strange :-s

I feel like an alien (though the sidewalks are at least as hazardous as they used to be in Taipei). I feel like an alien when I fumble in my wallet for coins that I don't recognize and then prefer to just hand over a banknote because that's easier. I feel like an alien when I stare at the red currants and the big range of yoghurt to choose from in the supermarket. I feel like an alien when I happen to catch the "Landarzt" on tv, a series that used to be on before I left for Asia 4 years ago, and that still features incredibly stupid dialogues, and the only thing different is the giant haunch the formerly slim and not unattractive main character has gained. Or when I watch anything else on tv (which I try to avoid) because it's either another bad series, a foreign movie hideously dubbed into German or a political magazine on the sensational level of any Taiwanese news feature (ok, no reason to feel like an alien here :-S). I feel like an alien when I check the movie listings in the paper and look for the note whether or not they have subtitles and then realize that they don't because everything is in German, anyway. I feel like an alien when I get a phone call at home, and a hyper-excited voice says: "Congratulations Ms. Oberle, you've been chosen as a candidate for the new tv show with Wiegald Boning" - who the heck is Wiegald Boning? At least, in Taipei, people would politely say good-bye if you told them you weren't interested in whatever they tried to sell you on the phone. That guy kept going on and on, so I just hung up. I feel like an alien when I look at the girls who are so pretty in a very different way from the Taiwanese girls and the guys who who look much more attractive than most of the Western expats in Taipei and all the cute little blond kids. I feel like an alien when I realize that I smile at every Asian crossing my way. I feel like an alien when I automatically address people in Chinese or English, and they answer in a language I don't expect (German) or when I realize that everybody around me understands what I'm talking about with H. I feel like an alien when I tell a shop assistant about the power cable with the Taiwanese plug, and he asks if I bought it on Ebay, and I look at him and say: "No, in Taiwan of course." I feel like an alien when H says something, and a "In Taipei, we do things this way" crosses my mind. Or when I start off with "last week in Taipei..."

And I feel much more stared at than in Taipei. Quote H: "Well, there are much less people to look at on the street, so naturally, more people look at you."

translation

One of the questions I really, really hate is "So, do you know what you'll do when you're back in Germany?" (another one would be: "So, when will you two have the first child?"). I was so busy leaving Taiwan, I most certainly had no mind for thinking about what to do, let alone organize anything in advance. Though I do have a couple of ideas. Apart from the lounge bar thing waaaaaaaaaaay below, the most obvious would probably be doing translations. That's what I have a degree in, I've always liked doing it, and doing Chinese-German translation would be one way to keep my Chinese halfway alive. And, thanks to Fei-Fei, I just did my first trial for a job for a Taiwanese TV station that might come in September. It was a horrible text, very Taiwanese, overindulging in insignificant details instead of giving real information. But it was Chinese, and in a way, it was fun.

Some other things I might want to do would be helping Monika with whatever help she needs for her Taiwan projects. Or do anything else that pops up in connection with China or Taiwan. Or assist STAR in whatever they need assistance, either checking Chinese stuff while the China/Taiwan offices are unavailable. Or do Transit training/support up here. If they still remember that I exist, of course.
The only thing I never want to do is teaching. Strangely enough, it was always the first thing my boyfriends/husband came up with when we talked about finding a job for me: "You could teach Chinese at evening school" :-S Noooooooooooooo way :-S

house

H bought a house in Halle, a small town in North-eastern Germany, more than 2 years ago. Halle is in the former GDR, so houses are plentiful and cheap but need to be thoroughly redecorated. The house he bought was built in the 1890s, is L-shaped and has three floors (with 4m high ceilings) and an attic. Two floors are rented out to pay for the mortgage (as will the attic be at one point), the middle floor is where we live on 140 sqm.
Right now, a lot still has to be done. Facade and roof need a make-over. The gardens in the front and the back are a mess and will be my task as soon as I get settled in (whereas I told H that I hate any decoration work like painting the walls etc, and am not too keen on helping with any of that). The two bedrooms in the back wing are a construction site with new windows to be put in and wiring and heating to be replaced. "My" room is a mess of books and boxes (and there are more to come). The living room has a massive old tiled oven, and apart from two sofas, the dinner table and the stereo not much decoration. We'll probably have to get some more furniture at one point, though the big empty spaces with the old wooden floors and the tainted sunlight through the curtains look pretty nice. Tuesday obviously enjoys herself wandering around and checking out everything. Though I wonder how long it will take before she starts racing across the place like she used to in Taipei.
Anyway, all our friends and relatives know that we have loads of space, so we'll have H's niece and nephew sleeping over in two weeks. And my brother will come for a weekend in August. And more guests will follow, I suppose.

The front. The 6 windows in the middle are where we live.

the back wing. Behind our garden, there is nothing but grass and trees

my front garden

our living room

Iris and Tuesday making a mess in the living room

the big old doors

stucco ceilings

my room

kitchen

I brought my fridge magnets :-)

getting used to each other

excess luggage

I took Reiner home after lunch on sunday because of course I still had to pack virtually everything. Thank goodness, Hans had come the evening before and told me not to worry, I could basically leave everything as it was, they would take care of it. THANKS!!!!
Anyway, Reiner walked around the place, talked to Tuesday, made himself useful by uninstalling phone, dsl etc and pacified my "I can't do this" wails :-S He took us to the airport, too (after we had a farewell dinner with Roelof and Hans and Ya-Ching). Right after getting there, Tuesday had go through animal quarantine. The lady was very nice, asked if it was her first flight, told her not to be nervous and wondered if I would bring her back again. And then we went to check-in. Including Tuesday (5.2kg including box), I had something like 48kg for check-in (and two more carry-on pieces with 11kg each). I went to pay for the 16kg they made me pay for, and while I was handing over my credit card, I could hear Tuesday meowing on the belt, so I dashed over to talk to her while they were securing her box with additional tape. And then, she was gone. And I was panicking. Reiner said good-bye and I started talking to Essi from Heidelberg who I had met in Eden the night after my farewell party and who happened to be on the same flight.
I was so tired after the ktv that after asking the flight attendant about adjusting the heat in the cargo for my baby, I fell asleep soon after dinner and only woke up 2.5 hours before landing. And started worrying again.
I got off the plane in Frankfurt and grabbed one of the ground staff ladies to ask on how to proceed (I think I was sort of shaking from having horror visions of a dried-out bundle of dehydrated or heart-failed Tuesday lying dead in her cage). So she got in touch with the guys in cargo, and when somebody said he'd heard something meowing, I almost broke down from relief. I called my sister-in-law, she picked me up, I had a sumptuous German breakfast in her place (rolls and sausage and cheese and jam and a whole pot of tea) and got back on the plane to Leipzig. Not without bugging ground staff again to make sure that Tuesday got on board. And not even an hour after taking off for Leipzig, I finally had my baby again. She was in need of a bath, her water bottle was drained and her meows had gotten quite a bit more quiet. But she was fine :-))) We took her home, let her out of the cage, and she immediately started exploring her new home. Including the bottom of the big old tiled oven. She came out so black, I immediately put her in the sink to wash her :-S

ktv

KTV, better known as Karaoke, is something everybody spending time in Asia should have experienced. I used to have a few Karaoke sessions with my Northkorean friends back in Tianjin, and we went to KTV once in Shanghai, almost 4 years ago. I had my first and last KTV in Taipei on Saturday night, as a farewell thing for Margaret and me. Geof had organized something at V-Mix, one of the biggest KTV palaces in Taipei, and we had our own room for the 18 of us (and of course, those rooms are well insulated, so we got quite loud). Thanks Geof, for organizing the whole things. And thanks to the rest of you for giving me such a good time.
Poor Reiner dreaded going (but as nobody tried to make him sing, he was ok, I guess), and Michele isn't exactly a fan of KTV either. But we had soooooo much fun :-))) I'm so bad with titles (and Chinese singers' names) that I only chose a handful of songs myself (the only ABBA song available for a very early and still amazingly sober start). But I recognized most of the Chinese titles and didn't mind grabbing a microphone whenever I felt safe enough to sing. We had booked until 1.30 but stayed on, and it was almost 3 when the last ones left. We went on to Room 18, a posh disco, and then bothered a totally drunk Barry at Chocolate & Love (one of my favorite places in Taipei, not only because they have the Chinese bed I always wanted and the second-cutest chef ever) for one last drink. It was a beautiful light morning when we finally left some time after five. And I still hadn't packed...
I went out every single night of my last week in Taipei. And I probably had more alcohol in that one week than I ever had before I moved to Taipei. But I guess it didn't hurt have a proper farewell. And at least, no sleep the night before flying will help me pass the 14 hours to Frankfurt faster because I'll be too exhausted to even bother watching movies, let alone worry about Tuesday.
The next morning, Alex called to tell me that she went to KTV in Shanghai on Saturday night. And they sang the same songs as we did, 對面的女孩看過來, some Jacky Cheungs, probably Hotel California, too :-)))

it's all about having fun

they have great voices

her first ktv

What was he on?

anarchy in the UK?

big crowd

dancing kings

typhoon over?

It's been downgraded to category 2 and it doesn't look half as scary anymore, so I guess it's basically over. According to H, they had it in the German news ("winds of 270 km/h, more than 1 million of households without power..."). I slept like a log, and when I got up at one, we just had some rain and some wind, and a few spots underneath the windows on the balcony were slightly wet. I'm thinking of going out and finding myself some food. A couple of pubs posted on Forumosa that they'd stay open, but they're probably packed with "typhoon tourists". Reiner says lots of shops are open, so I might just pop into the noodle shop around the corner.

typhoon update

This seems to be pretty serious. Somebody said, they expect TWICE the amount of rain as there was during Nari :-S. The whole of Taiwan will basically be closed down tomorrow. A couple of posters made people panic on Forumosa about packing an emergency kit etc. The wind is HOWLING, and will probably get worse during the night. Thank godness, I'm probably so exhausted due to the lack of sleep last night that I should be able to sleep through at least part of it.

Southern Germany must be really hot and sunny today, and SWR 3 is asking listeners to send them emails about where and when they're having a dip all over the world. I sent them an email about us "taking a dip" in a super typhoon, thinking that it might be a welcome distraction from all the "Hi, I live in France and am about to take a swim in the river" emails. But they didn't bother to read it :-S

typhoon

Tomorrow is an official typhoon holiday because of super typhoon Haitang, category 5 (of 5), with expected wind speeds of more than 50 m/s. It's the worst one I'll have experienced during my time here (I missed Typhoon Nari in September 2001, we only got the rain in Shanghai back then while parts of Taipei were flooded so badly that some MRT stations were still closed when I came here for my first trip in November). Not that I would worry much, as long as you stay home, the wind might be a little scary but there is no danger. It's mainly a holiday so that people don't go wandering around on the streets where they might be hit by broken-off tree branches or neon signs flying around. I still have some water (and could still dash out to get some more) and instant noodles, and unlike Michele, I haven't filled any buckets with water in case my district will get problems after the typhoon is over (as far as I remember, Hans said our area was fine after Nari). Anything else I need I have, anyway (lots of movies and Tuesday to hold on to, if it gets to scary). Oops, the next gust of wind and rain is starting. Updated satellite pictures here (click on "satellite").

farewell party

I had my farewell party yesterday, in the place where I cooked up the lounge bar in Germany thing a couple of weeks ago. 21 friends turned up. There was Tarra (USA) who talked to me in a park when I was very sick during one of my initial trips here and who PMed me months later on Forumosa asking if I happened to be the same girl she talked to (thanks for the bottle of Gin and that beautiful picture of the two of us). There was Brian (NZ) who has been at the Game Club and most other Forumosa dos ever since we started organizing something. There was, of course, my "second husband" Reiner (German). Tarra, Bri, Reiner and I made up the legendary Game Club team that won the first pub quiz in the Shannon light years ago. There was my neighbour Hans (German as well) who has helped me with so many things in the past few years including finding my place, feeding Tuesday when I'm on vacation and doing the DTP work for STAR Taiwan. There was Margaret (AUS) who knows almost everything and is leaving for Singapore with her husband and two kids at the end of the month. There was Frank (German), ex-colleague of Reiner on a business trip, who I'd met during his previous trips here and who is a very atypical German engineer ;-), and his colleague Zeynel (Turkey) who happened to recognize another friend of mine, Ilse who is about to move to Singapore as well and very happy with that. Ilse (ZA) came with Roelof, my Southafrican friend I literally picked up on the street 2.5 years ago and have since spent countless days with going out for food or watching movies. There was, of course, my friend and successor Michele (Swiss) with her boyfriend Johnny (Taiwan) who brought me two DVDs with old Taiwanese movies :-). And Michele's long-time friend Richard (Northern-Ireland) with his fiance Tanya (Taiwan). Our assistant Regina (Taiwan) could make it with her boyfriend Trevor (AUS). There was Jonathan (Scottish) who is sooo great and easy to talk to that he became a close friend very quickly after we met at the Forumosa November HH. And another Scotsman, Sandy with his wife Jojo (Taiwan) both of whom have repeatedly promised to come and visit us in Germany. Ting (Taiwan) who I met through Monika and who works for the GIO managed to pop in briefly and say Hi. Elliot (USA) was there, one of the funniest guys I ever met through Forumosa. Debra (USA) made it after being held up during dinner. And Mary (USA) who has just arrived in Taipei and who I met when she wanted to buy some of my stuff last week turned up for one of her first opportunities to meet some foreigners here. Thank you all so much for coming (and sorry for the not very skilled service)! I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did and had some fun talking to new people, playing with the bar kittens and watching Reiner do his magic tricks.

A few friends who couldn't make it were dearly missed :-( Alan and Jenny were too tired after moving house all day. Chris is terribly busy right now. Matthew said he'd make it but obviously didn't. Eric got sick with a cold and didn't want to pass it on to the others.

We stayed till they threw us out at 3.30am and then moved on to Eden, a lounge bar with tiny dance floor on the 11th floor of Bistro 98 on Chunghsiao Road where I used to have lunch with Reiner. The music was some horrible Techno stuff. I thought it might be loud and booming enough to drown out all the thoughts racing in my brain, but it didn't work out too well. Anyway, my Love-Parade participating 7-years younger brother Jonas would probably have had a heart attack seeing his old and sensible sister dancing to techno music.

We took a break on their balcony watching the sky get light over Taipei (quote Iris (after 6 GTs):"how can anyone not like Taipei???"), left when they threw us out again at 5.30am and decided to have breakfast at Carnegie's. Carnegie's was closed, so we walked over to the 24-hour restaurants on Fuhsing, with a short break when we passed a dog barking in an unlocked car and Debra had the urge to provide the poor thing with some water. I had my favorite Asian breakfast, porridge with tiny dried fish and some peanuts, followed by some pidan doufu, thousand-year egg with soft white Tofu. And then, all of us got very tired. I was home by 6.45am and immediately fell asleep.

Woke up at 9.45 because we have a super typhoon coming up, and the wind is really picking up. But I guess that's going to be its own story.

3.30 in the morning

never without her cell phone

reds

they figured it out

the great magician

who is watching whom?

two men and a kitten

meeting new people

70ies theme in my favorite lounge bar

beach and tamshui

I went to the beach today. It's actually very easy to get there, take the MRT to the terminal station and then catch a bus to Jinshan. But it drags on, and it took us almost 2.5 hours from the moment when I picked up Frank and Zeynel at the hotel until we finally stood at the beach.
It was the nicest beach I've seen in Northern Taiwan so far (not that I've seen very many), and just second to the beautiful beaches I came across on my trip to Penghu last year. Unlike the slippery, stony beach where I had that yummie seafood bbq with Alan, Jenny and Luna on Tomb-Sweeping Day 2003, it had real sand (though not as white as the name Baishawan - White Sand Bay - would suggest) and you could really go into the water without climbing over some rocks first. There was a sardines area where people lay next to each other and weren't allowed to go into the water any further than knee-high (most Taiwanese are scared of the water anyway), then a shut-off part where they had some rescue exercises, and another swimming area, much less crowded, with less eager life-guards and people who actually could swim. We got ourselves one of those shade thingies and dove into the water. It was terrific. We played with the waves, floated to and fro and watched the couple next to us whose Terrier obviously liked the water as much as them and us. We stayed in waaaaaaay too long and then got out and tried to sit in the shade which was sort of inconvenient as the wind was blowing and it felt like being sand-blasted. Thank godness they have showers and changing rooms at the entrance, so we could properly get rid of the sand before catching the bus back to Tamshui. Good thing, too, as my arms, back and face were of course turning into my usual shade of lobster red, and it wouldn't have been too comfortable slipping into my clothes with sand all over. Maybe, maybe, if I have time when the weather turns nice again after the upcoming typhoon, I could go again before I leave.
We concluded the trip with a proper seafood dinner in Tamshui, at one of those places with aquariums and big ice boxes at the entrance, where you choose what you want and how you want it before you go in, and then they prepare for you. We had a great view towards Bali, too, over the riverside promenade that they've fixed up really nicely in the past couple of years. I love the food in Tamshui. I could probably stuff myself just with all the snacks they sell at the promenade: bbqued squid on a stick, fried quail eggs, tiny seafood hotpots, fried shrimp dumplings..., and some Pearl Milk Tea or freshly squeezed fruit juice or fruit smoothie for dessert. And it's a fun place to do people watching, the old man with the squeaking erhu, the blind musicians right next to him, the young Taiwanese guy playing his guitar, the guys doing drawings of whoever wants their portrait, an older woman singing karaoke in one of the tiny restaurants, the kids catching tiny gold fish for prizes, the teens gaming away in the game arcades, the parents taking out their kids on tricycles, with the grandparents trailing behind, the young couples walking hand in hand, a few country bumpkins gawking at everything... We once even saw a guy with two big pigs on a leash and three piglets running after them.

Baishawan beach

my last Forumosa HH :-(

I found Forumosa (then Oriented, afterwards Segue) through a link on the infamous Tealit when I was first looking for a place to live in Taipei. I registered on 25 March 2002, and ever since, Forumosa has been a big part of my life.

The nice things about Forumosa are a) that with this big variety of subforums and topics, the posters aren't restricted to the bunch of narrow-minded geeks that make up the posters on more specialized forums. And b) that Forumosa has developped from a somewhat small, secluded and exclusive online community to the organization platform for loads of different offline activities like the weekly Game Club or regular movie outings. I've met about 80% of my friends here (including my friend and successor Michele) through Forumosa, I found most of my favorite bars and pubs through Forumosa, and I had loads of "where can I find..." questions answered on Forumosa.

And I've always enjoyed the Happy Hours. They started off as moderator meetings until the decision was made to set up a monthly meeting in changing venues, open for all Forumosans who want to meet the real posters behind the online names. The first one was at the now turned Chinese restaurant Bien on Jinshan Road, and it was a smashing success, as have been most HHs ever since. Unlike the somewhat stiff Oriented HHs, Forumosa HHs are always much more relaxed, more fun and much less about networking and career-advancing (we had this all business suit, tie and case Oriented guy dropping by at a Forumosa HH when Oriented froze their HHs during SARS. He left after about half an hour).

Last night was my last Forumosa HH. I hadn't been in a while, and it was nice to see familiar faces again, meet a few ones and get an opportunity to say good-bye to people. There were the long-term Game Clubbers and Weekly Movie goers like Tarra and Brian. Michele was there for my occasional German fix. The really nice Sandman brought his beautiful and great wife Jojo. A few people who have heard me talk about "leaving soon" the past two years could hardly believe that I DO have a one-way ticket now. And I saw a few new faces who will hopefully enjoy their stay in Taiwan as much as I did. As always, we had a few beers, talked about lots of things, took loads of pictures and had a great time.

I'll miss the Forumsans :-(

packing

Looks like basically everything is falling into place. 7 weeks for packing etc. after finishing my job sounded very loooooooong. But the time is almost over now, and I DID need it. Of course, I didn't go anywhere except for two badly needed farewell trips to Singapore and Shanghai. And of course, I didn't manage to get out of Taipei or even do my list of stuff I still wanted to see in Taipei. I'm not exactly sure what I did. I had a couple of days where I was so depressed that feeding Tuesday was the only reason to get out of bed. I watched a few movies, I managed to get lost in a couple of books (nothing worth mentioning much, and I keep reading the same few over and over again). I had a few dinners and lunches with Reiner and Michele. Oh, and I went to the gym every second day.

And I packed. Or rather sorted through my clothes (I'll take waaaaaaaay too much), washed the winter stuff, sold off some furniture (there is still way too much, and I'm not really sure how to get rid of it) and stacked all my books, dust catchers, cds,videos and a lot of nonsense in our empty ex-bedroom. Step by step, very slowly, one room at a time. Tomorrow afternoon, the first shipping company will come to give me a quotation. Next week, my stuff will be shipped, and I'll hopefully manage to reduce what I'll take with me on the plane to a manageable amount.

shanghai

I just came back from a visit in "no blogspot accessible" land. As always, it was absolutely great to end up with friends I've known for up to ten years and reminisce about teachers and class mates at university. Or to drop by in my old office and say Hi. Or to indulge in all the great Chinese food Shanghai has to offer. Or to eat Italian ice cream at that place off Huaihai Road around the corner from where a friend used to live. Or to buy DVDs in better quality than most of what you get here, and with English subtitles for all the foreign-language movies. Or to ride across town on the 911 bus, get off at Changshu Road and criss-cross the French quarter with all the old houses Alex and I imagined buying during our nightly walks four years ago. Or to have a drink in the beautiful park of the Ruijin Guest House. Or to just relax, not worry about internet (loads of sites aren't accessible anyway), and only check my emails once (next time I go there, I want to turn off my cell phone, too). Best of all, of course, was spending time with Alex, my former classmate and later roommate and colleague with whom I spent 16 hours a day for 8 months without a single argument. As always, being with her in Vanke was the perfect holiday (and it was way too hot to go outside, anyway, so we DID spend a lot of time in Vanke).

But for living, I think I prefer my tiny little village Taipei where you don't have to drive for an hour to go to dinner. Where, though the Chinese food is generally much worse, you don't have to pay an arm and a leg for tasty south-east Asian food or simple and good Western food. Where you can take the MRT to go hiking in the mountains or see the sea. Where you don't get drowned in concrete high-rises and motor ways. Where you don't sit praying in the taxi because they drive even worse than here. And where country bumpkins don't stare at you open-mouthed when you're just minding your own business.

Of course, if anyone ever offered me a (reasonable) job in Shanghai, I'd say Yes without thinking twice.