Our Travel Journal

Getting ready to head home

2011-07-17T09:47:00.000-04:00

We have had a great trip, but now we're about ready to head home. We fly out tomorrow (Monday) morning, going to Detroit via Tokyo.

Yesterday was a rainy day, especially in the afternoon. While I was in class, Mom had planned to go on a tour to Chiufen Village, but it was raining so hard that she decided to cancel, so she just wandered around took some photos when the rain stopped. Class went well, and when I got back to the hotel, we decided to just walk a little bit around our hotel, and then had some dinner at TGI Friday's. It was a nice slow day.

Today was the final day of class. We went through the remaining material for our class, and the students had group presentations to give. It is always interesting to see how the different groups take on the assigned task and reach very different conclusions about how best to take on the assignment. Just as one of the groups was about to start their presentation, we heard what sounded like a parade going on outside. There was actually a protest going down the street, though the protest march was, essentially, a marching band parade. There were drums and other instruments, marching in ranks down two lanes of the street, while traffic continued on the remaining lanes. The protesters were Falun Gong members. Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline rooted in Buddhism with some Taoist principles, and it is banned in mainland China, and practitioners are heavily persecuted there. I have seen various protests by Falun Gong members here before, but this was the first one with a band. It was pretty large, with what seemed to be a couple of hundred members.

We wrapped up class, and the students had invited me and Mom to join them at their post-last-day-of-class meal. They chose a very traditional Taiwanese restaurant, and ordered a fixed menu of a tremendous amount of food. They described it as the sort of meal that you might have had 30 years ago in a small village to celebrate some good fortune. I lost count when we reached eight different dishes brought to the table, but I do remember fish, beef ribs, squid, mussels, scallops, chicken, pork, cabbage soup, crab, and at least a few other things. It was excellent all around, and I left plenty full, that's for sure.

Mom and I came on back to the hotel, and we're all packed. The alarm is set for 5:45am, and the car will pick us up at 6:45am. We missed doing some of the things we were hoping to do while we were here, due to the rain, but we got to do a lot of things, too. The Maokong Gondola was really cool, and we really enjoyed the National Palace Museum. Going with Mom to the outdoor observation deck on the 91st floor of Taipei 101 was really fun, and the whole trip has just been a pleasure. Hanging out with Mom has been the best part, of course, and introducing her to a part of the world she's never seen before. It's been a good trip.

The Maokong Gondola, and rain, and a blog post from Mom

2011-07-15T06:04:00.000-04:00

(This post was written by Mom, and typed by Marcus, with a few editorial comments thrown in.)

Starting off our gondola ride

Looking out over Taipei

Taipei 101 towers over everything.

Our outing today was to the Maokong Gondola, one of the few "tourist" places that Marcus had not already been. We boarded the MRT at our usual subway station (I am getting a little better about which train to board to get where I want to be!), and road to the end of the brown line, which is the station for the Taipei Zoo, as well as for the gondola. We opted for the highest station on the gondola ride (which takes you up about 300 meters over the course of the trip), and really enjoyed the beauty all around us as we climbed higher and higher into the sky. [MWD: I kept saying "This is soo cool!] Each of the cars would probably hold six people and feel quite stable and secure.

The picture doesn't do this justice.

Sanxuan Temple, where we waited for a break in the rain

When we reached the top, we started of on a little exploration -- and then those fluffy, fast-moving clouds that we had enjoyed going up the mountain turned into angry black thunderclouds full of heavy rain and lightning. At that point, most of the exploring was over, the gondola was closed [MWD: Cool as it was, I would not want to be up there in high wind and heavy rain.], and after waiting out the rain for quite a while in a small local temple, we joined the very long line sitting and waiting for a bus to take us back to the zoo subway station at the bottom of the mountain. I don't know whether it was the gray hair ("honor your elders") or the round eyes, but somehow we were jumped to the front of the line and gratefully hopped on the bus. [MWD: Mom made friends with a little girl sitting on her mother's lap on the bus on the way down the mountain -- the mother said "She would like to ask you where you are from", and then encouraged the little girl to ask. She was probably 4 years old, I would guess, and they seemed to have quite a nice little chat on the way down the windy mountain road.] I really don't think God left us on that big airplane for 18 hours getting us to Taiwan just to spill us out on a gondola on the mountain, but returning to terra firma felt pretty good. Another good day.

The mist rolled in, and everything was hidden.

MWD: We had thought about going to a baseball game tonight, but the rain is continuing, and so that may not be our best choice. The same for our thoughts of going to Danshui to sit and look at the water. We still have another night or two, and if the rain does let up, maybe we'll hit the local night market tonight.

Last thing -- while Mom may not yet recognize any Chinese characters, this symbol is one she has come to recognize quickly.

The Paper Museum

2011-07-14T11:42:00.000-04:00

Mom at the MRT station entrance

As we do pretty much every time we head off somewhere by MRT, we headed to the Nanjing East Road station, and that's what we did this morning.

I've been to the SuHo Paper Museum before, but it is a neat place, and Mom wanted to go, so off we went. We had been given instructions on how to get there by subway (MRT), but learned as we went that the instructions were wrong -- we were told to go to the wrong subway station! Thankfully, we were only one station away from the right one, and we figured that out before we had left the trains, so we were able to just get back on the new train and go to the right place.

Mom making her perfect sheet of paper

Me making my deformed sheet of paper

The Paper Museum is fairly small, but the artwork in paper shown inside, along with the information about the history of paper-making, make it a wonderful place to visit.It is really educational, but also takes a light-hearted approach to much of what it displays and how it educates. It is a popular place for school groups, as we saw today, and we were glad that we were able to make our own sheet of paper before the HUGE school group came in a few minutes later. It was fun to watch them, though, and to see the similarities and differences between a group of Chinese schoolchildren and what a group of American schoolchildren would have been like.

There is a paper store almost next door to the museum, and between the two places, we found some really wonderful things to bring home. Thankfully, they are generally flat and light, so everything should fit in the suitcase!

This evening, I had class again, and it went smoothly. Tomorrow is up in the air for us -- depending largely on the weather. Hopefully we will be able to go to ride the Maokong Gondola to see some of the teahouses up on the mountain, and then to either catch a baseball game or go to Danshui, but for now, we just don't know. We'll be sure to let you know what we end up doing, though!

I lied to Mom tonight

2011-07-13T09:40:00.000-04:00

Yesterday when we went to Din Tai Fung, the famous Taiwanese dumpling restaurant, Mom wasn't feeling so well, and so she didn't have anything to eat. That was a shame, and today, she was feeling fine and we decided to head back to the same restaurant. She had said that maybe she'd need to have a fork to eat there, and I told her that we'd be sure to get her one.
The wait was a little longer than we had expected, but then suddenly it was our turn, and we were happily seated. We ordered shrimp fried rice and some spicy noodles, and then an order of the original dumpling recipe, and an order of steamed shrimp and pork dumplings. I encouraged Mom to go ahead and give the chopsticks a shot, and she did great! I had, of course, never intended to get her a fork -- I knew that once she tried with the chopsticks and spoon, all would be well. She learned to mix some soy sauce and vinegar in with the shredded ginger in a small dish on the table, and then to pick up a dumpling in the chopsticks, dip it in the ginger and soy sauce/vinegar mix, put the dumpling into your spoon and poke a hole in the dumpling with a chopstick to let the broth inside out so that it can cool, and then taste that delicious dumpling that was totally worth the wait!

Food and ancient artifacts

2011-07-13T06:25:00.000-04:00

Scooters, everywhere you look!

We continue to have a fun time here. Mom was commenting on all of the scooters -- this is far and away the most common way Taipei residents get around, and scooters are everywhere. I hope you can see that the scooters parked along this street just go on and on and on. You'll see children riding on the floorboards between a parent's feet, people carrying huge packs, all sorts of things -- I really liked having a scooter at home, but wouldn't dream of trying to ride one here.

Yesterday (Tuesday) was a great day for food. Robert and Jenny Torng, who run the program here in Taipei, invited us to lunch. I've worked with Robert and Jenny since I first started coming to Taiwan, and I have always enjoyed their company. They took us to a very nice Italian restaurant -- or to be more accurate, I'd say a very nice Italian restaurant that caters primarily to Chinese people. The foods were familiar, but with just a little twist. The Caesar salad was not quite what I was used to -- it had no lemon juice or parmesan cheese, and the egg was soft-boiled. It was delicious, but not what I would have expected when I ordered a Caesar salad. Mom had a risotto with asparagus and corn, and the pasta with beef that I had was absolutely Asian-influenced in its seasoning. Excellent again, but different. The restaurant was inside a mall that is part of a Japanese chain of malls, and had a wonderful view into a Japanese garden inside the mall. We enjoyed the time with Jenny and Robert, and hope we'll see them again while we're here.

Making dumplings at Din Tai Fung.

For dinner, some of the students had invited us to go to one of the most famous restaurants in Taipei -- Din Tai Fung. They do dumplings, mostly, and I had almost forgotten how good they are. We watched the dumplings being made, and were amazed at the speed and precision. Each dumpling is made by hand, and it is an impressive process to watch, especially since there are so many people in line and ordering dumplings at all hours of day and night. It was a pleasure to have the students meet Mom, and to get to know Alan, Paul, and Pauline a little better.

After dinner, it was time for class, so Mom had to take the subway (MRT) back to the hotel on her own. I wanted to take a picture of her venturing off on her own for the first time in Taipei, but she moved so swiftly and confidently through the subway station that she was gone before I could get the camera out!

Gardens around the National Palace Museum

One of the NPM buildings

Today our plan had been to go to the National Palace Museum, and then in the evening to go to Danshui, which is right on the water, and is a beautiful place to spend an evening. The rains came down HARD while we were at the museum, so we aren't so sure about going to an outdoor area for the evening -- we'll try to fit that in later on in the trip. But the museum was great, as it always is. Such a beautiful location -- great architecture in the midst of so much green.

"Meat stone"

The National Palace Museum houses the collections of the emperors of China, along with many other wonderful treasures. Many of the items in the collection were taken from the Forbidden City, where the Chinese emperors lived, by Chiang Kai-Shek, who is referred to as a thief by the Chinese. Of course, had the items remained in China, they would largely have been destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, so I think it is good that they are here. There are several amazing things to see, including wonderful jade objects going back to 4000 BC and before. One of the "featured items" is a piece of jasper that is said to look like a piece of pork (yes, I know, it seems odd), and Mom and I argued over whether it really does look like meat or not. What do you think? We also saw calligraphy, and talked about how calligraphy and hand-writing are not seen in the West as art forms in the way that they are here.

Me and Mom and Confucius, hanging out in Taipei

One of the fun things was to get a picture taken with Mom at the same statue of Confucius where I was photographed on my first visit to Taipei. Strangely, I seem smaller back then, especially around the middle. Must be a trick of the camera.
We spent more time at the museum that we expected, we were enjoying it so much, so we did not make it to the SuHo paper museum today. Perhaps tomorrow.
We miss everyone, and hope we are missed in return!

Catching up

2011-07-11T06:08:00.000-04:00

Yesterday (Sunday) was a busy day. I had class again, and so had to be out the door at 8:30am to hop on the MRT from our station (Nanjing Rd. East) one stop on the Muzha line to the Zhongxiao Fuxing station, with about a 10 minute walk from there to the office where my class is being taught. Class went well, and for lunch we all went out to another local little restaurant. The students ordered for me fish ball soup, as well as a spicy beef and noodles dish. Excellent food all around. I did ask for a Coke -- I still need my cold caffeine each day.
While I was in class, Mom spent a little time exploring around our hotel (Howard Garden Suites). She wandered up and down Changchun Road, and found several little hotspots, including a Starbucks, where I think she spent a little time over coffee and the newspaper.
In the evening, our plan had been to go to a Night Market that I have never been to before -- the Raohe Street Night Market. One of my students had recommended it, and so I was looking forward to something new. I gave the sheet of paper the student had written the name on to the person at the front desk of our hotel so that she could write it out on a card for the taxi driver. We hopped in a cab, and were on our way. But when we were dropped off, we discovered that we had been delivered instead to the Shihlin Night Market -- a big, famous market, but not the one that we had intended to go to. We decided to stay, though, and to explore it.

Outside the Shihlin Night Market

Mom and I wandered around, and found many wonderful things that somehow we did not need to purchase. We actually did find some fun things, including some little jade bracelets that we will give to the kids in Heather's Sunday School class, and a watch for me (I always love to get a very good looking stunningly cheap knock-off watch when I travel). We also wandered through all the food places -- all of those food odors mixing together don't always combine to create something wonderful, but we did find a lot of interesting things to look at, including a booth that had a variety of types of snakes in cages, though we didn't see any of them being turned into something to eat. I did find something that looked good -- it's essentially a potato that has been cut into a spiral that is then fried into a lengthy potato chip. It looked good, so I asked for one -- or at least, I thought I did. I had pointed to what I intended to get, but ended up with something entirely different. What I got was more like a fried triangle with something stuffed inside -- I have absolutely no idea what it was, but it was tasty! Mom wasn't sure that she would have gone for that -- she wants to know what she's eating. I suggested that sometimes, maybe you don't want to know!

91 floors up, and outside!

Today, we thought about going to the National Palace Museum, because it looked a bit overcast. But when we were through with breakfast, the sky was nice and clear, and we decided that it would be a good day to go to Taipei 101 instead. Taipei 101 used to be the tallest building in the world, though it has now been significantly surpassed by a building in Dubai. But it is truly impressive, and we very much enjoyed it. You can go up to the 89th floor inside observation deck, and then we went up two more floors, to an external observation deck on the 91st floor. The elevator to get you up there is the fastest in the world, covering 84 floors in 37 seconds! Your ears pop on the way up and back down, that's for sure.
After going through the observation deck way up high, we went back down to the lower floors, where there is a (very) upscale mall. We didn't feel the need to purchase anything at Coach or Burberry or any of the jewelry stores, but we did go to the food court down below. I had a Mos Burger -- sliced beef between two rice patties -- which is always one of my favorites. Mom was so excited when she spotted an Auntie Anne's pretzel shop! I wasn't able to persuade her to get the seaweed pretzel, though.

Yay! Auntie Anne's!

Wait a second... that's not what I wanted!

We will probably head back out for dinner a little later, and maybe make another try to go to the Raohe Night Market! But we'll figure that out a little later -- for now, we're just going to sit in the room, cool off, write a blog post, and watch some sumo wrestling on tv.

Mom's City Tour

2011-07-09T09:51:00.002-04:00

So while I was in class today, spending the day getting to know my 12 students, Mom went on a tour of Taipei. The tour guide came by to pick her up at about 8:10am, and from there they went to a Buddhist temple that is housed in what used to be the Taipei City Hall. It's a very different place from the much older Longshan Tempe we went to yesterday. From there, it was off to Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, where she was able to see the last part of the changing of the guard ceremony. She also said that the tour guide helpfully clarified that, while in mainland China you might hear that Chiang was a thief of imperial treasures, in fact he was a protector of them, not a thief. Next on the tour was the Martyrs' Shrine, where the dead from wars involving the Republic of China (ROC) are memorialized. A stop at a crafts center (with some high pressure sales folks), and then a brief visit to the National Palace Museum wrapped up the tour.
My class went well, and seems to be a good group of students. I am looking forward to working with them while I am here.
For dinner this evening, we thought we might look for something a little more Western -- we both had weird dreams last night after our local meal! So we asked at the front desk for suggestions, and were told that there is a Subway, a McDonalds, a Hooters, and a TGI Friday's close by. We went for the last one, and had a nice meal that was pretty much like what we'd get at home.

Mom's deciding now what she'll do tomorrow, and we'll let everyone know what happens. We're having a great time, and continue to enjoy the time together, as much as we miss everyone. We can't wait to hear how Michael's Choir Camp concert today went!

Class starts today, and Mom goes touring

2011-07-08T18:50:00.000-04:00

It's early morning here in Taipei, and Mom and I are up and getting ready to go get some breakfast. My class starts this morning, and I am looking forward to meeting the students and getting going on that. Mom is taking a City Tour this morning, going to the National Palace Museum (very briefly -- sort of like a Papaw visit to the Smithsonian), and to a Buddhist temple, and to the Martyr's Shrine, and one or two other places. Who knows where she'll adventure in the afternoon!
Last night, we asked at the desk for a recommendation for dinner, and they suggested a restaurant called Yokohama, which, despite the name, is Taiwanese style food. "You go down to the Family Mart, and go into the little lane next to it, and walk until you see these Chinese characters on the sign, because the sign isn't in English." Well, we did find it, and ended up having some excellent fried rice, stir-fried noodles and pork, some spicy eggplant dish (which the waitress insisted on -- we didn't realize that we were ordering to share, and she felt that we needed a vegetable, and so that's what we ended up with), and some sort of cold pea soup. More than enough food for both, and very good, in a place that was down in an alley and filled with local folks (so we knew it would be good), and the cost was about $15 US total (including a gigantic bottle of Taiwan Beer -- I had forgotten that they tend to bring the big bottles to dinner tables).
We turned in early (around 10pm), and were up early, and now it is time to start the day! I told Mom that she needs to ask the tour guide today to get some pictures of HER in Taiwan, not just letting her take pictures of Taiwan, so we'll see how well she follows through on that.
We're having a great time, and will check in later today.

Back to Taipei

2011-07-08T04:49:00.000-04:00

It's been a long time since this blog was updated, but it's about time to do so! I am back in Taipei to teach the Leadership class again as part of Baruch's Executive Master's degree program. I was supposed to be here last year, but the economy was so bad here that they couldn't get enough students to run the program. I had invited Mom to come along last year, and we were so disappointed when it was canceled. But now it is on, and we're here! Mom flew to Detroit on July 4, and then we flew together from Detroit to Tokyo, and then (because our flight was late) we had to rush through the airport in Tokyo to catch our flight to Taipei. We arrived at about 10pm local time last night.
We are no longer staying at the Howard International House, but are instead now at the Howard Garden Suites, which is very nice. We stayed up as late as we could last night, and then slept until about 7am, so as to try to get on local time. This morning we had a great breakfast in the hotel, and then went out to get a SIM card for a phone, so that Mom would be able to reach me while I am teaching and she is exploring. She is booked to go on a City Tour tomorrow morning, which is when my class starts. I want to be sure that she is comfortable, and knows that she has a way to reach me (I am given a phone for local calls by the local office here). So we got a SIM card, and need to see why it isn't quite working yet.
We found that this new hotel is only a very few minutes walk from the subway (MRT) station, so we started out the adventure here by getting a day pass for the MRT, and then went to Longshan Temple. Mom and I talked about how similar some things seemed at this old Buddhist Temple -- some people are obviously very devout, and some are going through the motions; there are prayer beads that look a lot like rosaries; there's a lot of incense; you see a lot more older people at the temple than you do elsewhere, since older folks are often among the more devoted to their faith; and there are rituals, motions, etc. that people make that reminded us of genuflection and other similar patterns we're a little more familiar with. But a lot is different as well, with the offerings to the ancestors, the varieties of Buddhas recognized, the throwing of tokens for fortune telling, and the traditional Buddhist and Taoist influences intermixing in the same temple. It was a great place to start our day. We also went through several little shopping alleys, and into a mall underneath the MRT at the Longshan Temple.
It is really hot here, so we took it easy today as we started off. We'll go out tonight, probably to a Night Market, to get a little more start on the visit. My class starts early tomorrow, and Mom's tour does as well, so we won't be out late, that's for sure.

It's great to be here, and to be on an adventure with Mom!

Travel Time Again!

2009-09-29T22:40:00.002-04:00

Last Thursday, Marcus went to Houston... he got back Sunday and has "nothing interesting to say" He arrived home safe and sound after getting to visit Brent at Rice for the SAPS conference.

He didn't post.

Tomorrow afternoon, I leave for Montana to see an old friend that I have not seen in...hrmm lets say its been a while. I will post pictures and things as I can. The photos might end up on facebook with the travel journal uploading (RSS) so that people who see Facebook can keep up with me and my adventures.

Michael is doing pretty well making the adjustments to Power Middle School. He has come SOOO far this summer in emotional growth. There are still things that upset him (losing a bionicle piece for example) but the meltdowns are fewer and I haven't been called to the school yet. His only real problem thus far is adjusting to the workload and keeping track of his homework.

I will have the net book with me... so I will be able to keep up with things pretty well. I wish you all well and good night. More to this blog tomorrow or thursday.

Sunday night, and ready to head home

2009-07-26T06:55:00.002-04:00

We finished up class today. Six group presentations, plus some last points to cover in lecture. It was a good group of students, and I enjoyed getting to know them a little bit. I hope I was able to pass along some worthwhile things to them.

Yesterday was also an all-day class, and of course there was also class on Friday night. So I haven't done much for the last couple of days. I did go out with one of the students last night, to a place called Holland Village, which is a shopping and dining area. We had some excellent food, including the Singaporean classic Chili Crab, as well as stir fried green beans with prawns, a very tasty fish that I don't know what it was (but it had a nasty looking head and lots of sharp, pointy teeth), some vegetables of different types... a few other things I think, as well. I was more than a little stuffed when I got back to the hotel.

My flight is tomorrow morning at 5:40am, which means I need to be at the airport at 3:40am, which means I need to leave the hotel at a little after 3:00am, which means I probably need to be up around 2:00am. I'm not real keen on that idea, but I'll certainly be able to get some sleep on the way to Tokyo. I have a very short layover in Tokyo, and then home to Detroit. I am supposed to arrive at DTW sometime around 1:30pm. I am looking forward to seeing Michael and hearing all about his week at Boy Scout camp (he earned his Tot'n Chip, and his Astronomy merit badge, I think, as well as his swimming certification). I also can't wait to see Heather and hear all about what's been going on at home, and just spend some time hanging out with the family.

Thanks for the interest, to whoever happens to read this. Not sure when it will next be updated, but I am sure some new adventure will come up before too long.

Chinatown

2009-07-23T05:06:00.006-04:00

This afternoon I got out and about in Chinatown. It's a really interesting part of Singapore, and includes a wide range of diversity in the ethnic Chinese population. For example, on my walkabout today, I went to mosques, Buddhist temples, and Hindu temples, and while eating lunch, a group of Chinese elementary age students came by, separated apparently by grade with shirts that said Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John (probably 1st-4th grade). The range of foods available in Chinatown was also immense, with Cantonese, Hakka, Teochew, Hokkien, and Hainanese food types all available. There were also tailors galore, several shops to cut chops (Chinese stamps of one's name, carved into a stone stamp) all of which had the best carver in Singapore, and a wide range of "medical halls" -- shops where you can get traditional Chinese medicine and herbs. You can see the dried lizards in the photo -- I have no idea what they are used for, but they're pretty cheap if you need one.

The walking tour that I took today started with the Sri Mariamman Hindu temple. The temple was under renovation, so I didn't get to see as much as one normally might, but it was really interesting. This temple is best known for their annual festival in October or November where adherents show their faith by walking on burning hot coals.

From there, I wandered on to the Sin Chor Kung

Temple, the Al-Abrar Mosque, and then to the Thian Hock Keng Temple, which was pretty impressive. It is the oldest Chinese temple in Singapore. I spent some time looking at the ancestor tablets -- similar to tombstones, except that the spirit of the person is believed to reside within the tablet -- as well as at the dragons on the roof, and the furnace where paper money and other paper items (like paper replicas of cars, or Coke cans) are burned to allow the items to reach the dead, who will make use of them. The temple has been around since 1839, and it remains impressive.

The walk through Chinatown gave lots of opportunity to see the style of homes in the area -- row houses, essentially, but the architecture and the design/coloration being distinctly Chinese, and well-cared-for. The Night Market area is a bit chaotic, but it is clean and well-regulated, and was certainly worth the visit. From most portions of Chinatown, you can see the metropolital skyline, so that you have the mix of the traditional and the modern together.

Today was a HOT day, and so when I sat down to have some lunch at a Hakka (Taiwanese) street restaurant (I had duck and noodles), and the waitress suggested a Tiger beer, I was happy to have it. The beer was so cold and the humidity high enough that when she poured it, it froze for a few seconds. It was certainly good on such a hot day.

Tonight is an open house for people interested in the Baruch programs, and I absolutely have to clean up before going there. So I'll get a shower and a shave and iron something to wear. Then tomorrow night starts my last batch of classes -- Friday night, then Saturday, and Sunday, and then home!

Little India

2009-07-22T05:23:00.004-04:00

I took a nice walking tour through the Little India sectino of town today. It was designed to take you to the major sights in the area, and it was a nice day to be out and about. There were a ton of shops, selling fresh fruit, trinkets, clothes, food... you name it. I am surprised so many shops selling the same things can survive in such a confined space.

The first major stop was the Abdul Gaffoor Mosque, which is about 100 years old, and which is described as "an architechtural explosion of styles -- Southern Indian and Moorish". I remembered to wear jeans today, so I was at least able to get into the mosque and look around today.

The mosque's visiting hours were not for a little while, so I stopped in for lunch at one

of the local street-front restaurants. I ordered the Chicken Biryani set, which is several rice-b

ased dishes with spices. According to Wikipedia, "The spices and condiments used in biryani may include but are not limited to: ghee, peas, beans, cumin,cloves, cardamom, cinnamon, bay leaves

, coriander and mint leaves, ginger, onions, and garlic." They also say that the premium versions

include saffron, but I am pretty sure that this place was not serving "premium" anything. The food was

really good, though, and I enjoyed just sitting and watching the people go by as I ate.

From there, I walked on to the Church of the True Light, which is a more recent construction, and apparently very charismatic. The church and mosque are not quite right across the street from each other, but they are no more than a 1-2 minute walk, and they seem to co-exist peacefully.

From there, I strolled up to Dickson Street, and then up to the Sri Veeramakaliamman Hindu Temple. Also of recent construction, it is nonetheless a pretty impressive design.

I did pick up one very important thing while I was in Little India -- a package of Oreos. Mmmmmmmm...

No eclipse for me

2009-07-21T23:07:00.002-04:00

Well, you might have seen some of the footage of the total eclipse that occurred today in parts of Asia. There are such strong superstitions in China about eclipses that the government there went to great lengths to explain the phenomenon, and to prevent accidents by turning on the street lights, etc. It was the longest total eclipse that will happen in this century, and people were really excited about it. Unfortunately, here in Singapore there was only going to be a 6% eclipse -- almost unnoticeable -- and then it was totally overcast here, as well, so for this part of Asia, at least, the eclipse was pretty much a non-event.

She was a fish-monger, and sure t'was no wonder...

2009-07-21T10:41:00.004-04:00

Well, unfortunately, the live music (listed online as going Tuesday to Friday) was not around this evening at Molly Malone's, but I did have a nice Kilkenny lager, and a surprisingly good steak sandwich. Here's Molly, outside the pub. The pub was originally built in Ireland, and was then taken apart and transported to Singapore. (Given the number of "originally built in Ireland" pubs around the world, one might be surprised there are pubs still left in Ireland, but then again, they started with quite a few.)

One thing I don't understand, though. A person who takes something from a store without paying for it -- everyone, including the person who does it, recognizes that that person is a criminal. But the person who creates elaborate tax dodges by keeping money in off-shore accounts, and who manages to secure passports from multiple countries by circumventing those nations' rules -- that person thinks of himself as clever, rather than as a criminal. What prompts

this observation? A conversation I couldn't help but listen to, since the two gentlemen (one American, one British) were speaking loudly next to me. They were so self-satisfied with their various schemes to keep what seemed to be large sums of money out of the hands of their respective governments. Both men recognized that, if they were caught, there would be "hell to pay", so they knew what they were doing is illegal. But they were also quite confident that they had managed to set up schemes that would not be uncovered. I mean, I believe in taking every deduction to which one is entitled -- pay what you owe, but no more. But I don't believe in creating a false identity as a Filipino woman living in Hong Kong so that you can divert hundreds of thousands of dollars there to avoid paying taxes.

But enough of that. After having dinner, I went and sat on Boat Quay for a while, on the Singapore River. It was really active and lively -- a TON of restaurants and bars, and then just some open places to sit and relax. There are boats -- water buses, essentially -- that you can take to get over to Clark Quay, and you can see a couple of them here. It was really nice to sit out in the evening, though when I saw a river rat running on the steps, I did draw my feet in a little closer to me.

To get to Boat Quay, and to a lot of other places here, I've been taking the subway, or MRT. It is very efficient, and clean, and easy to use. The minimum fare for a trip is S$2, but you get S$1 back when you return your ticket card, so functionally it is only S$1, which is about 68 cents US. You can get just about anywhere you need to go on the MRT, and I much prefer the independence of going on my own to having to rely on a taxicab.

I stopped in at the Plaza Singapura on the way back to the hotel, and had myself a little ice cream. It was nice to cool off a bit -- it is pretty humid here. I had cleaned up a bit before going out, and still very quickly found myself to be a bit pungent from the heat and humidity, so a little air conditioning and a little ice cream was quite welcomed. And then I came back to the room, and turned on the television. There are not all that many English-language stations here at the hotel, and at the moment, two stations are showing a "save the elephant" show, one is doing "save the turtles", and one is "save the rhinos" -- all narrated by John Hannah (from "Four Weddings and a Funeral", among other things. I've seen each of these shows on at least half a dozen different times already this trip. So... please... don't eat turtle meat, and don't purchase rhino horn or ivory. John Hannah will be happier, and it's the right thing to do.

A work day

2009-07-21T06:31:00.002-04:00

I went to the main office for Baruch today, to find out details about the one-day seminar they had asked me to do. I had been asked to do a full-day seminar on employee motivation during economic hard times, and had the seminar almost all put together. Baruch in Singapore is starting to do these seminars to help increase the awareness of the program among managers in the city. I was stopping in just to find out where to go Thursday morning, and how many people I should be planning for.

Well, apparently there was some miscommunication -- they had been waiting for some information from me that I was not aware they needed, and so consequently there had never been any publicity about the seminar, and so there will be no seminar. This was the first I had heard of any problem. It's a little frustrating, because I had made decisions about travel and activities while I am here based on the assumption that I needed to be ready to go for Thursday morning. I agreed to do an open house on Thursday evening because I knew I'd be around during the day on Thursday. Now, though, I don't teach again until Friday evening, and I might have not done the open house and had more leeway to travel a bit. So I am a little frustrated (not to mention that I'm out the money I would have earned for doing the seminar). As I said to Heather, grrrrrr.

So I wasn't in much mood to go exploring today, so I stayed in the room and got some work done. I'll have more time than I had planned to go exploring in the city, so it was ok to just hang here for a while. But now I am ready to head out, and I think that I'll head down to Boat Quay, and do something very Singaporean -- go to Molly Malone's, the oldest Irish Pub in Singapore. Should be a fun place to hang out, have dinner, and enjoy the evening. I'll let you know how it goes!

Arab Street

2009-07-20T05:39:00.005-04:00

I wandered through the Arab Street area this afternoon, and it was a good day to be out and about. Plenty hot, and that was a bit of a problem. I had worn shorts, and then realized once I got to the mosques that I would not be able to enter any of them. But I got to see them from the outside (as I did the Sultan Mosque, shown here), and to wander around in that part of the city, which was interesting. I did have to frame some of the shots of the Sultan Mosque to leave out the 7-11 sign. I also made it over to the Hajjah Fatima Mosque.

Lunch was murtabak, which was really tasty. Murtabak has a bread dough crust with chicken (though it is usually made with mutton), garlic, onion, and egg, served with a curry sauce.

I stopped in a toy store, and was amused at the number of knock-off products for sale, including the game O-Hello, which is Othello, and a bunch of others.

On the way back, I stopped in at the

Singapura Plaza, which is next to the Dhoby Ghaut metro station. It is a big mall, with a Carrefour in it, so I picked up some fresh grapes and a little

cheese, so I am well-stocked for days of work.

Monday

2009-07-19T23:23:00.002-04:00

I haven't posted for a couple of day -- sorry about that. The teaching schedule in Singapore is Friday night 7-10pm, Saturday 9-5:30pm, and Sunday 9-5:30pm. Between reviewing notes for the next day's class, getting adjusted to the time difference, and trying to spend a little time chatting online with Heather and Michael, I haven't had a lot of idle time.

I had thought about going to an island for some snorkeling, but the schedule was going to be really rough to make work. It was looking like a 4-hour bus ride, then a 2-hour ferry ride to get there, and the same to get back. I'd get back late on Wednesday evening, and then do an all-day seminar on Thursday, an open house for potential Baruch students Thursday night, and then class again Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The time just wasn't seeming to work out for me, given some of the other things I need to get done while I am here. So instead I am going to get out and see some of Singapore, which I didn't get to do really last time I was here. I'll try to get to Little India, Chinatown, and Arab Street. If I get to one of those spots each day Monday to Wednesday, then I'll be in pretty good shape.

Last night after class, I went to dinner with two of the students at a local hawker location -- a place where there are lots of little food stands all together. They just kept getting more stuff for me to eat! I had barbequed stingray with a really spicy sauce, which was quite good. We also had several varieties of satay, as well as two different types of noodle dishes. To drink I had sugar cane juice, made fresh as I waited. An excellent, and filling, meal.

Conversation at dinner was good and interesting, as well. One of my dinner companions was active in the ruling party, and the other not much in support of that party. Both acknowledged -- to me, though not so much to their compatriots -- that democracy in Singapore is not quite what most Westerners would think of as democracy. There are restrictions -- both real and perceived -- on free speech and expressions of disapproval of the government are not welcome or wise. The parliament has 81 seats, 79 of which are held by the ruling party, with the other two seemingly token opposition from two different parties. We talked about whether third world countries or developing economies should have open democracy or authoritarian leadership -- one argument was that under open democracy, the leaders are there for only a short time and so have no incentive to act in the country's best interests, and so instead act in their own best interests, as compared to an authoritarian ruler who can bring the country up economically by the rigid pursuit of individual vision. There were, of course, counter-arguments to that position.

After dinner we went to Wesley Methodist Church, which is withing walking distance of the hotel. It is the oldest Methodist Church in Singapore, celebrating its 125th anniversary next year. It is also very large -- the list of new members and baptisms from the past week was probably 40-50 people. The Sunday evening service is a prayer and praise service, which was not quite my typcial style -- I didn't know any of the songs, for example -- but I was glad to have gone. The general conservatism of Singapore was evident in the service and sermon, but I was warmly greeted and welcomed, and it was a good experience. The Singapore Methodist Church is affiliated with the United Methodist Church, so I saw familiar symbols on the hymnals, and when they started the communion liturgy, I was right at home.

I am going to get a little lunch now, and go see some sights. This evening, I may make it out to a movie -- it seems that "Harry Potter" is playing on just about every screen in town.

Class is going well

2009-07-17T20:42:00.002-04:00

Class started yesterday evening, and it seems like a good bunch of folks. We had some excellent conversation around challenges they are facing in staffing their organizations, and I think it will be a good class. Not much else going on yesterday -- mostly reviewing notes for class, and working on the 1-day seminar I will be doing next Thursday.

I did get reservations made for a trip on Monday-Wednesday to Pulau Tioman, and island in Malaysia where the snorkeling is supposed to be really good. Very isolated, and by all accounts little cell phone and likely no Internet access. So if you don't hear from me for a couple of days, that's why. I still have to work out the travel to the island, but think that should work out today. If not, I'll find something else to do!

Class starts in just a few moments, so I need to get in and get set up. Other than getting here, not much adventure so far -- just teaching!

Singapore

2009-07-16T09:03:00.003-04:00

I made it to Singapore today, with little effort, really. The hotel shuttle took me back to the Tokyo airport, Japan Airlines had everything set for my new ticket, the flight was uneventful, immigration and Customs in Singapore were very quick, the luggage was there, and I took the subway from the airport to within two blocks of my hotel. So even though I am here later than I expected to be, everything is in fine shape. My class materials are all ready, and everything is where it needs to be to get started tomorrow.

There were a couple of neat things from today. The hotel had a very nice Japanese garden, and though I only got to spend a few minutes there this morning, it was really lovely and calm. I took some pictures with my phone (since my camera was in my luggage and thus still at the airport), and had some ideas of things to do (over the long-term, not right now) in the yard at home. The koi pond had some gigantic fish in it, probably because you could purchase food to throw to them, and of course all the kids in the hotel wanted to do that. There was a family there feeding the fish, and the little boy came up to me and asked me if I wanted to feed the fish, too, and gave me a couple of food pellets to toss in. I enjoyed being in that spot, even though it was just a few moments before I had to catch the hotel shuttle.

On the Japan Airlines 777, they had a video camera that showed you what the pilot was seeing as you took off and landed, which was cool. Then during the flight, they had another camera you could watch that looked straight down, so that you could see what you were passing over (when the clouds let you see all the way down). Both of those were cool.

So for now I am settled in at the Concorde Hotel in Singapore, on Orchard Road. It's close to the Dhoby Ghaut MRT station, if you know Singapore. I am going to wrap up this post, and go wander down to get some dinner, and see what's for sale over at the outdoor shops.

Tomorrow I'll figure out what travel I can make happen on this trip, and will let you know what's up, and how class went.

Here in Japan, on the way to Singapore

2009-07-15T09:52:00.002-04:00

I am on my way to Singapore to teach another course in the Baruch Overseas Executive Master's program, and find myself spending the night in Tokyo. Our flight from Detroit to Tokyo had to make a landing in Minneapolis-St. Paul because someone on board had a medical emergency. We didn't get much detail, of course, but apparently the passenger had a problem related to diabetes. There was apparently a physician and a nurse on board, so the passenger got good treatment while we were still in the air. We initially were headed to Duluth, but weather issues there meant that we had to go to Minneapolis-St. Paul instead. It turns out that Minneapolis was the better bet for us, because (as one of the flight attendants told us) they had used all of the medical kits on board to treat the passenger, and we would not have been able to get replacements in Duluth, so our flight would probably have sat there for who knows how long. But since we went to Minneapolis, which is a NorthWest/Delta hub, we were able to re-equip the plane more easily. Of course, we also had to re-fuel, since we had to dump a LOT of fuel in order to land (otherwise we would have been too heavy). The pilot said we dumped 30,000 pounds of fuel. We were still heavy when we landed, which meant that we had to wait over an hour for the mandatory "brake cooling period". So eventually we were back in the air, landing in Tokyo about 4 hours late, I think. At first they announced that passengers heading on to Manila would still make their connections, but then they came back and said that they, too, would be staying here overnight.

Everything in Tokyo was very easy and smooth. Quickly through Immigration and Customs, a shuttle to the pre-arranged hotel with a shuttle back in the morning, dinner at the hotel cafeteria and breakfast in the morning, and re-routed tickets waiting when we landed. I was a little surprised on the plane during the medical situation, because the flight attendants were really flustered. I would have thought this was the sort of thing they handled from time to time, but several of them seemed really unsure of what to do.

So for this evening, I am at the Excel Hotel Tokyu, to get a night's rest. Then back to the airport, to finish up the journey to Singapore. Hopefully the next time I check in here, it will be from there.

Back at it.

2009-05-26T16:19:00.003-04:00

OK, I made it home, and had a great time. No problems on the return trip -- we had to fill out health forms on our way to Tokyo, but no one ever collected them! I did get bumped up to first class on the Taipei-Tokyo leg of the trip (which is always nice), but not on the long leg Tokyo-Detroit.

I got lots of reading done on the plane, and have hit the ground running. After a massive attack of jet lag yesterday afternoon, I took a short nap, and then forced myself to stay up until 10pm. Slept soundly, and think I am back on Detroit time.

I shared the pineapple cookies that Sophy gave me with the office staff and the grad students in my lab today, and they went over very well. Heather can't and Michael won't eat them, and I don't need them all. They do look cool, though -- each one wrapped in its own little cardboard fold-up box.

I also shared the "treasures" I brought home, including a USB flashdrive that looks like a penguin for Heather, and a computer keyboard that is flexible and can roll up like paper for Michael. Michael also got a Taipei City t-shirt (with Taipei 101 on it), and Heather got the seaweek potato chips she likes, so I think I did ok.

So that's about it for this trip. I have to send some information out to the students, and then grade their final papers, but for the most part, this trip is about done. I'll close this section of the blog, and pick it up again when it comes time for Singapore in July.

Winding down

2009-05-24T08:57:00.002-04:00

Today was our last day of class, and I think that it went really well. The students did their group presentations today. I had told them that they should shoot for 15-20 minutes, and all of them ended up going 35-45 (an hour with question and answer time), and the extra time was not padding -- it was good material, thoughtfully presented. I was really pleased with what they came up with.
For lunch, we went to a Beijing-style restaurant, and I had several good things, including bitter mellon, glass noodle soup, dumplings, and a barbeque beef roll that was described as "Chinese Mexican enchilada" by the students. It was all excellent, including the dish whose name I never could get right, but which when I tasted it I immediately said "This is grits!". It was a little more liquid than grits, and yellow, but I felt vindicated when I was told to add some sugar to it to give it some taste -- all those years of adding sugar to my grits in Arkansas, and who knew that that was the way Chinese people were eating it all along!
When class was over, the students gave me a lovely card they all had signed, and they wrote many very thoughtful messages -- I will definitely add this to my "shelf of treasures" at work. Afterwards, about half the class went out for a "beer session", and we went to a Belgian bar, where almost everything they had was a Belgian Trappist Ale or a lambic. It was all served in the proper glasses, and I was pretty impressed to see this little Belgian enclave in the middle of the lanes of Taipei.
Tonight I stopped by the Wellcome Mart to pick up some seaweed potato chips for Heather (the one thing she asked me to bring home for her), and now it is time to pack. Tomorrow will be a long day -- my car comes at 6:45am for a 9:45am flight to Tokyo. I have a 70 minute layover in Tokyo, and I am pretty concerned about it -- on the way through to Taipei, the health inspection on the plane took 90 minutes, and if anything like that happens again, there's no way I'll make my connection.
Assuming I do make it, the flight leaves Tokyo at 3:30pm on Monday and arrives in Detroit at 1:30pm on Monday -- I'm always amazed to have arrived earlier than I left!
I've enjoyed the time here, and the new things I got to do (and eat!) this time. The cooking class, the walk on Elephant Mountain, the paper museum... lots of fun things. But I miss my family and my home, and it is time to go. I'll be traveling again soon -- I go back to Singapore in July -- and I'll be back here in Taipei in a year. But for the moment I'll look forward to sleeping in my own bed (though I have to admit, I'll miss the sumo wrestling on tv).

Good eats

2009-05-23T08:49:00.004-04:00

I have been eating well in the last day, I'll tell you that for nothing. Last night for dinner, I made it out to my favorite little hawker stall, and had the fried dough with a fried egg on top that I've talked about on previous Taipei blogs (alright, I actually had two of them). They are so tasty, and they cost only about 90 cents. I also snagged a little bit of Haagen-Dazs ice cream, which rounded out the meal nicely.

For lunch today, the students took me out to Madame Jill's, the Vietnamese restaurant next to the hotel, and I had crackled pork skin and rice noodles, which was different than I expected, but was really tasty. The students were surprised that I knew how to make a chopstick rest out of the paper wrapper the chopsticks come in, so apparently I am not totally clueless.

Allen, one of the students, took me out to C3, an area of Taipei that is all about electronics (cameras, computers, etc.). I found a few little accessory things, but nothing big that I had to have. On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at a little chain restaurant called Meet Fresh, where we had a traditionally prepared Chinese sweet, which was ice with black sugar and sweet potatos and some sort of rice-based gelatin. It was unlike anything I have had before, and was surprisingly good.

I decided to walk back to the hotel from C3 (thankfully, it was a single straight shot walk of about 25 minutes, so I didn't have to navigate at all). On the way back, I passed the Seventh Day Adventist Church, the Catholic Church, and the Taipei Mosque (Heather will recognize that walk -- it is the same path back as from Din Tai Fung). I stopped in at Mos Burger to have the Teriyaki beef on a rice patty, and I always find that good, too. So I feel as if I have been well fed for the past day -- but it has mostly been pretty healthy, so who could ask for more?

Tomorrow is the last day of class, and I have really come to enjoy this group of students. Some of them talk more than others, of course, but they are knowledgeable and engaged, and ask smart questions. They've been tremendously nice to me (taking me to C3, trying to find how to get places I wanted to go, calling contacts of theirs to help me find gifts I was looking for, etc.), and I am very grateful for their kindnesses.

A little shopping, but no baseball

2009-05-22T05:15:00.003-04:00

Yesterday, the skies looked really threatening. (This is a view from my hotel room.) Having been here before during a typhoon, I wasn't quite expecting that level of rain, but I was expecting some pretty nasty weather. Ten minutes later, I looked again, and the skies were blue and clear. It was almost spooky how quickly it cleared up.

Fridays are off-days for me while I am in Taipei, and so I was able to spend some time today with Sophy Cheng, a former student of mine from Detroit who is now a faculty member in Taichung. She came up to see me, and we had an excellent lunch at a Cantonese restaurant. Sophy ordered SEVERAL things on the dim sum menu, and we certainly had our fill of excellent food, including shrimp dumplings, beef meatballs with herbs, and a special dish usually served around the time of the Dragon Boat races (which start next Friday), and finishing with a mango custard.

After lunch, Sophy was kind enough to go with me to a small version of the Jade Market that I have been to in the past. The huge Jade Market is open only on the weekends, while I am in class, and so it is hard for me to get there (though I have pulled it off before). This one is much smaller, but it was sufficient for my needs for today.

Sophy was also kind enough to give me a gift of cookies that are particularly local to Taichung. I haven't tried them yet, but suspect they'll be tasty.

I had planned to go to the Brother Elephants vs. the 7-11 Lions Chinese Professional Baseball League game tonight, but it turns out that the game is not in the stadium I thought it was in. The CPBL recently reduced from six to four teams (as a result of a game-fixing scandal), and when they did that, the reduced from seven stadiums country-wide (including two in the Taipei area) down to four. The game I went to a few years ago was in a stadium closer to here, which is more easily reachable by subway. I could have made it out to the game, but decided I would stay in and get a little reading done -- I have a couple of manuscripts to review, so I'll do those this evening.

(OK, the tv show "Bewitched" just came on, and it is dubbed into Japanese. Why?)

Tomorrow is class all day, and then one of the students from class offered to take me to C3, an area that is all about consumer electronics. I'm not sure what I need there, but I am sure that I will discover something that someone can't live without.

Sunday is another all-day class, followed by the students' typical routine of going out to grab a beer together. Then comes Monday morning, and a long flight home. I'm enjoying it here, but can't wait to get back.

Pizza this afternoon, chicken claw tonight

2009-05-21T12:34:00.002-04:00

Class tonight went well -- covered a lot of material, and laid out the structure for the rest of the class. Professor Jacoby and I headed out to the Night Market again for dinner, and went to a stall that had a sort of buffet. You got a plastic colander, and filled it up with vegetables and meats and tofu of various sorts, which were then put into a boiling broth to cook. Since I didn't recognize a good bit of what was there to choose from, but I did recognize chicken claws, I figured I'd try it out. So mine had some noodles, some snap peas, tofu, fish, and chicken claw, which tastes quite a bit like (wait for it) chicken, though with not much meat on the bone. It also poked me in the face a few times while I tried to eat it.

Tomorrow is more exploration!

Today: AmCham and pizza

2009-05-21T01:37:00.003-04:00

It is Thursday afternoon here (very early Thursday morning at home), and it's been a good day already. I started off the day by making a presentation to some folks at the American Chamber of Commerce of Taiwan. It was a breakfast meeting, and got publicized rather late (I was only asked to do the talk a little over a week ago), so the attendance was not huge, but it seemed to go well. I mostly talked about some of the cross-cultural issues in business ethics research that I've worked on with Christian Resick from Drexel, and Mary Keating and Gillian Martin from Trinity College Dublin. I am always a little unsure about what will be useful to people in a talk like this, but the people who were there today were primarily not HR people, and they were genuinely interested in the topic. We had lots of good discussion, and I was glad for the chance to do the talk.

I was back at the hotel by 10:30am or so, and for lunch I decided to go wandering in a different direction than usual. In Taipei, there are streets, and off of streets are lanes, and off of lanes are alleys, so I headed back in the alleys around the hotel. About 10 minutes walk away, I found a little pizza parlor -- Mary Jane's. It was not an Italian joint at all -- it was very airy and brightly colored, and was run by young Taiwanese people. The menu was typical pizza (more California Pizza Kitchen type dishes, I'd say), including a 4-cheese pizza for which the description read "This pizza is seriously cheesy. How cheesy? Think David Hasselhoff singing Air Supply backed up by Menudo -- seriously cheesy."

Tonight is class again, from 7-10pm. We're covering cross-cultural issues in leadership, and starting to address some specific issues the students have raised. Tomorrow I will spend part of the day with a Taiwanese former student from Wayne State who is now a professor in Taichung. She's going to show me around a few spots I haven't been to here, and I am looking forward to it.

Oh, and here's a picture that shows a scooter, piled not quite as high as the one I saw and mentioned the other day. This one is from Tuesday night, at the Shida Night Market.

Just sitting here watching sumo wrestling

2009-05-19T02:55:00.006-04:00

Hi everyone. Sorry I am a bit behind in the posting -- I'll try to catch up now.

Right now it is Tuesday afternoon (early Tuesday morning back home). I teach tonight at 7:0pm, so I've got some time before I need to go over my notes one last time before class.

This morning I went to the Suho Paper Museum. It is a small museum about traditional means of making paper, and you get to make a sheet of paper while you are there. Not surprisingly, this is a popular spot for the kindergarten/1st grade age range for a field trip -- they get to learn a little history, and get to make something to take home. I was interested in going there in hopes of finding something that Heather would be able to use for her scrapbooking work -- I had actually planned to just go to the attached shop, but the museum looked pretty interesting, so I did it, as well (and made a piece of paper to take home, too! There it is, along with my certificate as a papermaker). One of my students had made some inquiries for me to find out whether it was possible to get acid-free papers there, and had given me a contact name. So I met with the person (whose English name is Marcus), and he gave me some sample sheets of acid free paper (maybe 18" by 18"). Unfortunately, they don't really sell it in batches of less than 500 sheets, and it wasn't really quite what I was after. I did get some smaller sheets of (non-acid-free) paper that Heather might be able to use in some way, and after she sees photos of them, I'll see if I need to go back and get more. I also bought two larger sheets of hand-made paper that would look great just hung on a wall as is. I learned a bit about traditional Taiwanese paper making (which uses different trees than is typical elsewhere), and about a process where they used to "shave" the pith of a tree to get strips of paper, though those trees are almost unknown today, due to over cutting.

For lunch, I was invited to join the two people who run the local company that coordinates classes here for Baruch. Robert and Jenny Torng run LeadChief, and they have been so kind and thoughtful to me in the several times I have been here. We were joined by a finance professor and a marketing professor, both of whom are teaching courses at the same time as my class is going on. The finance professor is I believe Israeli, currently living in Winnipeg, moving to New York, and the marketing professor is Korean-American. It was interesting discussing the English-language requirements for the Baruch programs in Taipei in a car full of folks of which I was the only native English speaker, with everyone else being quite multi-lingual.

Yesterday was a really excellent, but very tiring day. I had my cooking class in the morning, and it turned out to be great. Jodie, who runs the class, used to do cook at a local restaurant and made her own sauces and such that she sold, but she decided that she prefers to do small cooking classes, where she can introduce people to Chinese culture through food. Here's the link: http://kitchen.j321.com/.

It was really fun, because I was the only student (or as Jodie says, "guest") for the day, which is actually the way she prefers to do classes. We started off talking a little bit, letting her get a sense for how much I knew about cooking or about Chinese food in general, and what sorts of things I was interested in. I had previously emailed (when confirming my class) that I was especially interested in foods that didn't require wheat flour, and everything we did was designed for rice flour, which will be great. Our first thing was simply to make soy bean milk, and typical hot beverage to start the day in Asia (moreso than cofee for many Asian folks). We then just spent time going through different ingredients, smelling and tasting the ingredients one by one, and then seeing how they tasted when mixed together, and learning which ones were more local Taiwanese, which were Szechuan, which were Shanghainese, and so on. Things like different vinegars, different oils, different peppers, different qualities of soy sauces -- she was already very good at pointing out when you can use basic (i.e., cheaper) ingredients, and when you really needed to invest in the good stuff.

We then moved on to bigger things -- a very simple but extremely good sour and spicy soup (which becomes Szechuan hot and sour soup with just a couple of ingredient additions). As with everything to come, Jodie talked about how flexible this dish was -- add in this, or that, serve it this way or that way, and so on. That was a key point in the class -- almost everything was such that it could be made in a variety of ways, and used on or with a variety of ingredients. It wasn't really a class to learn recipes, so much as a class to learn flavors and how they mix, and how they could be used in different ways.

We then made different types of sesame pastes (again, to be used on a ton of things -- fruit, meat, fish), and had a spicy Szechuan sunflower-pepper oil spicy pineapple dish -- just a spiced and herbed oil on pineapple, that was so simple, so good, and filled with all the flavors you would think of Asian cooking. We also made a sweet and sour dressing on spicy pickled cucumber, and about five other sauces. We finished up with a simple fried rice, and with conversation about why my fried rice (and stir fry) doesn't usually work out quite right. I really learned a lot, and enjoyed getting to know Jodie.

As you can see from the photo above, Jodie's Kitchen looks out over a beautfiul view. That's Elephant Mountain, and Taipei 101 is in the distance to the left. You are really close to the city, but in a gorgeous green mountain jungle area. When it was time to leave, Jodie and her boyfriend suggested that I take the foot path -- the day was beautiful and cool, and I had no obligations that afternoon. The foot path turns out to be UP Elephant Mountain to the very top, and then across, and then down. It was an amazing walk, through simply stunning terrain. The path was often very narrow, with no barrier between path and side of mountain. Along the way, tucked in to the trees and nooks on the mountain, were several shrines, mostly Buddhist, some Hindu, and one Christian that I saw (John, Jodie's Kitchen is just a little ways past the Taiwan Baptist Theological Seminary!). The whole time, you could always see Taipei 101 to the left, so you were never going to get totally lost. I was unhappy to have again forgotten my own advice to bring my camera, but I had not planned to be heading through the jungle that afternoon! By the time I reached the top of the mountain, I was pretty sure that my legs would cease to function at any moment. (You can pretty much see the area I walked in the photo.) At the very top was a small flag pole, with a couple of small Taiwanese flags flying, almost defiantly. Butterflies of types I had never seen before chased each other, and there was a small shrine there, as well. It was really stunningly beautiful. The cloud cover was low, so on the one hand you felt so high up on the mountain, but on the other hand, you could see 101 seeming to go up forever, because the clouds obscured the upper floors. I walked on down the mountain, and past a large, rustic Buddhist temple. Not a very fancy or old one, but one that seemed to be well-used. Eventually I came to a residential area, and soon enough, a taxi! It had only turned out to be about a two and half hour venture, but it was well worth it. No photos, but excellent memories.

So now I am in my room, with Sumo wrestling on tv. For some reason, I always enjoy watching the sumo when I am here. I don't understand a word anyone is saying, but the combination of ancient ritual and the sudden burst of action is really interesting. I'm going to turn it off, though, and finish up for tonight's class. I also have to finish my presentation to the American Chamber of Commerce for Thursday morning, and have several other work things to do, so I think I won't be lacking for tasks. But it was definitely worth taking the time for the one-on-one cooking class, and the walk through the mountain jungle.

An interesting group to work with

2009-05-16T06:38:00.002-04:00

Today was the first day of class. I am teaching Leadership in the Executive Program here, and this is the first time I have taught that class for this program. The students this time are a really nice bunch, and they are also pretty dedicated. We always give them time to work on a group project, and the students had finished up their group work and there were still several minutes left in the scheduled class session. Most classes would probably have just knocked off early, but these folks asked if we could talk more about one of the readings, which was pretty cool.

For lunch, we went to the Wisteria Tea House, which is the place where many of the early discussions about Western democracy in Taiwan took place. I've eaten there before, but not back on the tatami mats on the floor. The students were great conversationalists, and the meal was a sort of pork meat ball soup, among other things.

Tomorrow is another day of class, and I think that tonight I will finally sleep soundly. Then Monday is my cooking class!

Always take your camera with you

2009-05-15T01:40:00.002-04:00

I made it in to Taipei last night, and for the most part the travel was uneventful. I flew from Detroit to Tokyo, and Tokyo to Taipei. Both flights were pretty crowded, but not packed. The strangest part of the process was when we landed in Tokyo, and had about a 90 minute wait while the Health Inspectors checked to make sure that no one was carrying the H1N1 (swine flu) virus. Everyone had to fill out forms saying whether they had been to Mexico recently, or had been around people who were sneezing and coughing. Apparently, some folks didn't realize that you had to do a form for infants as well, so we ended up waiting while they had to match up the number of forms with the number of people. The health inspectors were not quite dressed in HazMat clothes, but cl0se -- they were all wearing medical gowns, gloves, eye protection, and serious masks (not the little surgical ones like we often see, but ones that were much more Darth Vader-esque), and most of them wore hair covers, as well. I was supposed to have about two hours in Tokyo as a layover, but ended up with about 25 minutes instead.

Taipei was much easier, and I got to the hotel actually a little earlier than expected. I checked in with Heather to let her know I had arrived, and then got some sleep (but it is always weird sleep after a flight like this -- not quite deep sleep).

This morning I got up, had an online chat with Michael before he went to bed (Yahoo Messenger lets us use audio and video, which is nice), and then went out into a beautiful Taipei morning. It is about 85 here today, and I walked up to a local bookstore because I had forgotten my Taipei guidebook, and I got another one. While I was on my way to the bookstore, I saw a man on a modified scooter (scooters are the preferred mode of transport for many people here). It was a three-wheeler, loaded high with at least 8 feet high and five feet wide of empty cardboard boxes and other such things. I wished I had had my camera with me, so that I could have posted the picture!

After the bookstore, I grabbed some munchies from the old familiar Wellcome Mart up the road, and set to work, finalizing my class. The conclusion of last semester and several other projects kept me from getting everything completely finalized for this class, but it is a leadership class, and so I am in pretty good shape for it. I think that I will go now and grab some lunch, and then finish off my class prep.

This should be a good trip. I have a lot of work to do on various projects, but I have scheduled in some fun things here, as well. I've been here often enough to have done a lot of the typical things one does in Taipei, but I've scheduled a Chinese Cooking Class for Monday, a baseball game for Friday evening, and a visit with a former student from Wayne State for Friday morning. I will also be speaking to the American Chamber of Commerce of Taiwan on Thursday, so that should be interesting. All in all, a trip with lots of work time, but some good activities built in as well.

So I'm here, safe and sound, and ready for some lunch!

Getting ready for some more posts

2009-05-11T19:38:00.004-04:00

I (Marcus) am getting ready to head back to Taipei, leaving on Wednesday, so I decided to log back in and make sure I remembered how to use the blog! Apparently I did, and so I am now relying on Heather to help me get everything ready for the trip. I'll post things here while I am gone, including (I hope) some things about a Brother Elephants baseball game, and maybe even a cooking class. I'll check in when I arrive at the ever-comfy Howard International House, late Thursday night Taiwan time, early Thursday afternoon Detroit time.

Greetings from Louisville

2008-11-14T22:14:00.006-05:00

On Thursday Michael, Marcus and I went to Portsmouth. Today we got My parents an early Christmas present. Her name is Rosie. After getting everyone settled in, Marcus and I went on to Louisville where he has a conference and I am just tagging along;)

We had Dinner at Amerigo where I had a marvelous salad and Marcus had a great pork tenderloin. It was strange to get to eat in a place that doesn't have a huge kid's menu or anything else kid related. It was strange, but kinda nice.

Now we are settling in because Marcus has to be on the shuttle to the conference at 7:45am. Tomorrow, Marcus will go to the conference and I get to wander around Louisville. Marcus has ironed his clothes all up and I am going to shower and hit the sack. More soon.... Heather

2008-10-06T15:44:00.000-04:00

This is Chuck, Jan, Felicia, David and Hugh (huey)

2008-10-06T15:42:00.000-04:00

This past weekend we were in Ohio again for my cousin Felicia (and new cousin David)'s wedding! This is a picture of my parents with our beautiful Bride and handsome groom! I will post more pictures here shortly but this was one that I wanted!

GREETINGS From Legoland

2008-08-06T23:24:00.000-04:00

Today we visited Michael's Elysium Fields. O.k. so we are still alive BUT as you can see he was pretty happy with the entire event.

2008-08-06T23:19:00.000-04:00

Greetings from Legoland

8/6/08

Look what I brought home from Legoland

2008-08-06T23:18:00.000-04:00

Its always Sunny in Southern California!

2008-08-05T20:00:00.003-04:00

Greetings all from Sunny California!!!! Marcus, Michael and I arrived at LAX, bought sunglasses and drove down from LA to the Encinitas. (5.4 miles from Legoland) We are settling in the hotel room and getting ready to hit the pool and then some dinner.... its feels like 8pm but its only 5.... that's going to be difficult.

Pictures will be forthcoming! more later!

Heather et al.

Almost done in Singapore

2008-06-07T08:12:00.007-04:00

I'm sorry for not posting more regularly while I've been here in Singapore -- I've been busy much of the time, and haven't had much chance to catch up on things. But it is now Saturday evening here (Saturday morning back home), and I have some time to share what's been going on.

I mentioned having gone to Sentosa, and posted a couple of pictures from there. On Thursday I was able to catch the ferry to Bintan, Indonesia, and go to a resort there and get in some snorkeling. I remembered to bring my waterproof camera, though unfortunately I was only able to get 200 film, so the pictures came out a little less clear than I had hoped. But I got to see some types of fish in the South China Sea that previously I have only been able to see in fishtanks, and that was a lot of fun. I also had some unexpected free time, because the morning snorkeling trip was canceled due to lack of people for it, so hmmm... what to do? I know! Get a 2 1/2 hour massage in a tropical resort, with the birds and the sea breeze and the warm air... THAT was an excellent idea.

Indonesia also helped out on my quest to fill up all the pages in my passport before it expires, in that it is the first place I have gone where I had to purchase a visa, and it filled up one entire page, so thanks for that, Indonesian Immigrasi!

I've been doing my best to eat good local Chinese, Indonesia, Thai, or other regional food while I am here, and today I had sweet and sour pork, which was excellent. Not at all like the thick sticky sauce we often get at home, but something very light, and extremely tasty.

There is one more day of class left, and I think it has gone pretty well. We've covered a lot of important topics, generated a lot of discussion among the students about how their organizations respond to various staffing issues, and a lot of cultural issues that arise in that situation, so I feel like they've come away with some useful things. Tomorrow, our last day of class, will be largely filled with student group project presentations, and the students have really worked hard on them, and I think will end up doing a great job on them.

Sunday will have to be an early evening, as my flight departs at 6:00am, and I'll need to be at the airport by 4:30am. So no last night carousing for me, I think. I've really enjoyed my time here, and will certainly hope to come back, but I think I am ready to get home and see the family, and see how the new house is turning into a new home.

That's about it for n0w -- I've done some good shopping, but some of you won't see the results of that for several months ;)

Love to all.

Singapore!

2008-06-03T05:24:00.006-04:00

OK, Singapore... I left on Wednesday afternoon, and flew to Tokyo. We waited on the tarmac for a while in Detroit, but ultimately landed in Tokyo only about an hour late, which left me plenty of time for the next flight. So I spent 13 hours in the plane on the way to Tokyo, had a 2-hour layover, and then another 8 hours on the plane to Singapore. We landed at about 1:30am local time, and I was amazed that no one asked me a single question at immigration or customs, so I was in the hotel and headed to bed by about 2:45am. Class started that evening at 7:00pm, so I didn't do much that day other than rest, find the class room, go over my files, and get ready for the class. I did go to a mall close by when I realized that I had brought a shirt with a stain on it -- fortunately, this month is "Singapore on Sale!" where everything everywhere is on sale. I got a couple of dress shirts inexpensively, though I did feel bad for the woman helping me. The shirt size she picked out for me was too small, which embarrassed her, but it wasn't surprising, given that the shirts are cut to fit an Asian population which is typically thinner than a North American population, and is certainly thinner than me!

Saturday and Sunday were both class all day. The class is really interesting -- there is a tremendous diversity of experience in the students, much moreso than I have wrestled with before. Some of the students are brand new to Human Resources, and really need to go over the basics of how you do Staffing (which is the topic of the course). Others are HR executives who have been doing this for many years, and no longer do the basics because their subordinates do that work now, and they want to talk about much more advanced topics. So I am re-working the classes for the final three days, and will try to find a point that works for everyone.

Sunday evening, I left class a few minutes early, and went over to the Presidential Palace, which is 5 minutes from my hotel. The first Sunday of every month they do the changing of the guard, and so that was interesting. Lots of pageantry, one military band playing as the new guard came in, another playing as the old guard went out. The MPs did a routine that was very complex, but also seemed to border on a dance routine at times. It was well-done, no doubt, but didn't seem to quite fit my idea of what MPs ought to do. I was looking around for an Indian, a cop, and a construction worker to go with them.

Singapore is a relatively large city (4.5 million), but a very small country. The class has several Singaporeans in it, but also Brits, Aussies, Indonesians, Vietnamese, Indians, Americans... it is very diverse, which is both fun and challenging. There is a tremendous variety of food available, and I've been doing my share of sampling it, including getting food from the "hawkers" who sell on the streets. These are very common and very popular, and typically extremely good.

Yesterday I went to Sentosa, which is essentially a resort island that is part of Singapore. They have all sorts of attractions, including the beach, animal shows, rides, etc. It reminded me of Paradise Island in the Bahamas. It was fun, and I got to see some neat things. There were macaques with babies on their bellies, peacocks, and I got a picture of me with a large parrot. There is also a large mer-lion at Sentosa -- the mer-lion is the symbol of Singapore, and it is half-lion, half-fish. To get to Sentosa, I took the Sentosa Express, which is a monorail from one of the jillions of malls here, and on the way back, took a cable car over the water, which gave a nice view. While at Sentosa, I went to the Southernmost point of the Asian Continent, which was nothing fancy, but just sort of cool.

This afternoon I had lunch with the staff who are coordinating my visit here, and we had excellent Thai food, including some really spicy things, and some things that I have no idea what they were. I also dropped my laundry off at the Washy-Washy, and will pick it up this evening. As soon as I am done with this entry, I am going to the Night Safari, where you get pretty close to the animals. I am planning to either go on a day trip to Malacca, Malaysia (a historical area), or to Bintan, Indonesia (a resort for good snorkeling), depending on which I can get to (trying to figure out the advance reservations needed).

So far, I am having a great time, though I feel horrible about leaving Heather and Michael and Heather's folks behind to work on the new house. "Hey, we have a new house, you all paint it while I am gone!" I really appreciate what they've done while I've been away, and look forward to seeing them and it in a week or so.

2008-06-02T10:05:00.002-04:00

OK, I'm a bad person for not posting while I've been traveling, so here are a couple of quick catch-up posts. I did in fact go to Amsterdam and stay at The Bridge Hotel, next to the Skinny Bridge, and I think the talk there (part of the Distinguished Speaker Series at the Business School of the University of Amsterdam) went well. I got to spend some good work time with my colleague Deanne Den Hartog, and really enjoyed meeting with the graduate students, as well. It was a quick visit -- I left on a Saturday night to arrive Sunday afternoon, and then returned home on Tuesay morning -- but I think it was well worth it.

I really enjoy Amsterdam as a city -- it is so pedestrian-friendly, with tons of bikes and scooters, and walking paths, and a great public transit system. I have been there a few times, and always enjoyed it there. I could see living there someday, or at least doing a longer stay of a several weeks, and really enjoying it. Great museums, and just a neat place all around.

I got home on Tuesday, we did the walk-through for the new house on Wednesday, and closed on Thursday. Our water problems in the new home began on Friday... I think now they are mostly resolved, but we've gotten to know the local plumber much quicker than we had expected to. So we started having problems, and then I promptly left for Singapore, and left Heather behind to resolve the problems, and I have to say she is coming through like a trooper. I am really proud of her, and grateful to her for helping so much with everything.

I am going to try to do a post with pictures about Singapore (which is where I am right now), but it may not be tonight, as bed time is approaching. Love to all, and I hope to see you soon! (Come visit our new home!)

Marcus

Marcus is in Amsterdam

2008-05-19T23:29:00.004-04:00

Marcus is in Amsterdam and left on Saturday.... actually he comes back tomorrow and we have tickets to go see Eddie Izzard (He is sooo funny)

I don't know much about Amsterdam and he is supposed to take pictures but this is where he is staying. It is called The Bridge Hotel.

And this is why! "The Bridge Hotel is located on the beautiful Amstel River next to Carre Theatre, at a walking distance from Rembrandt Square and Waterloo Square." so the listing says... we will have to hear from Marcus about that.

He gave his talk, which from what I have heard of it, was very engaging, and a bit less cranky then his sabatical talk. (IMHO) A little more upbeat and a lot more positive by his own reckoning. NEver the less I will encourage him to add a little more. However, this will prove a very busy week.

Tues- Flight back

Wed- Walk through the new house

Thurs- Close on the house

Fri- Oh... my the fun begins

And we have to have soooo much done because the 28th Marcus leaves for Singapore....
Exciting.... scary.... busy...

much love,

Heather

On the road again!

2008-04-09T10:29:00.001-04:00

Marcus flew out this morning for San Francisco. Hopefully, he will take some pictures and remember to post, but being as he is at a conference that might be doubtful. So, I will be happy to post in his stead! SO more soon I hope!

More Travels!

2008-02-27T12:45:00.002-05:00

Dr. Dickson has been invited to speak in Amsterdam so he will get to post pictures from Singapore and the Netherlands. Exciting stuff! Stay tuned!

Leavin' on a jet plane

2008-02-24T15:55:00.002-05:00

Leaving on a 747, in fact. It's about 4:45am, and we're getting ready to go check out of the hotel, get in a car, and head Chiang Kai Shek Airport, where we'll fly to Osaka, and then on to Detroit. We'll arrive in Detroit (through the wonders of a revolving Earth) earlier than when we left Osaka -- our flight leaves there at 1:30pm, and we arrive in Motown at 11:40am on Monday.

When we get back, we'll wrap up this journal, including a description of our adventures at "very famous dumpling restaurant" on our last night here. But for now, it's time to pack up the laptop, and say good-bye to the warm weather, the culture, and the friendliness of Taiwan.

Xie-xie for following us on this adventure, everyone!

Marcus

Marcus here -- Class is over now

2008-02-24T03:59:00.002-05:00

First of all, be sure to look all the way through the blog -- Heather and Pei have caught up on some delayed entries for the blog, and put the entries in correct chronological order, so you'll need to scroll all the way through to see everything!

We wrapped up class today, and it was a good class. The topic was Organizational Staffing, and covered things like Recruiting, Personnel Selection, Performance Appraisal, Employee Retention, Cultural issues affecting Staffing, and linking Staffing to the Organization's Strategy. Fifteen students in total, including several people with a tremendous amount of knowledge and experience in HR and Staffing, and several others with really no Staffing background. It made for an interesting class, trying to balance the needs of both groups. (I'll post a class picture once I get a copy of some of the ones taken today.)

The last part of class is always a group presentation of a project they've worked on all week, and the presentations today were all really good. I was very impressed with the level of effort and understanding, and it was fun to see how they integrated the class topics into their own workplace situations. We also had lunch at Schwarzwald, a local German restaurant, which was a lot of fun.

I learned while I was here that the Baruch HR Executive Master's Program is ready to launch in Singapore, and I am scheduled to teach there the first week of June. I'm already starting to learn about the country, and to prepare for that trip. Apparently the Russia program they had been working on fell through (the partners in Russia were apparently unsavory folks), but I'm excited about the Singapore opportunity.

Tonight is the last night for us here, and we're not yet sure where we're going to dinner, or how we'll spend the evening. Heather did all the laundry, so we're pretty much ready to go. So we'll find something fun to do to wrap up our Taipei adventure and Heather's first trip to Asia, and Pei's initial trip anywhere.

Chung Cheng Park

2008-02-22T19:34:00.002-05:00

Blogger takes a really long time to upload pictures. So I will be posting a few digital scrapbooks for you to enjoy. You can- (if you feel inclined) print them as scrapbook pages. So... this is the first part of yesterdays trip- to the coast. Our first stop was Chung Cheng Park. The park includes two "temples" one to Milefo and one to the Goddess of Mercy. There were several buddhas that I did not post pictures of. The entire 22.5 meter tall statue of the goddess is surrounded by the various buddhas that one might ask for help with different aspects of life. More about that later... for now enjoy the show;) - love Heather

Make a photobook - it's easy!

A Message from Pei- TALLL BUILDING

2008-02-21T09:01:00.006-05:00

Today was supposed to be rainy BUT instead it was sunny and over 70 degrees. We finally made it to the Taipei 101 building. It is very tall, but not as wide as most buildings. In the center of the building there is a damper system which is comprised of many pillars and one HUGE "damper baby" Damper Baby is 660 ton steel weight which hangs in the center of the building to help absorb the sway of the building. They are really proud of the damper giving it a super hero character named Damper Baby. They even display the Damper. We EVEN got our picture taken with the damper. The viewing area for the damper is on floor 88. To get up there you take a superfast elevator. It was like half a minute to go from the 5th floor to the 89th. Our ears were popping!

On floor 89 there is an observation area which is all enclosed and has a shopping area. They had a display of the Taipei 101 and Marcus showed me where we were at in the building. Then we got to look ou the windows. You could see the WHOLE city. Even though there was a little bit of fog you could still see the mountains in the distance. The entire building has windows all around it. Heather and Marcus wondered how they cleaned the windows on the building. Marcus said they might have a system for it and that sound like a good idea. Then we saw these guys. Heather decided that she doesn't do windows! I don't think any of us wanted to volunteer to be part of the window cleaning crew. To get to the outside viewing area you climb a set of stairs. We went up three flights of stairs to reach the 91st floor. Then we got to go out side to look around. The view was awesome. The sun was nice and warm but it was still windy.

After we looked around we went back and saw a video about the building being built. The end of the video had a section on the 2008 new year celebration where they shot fireworks off of the building. That was sooo cool! Before we went down, we sat at a little table and had some ice cream- Marcus had mint chocolate chip (Michael's favorite, boy I can't wait to meet him). Then we got BACK on the super fast elevator and shot back down to the shopping mall that is in the first several floors of the building. There was a McDonalds there and we got French Fries (mmmmm yummy) We also got Michael a present, but I can't tell you what it is. What a fun day!

Slideshow

2008-02-20T18:59:00.002-05:00

I wasn't feeling great yesterday, but this morning I am some better. I put this together, these were taken yesterday on the tour of the Northeast coast and Chiufen Village. About an hour's drive north of Taipei.

Make a slideshow - it's easy!

Marcus again

2008-02-20T07:02:00.006-05:00

Heather's going to catch up on the blog for Pei, but right now, she's a little worn out. We had a long but fun day, and it was rainy and wet, so she's taking a bit of a nap before we grab some dinner.

We had planned this morning to go to Taipei 101, the tallest building in the world (or at least, it is depending how you measure!). You can get a great view for miles around from the indoor observation deck on the 89th floor, or from the outdoor deck on the 91st floor. (There are, you guessed it, 101 floors in all.) However, we took a look from our hotel, and saw that this might not be the best day for viewing the view from 101 -- you can see the building looming over everything else, but the top floors, including the observation decks, were hidden in the clouds. So we thought we'd wait until another time to use the world's fastest elevator (84 floors in 37 seconds!).

What we did do today was go on a tour to the NorthEast coast of Taiwan, and to Chiufen Village. The NorthEast coast is very rugged, with stone beaches -- very little sand at all. The waves were running high today, and crashing on the shore. Both Heather and I took little spills as we walked out onto the rocks jutting into the North China Sea, and discovered that some of those rocks were very very slick.

Chiufen Village (by the way, also spelled Jioufan Village, just to make it interesting on the map) is the site of what was essentially a gold rush town in the early 1900s. The gold is long gone, but the village remains, apparently mostly as a tourist location. It is high on a mountain, up a VERY long and twisty road that made me think that even the roads in Pittsburgh are straight compared to this road. At the top, we went to see the local temple, and to wander through the many, many shops of food, clothes, souvenirs, and who knows what else. I had some sausage grilled right there, and also a sort of ice cream in which they put a scoop of what seemed pretty close to sherbet onto a sort of rice tortilla spread with peanuts, add in some parsley, and then roll it all up like a burrito. It took a little to get used to, but was actually pretty good.

Tomorrow will probably hold the Taipei 101 trip, even though the weather doesn't look a lot better. We'll also probably go out after my class is over to participate in the Lantern Festival -- the conclusion of the Chinese New Year celebrations.

Lunch at the Grand Hotel

2008-02-19T14:39:00.003-05:00

Today... I felt REALLY awful- But we did manage to get out and about to the Grand Hotel. Jenny, from Leadchief took us to lunch there where we had dim sum. So many really wonderful dishes. My favorite was the seafood soup, (no wheat!) Marcus seemed to prefer these little bread wraps with bbq pork inside. I felt really bad and I didn't take pictures. However, I pulled some stock photos so you can see the place. Sorry, I know I have subjected you to a lot of slideshows and digital scrapbooks but here's another one;)

Make a postcard - it's easy!

Here is more about the hotel:

"After Chiang Kai-shek's retreat to Taiwan in 1949, Chiang felt it was difficult to accommodate foreign ambassadors, as there weren't any five-star hotels in Taipei. Thus, he wanted to build an extravagant hotel to treat foreign guests. His wife Soong May-ling suggested to build it on the old Taiwan Hotel on Yuanshan Mountain, the site of the ruins of the Taiwan Grand Shrine, a Shinto shrine during the Japanese rule. Chiang decided on a Chinese palace-style architecture to promote Chinese culture to the West through its extravagance. Taipei-based architect Yang Cho-Cheng was responsible for the design of the new hotel.

The hotel was established in the May of 1952, but it was expanded several times before it became the landmark as it is known today. The swimming pool, tennis court, and the membership lounge were constructed in 1953, and Golden Dragon Pavilion and Golden Dragon Restaurant opened in 1956. The Jade Phoenix Pavilion and Chi-Lin Pavilion opened in 1958 and 1963, respectively. In 1968, the hotel was rated as one of the world's top ten hotels by the US Fortune magazine. And finally, in the Double Tenth Day of 1973, the main Grand Hotel building was completed, making it an instant Taipei icon.

In June 1995, a disastrous fire broke out on the roof during necessary reconstruction and refurbishment, and because neither ladders nor high pressure pumps could reach the fire, the roof and the upper floors were destroyed. Not until 1998 did the hotel recover from the damage and became fully reopened to the public. Following the fire, the two dragon heads on the roof were rotated 180 degrees to point inwards. As dragons are traditionally a symbol of rain and water, this was intended to symbolize preparedness against a future fire."

Of Cabbages and Kings....

2008-02-18T09:58:00.004-05:00

Today Pei, Marcus and I went to the National Palace Museum. Here we learned alot about Chinese Calligraphy. I was of course interested in seeing the art and figuring out its influences. One of the things I thought was so incredibly striking is that if there is a great piece of art that it often copied. In fact copying great works was looked upon as a GOOD thing. The more closely copied the more honor you did the artist. This is very much counter to the ideas of the western world that prizes art as individual expression.

I had to put together a slide show from the Palace Museum site. When Marcus was there last he was able to take pictures. WE however were not. So I gathered pictures of some of MY favorite things. I was there on Sunday with a quick tour group. Then again today with better company;) Sadly though, I am beginning to really feel under the weather.

The National Palace Museum Slideshow-

Make a slideshow - it's easy!

After the National Palace Museum we made our way to Longshan Temple and finally the market-

The original was built in 1738by settlers from China. The temple has since been destroyed either in full or in part by earthquakes and fires and in 1945, it was even hit by American bombers who claimed the Japanese were hiding armaments inside. Taipei residents rebuilt it as soon as the war was over. Determine no? Longshan is seen as an emblematic example of Taiwanese classical architecture. At the site one can worship Buddhist, Taoist or even folk deities like Matsu.
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A message from Pei- Sightseeing and lots of Lions!

2008-02-17T19:37:00.020-05:00

Today is Sunday, February 17th, 2008 but if you are in Taiwan it is also the local year 97.

Today we went traveling around the city in a van to see all of the sites. Of course we could not see all of them in a day, not even in a week! Taipei is a very large city! Taipei is actually from two words Tai-which means Taiwan and Pei which means North. (So my name means north). The first stop was at the building once called Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall (It is being called Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall- Heather will give you more about that later.)On the left you can see the Memorial hall with 89 steps each step is a year in the life of Chaing Kai-Shek. Here I am getting ready to go in the main hall.

There in the main hall there is a huge bronze statue of Chiang Kai-Shek. There in the hall there is a also a display of "kites of freedom." Some of the kites are really cool and some are almost a little scary. From the Memorial Hall we hopped back into the van and drove a few minutes to a Taoist Temple-

This particular temple is called the Bao-An Temple. This is one of the most popular temples in Taipei. The largest temple is called the Lungshan Temple and we will go see it tommorrow. The Bao-An Temple is primarily a Taoist temple though it is certain also for Buddists. Many of the temple's visitors come to pray for health, fortune and to see to it that the ancestors are taken care of. There were lots of inscence sticks and burners. There were also lots of lions used in the decoration of the buildings the way some places uses gargoyles. Chinese lions/Taiwanese Lions have scary expressions on their faces and their mouths open to protect the people and ward away evil and bad luck. I am not sure I would make a good guardian lion, yet. I will keep practicing! We watched people make offerings to the gods and keep the memory of the ancestors. Finally, we got back into the little van and continued our journey.

Our next stop was the Martyr's Shrine which is a war memorial- the brochure says this: The Martyrs Shrine is dedicated to approximately 330,000 men who sacrificed their lives to the overthrowing of the Ching Dynasty before the establishment of the Republic of China in 1911, and who fell during the Sino-Japanese war (1938-1945) and the Chinese Civil war (1945-1949). Plates of these brave and loyal martyrs have been inserted into the four walls of the main building in testimony of their heroic deeds.

Here at the gates there are guards that stand perfectly still until the changing of the guard. This place was very solemn. Heather got some video of the changing of the guard but I was busy practicing my chinese lion stance. Do you think this is any better? After my practice, it had started to rain so we were happy to climb back into the van for the long drive to the National Palace Museum. We didn't get to take any pictures there because it is now forbidden to take pictures in the museum itself. We saw the ivory ball in a ball in a ball in a ball and the jadite cabbage. Marcus has pictures of this stuff because you could take pictures the last time HE was here. So we can use them. We were in a rush and Heather and I decided we would come back tomorrow!

On the drive back, the driver dropped everyone else all, but because we are Americans he drove us over by the Taipei 101 so we could see it. He was really a fan of the US. It made us feel really good to be from there!

As we drove by, traffic was stopped by a light and we snapped this rainy window picture. Tomorrow Marcus, Heather and I will go back to the National Palace Museum. So, more from me after that!

Love,

Pei

Ya live... ya learn

2008-02-16T23:07:00.009-05:00

Sunday- February17th- 1p.m.

It has been threatening to rain all day... so Pei and I decided to stay close to the hotel. The Lamb Restaraunt was close and the food there wasn't bad... also we have to be ready to leave for the tour so we couldn't afford to get lost today... HOWEVER... That's where the where the story gets interesting. Since I didn't want to have the same thing twice. Pei and I ordered Lamb and Melon. Sadly, there was alot to be said for my preconcieved notions of what I was about to partake of. Never the less we waited until our meal had been prepared and placed in to go boxes. I had to wonder what this would taste like, because to me melon is a sweet thing... so... we took our lunch back to the hotel room. Of course Pei was willing to guard it because it was lamb and that is tasty. Never the less we opened our treasure and at first glance were intrigued but not alarmed. At first bite I realised that this was made with what is called bitter melon. It gave the dish a kind of bite kinda like cold strong coffee, but not quite flavored that way. I mixed it with the rice unwilling to rule a food out just because it was a little out of my comfort zone. The next threat to my comfort zone occurred when after the third time of

coming acrossed something not really flavored except kinda briney but both rubbery and crunchy at the same time. I had cleaned off the first small bit so digging some more out,. As I was putting more on my plate, I took a good look at the colors and textures. The bitterness of the dish had already ruled out a repeat performance. Then I found these little devils... I began to laugh really hard and then finished my plate before it all sunk in. You can't see it very well in the picture but they are little fish... heads and all. Not unlike an anchovy, but certainly not as strong in flavor... oh and they were crunchy. In my head the first rule of any cultures cuisine is that they eat it and it doesn't kill them so I'll live. However, eating like a native here is NOT for the timid! Again, I did finish my plate, but sadly I did not finish the whole take out box. Tried it Kept it down- sounds like a success to me. I don't think that it is something I would try again. Not so much because the fishies had their heads but more so because the bitter melon did not have a flavor I liked. Pei didn't seem so willing to guard it after all. Maybe the stuffed lion has more wisdom then I give him credit for. Well, can't say I am not willing to try something. However, pray for me... it sounds like I am gonna need it.
Love,
Heather

My Breakfast Faux Pas

2008-02-16T20:59:00.003-05:00

Well, it would seem I made my first slip in the OH I shouldn't have eaten that column. Apparently, the sauce on the Chilli Bean Curd was a wheat product... hrm... but after spending most of the morning recovering from THAT... I have booked a tour of the city this afternoon. Pei and I took our morning tea in the hotel room. But I am feeling better now and am having some coffee. Then thought I would share this.

Of course THIS gives me a chuckle. and while I am not entirely sure what Love milk is but strangely it tastes like fresh milk and it is heavy on the cream factor. YOU JUST can't get milk like this at home unless you go to a farm. Its really good. However, the name is once again a tribute to the strangely-almost english- product names and advertisements. It served to amuse me. Hope you got a kick out of it too! More Later-

Love,

Heather

A message from Pei- Night Market Fun

2008-02-16T10:32:00.009-05:00

I waited for my turn to use the computer. Now, I get to tell you all about the rest of our day!

After a nap, it was time to go back out exporing. We went out and about to see the sites and sounds of Taipei at night! Here is a picture of Heather and I out shopping. It was kinda crazy because there were so many people. Taipei has a population of 2,630,872 people, so you see it really is a large city. There are lots of signs that are written in Mandrin and some that are in English. Sometimes, though the english doesn't make much sense to people who speak English every day. Like this sign for shoes. Which says Fancy Holiday... There are lots of signs and shirts which say things in English just to be in English even if they don't make much sense.

After our trip to the market it was time for dinner. It was pretty easy to figure out what they were selling. They sell goat and lamb. They even have goat horns in the window on display. Which doesn't bother a lion like me. Not sure Michael would like it though. We got our dinner to go and I could hardly wait to dig in because Lamb and green onions didn't sound too bad to me. It smelled really good too. I even got a good sniff from inside the bag. So, I was all ready to have dinner and get ready for bed. It has been a really long day and tomorrow afternoon Heather and I will be going on a city tour. That should be fun and we will have to tell you all about it. *yawn* its time for good little lions to be asleep.

So good night-

Love,

Pei

Marcus here

2008-02-16T10:06:00.002-05:00

Just a quick note to say that we've had a good time here so far, and all is well. I taught class today, and had 15 students. There is a real range of background and experience among the students, so class is interesting. For lunch we went to a Japanese place, and I had tempura (flash fried vegetables and seafood).

This evening, Heather and I (and Pei) went to the Shida Night Market. Heather got some cool photos to show this very densely packed, very Chinese location. We'll probably make it to she Guaxi Night Market later this week -- also known as Snake Alley. It's right next to the Longshan Temple, so we'll go there first, and then go get a foot massage at the Night Market. Lots of fun things for us to do here, but first, I have another full day of teaching tomorrow. So we're having a late dinner of Lamb with green onions, and noodles, and then it is bed time!

A Message from Pei- Cool things

2008-02-16T01:06:00.009-05:00

Breakfast time!!! Yummy! There are all kinds of foods here in Taiwan, some of them Michael would eat and some he might not like so well. For breakfast we had: Scrambled Eggs, Fried Rice, Grapes, Grapefruit and Cabbage. Do you think you would like any of these things? I liked the scrambled eggs- yummy!

After breakfast it was time for Marcus to go teach, so he left us

to go do that- Wave bye! He will be back later today after he teaches his new Master Degree students. Then tonight we will go to something called a night market. Do you think they sell Nights there?

After Marcus left Heather and I had to decide what to do... We looked out over the city and it was huge. But we took off for a walk and decided that we would need some snacks for later and it would be nice to go get some lunch. Before we left though we accidently scared the lady who came to make our bed. She was very sweet though. So... we went off to get some lunch. I was hopping for a nice big steak... instead.. we got TEA EGGS... with seaweed... hrmmm... We tried them and they were pretty good But I think I would have rather had a steak. We walked 2 miles around the city and went to the family market and the wellcome market. We got sugar and milk and cornflakes and cookies and because it is still part of the Lunar New Year celebration and the Lantern festival we got a special rice cake to celebrate. I haven't eaten any of it, but I sure hope its better than tea eggs. Heather liked them but she doesn't think Michael would. I think I would agree with Michael! We also got Seaweed Sushi potato chips (yuck what is with Heather and seaweed today?) THEN, we got chips ahoy chocolate chip cookies, which Heather says Marcus and Michael like alot. I have to agree with them! Good thing we didn't find any seaweed cookies. All in all though we saw LOTS of scooters... and some really cool things! (just not the tea eggs)

Greetings all and happy lunch time!!!

2008-02-15T22:23:00.004-05:00

It is lunchtime- Saturday Feb 16th-

Marcus is in class so you get to hear about MY morning adventures. I have been out and about today learning as much as I can about my surroundings so that I am not relying on the kindness of others to get me back to the hotel. Perhaps not surprisingly, several people were happy to practice their English on me. The housekeeper in particular was very friendly, but that may have been because I scared her.

Lunch today was a coke, a banana and two seaweed wrapped tea eggs, which aren't bad. The flavors of the foods here are already very different. So, I got "lunch" from a little "cafe" down the street. Incidentally, lunch was 40 dollars Taiwan i.e. about $1.26. The largest part of that was the coke at $30.

I have learned the symbols which mean wheat. Allergy labels are in red at the bottom of the products. So I look for my little symbols at the bottom to know if I can eat that or not. At breakfast there were dishes called sweetened gluten. Doesn't that sound like something yummy;) It was interesting, but not something I was willing to do. I figured lunch could be more exciting, but lets start breakfast easy.

Anyway, while I was out, I also stopped in at "family mart" which ALSO had tea eggs... so not an entirely uncommon food. At the little store I got coke, which tastes really great though not quite the same as in the states. I also picked up sugar. I am perfectly fine with tea in the mornings, but I am not a tea purist and tea without sugar is not something I savor. Refined sugar is available readily, however, don't look for the fine granular stuff you have at home. Its kinda like rock sugar. Oh and forget the salt shaker, you can request salt, but it comes like sea salt and the grind it for you like pepper.

Today, I have learned that:
Ni Hao- means hello (pronounced knee how)
Bu Ke Chi means you are welcome (pronounced boo kay chee)
Xie, Xie means thank you (pronounced shay shay)
mayo wen ti means no problem or its ok (pronounced mayo when tie)

The last one was a good one to know when the maid came in and found me at the desk. She said that she was sorry several times. I had at least that phrase in my arsenal of badly spoke Mandrin to use. Never the less, tea egg now eaten and coke now drank, its time to get back out and about. Tonight, we are going to go to the Night Market and see what treasures we can find.
So, more later.

A Message from Pei- We've Arrived

2008-02-15T21:45:00.002-05:00

We made! Although, Heather looks a little pale and was kinda air sick, but, we made it safe and sound... Its nighttime here, but they tell me that its lunchtime back at home... but as for me I think its time for some sleep

We have arrived

2008-02-15T09:52:00.002-05:00

Ok this will be a really short post... but we have now arrived in Taiwan. OF COURSE the plane trip took a lot out of me, but Marcus is right as rain. We are settling in and getting ready to get some sleep. It is 11pm Friday night here. So, the fact that I am worn out is a good thing!! I will post more "tonight" for you and in my morning. Best wishes to you all!

Heather

A Message from Pei

2008-02-14T12:42:00.005-05:00

Hello, My name is Pei and I am originally from China, but I was adopted in Detroit as a gift for a very special boy named Michael. What's cool is that before I even meet Michael, I get to go on a trip. This place we are going is called Taiwan and is an island country right next to the country I was made in! This is me and Marcus at the fountain at the airport in Detroit. Heather tells me that Michael likes to play in the water of the fountain when they come here to the airport. Michael is a veteran flyer. But, this will be my first flight with my new family! I can't wait to meet him when we get back!

This is me waiting to get on the 747 that will take us all the way across the US and over the Pacific ocean to a place called Osaka, Japan. There we will get off the plane and wait a little while. Then right back on the plane until we get to Taipei. It will be daylight almost the whole 13 hours because we are flying west and the plane flys at a rate that keeps us in daylight as we pass through each time zone.

OK... now I am on the plane and they are getting ready to put on the seatbelt signs.... So, I will send you more messages later.

Love,

Pei

Today we pack

2008-02-13T13:19:00.002-05:00

Poor Logan gets to stay at the city house! He and Kitty are going to be cared for by Annie and Natalie (Thank you ladies!) My parents arrive soon to take care of my two-legged child. I am sure you will see him later... but for now I just needed to put the first entry up! I will post from Taiwan so everyone can see it.... and of course this will be available to everyone from myspace. Blessings to all of you and say a prayer as we travel. (Planes tend to get the best of me) BUT I AM SOOO EXCITED!