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