THURSDAY, DECEMBER 31, 2015 – SUNDAY, JANUARY 3, 2016
Crazy! Another year is coming to an end, and a new one is beginning. It happens every year, yet it still feels like a new experience. Sometimes it feels nice to have that clean slate. I think it every year. This is the time to change. To either change something you’re unhappy with or challenge yourself to start something new. What I’ve realized is that these thoughts can happen anytime of the year. At any point of the year, I can decide to change. I don’t really need to wait for one number to change to start it. It also feels like that change is not going to happen over night. It’s a process and the change will happen gradually if I keep working at it throughout the year. To me, resolution has a negative connotation. It’s often associated with surface level things or not genuine attitudes. I’ve tried the resolutions thing before, and it’s like a fad that fades away after two weeks, dropped and forgotten. What appears to be more meaningful are the goals that happen over time. This year, I am going to tell myself to continue pursuing those goals and a lot of it is little things that you can keep doing. I want to travel more often and spend more time with family and have more conversations with friends.
That’s my take on the new year. I was reading this blog and it is amazing! I agree with a lot of what the author wrote and his writing is so eloquent, delivering the message better than I ever could. I would highly recommend reading his view on the new year if you have the chance.
Back to my life… This week has been pretty hectic. Work schedule is slightly abnormal due to events and business outside of the office.
For my teacher readers: Reader’s Theater
This week I participated in my first Reader’s Theater. What is Reader’s Theater? Good question. I didn’t know til now. Reader’s Theater is like a skit that the students act out. Often times the content is some scenario that is all dialogue and often involves a group of people. You can create as many roles as you want. The students don’t usually don’t memorize the skit/dialogue, but it’s best if they deliver it with emotion. It can be fun if the students really get into it. This strategy is a great way for students to work on their reading skills.
Fortunately, on New Years Eve, I was able to take half of the day off and catch a relatively early high speed rail train to Taipei. My coworker went to buy a high speed rail ticket and they were completely sold out from 4pm to 10pm. Taipei is like Times Square on New Years Eve. So, it was not a complete surprised that many of the public transportation outlets were going to be heavily congested. RJ and I arrived in Taipei around 4pm. I had invited some of the other foreign English teachers to stay at my grandparents’ place. It was a lot of fun. We tried to create our own photo booth and we had a good dinner at 8pm. From there, we walked to Taipei 101. I’ll admit, I made the girls walk a little further to get a good view of the fireworks.
Afterwards, we went to another friend’s house and hung out til about 3am.
FRIDAY, January 1, 2016 – Happy New Year!
We made it to 2016! We woke up and went to a Pizza Hut Buffet. Pizza Hut has different flavors in Taiwan. I think I liked the salad bar they had the best though. It was 250-300NT per person. Afterwards, I took Tracy and Rebecca to Elephant Mountain since they haven’t been there before and it’s a pretty touristy thing to do. To my surprise, it seemed like climbing elephant mountain on new year day is a thing. Almost like an unspoken event. We reached the boulder and stood in line to take pictures. I have yet to climb the boulder but I’ve taken pictures for others. 🙂 My friend’s pictures all turned out pretty great too. We were thinking of staying for the sunset, but there didn’t really seem to be one. Beware, if you go on New Years Day, there are a lot of people. A LOT. The line seemed even longer as the day went on. The walk to the boulder is about 20 minutes.
We walked down the mountain and got on the red line at Xiangshan station. We then took it to Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall. Yeeep. My first time there! I thought it was really pretty with the gate lighted up. Unfortunately, we arrived too late to go any further, but we were able to enjoy the courtyard between the two front buildings and the gate.
After hanging out there for a bit, we decided to eat dinner at Shilin Night Market. Back on the red line, we took the MRT to Jiangtan station and shopped and ate. Afterwards, we made it back to my grandparents house and called it a day.
SATURDAY, January 2, 2016 – Northern Tip of Taiwan
And then there were two…. Tracy and I got up, bought a rice burrito and rode the MRT from Taipei 101/World Trade Center to Tamsui Station. From Tamsui Station, we took a 40 min bus to Shimen Arch. I read about it somewhere and I really wanted to check it out. It was beautiful!
Not really sure what else to do around the area, we consulted one of our travel brochures and thought it might be cool to check out this 10 story dog they have in front of a temple nearby.
The Temple is called The Eighteen Kings Temple. According to sources online it used to be one of Taiwan’s most popular temples during the 1980s, but nowadays there’s not many people there. We didn’t really read up on this temple and just went to see the dog. It was a little difficult to get there on foot. We were lucky that someone was nice enough to give us a ride. I know, two girls getting into a stranger’s car is probably not the smartest idea we had, but I think instinct told us that this ride was okay.
I didn’t know what to expect. Stepping into the temple, I felt something off, but I couldn’t really put my finger on it. The dog was really big, but it was kind of a scary dog. We then took a public bus back to the MRT station, but it was nearly two hours long and very uncomfortable.
We got off one stop earlier and ate at a curry restaurant. There was no wait and the food was decent.
It wasn’t until I got back that I found out the whole story about the temple. I told my mom and consulted Taiwanese co workers. Everyone kind of freaked out, which only freaked me out more.
So apparently, this temple is associated with the Underworld. I was told that prostitutes will often go to that temple. I can’t say it’s not a good temple. It just wasn’t a good temple for me. This might not matter to someone who doesn’t believe in that religion, but knowing that it was important to my family made me uneasy.
The next day, my aunt took me to Longshan Temple to change my fortune/luck. I think everyone thinks my soul was scared, which I was. I don’t have pictures of this temple because I deleted all of them. It sounds silly, but I got scared just looking at the dog, and my family said it was best to remove all traces of it from my life.
It’s funny. Everyone I talked to has never been to this temple, but they’ve all heard of it. I tried to find an equivalent of that in the U.S., but the only thing I can think of is maybe jail?
CatchUp! Coming soon: a trip with an elephant; playing with a dragon; flying between trees …