Orietation

Sunday, my family and I joined my Rotary Club, Taoyuan Fortune, for an awesome experience of making dumplings at a flour factory! It was so fun to meet everyone from my clubs families and learn how to fill and shape dumplings. I will defintely make them often back home, I love dumplngs! Then at noon all inbound students from my district sat through a long day of lectures and we had to introduce ourselves. I was one of the only people to intorduce myself in Mandarin and English, most just did it in English. We went over all the rules and plans for the year, some of which I might not be able attend but I hope I am able to. We had dinner in a buffet where they had a section for foreigners which the exchange students called "the white people section." Which I only saw white people go to so... makes sense. At the buffet I had my first piece of cake here that actually tasted sweet. My family sometimes tells me to try things that are "sweet" but trust me, compared to Canadian dessert, its never sweet. I've now realized how much sugar we put in literally everything. I always ate an exsessive amount of sugar also, so I will need to get used to not eating so many sweets. We took group photos and made a huge ruckus while playing games on the little stage area of the restaurant. It was around nine when I got home but I didn't fall asleep till around one in the morning, as usual.
Monday, after barely any sleep, I had to wake up at six to be at the couch bus for seven thirty, to go into the mountain area of Taoyuan for a long day of games with all the inbounds, Rotex and Ryla students from Taiwan. I wish we had gone on a hike or something, but it was still a veryy fun day with everyone. I met so many cool people and hopefully made a lot of friends. I like hanging out with people from here a lot. They also really help with Mandarin. But when I bent down and pet a toad, I think I freaked some of them out, one person even yelped when I did. I guess thats not so normal here. I love finding creatures though, so they will just have to get used to me a little bit as well. We played this game called running man, where we were chased my black shirts with water guns and had tasks to complete, but every game people just lasts till the end and won that way instead of completing the tasks. I won the first round that way but by the end of all the running half my hair was soaked with sweat. The humidity here always makes me drip in sweat. So much hotter than West Kelowna, to say the least. We ate lunch and dinner with all the inbounds sitting together, and laughed at all the ways we speak differently, and eat differently. There were a lot of complarisons between Australia and Canada made that day. Apparently I am the most stereotypical Canadian ever, according to the adorable Ausies. Me and Ghabriel, an inbouond from Brazil, took a lot of cool photos and get along very well, which is awesome because he also goes to my school. We saw such amazing views, with a gorgeous green looking river in the mountains. There were a lot of mosquitoes but their bites are not as itchy for some reason...or maybe I'm just more disraccted. There were so many noises in the trees also, apparently they are made by different species on beetles and get louder and louder around seven at night. I will eventually get pictures of those somehow as well. I am very curious about them.
Today was Tuesday and I finally set up my phone for soo cheap, thank goodness, and went to our grandparents house for dinner. Where for the second time, I rode on the back of a scooter, and it was a little less scary, but the traffic is scary even in a car sometimes. I finally tried sticky rice, which tasted amazing, but I kind of thought all rice here was "sticky rice" but no, just compared to our rice. They found it odd that Canadians eat loose rice. I like loose rice though, but I loved what they call sticky rice. I'd prefer that over the rice we eat here everyday but rice is rice you know. There are usually around ten different dishes to top the rice with too, so it's always enjoyable. After dinner I walked around my neighborhood with a Rotex student in university, who will hopefully continue to help me with my Mandarin, and he also suggests that with what I want to do, I should look in to his university, and I agree, it seems to be a very good school. We went to my favourite bubble tea place so far, where I don't even buy buubble tea, Coco and I should've tried to order for myself because I know how to say the drink I like in Mandarin, but I will next time.
Tomorrow is my first day at school and I leave for shool at around six fourty, until four in the afternoon, high school is much different here. I am so excited to learn Mandarin a little faster though, many more people to help in a classroom setting. So much to learn! So little time!

Mountain Town

A small town about thirty minutes outside of Taoyuan is home to a grave of a very famous Chinese soldier, where it is usually packed full of people. But being close to "winter," means there are less tourists so our clubs chairman took me and Erik, an Austrian boy from Switzerland, into this small mountain town. We tried something like tofu, made of beans, but I wasn't all that hungry. We wandered the town and saw many interesting shops and food stands. I stopped to look at almost every dog too, as usual. At one stand, where we bought peaches, there was an adorable stray dog who I began taking pictures of, he posed but was hesitant to let me pet him, the lady at the stand told us she raised him and other strays on her property in the mountains. I adore her and her little family of strays, I will one day have the same I swear.
We also went into a gorgeous temple where we were taught a lot about the traditions within the temple. Begin the day with the bell, end the day with the drum (if I remember correctly.) They also light candles to show the light to those who have lost their way. I though this one was very interesting. As well as the fact they burn inscence to show their respect to the gods, or in the case of this month, the spirits. It is the beginning of ghost festival this month which takes place in the fifth month of the Chinese year. On the fifteenth day the festival takes place. I am excited to see all the traditions within this festival. It is very interesting to learn about.
I had a great day hanging out with ET, her adorable daughter, who by the end of the day I think liked me a lot, and Erik. I am excited for more adventures.

Canadian Girls

I have already been extremely lucky on my exchange to have such amazing people around me, and even luckier because I was able to hangout all day with a friend/tutor from back home in Canada. We spent the day wandering my city of Taoyuan and found many interesting stores and restaurants. She taught me a lot more mandarin and how to handle myself better while walking around in the crazy traffic of a big city, where by the way, pedestrians do not have the right of way, ever. I'll need to adjust to that to say the least.
Michaella told me about the crazy adventure she has in this upcoming year and warned me about more things within mine. She is on her way to Cambodia to teach English for the year, and she will take a trip back to Taiwan in November, when I will hopefully see her again. We walked around and ordered things in Mandarin (mostly she did,) which impressed the locals very much, and also made them very curious. We got soup dumplings, which were amazing, and ate them in the park of an art building just a 15 minute walk from my house. While we were sitting there an elderly man came up and told us we were pretty, he knew little English but was very good at it for his age, Michaella then greatly impressed him with her Mandarin skills and he was shocked. He hung around the park and every time he walked by he tried to introduce us to more people to show off that we were from Canada and learning Mandarin. After a while my host dad and sister met us in the park and I got to see some reallly cute dogs with them. We wandered more then went home to enjoy dinner with my host mom as well. It was a very interesting day with many learning experiences.

Activities

 My second and third days in Taiwan were much more eventful than my first. I did much more than sleep to say the least. On Sunday, I was taken to meet more Rotarians for lunch and we all ate the same chicken dish, with lemon squeezed on top. At the same restaurant there was an all you can eat salad/soup bar, and I tried pumpkin soup for the first time, and everyone there thought I would've tried it before. We then walked over to the Ceramics Museum where we met with a large group of students who were in Taiwan for a three week mandarin course (which many said was not what they wanted it to be.) I also met the most adorable Romanian girl who at the end of the day, gave my cute little painted dolls wearing traditional Romanian outfits. The most interesting thing about her, is that she actually now lives in France and is fluent in french, but her accent sounds like she is from Canada or the states, I originally asked her if she was from America. We got to talking and ended up getting along very well, and I will continue to keep in conact with her and many others I met there, through social media, because they all flew home that evening, other than two. Those two I will see again soon.

 Monday, I was introduced to my host sisters best friend, and her brother, who we spent some of the morning with going to breakfast and walking around our neighbrohood. I ate a delicious corn, cheese soup from a shop just down the street, where I will surely order it again. Not that I know any word other than 'soup' for that order in mandarin, but I will learn. Later in the day me and my host father went to a huge tae kwon doe tournament where Taipei did amazing! It was very exciting and a fun bonding experience. We had a lot of fun cheering on Taipei together and watching them slay the competition. Korea was very good as well. It was very interesting to watch. I am exciting to go to more events like this in the future.

Start of the Adventure

 I began travelling at 2am, starting with a fourteen hour flight headed to Hong Kong. I tried to sleep but was sadly unable to for the most of the flight. Flying out of Vancouver at night was very pretty with all the city lights shining beneath us. By the time we flew over Japan, it was just barely sunrise and the sky in the distance glowed a deep orange red colour, I also think I saw mount fuji, the only peak in Japan high enough to see at the time with all the clouds and height of our plane. We even flew right over Taiwan, where I was surprised by the height of the mountains, the many, many mountains, but I think my favourite part was flying into Hong Kong. The landing strip had water on either side and I couldn't see the ground until we were already on it. The amount of ships and boats was crazy, along with am extremely long bridge which led to nowhere, I found I really enjoy the look of a city built within the mountains.
 I then had to navigate my way through Hong Kong Iternational Airport alone, with very little help from staff I might add, and thank goodness I found the train, or else I would've missed my second plane for sure. I struggled a lot trying to get up and down all the escalaters with all my carry-on stuff. I got onto the second plane, and thank goodness there was a super nice European man that helped me fill out all the required forms and helped my get through the confusing line ups in Taoyuan International Airport. Once I got through all he line ups, we went and waited for our luggage together and he laughed at me when I didn't know how to use a trolly, then showed me how. I got through all the lines and was welcomed by a huge group of wonderful people at the airport, many Rotarians and their families, and my amazing host family, who I already love very much. Everyone is very nice and welcoming. The drive to our home was short and cute, theres a 711 right on the corner where we turn into our little community and enter the town house area where the house is much bigger than I expected, and I share a bathroom with Jasmine, my little sister.
 My host family is already teaching me so much and making me try new things within the first hour! For lunch we had rice, with many dishes, salmon, tofu, pork, a veggie I don't know the name of, clam soup with a melon-like veggie that was really good, and last but not least squid. Which all of this I was told, was bought fresh at the market in the morning. My host mother goes to the market every morning to buy fresh meats and fish. And might I add, the salmon, was insanely good. I am excited to cook as a family with them, and go to dinners at the grandparents every Saturday, which I sadly slept through Today, and already regret it, but it won't happen again, as I was just super over tired from the travelling.
 I am a happy little camper and excited to do more!