Last Day of Work and Relaxing

Wow.  Cheesy to say it, but time went by really really fast.  Yesterday was already my last day at work.  Nothing too special, finished up my translations (I was working on translating an interview/new article on Lu Laoshi - the executive director of Begonia foundation - and another spreadsheet.  We had a wonderful lunch, and then, at 7pm, we went out to dinner!


We went to a fantastic vegetarian restaurant (one of my coworkers is vegan) that mimics meat dishes, but instead uses vegan substitutes.  Within our main courses we at "sashimi" (some kind of root vegetable gelatin), "black pepper pork medallions" (??? don't know what vegetable this was...), "deep fried fish" (??? again didn't know), ginger and mushroom aged soup, fried taro and something cubes in papaya, actual vegetables imitating vegetables, and tea!  Although I've eaten at a restaurant similar to this one in Beijing, and am still surprised that a lot of vegetarians will come here to eat.  In the states, I've never met anyone (who is vegan) who wants to eat this kind of fake "meat" --- because they oppose eating things with the cooked form of animals in any way, shape or form -- that's a good part of the reason they became vegetarian in the first place!
 Quite a few buddhist monks and youth like this type of restaurants -- it offers something unusual and tasty.

This weekend I'll be writing postcards, updating this blog, heading out to Longshan Temple, and Beitou (where all the hot springs are!).  And packing. : (

I thought I'd be doing more things in taiwan or that it would feel as comfortable as Beijing.  Now that I am close to leaving, I wish I traveled more in the area, and went down to the southern tip.  But more about that later......

(From left: Yu-san, Xiao Jin, Me, Lu Laoshi (CEO), Xiao Hui)

九分 Jiufen

Out of all the places gone and seen as of yet, Jiufen stands out as the most beautiful. I don't use that word lightly. Located on a mountanside, the town of Jiufen receives the refreshing breeze from the bay area below. While once a prosperous town in the early 1900s, supplying gold from their mines, it is now a historic day-visit to both Taiwanese and international tourists. Actually, this tourism is only quite recent (in the late 1900s, early 2000s) - Jiufen actually had a large downturn after running out of gold in the 70s. This spike of tourism in recet times was helped by Miyazaki's Spirited Away (a movie that I own and cherish), which used Jiufen's downtown as a model for the place Chihiro enters. More history can be read here.  Regardless, you cannot beat the 80TWD (less than $3.00) train ticket from downtown Taipei to Jiufen.

(ok, so this isn't the ocean, but it's still really pretty - taken from the museum)

From left: Harry (xiao jin's boyfriend), Yu-san, me,
xiao jin, and xiao ming (their friend) 

Turning away from staring at the blue seacarpet before you, the first thing you notice is the air - a mixed ocean and foresty sent that you know only gets better the higher you go up the mountain. Standing at the entrance of the Gold Ecological Park/Museum, you can see the entire bay area and the town below! Walking around the museum with my 2 coworkers (Xiao Jin and Yu-san), Xiao Jin's boyfriend, and their friend, we had a fantastic time.

Here I am talking about gold, pirates, and the Song dynasty. 
In the same conversation.

We learned about some of the other types of minerals that were mined (byrite, pyrite, quartz, and the like) and read about the history of gold as Taiwan knows it (and, of course, its role with the rest of the world). The museum even has a solid gold brick that is surrounded by a transparent case, open with 2 holes so one can stick their hand through and touch it！ (Which we all proceeded to do and shout - "we're rich people!!!!" haha). I was a little bemused when I read about gold and electronics, keeping in mind my past internship at Kester Solder (or ITW-Kester, however you like to call it now）with Dad.

A golden touch.

I was downright amused when we noticed a large group of caucasians (seen above) following a tour guide. Getting the courage to talk to them, I found out that they were all from Canada and are having a great time touring around Taipei! The next time we saw them, Xiao Jin went, "Fran! 你的外國朋友來一次！" and then proceeded to ask "他們為什麼呢麼大？" ("Fran! Your foreign friends are back!"...."Why are they so big?"). I was glad that they didn't understand Chinese, and hoped that the tour guide head wasn't listening. Finished eating our bakery goods (I had a walnut-something muffin and cream stuffed bun), we headed to the downtown.

The streets kind of reminded me of Venice's - except a little narrower and more...Taiwanese. They maintained that nice dark brown cobblestone and "old-style" buildings (although, like Venice, most of these shops are newly built for the tourist boom in recent times). Every square inch packed with either people, various food stands (stinky tofu included, unfortunately), or gift stores, Jiufen's "Old Street" quite a bit of variety.

Known for its fried taro, 肉圓 (this is a little hard to explain...), fishball soup, and sweet yuyuan冰淇凌 (another dough, like mochi, except different, put ontop of shaved ice), customers leave happy and full. Always a good thing in my mind =D And, like the rest of Taiwan, all the food is really inexpensive - dinner (plus snacks and dessert) would be around $5. Some of the souvenirs that can be bought are wooden goods (shoes, massagers, mooncake molds), jewlery, and other knicknacks. This is all very nice, but you really want to go there for the food and the mochi. ^__^ At night, strings of lanterns, which line the posts from store to store, all light up, and you can see the uncanny resemblence to the nighttime for Chihiro (in Spirited Away). The same coworker who was amazed at the Canadians got to use her two favorite words over and over: "so beautiful" and "so delicious". I couldn't help, but agree!

P.S. Grandma & Grandpa --- Look they had mini golf for the prince! (look near the grass - the long stretches of concrete are minigolf holes/fairways...haha!)

Ghost Festival and Buddhism Con't!

So.
I returned to the same spot with Esther and found our lady, who was ecstatic that her two foreigners (gawky and noticeable in the Taipei civilian crowd) had returned. She hurried us off to the tables, where at least 30 volunteers were rolling out mochi (again explained, rice gluten flour-dough that is eventually boiled) balls. They must have made HUNDREDS before we arrived. Turning the corner I could see more clearly that the prayer tables were set up on the grounds of an elementary school. Unlike our own schools, the halls of most Asian schools (Japan, China, Taiwan, not sure about Korea) have sinks outside in the corridors so kids can clean up before and after school. After washing our hands, we immediately got to work. Rolling out the dough in our hands, I started breaking off pieces and quickly got reprimanded: "太小了" and then "太大了 - 人吃不下!” ("too small" and then "too big- people won't be able to swallow them!"). After that, it wasn't too difficult! Just roll the dough, and pick up the next piece. It was at that point that I decided to strike a conversation with the ladies next to us with my savvy Chinese skills. It went something like this:

me: "There's a lot of these" (pointing to the mochi balls)
lady: **doesn't glance up**
me: **re-attempting, embarassed** "There's a lot of these - how many have you all made?"
lady: **blank stare**
Esther: (to me in English) "I don't think they understood...."
me: **what if they speak Taiwanese.....** "Are you all from Taibei?"
ladies: "Yep." **smiling**
me: **contact made! woohoo!**


It was quite a bit less daunting after that initial barrier of miscommunication (or lack thereof). However, that didn't stop me from not understanding quite a few words that they used....
After an hour and a half or so, we decided to clean up and walk around to see what else was going on. It turns out that this was quite a large event with quite a few 表演 (performances), not in the least including a dragon dance. They also had elementary kid setups with shime drums (small, beat-keeping drums about the size of a snare drum) for a drum performace. Some monks were preparing for a festival speech, while elementary girls in leaf ballet costumes were complaining about the heat. I do not blame them - it was hot. Not wanting to wait 30 minutes for the performances to start (we had other places to go), we decided to head out. On the way, we grabbed some of the mochi soup (the mochi balls were now cooked an in a very sweet syrup） and fish noodle soup. Both were delicious. We then left, and by the time we came back that evening all the tables we taken down and the people had all gone. The festival was over.