After Ted's Second Day of Teaching a Three Hour Class!

After the second consecutive day of three hour classes, Ted is beat! Nothing like a Taiwan brew to rest the weary mind and bones. After an eight year absence from teaching graduate courses, he is exhausted (He claims it is more a mental than physical fatigue, but I am not so sure....! )He came home and took a three hour nap!

On our route to and from classes or anywhere else for that matter, we encounter not only the monkeys, and the steps, but the mopeds! Every body has one, and the students zip around faster than you can believe. It definitely is a situation of "Walkers, Beware!" Ted is ready to get one, but, fortunately from my point of view, he forgot to bring his driver's license! Whew!




After class each day, we typically eat in the courtyard outside Ted's office; again, surprisingly, today's weather was delightfully comfortable, with a light breeze. As we did yesterday, we bought lunch, for a mere $4 apiece, at the stand located in the courtyard; we had a ham and cheese sandwich, delicious homemade corn chowder and a strawberry smoothie. Can't beat the prices for food around here!


Then, on our route home (before the steps!!), we stopped outside the 7-11 (where everybody goes for everything, from bread to phone cards,to wine) where there was a stall for photos, the kind you see at an amusement park. But the sign said passport photos were available there. Ted needs one that size to obtain his staff ID card.I need two for the reapplication for our visa when 60 days are up. So, we stepped inside the booth and it started talking (in Taiwanese) to us with instructions. Panicking, we zipped out of it and went into the 7-11 to ask for help from the very nice, limited English-speaking clerk. Fortunately, gestures as though I were taking a picture and pointing to the outside booth, she understood our need. She then very quickly turned to two of her customers, presumably students , who could speak a little English. Giggling and smiling the whole time, these two very kind students managed to convey what we needed to do, which buttons we needed to press, and we got our pictures!

Two comments about our daily residential life: when we first noticed the bars on our villa's windows, we assumed they were to stop thieves. Wrong! Monkeys! People here are so helpful that it appears things like theft are rare.

Secondly, each night, after doing the dishes (that is HIS job here just as in the States,thank-you!) Ted takes the garbage outside to a general trash area, praying all the while that the monkeys are sleeping! While taking care of the trash, he also fills a big water bottle that he brings back to our kitchen, where he pours it into a filtering and boiling machine! It reminds us of how precious our water system is in America!

Good night all!