I need to caution myself on being overly reflective, so I'm writing two posts at the same time. Here's to looking in and looking out (now, if only someone could teach me how to close my eyes...)
I did a little loop-de-loop around the country to get a feel for things, and after much drama and indecisiveness and what have you, I've landed back in Taipei. I'm getting a feel for the city, and gonsarnnit, I think I like it. First of all, it's HUGE. But better than that, it's accessible. The metro system, MRT, connects the cultural hub of the city centre to the natural surroundings on the fringe. Mountains, rivers, bike paths, hot springs, everything is accessible via the MRT.
There are a ridiculous number of night markets in the city too, many with their own distinct feel. The student areas, Shida and Gongguan, have a very cool student vibe- cheap food, chic clothing shops, good restaurants. The Danshui market has a coastal suburban vibe to it. My favourite one so far is the Lungshan Temple market, in the oldest part of Taipei. It has a totally magical ambience to it... very old school Asian and very alive. I went into the temple once, really late at night, and I was amazed at how crowded it was, packed with people giving alms, reading scriptures and kowtowing to the giant golden buddhas under candlelight.
Reading in Chinese continues to improve, but you might say it's all for show, since very little of what I'm able to read is useful. Chinese is such a difficult language- seriously and somewhat needlessly complicated (hmmm, that sounds familiar). Ok, here's a taste:
Take the word gung. If read by itself, it means grandpa, or old man. But the meaning of the character is contextual, based on all the other characters around it. So, it could also mean public, as in park (gung yuen) or washroom (gung chi). Or.. it could refer to the metric system, like kilometre- gung le.
On top of that, most chinese characters are also homonyms, so the other gungs refers to whole other sets of contextual meanings, like gung fu (that guy) which refers to work, or gung hei fat choi (another gung) which is a greeting for good fortune.
Now, let's try a game. First person to give me the associative six degrees for the words park, kilometre, grandpa, kung fu, fortunate greeting and Kevin Bacon gets a big fat gold star...
So basically, where I used to be the closet illiterate mute-deaf who pointed and smiled a lot, I have now graduated to someone who can mouth the words but can't comprehend the meaning. Do we have a name for those people? Anyways, it's all very amusing, and I should have time to start Chinese lessons fuh real in the next month or two. Good times.
I did a little loop-de-loop around the country to get a feel for things, and after much drama and indecisiveness and what have you, I've landed back in Taipei. I'm getting a feel for the city, and gonsarnnit, I think I like it. First of all, it's HUGE. But better than that, it's accessible. The metro system, MRT, connects the cultural hub of the city centre to the natural surroundings on the fringe. Mountains, rivers, bike paths, hot springs, everything is accessible via the MRT.
There are a ridiculous number of night markets in the city too, many with their own distinct feel. The student areas, Shida and Gongguan, have a very cool student vibe- cheap food, chic clothing shops, good restaurants. The Danshui market has a coastal suburban vibe to it. My favourite one so far is the Lungshan Temple market, in the oldest part of Taipei. It has a totally magical ambience to it... very old school Asian and very alive. I went into the temple once, really late at night, and I was amazed at how crowded it was, packed with people giving alms, reading scriptures and kowtowing to the giant golden buddhas under candlelight.
Reading in Chinese continues to improve, but you might say it's all for show, since very little of what I'm able to read is useful. Chinese is such a difficult language- seriously and somewhat needlessly complicated (hmmm, that sounds familiar). Ok, here's a taste:
Take the word gung. If read by itself, it means grandpa, or old man. But the meaning of the character is contextual, based on all the other characters around it. So, it could also mean public, as in park (gung yuen) or washroom (gung chi). Or.. it could refer to the metric system, like kilometre- gung le.
On top of that, most chinese characters are also homonyms, so the other gungs refers to whole other sets of contextual meanings, like gung fu (that guy) which refers to work, or gung hei fat choi (another gung) which is a greeting for good fortune.
Now, let's try a game. First person to give me the associative six degrees for the words park, kilometre, grandpa, kung fu, fortunate greeting and Kevin Bacon gets a big fat gold star...
So basically, where I used to be the closet illiterate mute-deaf who pointed and smiled a lot, I have now graduated to someone who can mouth the words but can't comprehend the meaning. Do we have a name for those people? Anyways, it's all very amusing, and I should have time to start Chinese lessons fuh real in the next month or two. Good times.
