Home Again, Home Again

Love River, cactus ice cream, pig foot, fireworks, hidden beaches, hyper-aggressive monkeys and a whole heap of temples.

We're back from four days down south. It's cold and rainy here in Nankan. Today I had a post-vacation headache and some serious laptop issues. Tomorrow the recounting of adventures resumes.

We Goin' to Kaohsiung!

It's 10:30 p.m. in five hours James and I will awake, maybe brush our teeth, and stumble down to the bus stop where buses leave for the South every half hour 24-hours-a-day. It'll probably take upwards of five hours to get there. By leaving so early, we'll have almost a full day when we get there, we figured.

We have no firm plans and no reservations. And it's Chinese New Year - one of the busiest travel times of the year. Foolish? Maybe.

But we haven't been out of the greater Taipei area for more than a month now. It's time to go.

I probably wont be posting for four or five days.

Oh yeah, and Happy New Year!

Our House

Some of the folks back home have been asking about the digs over here. Finally, we made a video so you can see it. We spent several hours on it. Or rather, for several hours I ate Pringles and prodded James to add more special effects with his editing software. Hope you enjoy.

Spend $200M on grass seed? Yes we can.

There's a good post on my favorite political blog about the stimulus bill the House put together. Whatever your political beliefs, everyone should at least be aware of what's being proposed for $825 billion to supposedly end the recession.

Personally, I can't get behind $6 billion in corporate welfare and $200 million for National Mall repairs (including planting grass) as a means to improve the economy.

Right now I'm reading Thomas Sowell's Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy. Sowell does a great job of explaining how and why economies operate most efficiently when individuals, not governments, decide how money is spent.

At this rate, why not consider the Larry Flynt economic recovery plan? I saw Flynt once - or the back of his head anyways. Two security guards were wheeling him into the j-school on the USC campus. I knew it was him because there was a black Bentley, license plate HUSTLR, parked outside. Once a semester he gives a lecture on censorship to a communication class. Four years living in Los Angeles, that was probably my second most exciting celebrity sighting. Number one being when I got to see George Lucas at a campus screening of THX-1138.

Science fiction & Porn - I digress: Email your congressman, say no to corporate bailouts and pork!

'Tis the Season (again): Chinese New Year

Picture of a lantern display hanging in Taimall, my local mega-shopping atrocity/complex.

New Year Decorations

The Christmas trees came down shortly after Jan. 1 and now there are red lanterns, strings of firecrackers, and all matter of ox-themed decorations about town (if you haven't been keeping track, we're coming into the year of the ox). Department store caroling soundtracks were replaced with something I identify only as upbeat Chinese music that's heavy on the gong. It all sounds the same, but I like it.

I also like that, for the first time since October, I have an entire week off! I don't work very many hours as it is, but i do spend more than 15 hours a week commuting, and I'm tired. We don't have firm plans, but James and I are hoping to get about the island some with our time off.

I just finished my last class of the week so the holiday starts now, yeehaw! James wont be home until late. I intend to spend the remainder of the afternoon eating leftover Thai food and watching a movie that's not part of the Criterion Collection.

James: Gee, you know I really don't have very many fun movies.

Me: Yeah. I know.

A Bad Day to be Dutch

And a terrible day for free speech.

Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders will be prosecuted for making anti-Islam comments, the Dutch Court of appeal decided.

I'd like to think of freedom of speech as a right bestowed on all of western society. Europe is supposed to be the place where Americans got all their nifty ideas for our hallowed documents.

What happened to the spirit of Voltaire and "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."

Netherlands: wtf?

Fun with Fat Kids

In America, making fun of a fat person is not okay (or not to their face, at least). Americans don't make fun of fat kids because we're afraid we'll hurt their feelings.

But here, kidding the fat kid (or fat adult) is seen as a good time for young and old alike. It's not done in meanness, Chinese people just think fat is hilarious. Every fat kid in each of my six classes has been called out at one time or another for his paunch.

And when I say fat kid, I don't mean neckless and obese like you see some (too many) unfortunate children in the U.S. My fat kids are all just stout little boys who will probably become strapping young men once they're through the puberty business. They're boys who probably wouldn't reach the bar for fat kid in America. But that doesn't stop their peers and their teachers from laughing at them.

"Aaron is so big. He like to eat too much," cackled a Chinese teacher at my pre-school. She puffed out her cheeks to demonstrate. She was standing over Aaron at the table where the students were having lunch as she showed me.

"BORIS IS VERY FAT! WILSON VERY FAT!" a 15-year-old girl in one cram school class announced, giggling, in class one day.

"Hee hee, Gregory is so fat." Judy said to me this week.
Judy is a very sweet 10-year-old. Gregory is 7. Judy mothers the younger students at the school, I've never seen her do anything mean to anyone.
Judy rubbed Gregory's tummy and said something in Chinese.
What did you say? I asked.
"I told him he cannot have baby because he is not girl."

What surprises me as much as the jokes are the fat kids' reactions. I've never seen anyone upset. Mostly they smile, some pat their tummys, some look pleased to be noticed for something. It's not a big deal. Still, I am always at a loss for what to do. My American ways are too ingrained for me to laugh along. A couple times I've said, "nu-uh! He is not fat!" because, for serious, the kid really isn't fat, he just isn't skinny either. Or I say, "Hey be nice!" for lack of better words.

But I don't think that's the right approach: If the kid doesn't think so already, I don't want to be the one to make him feel like there's something wrong with his size.

Now mostly I half smile and lead off with, "Okay! As I was saying about gerunds..."

There is an upside to all this: Like many women who look at Vogue or InStyle from time to time, I operate under the sneaky suspicion that, despite my healthy B.M.I., I am really a lard ass who is no less than 20 pounds overweight.

I've been in Taiwan four months and no one has called me fat. This is the greatest reassurance I have ever received that I'm not actually overweight. The fact that no one has giggled while marveling at my stomach does more for me than all the countless times my mom has scoffed, rolled her eyes, and walked away as I whimper in front of a mirror. Thanks, Taiwan.