(no subject)
Taiwan Fact: Taiwan pretty well shuts down at night. By 10pm you can't eat at most restaurants. At around midnight, the night markets close. During the week, the bars may not have been open in the first place and all you have left are 7-elevens, illuminating near-empty streets. Taipei: The City That Often Sleeps.
Let me tell ya, watching a five-year-old swinging their shoulders, looking down at the foot they're shuffling while rehearsing You were such a P.Y.T. / Catching all the lights is all kinds of cute. I wrote the script for our play, loosely based on Dumbo. Basically, there is a circus and all the animals like it except the elephants because they don't have room. They are all afraid of the outside world because of stories the ring master tells them. Since they can't really move much, the elephants are boring to watch so the ring master is going to dress them up like clowns. They get pissed and leave. The other animals go to rescue them and find them playing in a field. The ring master finds them and sees them dancing. They return to the circus on the conditions that they get to dance instead of be clowns and can go outside when they want.
Candid picture of posing for a different picture! It's clever because of the layers.
I did a lot of nothing this weekend and a little something on Saturday. Jordan went to a co-worker's birthday party, leaving me at her place with Kiah and Liz. I've been afraid of cramping their style so I made moves to leave, but they made me feel very welcome and Sarah, Alyson and this other dude came over shortly. We smoked some drugs and ate lots of food. Eventually Alyson and I left to go to Luxy to drop by someone's birthday party before midnight when we were all to reconvene at Vibe. The someone wound up not being at Luxy yet so Alyson and I killed some time at an arcade we found. It was filled with slot machines, video poker and a handful of slightly creepy patrons. Gambling is illegal here, so you play with and win tokens. Unless you go to the back and pony up a grand! A grand of New Taiwanese Dollars! We'd been carrying around a balloon sculpture...
...and a stogie.
After that we went to Vibe which dragged until Andy, Adam, Bevis and Aaron showed up. The music was cheesy "old school rock" but pretty fun. Sarah, Liz and Kiah showed up a bit later and it started to get pretty fun. After a few beers we dominated the dance floor, with Alyson zipping in and out. The boys had skidooed (Andy flew back to the homeland 8 hours later) and the girls made me feel very much like a good friend rather than a friend of a friend. Liz even referred to me as her forth roommate- aw, jeeeez! We were just heading out the door when Kiah was informed that Cathleen was just pulling up to the club, so we 180ed and descended once more. After more good dance times, Kiah and I left together (her suggestion so she could let me in, so nice!) and at about 4am I crawled into be with a sound and fast asleeping Jordan. On Sunday I wrote my script and we watched the two most recent Harry Potter movies.
I've also arranged to have a regular language exchange partner or three. One I've never met I'm meeting on Sunday, the other two are a co-worker and her friend which is more tentative and they want to start in June for some reason.
It made me really happy to hear about and see pictures from my friends coming to visit my family last week. Makes me see there are connections that I helped forge that are strong enough to stand in my absence. Friends, say you'll still hang out at my parents house even if I die, ok? I still haven't gotten to looking for tickets home on account of I don't have the cash to buy them up front and, more importantly, I don't know exactly when I'll have off. Chad says just buy them and the school will work something out. Gotta get on that! I'll have to make a facebook event where people bid and vie for my time when I'm back home! Then everyone will think I'm a tool and I'll just stay at my parents' house the whole time.
Let me tell ya, watching a five-year-old swinging their shoulders, looking down at the foot they're shuffling while rehearsing You were such a P.Y.T. / Catching all the lights is all kinds of cute. I wrote the script for our play, loosely based on Dumbo. Basically, there is a circus and all the animals like it except the elephants because they don't have room. They are all afraid of the outside world because of stories the ring master tells them. Since they can't really move much, the elephants are boring to watch so the ring master is going to dress them up like clowns. They get pissed and leave. The other animals go to rescue them and find them playing in a field. The ring master finds them and sees them dancing. They return to the circus on the conditions that they get to dance instead of be clowns and can go outside when they want.
Candid picture of posing for a different picture! It's clever because of the layers.
I did a lot of nothing this weekend and a little something on Saturday. Jordan went to a co-worker's birthday party, leaving me at her place with Kiah and Liz. I've been afraid of cramping their style so I made moves to leave, but they made me feel very welcome and Sarah, Alyson and this other dude came over shortly. We smoked some drugs and ate lots of food. Eventually Alyson and I left to go to Luxy to drop by someone's birthday party before midnight when we were all to reconvene at Vibe. The someone wound up not being at Luxy yet so Alyson and I killed some time at an arcade we found. It was filled with slot machines, video poker and a handful of slightly creepy patrons. Gambling is illegal here, so you play with and win tokens. Unless you go to the back and pony up a grand! A grand of New Taiwanese Dollars! We'd been carrying around a balloon sculpture...
...and a stogie.
After that we went to Vibe which dragged until Andy, Adam, Bevis and Aaron showed up. The music was cheesy "old school rock" but pretty fun. Sarah, Liz and Kiah showed up a bit later and it started to get pretty fun. After a few beers we dominated the dance floor, with Alyson zipping in and out. The boys had skidooed (Andy flew back to the homeland 8 hours later) and the girls made me feel very much like a good friend rather than a friend of a friend. Liz even referred to me as her forth roommate- aw, jeeeez! We were just heading out the door when Kiah was informed that Cathleen was just pulling up to the club, so we 180ed and descended once more. After more good dance times, Kiah and I left together (her suggestion so she could let me in, so nice!) and at about 4am I crawled into be with a sound and fast asleeping Jordan. On Sunday I wrote my script and we watched the two most recent Harry Potter movies.
I've also arranged to have a regular language exchange partner or three. One I've never met I'm meeting on Sunday, the other two are a co-worker and her friend which is more tentative and they want to start in June for some reason.
It made me really happy to hear about and see pictures from my friends coming to visit my family last week. Makes me see there are connections that I helped forge that are strong enough to stand in my absence. Friends, say you'll still hang out at my parents house even if I die, ok? I still haven't gotten to looking for tickets home on account of I don't have the cash to buy them up front and, more importantly, I don't know exactly when I'll have off. Chad says just buy them and the school will work something out. Gotta get on that! I'll have to make a facebook event where people bid and vie for my time when I'm back home! Then everyone will think I'm a tool and I'll just stay at my parents' house the whole time.