Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Dump Trucks
Another reminder is the sheer number of people who can speak English. My uncle, who just visited, assured me that it still seems like there aren't enough English speakers to comfortably get around the city, but I feel like I'm in an English speaking country. In China, English was very much a status symbol, and the only time I was ever served by someone who could speak English was when I was paying $30 bucks a meal. Here, I've been in cabs where the driver spoke better English than Abdikarim in San Diego. (Abdikarim being, in this case, a stereotypical Somali name I found at http://www.babynamesworld.com/category-somali-names.html)
Finally, The garbage trucks play classical music. When I first heard the 2 bit Mozart being played, I thought there was an upscale ice cream truck selling gelatos to the children of people with too much disposable income. I was kind of disappointed when it was just a malnourished-looking guy asking me if I had any trash or recyclables. In Taiwan, people have to take their own trash to the garbage truck, which means that being a garbage man means riding on the back of the truck and making sure people don't miss, and that hearing Mozart being played on a xylaphone means it is either 2 in the afternoon or 10 at night and I better get my ass downstairs or I'm going to be chasing a garbage truck down the alley.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Taiphoon Troubles
Anyway, on typhoon day all school is cancelled, and the only businesses left open are the internet cafes and restaurants. Unfortunately, the phone companies are closed, and the DSL installation guys chose not to heroically brave the typhoon in order to hook me up with the internet, and typhoons tend to inhibit long-distance travel, so I spent a lot of time at the local internet cafe. Which is where I am right now, talking to the attendant's younger brother, Vic, and watching Taiwanese people play absurd looking Taiwanese computer games.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Where the Wild Things Are
I took a bus today. I ended up in a place called Linkou, which means “Mouth of the
Anyway, William told me about a teaching job at a private school in Linkou. Being a relative newcomer to
In my rather limited experience, business in
Sunday, September 2, 2007
Zhonghe City Living
Finally found a place to stay. It is not actually in
I got a job, maybe. I’m not entirely sure how I’m getting paid, or what the stipulations for my employment are, but every Wednesday and Friday afternoons I take the Bannan Line subway, get off at City Hall, and take the Blue 5 bus to an afterschool childcare center. I have two classes of 12-year olds, and I’m going to have to find some way of keeping the little rascals in line for 90 minutes. I had to give the administrators a demonstration of my mad child-rearing skills, and after 30 minutes of pleading with little Leo and Bruce to stay in their seats, and little David to stop reading the Chinese translation of Harry Potter while I was teaching them how to spell January, the powers-that-be revealed their absolute desperation and decided to hire me permanently. Permanently is probably a poor choice of words because I signed no contracts, and very well may never see the $17/hour I was promised for my six-hour work-week.