Well, ring the bell backwards and bury the axe

I'm the world's worst blogger, updating only at my fancy. That's mostly because the past few days have been pretty similar -- saying goodbye to some people, starting the pack up, cleaning up sections of my room as I pack things away and trying to do some last minute shopping. But, some updates:

1) Ginger and I rode to the top of Tiger's Head Mountain, which overlooks Taoyuan city. It was a stunning view at night, and the whole park was filled with couples walking around hand in hand, and families playing with their children. We also ate Thai take out up there, and there's nothing quite like Larb Gai, Beef Curry and a breezy summer night!

2) I got a tour of the Grand Hotel today, and we ate in one of the restaurants in the Hotel. We = myself and the director of the College of Education. The food was amazing, as always and the Grand Hotel is absolutely beautiful inside and out.

3) I am deeply in love with Hi-Chews, iced milk tea, lotus soup, and steamed meat buns. Also, I'm worried about my adjustment to meals that don't always include rice. How will I get full?

4) I've got my game plan for traveling to the airport from campus all squared away, and my last day at my internship is Thursday (it's currently Tuesday night here). So, everything is really coming to a close.

As a last note, my July once I get back to the states is going to be busy but absolutely wonderful. I'll be mostly in Mississippi, but will travel to South Carolina, Louisiana, Tennessee all before I finally return to South Carolina in August. I'm getting really excited to see everyone, and share all my Taiwan goodies and pictures with them!

"Never Let Go" by Tom Waits from Orphans

I will help you read those books, if you will soothe my worried looks

Amazing day here in Taiwan, to everyone just starting Wednesday, you're gonna love it.

1) I spent some time with Dr. Liu this morning over coffee, and we talked more about religious life here in Taiwan and how she compares it to what religious life seems like in the States. She's a practicing Christian (practicing for the spring softball league, badumching!) and talked a lot about her sense of being less open with her church community about her "true feelings" on issues like politics and social issues. She asked if I thought that was true in America, and I said I just didn't know enough to be sure, but I thought it was common enough in a lot of the monotheistic faiths. I absolutely love spending time chatting with Dr. Liu, and with only 11 days left in Taiwan I know I'm going to miss these morning chats so much.

2) No more presentations for me, I'm doing some work on the English website for the Education department, trying to streamline it and correct grammar and word choice. I should be really honest and say I've already had to Google some grammar assistance. I know, from being able to diagram any sentence in just a minute (no matter how complex, try me) to this. How the mighty have fallen.

3) My last roommate departs tomorrow morning at 6 am, and then it's just me until July 5th when I leave. I'll miss having others here, but it should give me time to do some sleeping, and I'll travel back into Taipei at least one more time before I head for the US of A.

4) I'm also hoping to visit a few more temples before I head out, I didn't visit nearly as many as I'd hoped to!

5) Thai food and green tea ice cream with Ginger tomorrow night, and some shopping in Taoyuan. I'm so excited, I'm going to ask very nicely to drive that scooter again!

"You and I" by Ingrid Michaelson from Be Ok

It was a slow walk in a sad rain, and nobody tried to be John Wayne

Just a fast update, I'm now 13 days from my departure and I'm starting to get more and more excited for home comforts, family, Andy and friends!

1) Things on campus are kind of shutting down now that most of the students have moved back home for the summer break. The shuttle hours all change and so do business hours so I'm trying to keep myself updated on all those changes, which is a little stressful but nothing too intense.

2) Here in Taiwan, if you ask someone where something is on campus you're almost guaranteed to be escorted to that place by the person you asked, or someone nearby. This is usually a nice perk, but sometimes it's a little embarrassing. Like today, when showing you where a store is requires the person to travel three stops away on the MRT and several blocks. I really just needed to know which MRT stop it was, but never doubt that the Taiwanese are helpful.

3) After today I will offically be done with my Maymester course requirements, and I really just enjoyed it so much. Maybe I enjoyed the paper writing and journals less than the exploring Taiwan part, but really. If you get to study abroad, do it, kids. DO IT.

4) Johnny Cash covering The Man Who Couldn't Cry. Go, find, download. Listen. Repeat. Recorded live at the Viper Room.

"Drive On" by Johnny Cash from American Recordings

It Lives!

The blog was down or locked or something. BUT I'm back! UPDATES!!

1) This past week was really busy but wonderful. I love doing the presentations for the students, and I've even gotten to help a few of them with their presentations on higher education. Mostly it's been correcting already very good English, but I've also gotten to learn about their perspectives on Taiwanese higher education. Many of the students think that Taiwanese higher education isn't rigorous enough, and that it should be more like the US system. Which leads to...

2) The more time I spend talking with Taiwanese people, the more I'm beginning to feel comfortable saying that, in general, there's a lot of "in America, this is much better." I hear that phrase so frequently, I've begun to be surprised when we talk about anything comparatively and it isn't said. I usually don't think much about it, these are highly educated professors and students I'm working with, and I usually find something else in the conversation that strikes me. But, today I thought about it more and more.

I understand that, to some extent, some things simply are more accessible in America. It should probably be pointed out that, for a Taiwanese citizen in America, I have no idea if much would truly be more accessible. But, for the most part, things are just different in America. Our education system is different, I don't know enough about either to know if it's better, and I'm not even sure how valuable that comparison would be. I get why I hear it so often, and again, I usually don't reflect on it as much. But I can speculate about where that response comes from, but I wish I had a better hold on it.

3) No Typhoon (so far at least). It was redirected by wind they said? I'm just happy to have not lost a weekend to rain!

4) I went to the Taipei Zoo today, and saw two pandas. I bought the most ridiculous purchase ever at the gift shop. I won't waste time describing, I promise photos tomorrow.

5) I ate at a bar called The Brass Monkey for dinner. It's a pub in Taiwan. Note to the Maymester class: There were only Westerners in their ads because...pretty much only Westerners go there. Loud rugby on the TV, heavy beers and delicious food. I got a Smithick's, ate bangers and mash (good) and buffalo wings with friends. It was definitely fun, and it made me miss Fenian's in Miss-a-sip more than I have in a long time. All you Jackson folks -- let's go shame our family names as soon as I get back. Or, you know, just have a beer and laugh?

6) I'm offically two weeks away from "Operation Reunited and It Feels So Reasonably Pleasant and Downright Convenient" and I have to say I'm feeling so excited for the "Dani's Welcome Wagon '09", and all the fun trips for July. I'm also starting to feel that rush of "get all the fun you can out of it, because when you leave you can't just come back over the weekend". But I'm just going to try to soak it all up, and then feel excited and happy to return home.

Now you know it won't make a sound, burn down this town

I haven't updated in a few days, which in the life of a blog is, like, forever, man, okay? Yaah. 

1.I spent the weekend on Green Island (a bit of an extended weekend, but not by much). Had some rain, but got to enjoy some snorkeling (absolutely amazing), got to flex my very tiny Chinese muscle (mostly I flexed my phrase book muscle) and got plenty of reading and relaxing in. It was absolutely beautiful, and was one of the top five places I've gotten to experience here. Don't worry, towards the end there will be plenty of High Fidelity-esque top five lists...Going snorkeling there was perfect, the people were wonderfully friendly and renting and driving my own scooter was fantastic. I hadn't realized that I missed self-transportation so much (plus, come on. the scooter is neat!).

2. I'm excited about this week for a few reasons: Lots of presentations (well, three, which is a lot for me!), some more coffee/chat time with Dr. Liu which I always look forward to and a visit to Danshui (just north of Taipei city) at the end of the week. I've heard wonderful things about Danshui, and the undergrads who were here with the class got to take a day trip there, so I'm excited to experience it for myself!

3. I'm going to see The Hangover tonight at a theatre here in Taoyuan. I saw a movie while I was in Taipei (Angels and Demons, based on the book by that great bard of modern literature, Dan Brown), and I'm actually excited to see what everyone has said is a hilarious movie. 

A note on phrase books (or, at least, my phrase book): The phrase book I have is a bit like one of those survival knives boys I knew in college had. You know, they're knives but they have a compass, fishing line, toothpick, scissors, maybe some rope and oh..what's that? Yes, a nail file. For the survivalist who needs smart, rounded nails. My point is this: My phrase book has tons of sections filled with great stuff. How to tell someone congratulations on their recent wedding, how to ask for a dentist. But I really only use it for transportation and food. It even has a section for Mistakes...pssh. As if I'd ever need a thing like that.

Burn Down This Town by Roseanne Cash from the album Black Cadillac

You don't meet nice girls in coffee shops

Not a great day here in Taiwan, so I'll keep it brief.

1) Presentations tomorrow on American Music and the Ame

rican Education System. Had fun putting both together, so I hope tomorrow will go well. I'm still editing the American Music one, and will be for parts of the night. It's tough to present even close to a sampling of American Music in an hour and 1/2.

2) As with lots of "bummer" days, I ended up listening to more Tom Waits. Lower your eyebrows, I didn't say it made sense I just said I do it. Tom Waits is amazing. Yes, he probably drank battery acid before recording some of his songs. I can't help but love him. 

From his performance in Atlanta last year. I can hear the thump-thump of your heart already.

Go here for a few more pictures from that same performance, and then download (legally, illegally, whatever) Filipino Box Spring Hog and try to guess what the lyrics are. Joke's on you, they don't really matter.

"Hold On" by Tom Waits from Mule Variations

Take that frown and break it

It's been a pretty action packed two days. I was at the Taipei campus both days, and have been doing lots of talking with the Education professors at the campus. Dr. Liu, a psychology professor, was nice enough to spend several hours talking with me about education, Taiwan, religion and life in general. Dr. Yang and I spoke about American education (she's a recent Penn State grad and a lover of Penn State football if ever I've met one). Today I spent with education students visiting Taiwan civil courts and the Presidential Residence. Rundown:

1) Dr. Liu was so insightful about religious life in Taiwan and in general. The highlight was when she related her observation that so often, we hide parts of ourself in order to practice our religion with the people who we are with. She was so wonderful to talk with, and we'll have coffee again sometime next week.

2) Dr. Yang and I talked a good bit about student-teacher interaction in Taiwanese education and how she sees that as different from the typical American interactions. From her point of view, there's much more distance between a Taiwanese professor and student, but I haven't observed that so far. Maybe the Education department is much smaller though.

3) I rode on and then drove a scooter Monday night. I only drove in the hills, away from traffic so I can't speak to driving on the crazy streets but riding the scooter in the traffic was a hilarious and amazing experience. Driving the scooter was addictive, so I'm pretty sure I'll be trying it again.

4) Today I talked with several of my Taiwanese student friends (Maya, Eileen, and Eric mostly). Eric is still shy about his English, but I learned quickly today that there is one thing Eric is perfectly fluent in: American Baseball. Luckily, so am I. We had a great conversation over lunch about his favorite team (ATL Braves) and mine (STL Cardinals). Some playful ragging and general ranting about the NY Yankees. According to Eric, the Yankees are "selling the soul of baseball." Get it, Eric.

5) I may have inadvertently introduced "get it" into Maya, Eileen and Eric's English lexicon today. I feel alright about this, especially since they seemed to think it was funny. By the end of the day, Maya wanted a bubble tea and Eileen told her "Get it!" 

6) I get to sleep in tomorrow, after a few days of waking up at 7:00 am. Life's good!

I'm going to try to start saying what song the blog titles are from, because I've gotten a few emails asking. "I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You" by Tom Waits

If looks could kill it would have been us instead of him

So, updates from the weekend are a little late, but here they are! As a sidenote, in reference to my title today, I had a good friend in high school who sent Yoko Ono a lengthy and expletive-laden email regarding Yoko's "hellacious Banshee scream" on the track of The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill" and how it ruined this "would be classic of pacifism-motivated music." Sixteen-year olds are neat, right?

1. I went to Ming Chuan's Taoyuan campus graduation on Saturday and there was a surprise guest. The President of Taiwan! He spoke briefly, shook some hands and then left. As he was leaving, people (including myself!) were standing maybe 20 feet from him. The reaction of the grads and families to him entering the graduation was pretty polarized, they were either wildly excited or clearly unhappy with him. But, it was definately a once in a lifetime experience!

2) That same night there was a huge fireworks display for the grads. Really amazing.

3) Sunday I ventured into Taipei, met a guy named Mark from Columbia, SC (very small world!). He was hilarious, loves Art Bar. We got pizza and beer and he told me about some neat hole-in-the-wall places to explore around South Carolina. I also shopped a lot on Sunday, and bought more books. It seems like I'll leave here with an entire unread library, which I feel pretty good about.

4) Ginger and I are doing dinner tonight, maybe at a Thai place or Japanese. She's got such a great perspective on experiencing education in Taiwan, and I'm excited to hear more about her in-class experiences as well as general cultural thoughts.

5) Most common question: Do you like Obama? People here love Barak Obama so much, and they love talking about him and asking questions about him. Get it, Obama!

This would only be an experiment in things that could have been...

Let's just cut right down to the heart of the matter here. I don't speak Chinese, but I'm living and working in a country where people do, predominately. Everyone I have contact with also speaks very good English, but their first language and the one they most often use is Chinese. But, I don't speak Chinese.

Keep this in mind, always. It's important. And somedays, it's downright hilarious.

1) I sat through a total of four hours of meetings. Two meetings, two hours each. One was about the Educational Resouraces in Taipei, the other about accreditation for Ming Chuan. Both sound really interesting, right? I'm sure they were. They were completely in Chinese. See above. However, every once in awhile they'd ask me a question or make a comment to me in Chinese. I just shrugged and actually said ni hao once. Ni hao means hello.

 But, nevertheless, I did learn somethings! It's amazing how much you can pick up just by facial expressions, gestures and the group's reactions. It's not rude to answer your cell in a meeting here. Also, they were very funny and fun loving during both meetings, teasing one another and telling jokes during their presentations. Even during situations like this, I find that I actually am enjoying myself in the moment. Partly because, come on, that's some Seinfeld-quality hilarity. But also because I'm still having an amazing experience and in exactly a month I won't be here anymore. So, I'm soaking up the odd, interesting, fun, hilarious and awkward all the same!

2) I met another American student here named Ginger. She and I were going to get dinner tonight, but I'm still pretty exhausted so we'll go for dinner tomorrow night instead. I can't wait to talk to her more, she seemed so laid back and funny. She's been in Taiwan for a year now, and promised to show me some neat jewelry shops around Taoyuan.

3) Dear Prudence, by The Beatles from the White Album is the perfect song to walk to work in the morning to. I know I sound like a cheeseball, but go on, try it. You'll be in an amazing mood all morning. Well, you're gonna obviously need some Mr. Brown too. This smile ain't natural ya'll, it's all stimulants and dead musicians!

So now it's time quote time. Oh yes, I'm one of those, on occasion at least. I started reading The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable recently, and a quote from the very first few pages stuck to some part of my mind.

 "We tend to treat our knowledge as personal property to be protected and defended. It is an ornament that allows us to rise in the pecking order. We take what we know a little too seriously." 

Those seem like pretty wise words for a grad student like me to read and hold onto!

What's your persona about this Americana?

Thanks for the Mom-toned emails about me being sick in Taiwan (and Mom, thanks for not being so mom-toned!).  I especially appreciated one message which encouraged me to discover a means to "kick the crap out of that Taiwan funk." Ya'll are neat!

1) Did the kick-off American Culture presentation where I introduced a variety of culture topics. I exposed them to red beans and rice (gimme dat!), the fair, Outkast and college football just to name a few. The rest of my presentations will be more specific so this was just the start.

2) I met a student who will be studying at South Carolina in the fall. I taught her the Gamecocks football chant and promised to take her around Columbia once she got there.

3) A band on campus is rocking out in the middle of the track right now, and since our windows are open I can hear it all. It's a little like Chinese Nirvana Ska...get it, Taiwan.

4) I sat in on a graduate level education class about research methods today, taught in English. The class was taught by Eva, a professor we met while in Taipei for our Maymester class. She remembered me and invited me back next week to present to the class. The students and I talked for awhile about the differences in our programs, and their thesis topics.

5) Kenting trip is offically set to start on June 19th, we'll stay for the weekend. Kenting is in the south of Taiwan, and is supposed to be beautiful beaches and national park areas. Can't wait!

Beware of the ruffian who ain't got nothing, he ain't got nothing to lose

A mini-complaint:

Blue Mountain, a band I dig, is playing Memphis this weekend, Columbia next Friday and Jackson for Jubilee Jam. I missed them completely the last time they were in Mississippi, but maybe I'll catch them the next time around! The parallelism is too much to not take note of though. Well, parallelism or just...being into a band that mostly tours the Southeast. Someone, go see them in one of those three places! Or, be a fanboy (or girl) and see them in all three.

Isn't it electric in here

At this point, these blog titles are just names of the first song that comes to mind from the day. One funny thing about Taiwan, I pretty much have my iPod going anytime I'm walking around or on the bus. And I'm on the bus at least twice a day. And maybe in my head sometimes I sing the "Ride the Bus" song and think of days gone by...

1) Did my presentation on American Higher Education today. It went pretty well, the class had some really great questions for me and we had this interesting conversation about why American public universities are state schools and not national universities like in Taiwan. I didn't have all the answers, but the conversation was really interesting. We talked some about "state's rights" as well, which one of the professors was especially interested in. He's always at the Taipei campus, so I think we're going to try to get lunch to continue the discussion.

2) My body finally caught up to itself and I got sick today, but I saw a great doctor (British, yes, Hewitt and Coale, very McDreamy) and am already springing back. Also, GET IT Taiwan medical care. 

3) Tomorrow I start the American Culture presentation series with an introductory presentation. I'm still putting the last touches on it but I feel pretty good about it as a starting point. Hoping they'll bring more great questions.  Although, there's nothing like trying to encapsulate y

our culture for others to make you feel a little sad about the state of it. Maybe I should just create this image of Americans as book reading, music writing intellectuals who only eat farm grown vegetables and free range meat? Naw, ya'll. We talkin' bout fried chicken and MTV around here!

4) Everyone in my office speaks Chinese (obviously) unless they are talking to me. Sometimes I hear "Random Chinese...Daniel....Random Chinese" That's how I know they're

 about to talk to me, so I've started automatically looking up anytime I hear that happen. I'm being conditioned.

I got my hair cut in Taiwan last week and never put up a picture. Here's the hair, not "styled" because..well. Sha'mon, folks. I'm in Taiwan, where (as we used to say) "they don't KNOW me like that."

Oh, what's that? Yes, the BANGIN' BANGS ARE BACK!

I got it one piece at a time...

Pretty long day on this end of life, but for everyone starting up Tuesday: Don't worry. I made it. It's going to be great. Always nice to have a word from the future, right? 

1) Went to the Taipei campus today to meet with Dr. Shih, a professor in Ming Chuan's Education department. Dr. Shih was a principal and a superintendent before becoming a professor and he shared with me all kinds of insights about Taiwanese secondary education, especially about classroom structure. He felt that it was best to have teachers instruct to students and to minimize discussions in class. Rather, teachers should encourage the students to discuss privately with them after class, or in smaller groups.

2) I read ten research article abstracts for the Education department that they're hoping to have published in English journals. They asked me to proofread for clarity and grammar. They were each between 150 and 200 words, but it was pretty painstaking work. I'd read a sentence, read on Wikipeidia or some other site about the topic, then correct as much of the English as I could. Their English is really good, but I'm neither an education expert nor am I an English expert. But, did what I could and am looking back over them now. As an edit, I'm STILL looking over them roughly two hours later. Could be a long night, but I'll sleep when I'm dead!

3) First presentation is tomorrow, about American Higher Education. The presentation is laughably simplistic, but I know they'll bring some great questions and we can hopefully have some fun conversation.

4) My general American Culture presentation is Thursday. I'm still working on it, but I'm hoping I can find a way to post it to the blog.  Who doesn't want to see a PowerPoint presentation filled with baseball clips, Superman, beer, muscle cars and Jay-Z? Oh, and let us not forget, Gap commercials. Oh, but baby, it's cold outside indeed. Yes, AndrewBear, Christmas will make an appearance. 

I also had some amazing chocolate toast tonight. I'm not sure what it actually was, but from what I can gather it's a bread similar to challa, in a cone shape. It's hollowed out and filled with melted dark chocolate. It hardens, but stays mushy. You eat and fall into a foodlustcoma. Go on, cue up the slow clap!

I'm like the sky, baby, I'm never comin' down!

I started my internship at Ming Chuan today, and it looks to be a pretty action packed 5 weeks! I spent two hours at the Taoyuan campus getting to know my office and then four hours at the Taipei campus doing the same. Annndd we're off:

1) I woke up at 7:30 am. My old friend Mr. Brown woke up with me though (dear non-Taiwan affiliated readers--That's a coffee brand. Not an illicit substance. Unless you consider caffeine an illicit substance in which case, I quote Banks, Hampton and Jackson: If lovin' you (coffee) is wrong, I don't wanna be right.) This moment brought to you by Wikipedia. What? You thought I knew the songwriters off the top of my head? Sha'mon now.

2) In Taipei I hung out with Eileen and Mya, two Education majors at Ming Chuan. They're bangin'. They asked tons of questions about my life, and again I was ill-at-ease with it. Mostly because I have no idea how to answer their questions about my relationship, friendships, family or religion. But these two are so dear, and were just amazing to get to know. And they couldn't have taken more care with me, even to the point of giving me the "dad arm" in the street. That's right, the "dad arm" givers of the Taipei trip have been usurped!

3) The internship duties. Basically, they consist of various meetings with faculty and staff to have one-on-ones for them to ask me about American higher ed and me to ask them about Taiwanese higher ed. When do these meetings start? Tomorrow at 11:00 am! I've set up roughly six already, the time in Taipei's offices was spent with people coming in and out. Every few minutes someone would walk in, say "Daniel! You're here" and I'd meet someone new. Overwhelming, but I just reminded myself to relax and process it later. Also, that's not a typo. Danielle must be pretty difficult to pronounce here. That's alright, it occurred to me that everyone I've met has given me their English name. That is, a name they chose for English speakers. Something about that strikes me, I don't know what yet.

4) The other part of my duties is a series of presentations for various audiences. The rundown is truly ridiculous, and if you've ever sat through a Safe Zone presentation (or any other presentation I've done) you should be laughing right about.....now. 

Some of the presentations will be for the Teacher Education majors:

Teacher Education in America (know ZERO about it, Ryan and Ashley you will be my saviors)

Educational Systems in America

Some will be for Education majors in general:

Higher Education in America

History of the University of South Carolina (HESA kids, look alive, look alive!)

Some will just be open to students in general:

American Culture

American Music

The American South

American Sports

Religion in America 

The religion and the music ones may only be open to students in courses on those topics, but I'm not entirely sure.

Alright, it's pleading time. Listen, if you know something neat or interesting or ANYTHING about one of these topics, email me or leave a comment. I'm excited about doing them, but could use a little help from my friends, to get by with a little help from my friends (do you need anybody?). 

Also, let's keep it on the real, I know all of you. I know what you know things about. I'll e-find you. And when I do, I'm going to email you until you finally break down and help me. So, I look forward to hearing from all of you! Email me: KDanielleC@gmail.com or just comment here.

6) I'm going to love doing this internship. Every day is going to be so different from the one before it. It's a little odd to be the one answering lots of questions about American Higher Education (and American culture in general), but I'm just going to be as honest as ever about what I know and don't know. Maybe I can teach someone a little something, but mostly I feel like I'm going to learn a whole lot about the topics I present on and Taiwan education in general.

This is the longest blog post ever. If you read the whole thing, you should probably let me buy you a beer when I get back to the States. Or you should get back to work. Hard to say.