Wandered
Hi all!! I'm so sorry to have taken so long to post again...>_< Things with my bf went south in December, and then from bad to worse in January, so I cut him loose at the end of January, after my last exam;P I'm enjoying being single, but lately things have been getting a little weird with the guys in my life...O_o More on that later^^; I've been working 2-3 part time jobs over the last month since finals ended in January, plus planning and participating in a trip to Taiwan at the end of February^^ And...I come today bringing photos of that trip=)
I have over 300 photos of the 6 days I spent in Taiwan, so I'll have to break this up over a series of posts, I apologize in advance for the barrage of images;P Basically, since I was on spring break from school I decided to get out of Japan for a bit and reset my head, and was lucky enough to have just enough points (with a small early b-day gift from my parents) to get a free ticket (business class no less!! my first time:3). I have a friend in Taiwan and lots of people in my dorm gave me advice, so I planned it like I did for my Japan trips and set off~;)
A view of Mt. Fuji from the air...it looks so different from when I climbed it.
In business class you get a full meal even on 2hr flights...Asiana is the best for food^^
Getting ready to land at Incheon airport in Korea. Because it was bought with points I ended up having to transfer to another plane to get to Taipei, although I had only one flight on the way back^^; Inside the airport there was a small museum of Korean Art History, so I browsed about=)
I also got to use the Asiana flight lounge, because I was business class...they have lots of free food, a comfortable quiet reading area, internet computers, tv...it was like a little house inside the airport;) Then my next flight was Thai airways, so more food...
Then sunset over Taiwan:3
My late night snack was some Korean sweets I got from the flight lounge;P
Here's a pic of the street near the hostel I stayed at, Song Jiang Road.
After checking in I went right to Eslite bookstore, the one near Dunhua which is 24 hours. Here you're allowed, even encouraged to just pick up a book and read it, anywhere...most people choose the floorXD
This is their mascot I guess?
Deciding to imitate the locals I picked up the nearest interesting-looking book and had a seatXD
A view from the floor of Eslite
Unfortunately the content ofthe book began to make me feel ill so I decided to move to the cafe for a small bedtime snack: homemade cookies and hazelnut cocoaX3
The next morning I got up as early as I could manage (since the day before I'd travelled on 3 hours of sleep I was pretty bushed, but people kept talking outside my room so I ended up only getting 6 hours that night^^;;) to head for Jiufen, an old gold mining town in the countryside. Here's a shot of my hostel, World Scholar House, highly recommended^^
Song Jiang Road in daytime
A local farmer's market's ad balloon;)
Then I took the MRT to Zhongxiao-Fuxing to catch the bus to Jiufen, and waited outside Sogo department store. It apparently used to be big in Japan but went under, and now survives only in TaiwanO_o
It was an hour-long bus-ride, some views along the way:
At one point 2 Japanese girls got on, so I was having fun listening to their conversationXDAfter arriving at Jiufen I stopped at a lookout spot for a photo op.
And here's a view of Jinshan street, a small alley filled with all kinds of food and souvenir shops^^
Inside Jinshan street
Some of the wares
And apparently a condom store...O_o
The LEAST risque thing in the store!
A monument to the gold miners who used to work here
Next stop Jiufen Tea House, where famous writers and poets used to congregate
Across the street is the old movie theatre, a historic site
A view from the teahouse balcony
Since I know less than 20 words/phrases in Mandarin (I'm starting to learn it!) it took forever to order food, and a kind shopkeeper with an internet translation siteXD But I got something with pork in it
The historic part of the teahouse
A nearby store selling cat goods:D
And a real cat...I wasn't the only one taking pics of her either!;P
And last for this post, a sign outside the police station warning people not to fall for the same 'Ore-ore' swindle that's big in JapanO_o
I'll stop here for now cause I have to go get ready for a dinner party where we all make the food together^^ In other news, during that same trip I ran into a Taiwanese guy who spoke FrenchO_o And all his relatives spoke Japanese, so that was funny;P He was kind enough to offer to escort me to the places I wanted to go for a couple days, and I thought I'd made a great friend, but when I got back to Japan he started chatting with me on facebook and suddenly asked if I wanted to live in Taiwan, and didn't I want a family, and saying how he was looking for a woman who thought like him to help run his tourist store, and I would be great with customers cause I speak 3 languages...O_o I was like....wtf?? I'd only known him a week^^;; At any rate, after I said I wasn't ready for a family yet he said 'I understand' and closed the chatO_o Um...what?XD He left a comment on one of my posts on fb a few days later, but I removed him from chat cause I really don't know how to deal with him now^^; He's really nice but...that just freaked me out>_<
Then, on Saturday a guy I know through a friend of mine and had met once at a party suggested we hang out since it had been awhile (I was like, we've met once...but okay). He told me to invite other ppl if I wanted, but lately people don't show up when I invite them places so I didn't bother...we ended up having some drinks and snacks at a bar before going to karaoke and getting drunk on sake, which was all fun and games until I had to navigate the trains on the way home;P At any rate, since then he won't stop emailing my cellphoneO_o 'Goodnight' 'good morning' 'what are you doing today' 'when are we going to party again'...^^;; It's verging on harassment, and he keeps writing even if I don't write back. What is with men these days???>_< Again, I just thought I'd made a friend, and was bored and wanted to go do something. If this is 'I want to date you' he's nearly a stalker, if this is 'I'm lonely' it's just plain creepy. Any suggestions on what to do with these two guys??:S Okay, enough of my rambling;P
To end this on a good note, here's the post I made on facebook the night I arrived in Taiwan:) I wish you all a wonderful day and hope you have something beautiful nearby to make you smile^^
It's been many years since the last time I was this completely adrift in a sea of new sensations, and even longer since I've been somewhere I don't speak the language or know the customs as if they were my own. Although it's not my first experience of being completely alone in a crowd of people, it is one of the most expensive of such experiences to date...and I don't regret it at all.
For some people vacations are a chance to do absolutely nothing without the debilitating guilt of all the nagging unfinished tasks they are ignoring. For me they're a different kind of escape: a chance to escape the me that I am and become the me I want to or will be. It seems that nothing spurs my personal growth like being totally out of my element and having things not go my way, as frustrating as it is when I'm experiencing it first hand.
From missing the train and forgetting to get a re-entry permit to fine dining thousands of feet above Mt. Fuji, from a mad dash through two airports to a glowingly peaceful sunset over Taipei, this day has left me with an ebb and flow of emotions and thoughts that I can already feel eroding and reforming the surfaces of my 'self'. The scary older man who stared at me in the Asiana business class flight lounge in Incheon turned out to be an English-speaking Taiwanese who offered to help me get off the bus at the right stop. Outside my hotel a little kid yells 'hello!' and his handsome father waves warmly. Two creepy guys stop talking to stare as I walk by and one mutters 'oh my god'. Being the only white person in a train full of people who are quite conscious of that fact is considerably more unnerving when you are isolated from them by a language barrier that only emphasizes your own ignorance. Why was being the only foreigner on a train in Tokyo such an amusing experience, and here it is suddenly a completely unusual sensation? Obviously it's all a reflection of my own perceptions, a recanting of the 'looking glass self' if you will, but that's what's so important: being forced to address my normal behaviours and ask why they have become normal gives me insight into what makes me who I am. And the me who looks back with such alien eyes is suddenly a revelation.
Taiwan's sparkling night-scape and warm humid air sparked with the sounds of roaming scooter tribes and scents of Vietnamese noodle soup reminded me of the sensual assault when I first landed in Tokyo, of the disorientation and awe at being immersed in a new world that had long held such fascination and promise for me. Hearing the different languages on the various flights rekindled my old raging desire to learn every language known to man so I can physically experience the sheer beauty of their sound and structure and play a small part in that precious meeting of the minds they permit, not to mention learning the secrets of their deep connections to each other and the underlying basic human core that they both hide and reveal in all of us.
Maybe this is also a chance to feed a part of myself that hungers for more than my regular life can give it, at least on a regular basis. The way the beauty of a warm blue sky fills my heart with a burst of love for all humanity often gets lost in the unending flow of choices and chances that I use to give meaning to the chaos that is living. Being stuck in my own head for too long often leads to a melancholy too deep for words, but having no familiar territory or structure makes sure I am off-balance enough to push through to the silver-lining on the other side of that cloud without getting too drenched in the bewildering mist it's made of. And now I can appreciate more carefully the unspeakably precious gift that is the company of good friends and family, having cast myself adrift in a world I can only as yet aspire to be part of. But just like that first time in Tokyo, I knew instantly I would make that dream happen. 3 years and 6 months later I'm living that dream, a self that the me of 5 years ago would never believe could have existed is charting a new course every day and floundering forward with renewed resolve thanks to the people in my life who support me and the dreams that I just won't let go of.
Someone once said experience is what you get when you don't get what you want. As painful as it may be sometimes, in one sense it's a win/win situation, right?;) To all my friends. I wish I could share this wild joy with you in a less awkward, self-centered way, I wish I could distill it and channel it directly to you through Jung's great unconscious instead of feebly attempting to confine it in the cold cage that is my poor attempt at the written word. But here I am, and though I go alone I take with me what you have given me, intentionally or not, and that's what keeps me going until we meet again=)>/lj-cut>
今の私にはいろんなチャンスがあるはず。。。それを逃さないようにしないとね！
I have over 300 photos of the 6 days I spent in Taiwan, so I'll have to break this up over a series of posts, I apologize in advance for the barrage of images;P Basically, since I was on spring break from school I decided to get out of Japan for a bit and reset my head, and was lucky enough to have just enough points (with a small early b-day gift from my parents) to get a free ticket (business class no less!! my first time:3). I have a friend in Taiwan and lots of people in my dorm gave me advice, so I planned it like I did for my Japan trips and set off~;)
A view of Mt. Fuji from the air...it looks so different from when I climbed it.
In business class you get a full meal even on 2hr flights...Asiana is the best for food^^
Getting ready to land at Incheon airport in Korea. Because it was bought with points I ended up having to transfer to another plane to get to Taipei, although I had only one flight on the way back^^; Inside the airport there was a small museum of Korean Art History, so I browsed about=)
I also got to use the Asiana flight lounge, because I was business class...they have lots of free food, a comfortable quiet reading area, internet computers, tv...it was like a little house inside the airport;) Then my next flight was Thai airways, so more food...
Then sunset over Taiwan:3
My late night snack was some Korean sweets I got from the flight lounge;P
Here's a pic of the street near the hostel I stayed at, Song Jiang Road.
After checking in I went right to Eslite bookstore, the one near Dunhua which is 24 hours. Here you're allowed, even encouraged to just pick up a book and read it, anywhere...most people choose the floorXD
This is their mascot I guess?
Deciding to imitate the locals I picked up the nearest interesting-looking book and had a seatXD
A view from the floor of Eslite
Unfortunately the content ofthe book began to make me feel ill so I decided to move to the cafe for a small bedtime snack: homemade cookies and hazelnut cocoaX3
The next morning I got up as early as I could manage (since the day before I'd travelled on 3 hours of sleep I was pretty bushed, but people kept talking outside my room so I ended up only getting 6 hours that night^^;;) to head for Jiufen, an old gold mining town in the countryside. Here's a shot of my hostel, World Scholar House, highly recommended^^
Song Jiang Road in daytime
A local farmer's market's ad balloon;)
Then I took the MRT to Zhongxiao-Fuxing to catch the bus to Jiufen, and waited outside Sogo department store. It apparently used to be big in Japan but went under, and now survives only in TaiwanO_o
It was an hour-long bus-ride, some views along the way:
At one point 2 Japanese girls got on, so I was having fun listening to their conversationXDAfter arriving at Jiufen I stopped at a lookout spot for a photo op.
And here's a view of Jinshan street, a small alley filled with all kinds of food and souvenir shops^^
Inside Jinshan street
Some of the wares
And apparently a condom store...O_o
The LEAST risque thing in the store!
A monument to the gold miners who used to work here
Next stop Jiufen Tea House, where famous writers and poets used to congregate
Across the street is the old movie theatre, a historic site
A view from the teahouse balcony
Since I know less than 20 words/phrases in Mandarin (I'm starting to learn it!) it took forever to order food, and a kind shopkeeper with an internet translation siteXD But I got something with pork in it
The historic part of the teahouse
A nearby store selling cat goods:D
And a real cat...I wasn't the only one taking pics of her either!;P
And last for this post, a sign outside the police station warning people not to fall for the same 'Ore-ore' swindle that's big in JapanO_o
I'll stop here for now cause I have to go get ready for a dinner party where we all make the food together^^ In other news, during that same trip I ran into a Taiwanese guy who spoke FrenchO_o And all his relatives spoke Japanese, so that was funny;P He was kind enough to offer to escort me to the places I wanted to go for a couple days, and I thought I'd made a great friend, but when I got back to Japan he started chatting with me on facebook and suddenly asked if I wanted to live in Taiwan, and didn't I want a family, and saying how he was looking for a woman who thought like him to help run his tourist store, and I would be great with customers cause I speak 3 languages...O_o I was like....wtf?? I'd only known him a week^^;; At any rate, after I said I wasn't ready for a family yet he said 'I understand' and closed the chatO_o Um...what?XD He left a comment on one of my posts on fb a few days later, but I removed him from chat cause I really don't know how to deal with him now^^; He's really nice but...that just freaked me out>_<
Then, on Saturday a guy I know through a friend of mine and had met once at a party suggested we hang out since it had been awhile (I was like, we've met once...but okay). He told me to invite other ppl if I wanted, but lately people don't show up when I invite them places so I didn't bother...we ended up having some drinks and snacks at a bar before going to karaoke and getting drunk on sake, which was all fun and games until I had to navigate the trains on the way home;P At any rate, since then he won't stop emailing my cellphoneO_o 'Goodnight' 'good morning' 'what are you doing today' 'when are we going to party again'...^^;; It's verging on harassment, and he keeps writing even if I don't write back. What is with men these days???>_< Again, I just thought I'd made a friend, and was bored and wanted to go do something. If this is 'I want to date you' he's nearly a stalker, if this is 'I'm lonely' it's just plain creepy. Any suggestions on what to do with these two guys??:S Okay, enough of my rambling;P
To end this on a good note, here's the post I made on facebook the night I arrived in Taiwan:) I wish you all a wonderful day and hope you have something beautiful nearby to make you smile^^
It's been many years since the last time I was this completely adrift in a sea of new sensations, and even longer since I've been somewhere I don't speak the language or know the customs as if they were my own. Although it's not my first experience of being completely alone in a crowd of people, it is one of the most expensive of such experiences to date...and I don't regret it at all.
For some people vacations are a chance to do absolutely nothing without the debilitating guilt of all the nagging unfinished tasks they are ignoring. For me they're a different kind of escape: a chance to escape the me that I am and become the me I want to or will be. It seems that nothing spurs my personal growth like being totally out of my element and having things not go my way, as frustrating as it is when I'm experiencing it first hand.
From missing the train and forgetting to get a re-entry permit to fine dining thousands of feet above Mt. Fuji, from a mad dash through two airports to a glowingly peaceful sunset over Taipei, this day has left me with an ebb and flow of emotions and thoughts that I can already feel eroding and reforming the surfaces of my 'self'. The scary older man who stared at me in the Asiana business class flight lounge in Incheon turned out to be an English-speaking Taiwanese who offered to help me get off the bus at the right stop. Outside my hotel a little kid yells 'hello!' and his handsome father waves warmly. Two creepy guys stop talking to stare as I walk by and one mutters 'oh my god'. Being the only white person in a train full of people who are quite conscious of that fact is considerably more unnerving when you are isolated from them by a language barrier that only emphasizes your own ignorance. Why was being the only foreigner on a train in Tokyo such an amusing experience, and here it is suddenly a completely unusual sensation? Obviously it's all a reflection of my own perceptions, a recanting of the 'looking glass self' if you will, but that's what's so important: being forced to address my normal behaviours and ask why they have become normal gives me insight into what makes me who I am. And the me who looks back with such alien eyes is suddenly a revelation.
Taiwan's sparkling night-scape and warm humid air sparked with the sounds of roaming scooter tribes and scents of Vietnamese noodle soup reminded me of the sensual assault when I first landed in Tokyo, of the disorientation and awe at being immersed in a new world that had long held such fascination and promise for me. Hearing the different languages on the various flights rekindled my old raging desire to learn every language known to man so I can physically experience the sheer beauty of their sound and structure and play a small part in that precious meeting of the minds they permit, not to mention learning the secrets of their deep connections to each other and the underlying basic human core that they both hide and reveal in all of us.
Maybe this is also a chance to feed a part of myself that hungers for more than my regular life can give it, at least on a regular basis. The way the beauty of a warm blue sky fills my heart with a burst of love for all humanity often gets lost in the unending flow of choices and chances that I use to give meaning to the chaos that is living. Being stuck in my own head for too long often leads to a melancholy too deep for words, but having no familiar territory or structure makes sure I am off-balance enough to push through to the silver-lining on the other side of that cloud without getting too drenched in the bewildering mist it's made of. And now I can appreciate more carefully the unspeakably precious gift that is the company of good friends and family, having cast myself adrift in a world I can only as yet aspire to be part of. But just like that first time in Tokyo, I knew instantly I would make that dream happen. 3 years and 6 months later I'm living that dream, a self that the me of 5 years ago would never believe could have existed is charting a new course every day and floundering forward with renewed resolve thanks to the people in my life who support me and the dreams that I just won't let go of.
Someone once said experience is what you get when you don't get what you want. As painful as it may be sometimes, in one sense it's a win/win situation, right?;) To all my friends. I wish I could share this wild joy with you in a less awkward, self-centered way, I wish I could distill it and channel it directly to you through Jung's great unconscious instead of feebly attempting to confine it in the cold cage that is my poor attempt at the written word. But here I am, and though I go alone I take with me what you have given me, intentionally or not, and that's what keeps me going until we meet again=)>/lj-cut>
今の私にはいろんなチャンスがあるはず。。。それを逃さないようにしないとね！