While certainly not the “shot that was heard around the world”, the dual assassination attempts on President Chen and vice president Annette Lu on Friday, will have far reaching consequences for this tiny Chinese “rogue state”. The bullets reverberated around the island just as we were finishing off our 3rd quarter parent teacher conferences and preparing for a quick dash to the Pillbox for some Friday afternoon waves. The presidential election the next day and the associated referendum were nearly as dramatic. As we joined Carl and Hiroko, Ross and Ainsley for tea at Big Nose pasta on Saturday night, the news started filtering through that Chen had taken the lead in election counts. Previously known to be behind in the polls, Chen benefited by three things it appears. First, an unusually high number of donkey votes were submitted, secondly, after the National guard were called out on Friday night, a pool of 200,000 conservative voters (the bulk of whom would have voted for the opposition) were ruled ineligible to vote due to military duty and thirdly, a suspected ground swell of sympathy votes went the way of the incumbents after the attempts on their lives the day before.
TV channels showed an incredibly close tussle through the evening, the final count after 13 million had voted saw just 30,000 votes making the difference. Opposition leader Lien immediately challenged the outcome on the grounds set out above and voters loyal to him staged several violent and impromptu demonstrations in all of the main cities. Needless to say, we didn’t venture anywhere near the presidential palace that night, which was basically under siege!
Opposition leader Lien had espoused a more conciliatory approach with China, while Chen had insisted that China withdraw the 500 missiles which line the Chinese coastline, all pointing at Taiwan, and begin to accept Taiwan as an independent democratic state. This stance has a lot of popular support here, tempered by people’s anxiety over the Chinese military threat. As the election result hangs in the balance and is now before the courts, China has been strangely and disturbingly quiet. All the cool heads here believe that it would be economic and political folly for China to flex its might over Taiwan at this point, but it is an uneasy calm that blankets the country today, people back at work, yet all abuzz at the “what ifs”.
I was slightly reticent to post these thoughts today as my Mum heads over here in less than a fortnight. Suffice to say, the AIT (American spooks here) are not pushing any panic buttons; quite the opposite in fact, declaring business as usual. It is a slightly scary time when news broadcasts (ABC included) refer to Taiwan as “one of the world’s flashpoints”, but more palatable to us when we realize the enormous disincentive for China to do anything stupid. The country that will hold the 2008 Olympic games surely cannot risk the ire of the world (not to mention Taiwan’s staunchest ally, the U.S.) in military action against a peace-loving nation like Taiwan.
So, Mum, come on over, things are always interesting here, but not dangerous! Of course, amongst all this national turmoil, Carl and I managed a surf on Friday afternoon, we had a great lazy Saturday at home with the ever growing kittens/mini cats, Virg’n Mary, before heading out to a fine dinner with friends on Saturday evening. Ross and I braved the elements on Sunday for another surf, at the infamous and previously mentioned in this diary, Rockets. The rocket paddle out was working and a quite vicious take off peak was great fun until, a little tired after a couple of hours in the water and paddling against a rip, I tried a late takeoff on a set, my board fell to the bottom of the sheer drop and I landed head first on the board from a great height. It sounds hilarious, I know and probably did look pretty funny, but I was momentarily dazed and I am still nursing a savage headache and an interesting lump on my head 24 hours later!
Well, contact surfing, playing with kittens, working, dining have taken most of our week, with more than a little political drama and intrigue as an accompaniment. We’re certain we’ll hear the Chinese sabres rattling many, many months before they try anything, by which time we’ll be “out of here”, to quote my American colleagues!
Monday, March 22, 2004
Monday, March 15, 2004
Although not a totally foreign experience to us here in Taipei, we have enjoyed some delightful meals in the last week or so. Taking the MRT to Peitou, away from the city and to the foothills of an ever-looming Yangminshan, the community here seems prosperous and clean and modern. The Royal Host, a Japanese dining chain, has an establishment there, which we went to for my 40th birthday two years ago. We both enjoyed 5 course “set” meals, culminating in sizzling thick, tasty steaks on a hot plate served at our table.
On Saturday night we checked out a new pizza place in the Deh Shing road a few kms away from our place, only to discover a curious system of ordering at street front counter and hoping that a table was ready when your meal was. Not trusting this system, not to mention the Chinese menu, which was making things a tad more difficult, we hopped back on the scooter and weaved through a few alleys and lanes to another new spot I’d spied on a trip to Takashimaya (think Sydney DJs on speed!). Tucked behind the live food market on the Shi Dong Rd is a tiny shop, just seating 20 people. It was busy and oozed an inviting ambience, so the “Big Nose Pasta” was the restaurant for the night. We opted for the set of soup, salad and snapper, followed by coffee, all for the princely sum of about AU$28 for two (the exchange rate is helping us a bit at the moment, but only spending money here!). To say that the meal was scrumptious understates it just a little. The snapper melted in the mouth and was served on those big, fancy white plates usually reserved for fine restaurants serving a bite sized gourmet mouthful for a main meal. Accompanied by roasted capsicum and slabs of garlic, built into a tiny mountain of layered deliciousness it was preceded by a generous and super fresh salad and a minestrone soup that Newcastle’s Northern Star café would have been proud of.
Suffice to say that I think we’ve found a new favourite restaurant!
I went out with Bob and Aaron this Saturday to the Pillbox beach where we enjoyed some neat little waves. Carl joined us out there a little later. Bob is a laid back Californian with a wicked sense of humor and Aaron is our Aquatics director from NZ. Together they are the “pool guys”. On the way back, Bob took an unexpected turn back towards the north instead of turning onto the road to Tienmu, our suburb. He was keen on checking out the Beetle nut girl in a stand up the road! The beetle nut girl is a peculiar Taipei county phenomenon who has been banned in the city environs as an antiquated sexist part of the culture of a city that seems to be moving like a juggernaut into a more modern image (either that or she was causing too many traffic accidents!) Hundreds of glass booths line the main arteries of the county, each one housing one or two scantily clad young women, ostensibly selling beetle nut to passing drivers. They perform these duties in various ways, but owing to the competition, sometimes resort to disco dancing, removing even more clothing than seems possible to still avoid being totally risqué, or dressing in the most outrageous of costumes. Anyway, Bob decided that he needed to see this girl get off her stool and get him a beer from the fridge, which she did. The beer of course, was not needed, but he decided to drink it on the way back anyway!
Sunday was another surf day, this time at Jinshan, where a very shallow bank provided all sorts of hilarity for those watching, as waves caught and ridden were outnumbered by not quite made late takeoffs, resulting in the most vicious of wipeouts in about two inches of water! A little battered, we headed back to watch our second NRL game of the weekend courtesy of our ABC Asiapacific. We were disappointed not to see the Knights on Saturday, as they usually replay the Friday game then, but we enjoyed the Tiger’s win and nearly cheered the Warriors home on Sunday.
We had another tough week at school, deadlines looming for a raft of things I have to do and Cass teaching away on the 8th grade. All things are relative, however, and we often wonder now how we never had a heart attack at our last school: such is the difference in attitude. I’m sure we work just as hard here and we certainly work longer hours, but due to sensibly timed critical periods such as reports etc and an idea of ongoing assessment rather than ridiculous, full on, pencil and paper testing twice a year, nothing becomes too much of a drama. The main concern we have is not being able to cope in an Australian school ever again! One concern we don’t have, however, is adjusting to a Newcastle lifestyle eventually. Our friend Thurza wrote recently wondering just that, suggesting that Newcastle would be positively bucolic compared to Taipei. The times we enjoy the most here are very “Newcastlesque”: surfing, movies, dining out, making little adventures for ourselves and finding interesting sights and sounds among the seemingly mundane…..we just work hard at having an enjoyable time, I suppose!
On Saturday night we checked out a new pizza place in the Deh Shing road a few kms away from our place, only to discover a curious system of ordering at street front counter and hoping that a table was ready when your meal was. Not trusting this system, not to mention the Chinese menu, which was making things a tad more difficult, we hopped back on the scooter and weaved through a few alleys and lanes to another new spot I’d spied on a trip to Takashimaya (think Sydney DJs on speed!). Tucked behind the live food market on the Shi Dong Rd is a tiny shop, just seating 20 people. It was busy and oozed an inviting ambience, so the “Big Nose Pasta” was the restaurant for the night. We opted for the set of soup, salad and snapper, followed by coffee, all for the princely sum of about AU$28 for two (the exchange rate is helping us a bit at the moment, but only spending money here!). To say that the meal was scrumptious understates it just a little. The snapper melted in the mouth and was served on those big, fancy white plates usually reserved for fine restaurants serving a bite sized gourmet mouthful for a main meal. Accompanied by roasted capsicum and slabs of garlic, built into a tiny mountain of layered deliciousness it was preceded by a generous and super fresh salad and a minestrone soup that Newcastle’s Northern Star café would have been proud of.
Suffice to say that I think we’ve found a new favourite restaurant!
I went out with Bob and Aaron this Saturday to the Pillbox beach where we enjoyed some neat little waves. Carl joined us out there a little later. Bob is a laid back Californian with a wicked sense of humor and Aaron is our Aquatics director from NZ. Together they are the “pool guys”. On the way back, Bob took an unexpected turn back towards the north instead of turning onto the road to Tienmu, our suburb. He was keen on checking out the Beetle nut girl in a stand up the road! The beetle nut girl is a peculiar Taipei county phenomenon who has been banned in the city environs as an antiquated sexist part of the culture of a city that seems to be moving like a juggernaut into a more modern image (either that or she was causing too many traffic accidents!) Hundreds of glass booths line the main arteries of the county, each one housing one or two scantily clad young women, ostensibly selling beetle nut to passing drivers. They perform these duties in various ways, but owing to the competition, sometimes resort to disco dancing, removing even more clothing than seems possible to still avoid being totally risqué, or dressing in the most outrageous of costumes. Anyway, Bob decided that he needed to see this girl get off her stool and get him a beer from the fridge, which she did. The beer of course, was not needed, but he decided to drink it on the way back anyway!
Sunday was another surf day, this time at Jinshan, where a very shallow bank provided all sorts of hilarity for those watching, as waves caught and ridden were outnumbered by not quite made late takeoffs, resulting in the most vicious of wipeouts in about two inches of water! A little battered, we headed back to watch our second NRL game of the weekend courtesy of our ABC Asiapacific. We were disappointed not to see the Knights on Saturday, as they usually replay the Friday game then, but we enjoyed the Tiger’s win and nearly cheered the Warriors home on Sunday.
We had another tough week at school, deadlines looming for a raft of things I have to do and Cass teaching away on the 8th grade. All things are relative, however, and we often wonder now how we never had a heart attack at our last school: such is the difference in attitude. I’m sure we work just as hard here and we certainly work longer hours, but due to sensibly timed critical periods such as reports etc and an idea of ongoing assessment rather than ridiculous, full on, pencil and paper testing twice a year, nothing becomes too much of a drama. The main concern we have is not being able to cope in an Australian school ever again! One concern we don’t have, however, is adjusting to a Newcastle lifestyle eventually. Our friend Thurza wrote recently wondering just that, suggesting that Newcastle would be positively bucolic compared to Taipei. The times we enjoy the most here are very “Newcastlesque”: surfing, movies, dining out, making little adventures for ourselves and finding interesting sights and sounds among the seemingly mundane…..we just work hard at having an enjoyable time, I suppose!
Sunday, March 07, 2004
After befriending a few of the local guys at Jinshan, Ross and I discovered a surfer’s Aladdin’s cave last weekend. Johnny and Jack and a mysterious fellow who we did not recognize, but who decided all he had to do to reveal his mystery identity was to lift his mirrored sunglasses so we could catch a glimpse of his bloodshot peepers, directed us to Johnny Rose’s surf club clubhouse. We followed them up a winding tar track and ducked under hanging washing and dodged sleeping dogs to enter their laundry. This led into a lounge room fitted out with boards, leg ropes, wax, deck grip and all other surfing essentials. We had no money, but promised we’d be back, especially as somehow, we had become “club members” through our obvious dedication over the winter months and qualified for special rates!
On our way back down, we spotted Clayton from Margaret River, a surfer of some quality who I’d met on the point a few months before and not seen since. We relayed our good news only for him to pop the boot of his car to reveal boxes full of Aussie leg ropes and grip. I selected some grip for my new board and a leg rope (for the new board which has not yet arrived from China) for him to hold, only for him to let me take them… “pay me when you see me next time”, which was lovely. Mirrored sunnies man then proceeded to tell us in his broken English of how he nearly didn’t come out this morning, but spied some swell on the surf cam. Surf cam??!! We did a double take and pressed him for more info. After an exchange of emails and a promise to follow up, we received access codes in an email the next day and can now check the surf, streaming at a photo a second from the point before we leave for the hour’s drive. Surfer speak of “sick” and “stoked” come to mind!
Cass wowed her middle school students by performing a lip sync to “Respect” as the culmination of their “Spirit Week”. Not alone, mind you, but still terrifying enough that long back wig and sunnies and boa were hardly enough disguise for her. Exhaustive rehearsals apparently saw it go off very well indeed….I’m currently trying to hunt down a copy of the video…stay tuned! The long black wig was donned later for my edification and Cass looked just like she did when we met (24 years ago last week if you can believe it), so I got a photo of that at least. Virg’n Mary have been at their playful best, and constantly amaze and terrify, delight and surprise us with their dexterity and capriciousness in all manner of games with us and each other and their ability to jump onto a lap and fall dead asleep only seconds after trying to scale the curtains to ceiling
height.
Work has been a constant of course and the middle of a long hard 3rd quarter is telling on a number of people; even I have succumbed to more than a few episodes of stress in the past couple of weeks! Our department has been charged with making an educational booklet and video/DVD for our parents before the end of the school year, something that was unceremoniously dumped in my lap just a few weeks ago. Sounds simple enough, but when DVDs are made at this school they have to be Slick, with a capital S. Oh well, should keep me busy!
Surfing again, sorry, but this story is just so exciting for us. After a succession of wild and stormy sessions at a variety of spots on the northern tip of the island, we decided to investigate a few alternatives a month or so back. On our way back on the river road near Damshuie, we took any little lane or track that looked like it led to the coast a few kms away. After following dusty tracks down to the sea, we found time and again, nothing but rocky coastline with little surf. One thing that did get us a little optimistic was the absence of a howling off shore wind; rather, it was replaced by a gentle cross-shore. After nearly giving up, one last minor road was traveled and a couple of lanes were followed till we spied a tiny sandy beach between two rocky outcrops. The surf was tiny, but the wind was off shore, blowing gentle wisps of spray back off the face of the waves. We decided to investigate again when conditions were big and blustery and unrideable at our usual haunts. This weekend, the web cam greeted us with sights of wild stormy surf, ferocious wind and lines of vicious whitewater. We headed to our “secret spot” and surfed today and yesterday on a quality 3-4 foot peak break, offshore light winds and the whole break to ourselves! Although we were exhausted from our efforts, we were also very excited: a wonderful alternative to our previous efforts of corks in a wild bathtub, a spot we suspect that no one may ever have surfed before. There is a pig farm and a recycling depot at the end of the road, and the locals looked at our boards as if they were spaceships and we were aliens descended from another planet. Great fun!
That’s all for now…..apologies for not writing last week…..now you know how we feel (!)
On our way back down, we spotted Clayton from Margaret River, a surfer of some quality who I’d met on the point a few months before and not seen since. We relayed our good news only for him to pop the boot of his car to reveal boxes full of Aussie leg ropes and grip. I selected some grip for my new board and a leg rope (for the new board which has not yet arrived from China) for him to hold, only for him to let me take them… “pay me when you see me next time”, which was lovely. Mirrored sunnies man then proceeded to tell us in his broken English of how he nearly didn’t come out this morning, but spied some swell on the surf cam. Surf cam??!! We did a double take and pressed him for more info. After an exchange of emails and a promise to follow up, we received access codes in an email the next day and can now check the surf, streaming at a photo a second from the point before we leave for the hour’s drive. Surfer speak of “sick” and “stoked” come to mind!
Cass wowed her middle school students by performing a lip sync to “Respect” as the culmination of their “Spirit Week”. Not alone, mind you, but still terrifying enough that long back wig and sunnies and boa were hardly enough disguise for her. Exhaustive rehearsals apparently saw it go off very well indeed….I’m currently trying to hunt down a copy of the video…stay tuned! The long black wig was donned later for my edification and Cass looked just like she did when we met (24 years ago last week if you can believe it), so I got a photo of that at least. Virg’n Mary have been at their playful best, and constantly amaze and terrify, delight and surprise us with their dexterity and capriciousness in all manner of games with us and each other and their ability to jump onto a lap and fall dead asleep only seconds after trying to scale the curtains to ceiling
height.
Work has been a constant of course and the middle of a long hard 3rd quarter is telling on a number of people; even I have succumbed to more than a few episodes of stress in the past couple of weeks! Our department has been charged with making an educational booklet and video/DVD for our parents before the end of the school year, something that was unceremoniously dumped in my lap just a few weeks ago. Sounds simple enough, but when DVDs are made at this school they have to be Slick, with a capital S. Oh well, should keep me busy!
Surfing again, sorry, but this story is just so exciting for us. After a succession of wild and stormy sessions at a variety of spots on the northern tip of the island, we decided to investigate a few alternatives a month or so back. On our way back on the river road near Damshuie, we took any little lane or track that looked like it led to the coast a few kms away. After following dusty tracks down to the sea, we found time and again, nothing but rocky coastline with little surf. One thing that did get us a little optimistic was the absence of a howling off shore wind; rather, it was replaced by a gentle cross-shore. After nearly giving up, one last minor road was traveled and a couple of lanes were followed till we spied a tiny sandy beach between two rocky outcrops. The surf was tiny, but the wind was off shore, blowing gentle wisps of spray back off the face of the waves. We decided to investigate again when conditions were big and blustery and unrideable at our usual haunts. This weekend, the web cam greeted us with sights of wild stormy surf, ferocious wind and lines of vicious whitewater. We headed to our “secret spot” and surfed today and yesterday on a quality 3-4 foot peak break, offshore light winds and the whole break to ourselves! Although we were exhausted from our efforts, we were also very excited: a wonderful alternative to our previous efforts of corks in a wild bathtub, a spot we suspect that no one may ever have surfed before. There is a pig farm and a recycling depot at the end of the road, and the locals looked at our boards as if they were spaceships and we were aliens descended from another planet. Great fun!
That’s all for now…..apologies for not writing last week…..now you know how we feel (!)
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