Living a life lost in translation

Yesterday, I saw the biggest spider I have ever seen (out of a cage). I thought it was dead because it had its legs curled and as I was being grossed out, it moved a leg. Lindsay was with me and jumped very high because I let out a huge scream. Srsly... biggest spider ever. I am sure I will have nightmares. Mom- you have seen me scream at tiny spiders. Imagine my scream for a huge one.

Hey hey hey! You were supposed to imagine me talking as Krusty the Clown there. I can't explain why that popped in my head.

This whole month our theme at the school has been Halloween. So we've been making Halloween crafts, talking about Halloween words, and we even went Trick-or-Treating for our field trip. It was... crazy. In previous years they went Trick-or-Treating around the neighborhood the school is in, but I guess people were complaining, so this year we went to the biggest mall in town. The only way the mall agreed to this, was that the kids only Trick-or-Treated on the toy floor. LOL. Ahh, consumerism at its best. So everything went smoothly, although I'm not sure some of the people shopping were too happy about a bunch of kids shouting "TRICK OR TREAT!" at the top of their lungs.

I am going to have to look for another job. The problems with this school are numerous. The only problem is the contract I signed says that I have to wait until they find a replacement... up to two months! ...Why did I sign that, again? Once my contract is cancelled, I shouldn't have problems finding a job at a public school. Apparently, the public schools here are much better than private. Not to mention, I won't be taxed. Awesommmme.

I want to say a big I LOVE YOU to my grandma and mom. You two are the best :o) I miss you like crazy!

I went to a mormon church today! Several weeks ago I saw some missionaries on the street, and being the way I am, I went to talk to them. Being the way they are, they invited me to visit the church :o) So I finally went today and it was... interesting. I really couldn't understand anything being said, but one of the sisters was nice enough to translate for the second part of sacrament. I titled this blog bitter heart because I told her the ride to the church was much longer than I thought and, as always, it was very hot. She said she felt sorry and that in Taiwan they always say the word that means "bitter heart" to show their appriciation for my distress. I thought that was nice.

Anyways, part of what was translated to me was rather inspiring. One of the sisters was saying that oftentimes in life, we take pictures of our life. We look at those pictures and cherish those moments. Those moments help us get through hard times. What we cannot do is expect life to stay as they are in those pictures. We must accept that life will be hard sometimes, and that we will need help from others, and from Jesus. Recognizing this, we must all reach out and help each other because we will need the same help at some point in our life. There was a lot more about prayers and how we should ask Jesus about how to help others through their trials, and in turn Jesus will help us with our trials... but I like to take my own personal message out of any religious sermon-- I am UU :o)

Anyways, I just thought I'd share that. Things have been all right here. I got paid, so things look good right now. lol.

Hello there bloggers! I know its been a while since I posted but I've been very up and down lately. I'd rather just skip all the stupid drama that's happening at work and tell you about the festival I went to this weekend.

It was called Earth Festival 2008, and it was truly a hippie event. It was a concert that lasted 24 hours a day. I ended up camping out, and let me tell you, it's hard to sleep with loud music thumping in your ears! Everyone who had been to these festivals before were smart enough to bring ear plugs. Doh!

So I had quite and adventure on the way there. The person who asked me to come, Michelle, said she didn't have any room in her car. So I took a train and a taxi. It ended up costing more than I expected. I'm calling Michelle from the taxi thinking, "They're not going to let me in if I can't get Michelle down here" and she is just not answering her phone. Basically, out of the goodness of their hearts, the people running the ticket booth let me in on a student rate. I ended up having just enough money to pay the taxi. It was a close call. So I end up finding Michelle within ten minutes and she feels bad because it seems as though cell phones don't work in this remote location. Oh well! I got there okay.

So I had a lot of fun over Friday-Sunday. I met some awesome people that I hope I'll get to see again. I managed to step into a swamp and ruin my Asics on the first night, lol. What else... they had burritos! You people don't know how lucky you are to have mexican food. The view was just awesome. The weather was a little cold during the night, but during the day it was nice. I managed to get a wicked sunburn. My family genes showing through I guess :o)

All right, I'll try and update sooner next time. I miss you!

Hello there. I think I'd like to commit this post to out of the ordinary things I've seen here in Taiwan.

First of all, pretty much everyone here has a scooter or motorcycle. I plan to get a scooter once I get my ARC card. An ARC card is basically just a card saying you have a job here and place to stay. I wish I could get a yellow scooter like in FLCL. That would be awesome. Outside my building, there are about 100 scooters parked. It is pretty crazy to see. I have also seen three people on one scooter, and a baby being held on a scooter. No offense to Taiwanese people, but they are not very safe with cars and scooters. On scooters, a child will just stand where you normally place your feet, and the parent will just put their legs around them. In a car, parents often just hold their kids in their lap, in the passenger seat. No seat belt or anything. On top of all of this, people here drive like crazy people. They drive into oncoming traffic if they think they can turn in time, they rarely wear seatbelts, and don't get me started on how crazy scooters will be. All-in-all, getting around in Taiwan is a dangerous business.

There are tons of "rules" that I've discovered over the past few weeks. For instance, I often sit cross-legged on chairs. Totally inappropriate here. It's the equivalent of spreading your legs wide open on a chair. Women are expected to sit with legs completely together at all times.

Let's see... what else? Well, we take off our shoes here, just like in Japan. If you enter someone's house, you take off your shoes. At school, the kids have "inside shoes" and "outside shoes". So, we're allowed to wear shoes inside, but those shoes must never be used outside. I've noticed that these inside shoes usually get just as dirty as outside shoes, but oh well. Haha. My kids in the afternoon usually just walk around in bare feet or socks. Boy do their feet and socks get dirty. Taiwan has this weird atmosphere in which everyone thinks things are "clean" but someone in America would surely think that same room/floor is dirty. It's strange. The water here is even too dirty to drink or cook with. We bath in it though, which makes me think, are we ever really clean?

I met some new caucasian people on Thursday. Another lady that tutors at the school, Michelle, introduced me to her friends. They are all from South Africa, which is very interesting to me. I think I might be hanging out with them tonight, weather permitting. Right now the clouds are floating past my window faster than I have ever seen in my life, and it's not ever raining. We are supposed to get another typhoon soon. haha. So many typhoons here!

All right, that's all for now. I miss all of you like crazy. You have no idea.

This weekend has been odd. I think I feel very alone, and I don't quite know how to handle it. I'm not sure I'm the type of person who can just throw myself out into the open. I may be strong sometimes... for instance if I see any Caucasian (which there aren't many here) I say, "Hello!" But I think that's easy for me because I know it will not go anywhere. I don't know how to make friends from total strangers. I'm pretty sure for a very long time I have just made friends with my friends' friends. I know I have made my own friends, after all, I had friends at college... but I feel like a completely different person than then. It's not like I expect anything bad to happen. It's more like, the easiest thing would be to sit in my suite and watch English movies. I just don't know how to force myself to do things that aren't easy. I don't mean with life. I've done some really challenging things (for instance, coming here). I mean with people. I don't take risks with people. I don't even know where to begin! Even if I joined a class, I doubt there will be anyone who can speak English. I am friends with Lindsay and Brad, but I don't want to bug them when they are trying to spend our little free time together. Hmmm....

Soooo, I guess I'll have to break down and have a negative post.

The people I work for are shady. I feel naive, because I really trusted them... but it appears they are lying to me and the other teachers; about stupid things too. The biggest thing is that that my bosses have a job posting on an ESL website-- for a job that is already taken. There are three main positions at the school, and those positions are filled by the two Canadians I have come to like and by me. None of us have expressed that we plan on leaving the school... but for some reason there is a brand new post for one of our jobs. It's like... wait, what?

They lie about other things too. For instance, we asked them to change the format of our lesson plans. They said they would talk about it with their bosses. After a week, they came back and said, "We fought very hard and we got our bosses to change the format. It was very hard, but they agreed." We're thinking-- awesome! They are listening to our ideas. Then a few days later we discover an old lesson plan in Lindsay's desk that has the same format of this "new" lesson plan. Why did you tell us that you fought to change to this new lesson when that's not true at all? You just changed back to an old format... one you probably had saved on your computer.

Another example is one of my bosses said that the students have always been silent at lunch time, and that we really need to work on returning them to that habit. But we looked in some old meeting minutes from last year, and several times it's mentioned that the students need to be quiet at lunch. Why would you tell us that they were silent last year if that's not true?

I feel like I cannot trust these people at all. I feel like they think we're stupid. They are constantly peering into my classroom to see what I'm doing. Not coming in the room-- just looking in through the door. What the hell is that? Am I a child who needs to be supervised, or a teacher and adult? It's degrading. Lindsay and Brad tell me that in the public school system you do less work, easier work, and there's none of this bull shit going down. Also-- they get preparation periods-- something I don't have! It's insane. I work for almost 6 hours straight! If I forget to print something off-- too bad! There is no time for you to do that during the day.

I guess I just feel trapped and a little degraded. It's not cool. Okay, I'm done venting.