didn’t get a good look the first time so began to turn his head to look again
However, due to instinct or synchronicity, his fingers followed the turn of his head and instead of just his head, he spun the whole wheelchair around at quite the backbreaking speed, sending him flying in the middle of the road, almost hitting a car. I stopped running, and started staring as he continued the spin and then stealthily pretended like he was making a left-hand turn at the intersection.


Of course I made sure he wasn’t hurt or frightened and that he was out of earshot, but I laughed so hard, seeing that “crap! be cool, be cool” look on his face as he squeaked onward.
A girl I met recently was talking about India and said that to experience it, you have to surrender yourself to the country. I think you have to surrender yourself to Taiwan, to the old man steering his cart into traffic trying to stare, to the strange occurrences that happen on a daily basis, and to life in general.

The Running of the Fireworks

Of all the strange things in Taiwan (which I have checked and confirmed is a lot), this festival must have been one of the craziest. Almost like a running of the bulls but Taiwanese style, a running of the fireworks.
We coated ourselves with armor: boots, jeans, gloves, jackets, scarves, face masks, helmets, glasses, towels, and anything else we could throw on, and took a train to the war zone.

Imagine thousands of Taiwanese people in airtight costumes- duck taped towels, actual shields, and Mickey Mouse helmets, huddled together on a warm Winter night, hopping up and down, getting directly shot at by fireworks.

No joke, the festival is celebrated by having the fireworks shot on the people. I am sure it has a great and historical story about a war god, but it has turned into a sort of self-punishment adrenaline rush. Either way, it was really fun, exciting, and so oddly Taiwanese.

Then we went home on a two-story bus with reclining bed seats, personal TVs, and built in massagers. Oh Taiwan.