Knock knock!!

Knock knock
Who's there?
Interrupting cow.

Interrupting cow--MOO!!

Knock knock
Who's there?
Hatch.
Hatch who?
Bless you!

Knock knock
Who's there?
Repeat
Repeat who?
Who! Who! Who! *sounds like laughter*

Knock knock
Who's there?
Mary
Mary who?
Merry Christmas!

Knock knock
Who's there?
Koni
Koni who?
Konichiwa!

These girls are so clever :)

*******

You know, I've never had problems with math. More often than not, the classes were so easy that I could read something like through the notes and still manage to ace the tests.

Not so in Taiwan.

The language barrier is putting me at a distinct disadvantage here (No need to point out the obvious Kathryn)

My class is learning geometry at the moment. Sine, cosine, tangents, the works. I learned all this freshman year... And to be honest, I barely remember any of it. Maybe it was because I hated my teacher or maybe its just the long summers and lack of use have effectively erased all but basic recognition from my brain.

For example, I took three pages of notes and still don't remember how to get from the "cartesian coordinate" to the "polar coordinate" (I swear to god, they use different terminology over here... Or maybe it's just been THAT long.) At least they use the same mathematical formats otherwise I would be completely lost.

Luckily for me, our teacher Peter is falling down funny. He frequently stops the class and asks me questions or writes the English words on the board.

"What is this called in English?"
"Uh.. Arrow? Equal sign? Something in the middle? I don't know. I don't think we have a word for that..."

"You know the Basic Theory of Algebra right? 1199 Gauss. Gauss. You know Gauss"
"Um no. I feel like it goes by a different name in English but it's been like two years since I've studied this so I'm really not the person to ask. Hehe sorry."

He told me at one point that if I'm gonna be taking his class that I need to have the textbook... I think he was kidding. *crosses fingers*

*******

I talked with the woman who's giving me Chinese lessons today.

Guess what she told me!!

The window into my classroom.. You can see the class rep
Camel through the window

I get to spend half of the day at the university learning to cook!! How freaking cool is that?!

To those of you that didn't know, I spent my last two weeks at my (biological) mom's baking something different everyday and then I made an array of sweets for my going away party. I don't know why, but I've been on a cooking kick lately and spending half of my day learning to cook is probably going to be one of the highlights of this experience. I mean, this ability will be hard to lose and honesty, how many people in the US can say they can cook traditional Taiwanese/Chinese food?

Don't give me any smart alecky remarks about people who grew up here and immigrated. I'd say they aren't included in the group of people we'd be polling for this statistic. Not to downplay their ability or anything but they simply don't count.

*******

I finally went to go get my alien residency card today. (haha I'm an alien. OooOooohhhhhh) I left school right after lunch to do so. It's still kinda awkward to be in the car with my host mum as neither of us speak much of the other's language. Although this is mostly pretty annoying, it does allow for me to observe my surroundings.

The stairs up to my classroom..

Today I saw a woman texting and driving her scooter one handed. Just think, they just passed a law about texting and driving in the US!

Bike+cell phone
Scooter+cell phone
Car+cell phone
Which is worse?

Its the funniest when you see a person on their bike and texting because, really, you can't get going that fast and you end up moving in a funny swervey line... It's a marvelous visual. The scooter combination looks plain dangerous and a car combo gets too much publicity. But that's just my humble opinion ;)

Driving here is insane. (and that opinion is NOT humble by the way.. Lol) People pull u-turns wherever they want and it's an awkward dance to get to school. There's this one s-curve on my way to school that's murder. I'm so not excited to be biking that one later. I'll post a picture as soon as I figure out how exactly I'm going to upload them (it hurts me to write that... I pride myself on being quite the techie... Or at least in comparison to my mother ;) )

*******

Wednesday is no AC day. I want to cry. I feel so sweaty and gross. I don't think I've ever wanted a shower this bad. At least we get to have the fans on and I wore my skirt today. Soooo much better than pants! :)

********

I got my schedule today! :D
For the most part I have class with the girls... Pretty much I get to hang out and read (hope you don't mind Dad :) ) I'm gonna write out my schedule (don't creep on me, I will use Kung Fu AND Taekwondo on you!!!!). Class with the girls will from now on be known as... 212! Lol

(English is with the girls... It's just labeled specially on my schedule.)

Monday- Chinese, PE, English (2hr), lunch, cooking lessons at the university for the rest of the day

Another picture from outside my classroom.
The striped building is where all the teacher's offices are.

Tuesday- 212, Chinese (3hrs), lunch, 212, music with class 108, English, hang time in the counseling office with Leanne (known as Leanne lol)
Wednesday- English, Chinese (3hrs), lunch, Kung Fu (2hr), 212, Leanne
Thurs- 212, PE, Chinese, 212, lunch, 212, English, 212, Leanne
Friday- 212, Art with 104, English, art with 205, lunch, english, music, 212, Leanne.

Exciting huh??

Here's the mind boggling part. I get to school by 7:20 and get out at 5:10. Yah. I thought my day was long in the US (a humble 3:22). Yah, I've been proven wrong on so many levels!! So no complaining!! You Americans get out earlier and understand everything. Double whammy right there. Buuuuuuuttt it could be worse. I could have to go to cram school after class is out. :)

********

I must say, it was wonderful to read everybody's comments and see all the 'likes' on Facebook. It's nice to know you all are having fun living vicariously through me. (Notice how that wasn't sentimental? :P)

Drop me a line. Hit the Like button. Join my fanclub. Whatever floats your boat. :D

Till next time!

K

School!!

As promised, here's the second post. Hopefully this is easier to write than the last one. Lol

***********

Uniform shirt and pants...

School. Freaking scary on its own. Teachers, fellow students, projects, homework... You know the vibe. Or at least you think you do until you add in that extra element of not understanding a WORD your teacher is saying.... Unless it's my English teacher, Allen (I hope I got his name right lol) He goes back and forth between English and Chinese, seemingly at the drop of a hat. Its pretty nifty :)

Anyway,  I was a tangled mess of nerves when I went to school this morning. I felt self-conscious in my uniform (you're SURE it's not too big?) and like I stood out like a sore thumb (well duh you did Kathryn. You're tall and blond. Not much you can do there) My steps were quick as I made my way to the councilors office. He lead me to my class and that sickening feeling in my stomach deepened.

What if they don't like me?

Shirt, skirt and socks. Perfect for hot weather

What if they can't speak English?
What if I totally bomb my speech in front of the entire school?
OH MY GOD, WHAT IF?!

I told you I was a mess.

"This is the new exchange student. She's from the US" said Mr Chen.

Or at least that's what I thought he said. I don't quite speak Chinese.

The girls in the room looked at me. I looked at them, you know, that awkward expectant look that near decides it all. Then they were all surrounding me.

Whats your name?
Where are you from?
Do you speak Chinese?
Are you a rotary student?

All a sudden I wasn't feeling so ill. The more questions I answered, the better I felt. I met Winnie ("like Winnie the Pooh" she was quick to assure me) who was a fellow rotary kid. She was one of the potential outbound students. She was the girl who, for all intents and purposes*, held my hand for that first hour or so.

Now that's not to say the rest of the class wasn't interested. I had quite the crowd around my desk, each girl a well of questions and information both.we all chatted until it was time to go to the opening ceremonies.

The only good thing about
this is my hair...

Now that was interesting. Leanne and I sat on stage with the staff and watched as the girls quite literally filled the auditorium. I'm pretty sure the amount of people in that room broke several fire safety laws. Maybe they're different here. Lol
As an overview, the ceremony consisted of the national anthem, the school song, select students taking photos with the principal (who is freaking adorable) wile holding awards of some sort, an introduction of the teachers and of the resident exchange students, aka me and Leanne.

Now for the details.

During the teacher introductions, the students would scream and cheer for their favorite teachers (read: crushes) It was freaking hilarious. I feel like a lot of American parents would get their knickers in a twist over such blatant adoration for the attractive male staff. Either way, They have good taste ;)

Now, Leanne and I had to give a one to two minute speech about ourselves. That was a riot. Leanne wrote hers out and I completely winged it. Mine went something along the lines of;

Principal: *handing me the mic* English or Chinese
Me: English.
*laughter*
Me: 你好! My name is Kathryn. I'm 16
*collective gasp/murmuring*
Me: *thinking* Okaaayyyy. What did I say wrong? *keeps talking* I'm from the US, Oregon to be specific. Now I dont speak a lot of Chinese but I hope to learn. You all seem super fun and I'm excited to be going to school here.... Thank you..?

Not bad right?? I'm hoping not. I got a lot of cheers afterwards. That has to be a good sign. :)

After that we went back to our class and I started talking with two girls from my class. (I feel really bad for not remembering their names :( )

Guess what we talked about. Yah. That's right. Boys.

This is my default flirting face. Bwahahah kidding.  

Do you like Serbian boys?
Uh. Sure? I don't know if I've ever seen a Serbian boy.
Oh. What kind of boy do you like?
Ummm...Europeans? Africans. Yah definantly Africans.
*Squealing laughter*
What do you think of the last guy on stage?
The one with the long hair? He's hottt.
*more squealing*
We like you a lot.

I was pretty much on cloud nine after that. These girls are amazing. They helped me get lunch, taught me some Chinese phrases, and even went as far as to have someone sitting next to me and translating parts of our history and ethics(?) classes so I could get the gist of it all. <3 <3

I'm so excited for tomorrow!!

Till next time!
K





*Notice how I used the phrase right Mom? ;)

Beginnings...

This is probably the fourth time I've rewritten this stupid post. There's so much to tell and I feel like I'm behind on it all. Ive put waaay too much effort into something that should be simpler than breathing. So here's what I'm gonna do, I'm just gonna post this and then write a whole new post about my first day of school. Luck you. Two posts in one day.

Sorry about any awkwardness... Im going to try and make it as logical as possible :)

********

Wednesday- August 24, 2011

4:00- #%$&!!! I was supposed to be up an a hour ago!! Mom! Wake up!
4:20- I think that's the fastest I have ever gotten ready for anything. *closes the car door* Whew!
4:30- The airport doesn't look that busy... Double Whew!
4:33- Auntie Carla!! Hi!! I can't believe you made it!! *hugs*
4:40- Wait a second, you're telling me that I have to go find this magical thing you call "United counter" in the San Fran airport to get my last ticket and I might have to re-check my luggage?! *chokes*
4:42- You can check my luggage straight through?? *jumps over the counter* *hugs the woman* thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou
4:45- *inline for security* *slightly worried* hurry up.. My flight is boarding in ten minutes...
4:50- *front of security* ohhhh group hug!! Bye mom! Bye dad! See you next year! .... Oh my god I just said that out loud... Weird. *goes through security before the sobbing starts*
4:53- that shirt looks familiar... Graham? Oh hi it is you! Where are you going? LA? Cool. Oh me? I'm going to San Fran....

********

And thus I started the greatest adventure of my life. (that statement is so cliche lol)
16+ hours in the air, customs, one airplane dinner, security, five airports, one book, numerous naps, one rotary blazer, another two rotary blazers, security again, six rotary blazers, a rousing game of Fruit Ninja, and conversations with fellow exchange students. All these things filled the hours between Oregon and Taipei. It all lead to the moment when I stepped off the plane into the muggy airport in search of a bed, food and a brand new family.

I so far, I've found everything I wanted and stumbled upon a whole lot more.

For starters, Humidity isn't as bad as one would think. They have the system down to the T. There's at least one air-conditioning unit in every room and in outdoor performance areas there are misters. Not that the misters are that important because it's always pretty moist. I think one of the coolest things is that the rain is warm. Yah, thats right. Warm. In Oregon, the rain is that miserable combination of cold and wet. Here it's warm. I'm pretty sure that people think we exchange students are crazy because we just walk around sans umbrella. But then again, they have their umbrellas out when there is barely a drizzle so the feeling goes both ways. ;)

*****

PF Changs has nothing on real Chinese food. It's so Americanized it isn't even funny. I have yet to see anything that looks remotely like lettus wraps or 'Shanghi Cucumbers'. The flavors are nothing I have ever tasted. Its rare that you find something as sweet or carb infested as doughnuts or a PB&J sandwich.... But then again, I couldnt tell you half the things I've eaten since I got here so that last statement should probably taken with a bag of salt. All that I can tell you is that it always comes with rice and chopsticks and more often than not you actually eat most things out of your rice bowl. No plates necessary. It all takes some getting used to but I'm hoping that by Thanksgiving I'll be good.

*****

I found it surprising how quickly I became friends with the other exchange students in the area. Call me crazy but I thought it would take a whole lot longer. We are quite the group that's for sure. Leanne from Canada, Ana from Brazil, Carlos from Mexico and me. There are more exchange students but the four of just got back from a two day trip to central (?) Taiwan. That was loads of fun and deserves it's own post.. Anybody interested?? ;)



Till next time,
K