Man-Q: Your Life Style

Today, I completed a full marathon in Miaoli. My plan had originally been to do the half-marathon but through some peer-pressure, I agreed to do what I thought would be impossible considering my current fitness level. It actually turned out to be a great day! We woke up at 4:30 AM to get our free breakfast, which we had been told would be a grand spread, but instead was a pastry and a sandwich with some whole milk, all in a little plastic bag. I ate the pastry. We wandered down to the finish line by 5:30 or so where our contingent of a dozen foreigners were paraded in front of the locals like monkeys. The race was considered "international" because Carrier, a fellow hasher, recruited about 12 other hashers to pretend that they'd just come to Taiwan for the race. It was a little goofy but the whole thing was free too so that was nice. We had a great hotel and free meals and the works. Anyway, at the start line, the only thing I could see in English was "Man-Q" which is apparently some sort of shampoo. I had been told it was an energy gel but I found out the hard way that it most certainly was not.

There were about 7,000 people who competed in the 10k, half-marathon, and marathon. I'm not sure how many people were in the marathon but Jacob and I finished in about 260th place in a time of roughly 3:57. Our goal had been to break 4 hours. Since I hadn't planned on running the marathon, I decided to be Jacob's pacer, although I think if I had taken off on my own, I probably wouldn't have run much faster. The race itself was out and back on a highway. So it was not the most interesting course, but the race went by surprisingly quickly. The weather was perfect: about 55 degrees and drizzling. Had it been a hot day, the outcome of the race would've been a lot different. Jacob and I were able to chat until about the 30K mark. We both started and stayed as relaxed as possible because both of us were not quite sure of how fit we were. Jacob started to hit the wall pretty badly the last 1oK or so but other than that, the race went smoothly. Apparently, we got the biggest cheer of all the participants when we crossed the finish line! We had a ton of people throughout the race saying "Go Go" and "Ja Yo" which is the same thing, but Chinese.

The winning time of the half-marathon was about 1:27, which really is not that impressive, but the winning time for the full was 2:29 which is very respectable. Apparently, the winner won $100,000 NT which is roughly $3,000 US. Well, I hope that's a pretty good summary of the race. I'm feeling very tired right now and my body is very achy. I'm really dreading waking up in the morning because that will be much more painful! I'll blog about the pain if it's significant enough. Ha ha.

Chicken Needs Beer to Have Less Chicken S#*&

This past Sunday, I had the privilege of going to a water park in Bali, which is a town just northeast of Linkou on the coast. I went with all of the teachers from school and we were there celebrating Jade's b-day, a former Principal teacher. The pictures I'll post will give you a better description of what it looked like, but it was awesome. It had relatively short lines, fun rides, and it wasn't too crowded. The highlight of the water park itself was the fact that all the lifeguards were male and they all wore tiny pink Speedos, which was pretty comical. And no, they weren't what you're thinking they are perhaps. That's just the uniform for some reason. They had a very prominent wall in the water park covered with photos of the lifeguards posing...very strange. It was a little Chippendale-esque. So yeah, that was all good and fun, but the cab ride home was the best part of the day. We got a ride back from Mr. Hwong, who had so kindly driven us there as well. In the cab, we tried to have a conversation with him and then I made the mistake of asking him if he liked music. He had a DVD and TV built into the car and he turned it on to the Taiwanese equivalent of MTV and it was all these teen girls dancing to techno music with strobe lights and everything and then Mr. Hwong started dancing. Bear in mind he's probably about 55. Then he kept saying "nice to watch" and "dance dance" in Chinese. It was really funny. It was also sad though during the conversation because we kept asking him if he did certain things or what he liked and he said he worked from 6 AM to 1 AM everyday driving his cab so he didn't have time for anything. He's never even left the main island of Taiwan. It didn't seem to bother him though. He was a jolly guy and we may enlist his services again shortly.

The other funny thing that happened was today! I was going to go get a blood test from Frank, little Brian's dad at a nearby hospital. He told me where to get the bus and he said it would be about a 10 minute drive. After being on the bus for about 20 minutes, I started to get concerned. Once we got to "the end of the line" after 30 minutes, there was definitely not a hospital in sight. I had no idea where I was. I asked the bus driver where we were and how to get to the hospital. He said something in Chinese and I had no idea what he said, but he said he was going back to the same place he started, so I stayed on the bus. In other words, I rode on the bus for an hour for no reason. Once I got back to the starting point, I found where I was supposed to be waiting about 100 meters away. Apparently, there's a spot where all of the buses stop but one, and that 'one' was the one I needed. Not sure why they separate them like that but oh well. I'm going to try again next week. Believe it or not, I was able to do all this during my lunch break and I wasn't late going back to work. The reason why I'm going to get a blood test is because I'm curious to see what it says and I suspect I may be anemic, but it could just be in my head. I feel more tired and fatigued than I think I should, considering that I'm sleeping pretty well and eating well too. Oh well, more on that later.

The other big news is seeing the dust storms in Australia. Kelly said she was coughing all day today and that was from staying inside. She said in Brisbane, she can't see more than two houses away. The pictures in Sydney looked really bad too. It's something like the worst dust storm they've had in 70 years. Anyway, I'm rambling. I'm going to post some pictures! Oh and by the way, the subject line of this blog is taken from a pair of sandals I saw at the water park.

Iron Tasty: For protection, for power, for health

Two orders of business for the day. The first: tonight I went to buy some iron pills because I'm feeling a little depleted. I went to Cosmed a few blocks from my house. I went inside and luckily the first person I talked to knew English. I told her I needed liquid iron. The first thing she showed me was some flowery box that I was guessing was some sort of tea so that didn't really look like the right thing. Then she said she had one more thing. She showed me a product called "Iron Tasty" and it had the outline of a woman drawn on it. The box was pink and clearly for women. However, I bought it because I guess that was my only option. I'm going to show the box to my Taiwanese friend Tony to have him tell me what's in it before I start taking it. The box is completely in Chinese and I don't want to start taking estrogen by mistake.

The other thing: the Hash last Sunday. I'll give a quick rundown. It was at Fulong Beach again on the Northeast side of the island. It's our last beach run of the year because it's getting colder and rainier. The run started up a steep staircase and then we got on a road which we ran on for about 5 minutes. Then the first check came and a guy found the right way and plunged into some thick jungle. After running down this for about 2 minutes, we ran into the hare putting down the flour. There was some arguing in Chinese and then we turned back and had to basically start the run over again. Apparently, the trail had been marked incorrectly and we missed a 30 minute loop we were supposed to do first before we got to the part where we saw the hare. This was kind of funny and has never happened on a hash I've been on. Anyway, the rest of the run was pretty fun but very muddy and not that runnable because much of the jungle we ran through was just too thick. The highlight of the run came after at Down Downs. They brought me and my friend Andrew up to the front and started making fun of me, saying how I'm always bringing young guys along with me. Mark, the GM, asked us who was Martha and who was Arthur? I wasn't exactly sure how to respond to this so at that moment, a fellow hasher behind Andrew de-pantsed him completely in front of the whole crowd. I was quick enough to dive into a cat pose and avoid humiliation. Andrew wasn't too concerned about it because he leaves on Monday and will probably never see any of these people again. But yeah, that was pretty funny. My friends Dan, Lauren, and Jade from school came along to the hash too. It was their first one and I think they had fun. They were definitely a little confused by the whole thing but they might go again so that's what's important.

We did skip the bash at the hash because Dan, Lauren, and Jade didn't want to drink so we went to a dive of a restaurant a few blocks from the bash. I ordered "fish" which was a whole fish, completely blackened, and brought out on a plate of juices and odd vegetables. But, I was hungry and managed to eat the entire thing by myself. At the end of the meal, Andrew posed the question "could you have pictured yourself eating something like this one year ago?" I said no way, and then laughed and realized just a simple thing like that was a fairly significant experience. Now that I think about it, I've been a very very picky eater my whole life and now that's clearly changing. I'll try and post a picture of that shortly. I had a moment at the restaurant that again, made me realize this has been a pretty unique experience! More to come...stay tuned!

Welcome to Venice

It has been a hectic week and I wanted to write a blog sooner but had I done that, the hecticness would've been reflected in my blog and thus, made my hundreds of readers crazy as well. Last Sunday, I went on an amazing hike with little Brian and his family (pictures will be posted shortly). We climbed Seven Star Mountain on the outskirts of Taipei. The hike started at the base of a large, natural sulfur spring which was pretty cool to see, and it smelled terrible of course. The hike began at an elevation of about 800 meters and climbed to about 1,120 meters total. It's the tallest mountain in Taipei County. The hike itself was composed mainly of steep stone steps, with of course very, very few switchbacks. For some reason here, hiking trails are constructed straight up mountains, so I guess the hike is shorter but it's much more intense. Then again, I was hiking with Brian who is 6 years old so it wasn't that difficult. I was able to hang, just barely. At the peak of the mountain, it was extremely foggy so we didn't have a good view of anything but it was fun being at the top nonetheless. There were a ton of Taiwanese people just laying around. The most peculiar thing I discovered on the hike was on the descent. While we were going down, I saw a little side trail that cut into the tall grass that was on either side of the trail. I walked down the trail with Brian for about 20 feet, and then we got to a clearing with a bunch of, hmm shall we say, remnants of human occupation in the area. So yeah, instead of having bathrooms along the hiking trail, they just had these clearings that you could duck down in the grass and completely concealed, but no attempt was made to conceal the "business" being done there. That was a first for me. After seeing this one, I noticed trails just like these every few hundred meters.

After the hike, I went out to dinner with his family. Our appetizer was tofu and pig intestine. I picked at this dish and ate one bite of each thing. Then Brian's mom said "foreigners usually don't like this food" so I guess I made it pretty obvious that I didn't like it when I only took one piece of each and then moved on to another dish as fast as I could. I got a bottle of what I thought was apple juice to drink for dinner. It actually was apple juice, but at the bottom, it had Jello-like chunks of apple flavored gelatin or something so that was a new one for me too.

I could've sworn there were some other highlights from the week but they're escaping me right now. Last night I moved out of my apartment and into a new place with Dan and Lauren, two other teachers from school. The rent is a lot less now and it's a really nice place, plus I think it will be good for me to live with other people. Sometimes in a tiny little studio apartment, the walls felt like they were starting to close in. Anyway, the name of the building is Venice and it's pretty swanky. I'll put up pictures of that too. The funny thing about moving last night was when my landlord got there, we couldn't really communicate at all so I called my neighbor Tony and had him come translate and moderate the exchange. I tried cleaning the apartment but not that much because it wasn't that clean when I moved in, but I was worried the landlord would say I had failed the cleaning test, but that was not the case. She did burp loudly about 6 times in half an hour while surveying the apartment, so that was funny. Thanks to the help of Brian's mom, I was able to get back over half of my security deposit for breaking my contract.

Ok, well I'm out of stories right now but this weekend promises to be a big one. I'll post pictures shortly and another blog in the next couple of days. Oh last thing I just remembered...because of the H1N1 epidemic or whatever you want to call it, all of the students have their temperatures taken at school a few times a day, of course using the same thermometer in all of their ears without ever cleaning it. Then after they're done, the teachers are expected to use the same dirty thermometer to take their temperatures. Even when I go to my Chinese class in Taipei, the doorman of the building stops me and takes my temperature. I've heard that about 50,000 people in Taiwan have the swine flu, so they're doing their best to prevent it from spreading more. At our school, if 2 or more kids have a fever and are sent home and later develop swine flu, then their whole class is cancelled for 5 days. So, it's not bad at our school but I guess it has the potential of getting there. I've been washing my hands after every class just in case. It is pretty crazy though that if any kid has a fever, they're sent home immediately. But at the same time, I've heard that H1N1 is transmitted through mucus, and ear wax is a mucus, so why is it that they test all the kids at school...like 200 kids, with the same thermometer and never clean it? I'll leave that to you guys to ponder.

Jaywalking leads to regretting

Yesterday was quite a day! It started with a run through Linkou and as I ran by a few blocks of restaurants, I couldn't help but notice that I was associating all of the scents emanating from the restaurants with scents from a landfill or a hot spring. After showering and cleaning off the ridiculous amounts of sweat your body produces in sweltering humidity, I went to the neighborhood photo shop where on of the salesman speaks English. While he was ringing me up, he asked if I was married. I said that I was not. Then he said, "why not? You are so handsome." I chuckled and told him I was very young. He said he was 32. Then I asked him if he was married. He said, paraphrasing, "I like Taiwanese girls but they don't like me. I am too fat, I have no money, no car, and no house." So in other words, he was not married. It was pretty sad actually but awkward too because I didn't really know what to say to him. I told him to be patient and something good would happen eventually.

A little later on, I hopped on the bus with Josh to go into Taipei. The bus was basically full so we had to sit separately. I sat next to a little lady that was mumbling to herself during the entire bus ride and she kept putting her hands together and praying. The only thing she was carrying was a little clicker, like the ones they use to count people in a bar. If she hadn't been about 4 feet tall, I would've thought she was a terrorist. Anyway, that was pretty funny to see. Josh and I went to a movie theater near Taipei 101 and saw the new flick "Inglourious Basterds." This was fun to watch and very entertaining, and violent. Very violent. The funniest part of the movie was when we first arrived and there was no one in line for the movie. We got there about 10 minutes before the movie started and there was not a soul in sight. We sat down inside and we were the only ones in there about 5 minutes before the movie was supposed to start. Then, about 3 minutes before, people just started flooding in like ants. They all sat down in about 5 minutes and the movie began with a packed theater. That's about all I can think of right now from yesterday.

I am off to the Hash. There will be an update from that later!

Merlin, it's ok...don't cry

Well, school is finally in full swing, and boy has it been a trip already. Each day, it feels like there are enough stories to write a book. I remember a 7 year old student dancing like Michael Jackson, complete with very suggestive hip thrusts. One student leaves his chair about every 3 minutes when he decides to fall out of his seat and face plant and then start crying hysterically. His name is Merlin, but in his class they say it "Mer-leen" which is really funny. I'll post a picture of him. One student likes to get out of his seat, lay on the ground, and kick his arms and legs in the air. My boss calls the trouble children "popcorns". I'll try and post pictures in the next few weeks of all the new kids.

On Sunday, I went to the Hash in Muzha. It was a really hard run that began with a long, steep descent which of course we had to ascend on the way back. It was brutally hot that day but it was still a lot of fun. I got the new teacher Sam to go with me. He said he wanted to go again so that was a relief. One girl did get lost on the Hash and about 4 search parties were sent out after Down-Downs to track her down. Apparently, she thought the run was too hard so she just went home and decided not to tell anyone she had gone and she also left her bag at the beginning of the run. That was quite dramatic. However, on Saturday a fellow hasher died during the Taipei Hash. I heard that he had gotten lost and he fell somewhere and broke his neck. His body was not actually found until the next day. The Taiwanese "Ghost Month" is going on right now so a lot of bad things happen. So yeah, this weekend was a bit of a sad weekend.

The cutest thing that happened this week was a few days ago when my ring broke accidentally in class. I showed the broken pieces to the class and Lucien (a boy) came up to me and said "it's ok" and he patted me on the back. On Tuesday, I taught a P8 class which has like 14 year old students and when I walked in the classroom, they all started laughing at me and snickering to each other. That was a pleasant welcome. What was funny was that their material was hard enough that I was second guessing myself about if their answers were right or not. There are a ton of rules about English that I've long since forgotten and it's funny to compare conversational English to proper English.

It rained last night and while I was walking to and from the store, I slipped at least 6 times on the 10 minute walk. The sidewalk materials here are just horrible. What were they thinking when they built them? It rains here all the time, so why do they paint the concrete on exposed entryways to buildings, or why do they use marble tiling on major sidewalks? Also, at lunch today at the all-you-can-eat buffet, they were serving what looked like pigs' tails but I can't be sure because I definitely did not taste them.

My running has been going well. I've been into the routine of going to bed early and getting up early. I'm supposed to be doing a marathon in a few weeks but I'm still not sure about it. I've been running between 30 minutes a day up to an hour and 40 minutes a day. I am feeling better but still not in the shape I want to be. Much like the guitar I borrow from school. It says it's the "Finest Guitar in the World" (and the is spelled "th") but it most certainly is not. Maybe that's why I like the guitar so much. We have something in common.

Oh, last story and then I need to end this rant. Last night, I went to sushi with the new teachers, Sam and Josh. When we first sat down the waiter came up to us and said something in Chinese and I didn't understand him at all. Because Josh and Sam don't really know any Chinese, I became the official spokesperson for the group so when the waiter spoke, Josh and Sam just looked at me. I told the waiter "wait a moment" in Chinese and he just shook his head. It became very awkward and silent. Then he chatted with his fellow waiters and then he said in English, "what do you want?" Later in the meal, I ordered dessert and I wanted the pudding dish with the red fruit sauce. I tried to explain this by saying what I thought was "red" in Chinese but again, they just stared back at me blankly. Clearly, my Chinese classes are paying off. Ha ha. At the end of the meal, I wanted to tell the cashier that our group was paying separately and again, I was met with completely blank stares. The whole ordeal was pretty awkward but I asked my teacher today how to say some new things so hopefully this situation will be avoided in the future.