Virg'n Mary (Virg in front)

My hands are ruined! A small, painful, bone like bump is protruding from the bottom pad of my left hand and I can’t bend my right hand back without pain. To add insult to injury I now have a red raw stigmata appearing on the middle of my right palm…hhmmm.

The first two injuries are a result of my skate park trips and have necessitated some adjustments in my activities. I have to strap my wrist up to lift weights and use a machine rather than the free weights for a while. My right hand kills me when pressing to standing position on the surfboard, so it has actually helped me stand a bit quicker to lessen the pain. The third injury is not the result of a miraculous vision or a divine calling, but rather the aftermath of using a screwdriver to build a wardrobe on Sunday. I am about to make a bold statement: after the next of these wardrobes is built, I am NEVER building another one!! I’ve built a fair few of these things in my time and I am now officially retired from the flat pack re-assembly game. It’s quite possible that the incomprehensible Chinese instructions didn’t help and the drawings didn’t match what was actually in the pack but I have now had enough. I will build the other one with the sweet thought that I will never again be afflicted with morning after stigmata and a structure that bears little resemblance to the picture on the box, but more to a kid’s cubby house assembled from scrap timber! I’m getting frustrated just remembering this so……

On a lighter note, we had a very enjoyable Saturday afternoon/evening when we went to see the outstanding “Million Dollar Baby”. I know it and “The Aviator” are in the running for the best picture Oscar so I thought it might be interesting to see both before the decision. If it was up to me, Million $ would win in a canter. Soaring performances from all three leads backed up a magnificent story. I won’t spoil it if you haven’t seen it, but the twist in the movie had me gasping. It was certainly a triumph for all concerned and had me thinking about the issues even today at work. This is the best movie I’ve seen for a couple of years (and I’ve seen a few!!) After braving the teeming streets, we walked up to Royal Host for tea. Although not a restaurant of fine dining, this Japanese “family” restaurant chain is a sentimental favorite of mine. When I walk in, I always remember sitting there and drinking the bottomless cup of coffee with Carl and Rob while we discussed our plans all those years ago when we first went to Japan.

It was a celebration of sorts on Saturday, as it was 25 years ago on this day that a skinny punk with a shock of fuzzy hair audaciously decided to chat to the beautiful young girl at the Uni 1st year’s “get to know you” BBQ. Little did we know how far we’d come! In fact, this day five years ago, when we shared a bottle of champagne on the very balcony where we met all those years before, we were at a much different point in our lives. We were ensconced in our Georgetown home with Eugene, working happily at the Grammar School, with nary a thought to change anything. Five years on we have a new house at home, an exciting life here in Taiwan and the opportunity to continue to travel on our breaks. We have a whole household of stuff as well as car, bike and of course, Virg’n Mary. While still teaching, this is an invigorating job of different challenges and recognition of a job done well. We couldn’t imagine in our wildest dreams that we’d be here now while standing on that balcony 5 years ago, so what might the next 5 years bring?

The weather has not improved. It is still cold, wet and miserable and more is forecast for this week. Ross and I were thankful to spy a rare window of opportunity on Sunday afternoon and set about to make the most of it. The wind died to a whisper and the rain stopped momentarily about 3pm. We made some hasty arrangements and rushed to the Pillbox and enjoyed glassy smooth waves. They were small but great fun and although it again started raining heavily before we got out, it was a tiny slice of excellent conditions, quite freakily appearing out of nowhere and disappearing just as quickly. For once we were in the right place at the right time!

on the phone (with help) 

Taipei dog fashion 

Manson burgers!! 

Drizzly, dark, damp, depressing, dank and downright disastrous. An alliterative alternative to amplify the all consuming, angry and atrocious, atmospheric anomalies. Hopped up on about 15 cups of coffee, you can see my mind is playing a few tricks on me, none as bad as the weather has played on us this weekend. Whilst previously in these pages I have complained of the cold, this is by far the coldest Taipei we have experienced. Single digit temps combined with searing winds and persistent rain left us with little option but to huddle inside this weekend. The caffeine overload comes from meeting Carl down at Jakes with their bottomless cup of coffee where we spent a leisurely couple of hours, discussing all sorts and feeling that we’d at least “got out for some air”.

Whilst the weather turned particularly nasty this weekend, you guessed it; it didn’t deter us from our surfing run. In fact, just to make sure we were aware of the freezing conditions, we decided to leave on Saturday at 5.30am! Dan, our new IT guy at school offered to drive his van over so Ross and I met him at the school gate at aforementioned ridiculous hour. Dan is a surfer of some accomplishment (read: much better than me!) and rides a short and long board with equal finesse. We arrived at a blown out Jinshan and headed north to Green Bay where we were greeted by some crisp swell, with just a touch of dusting offshore whip on top of the waves as they broke. After a record-breaking change, Dan and Garry, the other two Kiwis, each with a full steamer,
dove into a heart-stopping liquid ice, accompanied by Ross and me with our paper thin spring suits. We managed to get out the back through a quite fierce bank largely due to rapid arm movement in response to the temperature of the water. Garry and Dan, luxuriating in their steamers started to worry about us when, after just 10 minutes, we were shaking with the cold. After 45 minutes, I had to go in after saying to Dan, “wuun mooor furme, aimfreeezin” which he perhaps translated as “One more for me, I’m freezing” although my lips weren’t even working by that stage. The chill was that bad, that even after a 30-minute shower under the “Exfoliator” I was still shivering. Ross and I didn’t even bother ringing each other this morning as we both knew it was beyond madness, as the temperatures had dipped even further overnight.

Cass and I watched “Ned Kelly” on DVD yesterday afternoon, ordered some wardrobes from Carrefour in which to store all our junk and then planned to head to the Indian for tea. In the end, I went and got some Indian takeaway, as it was just too ugly to go out and enjoy it. Apart from the coffee shop interlude (Cass did the shopping), we’ve done little today. Cass was stoked to sneak up on a sleepy Virg and cut some claws this afternoon. While perhaps not very startling news, Virg has struggled with the strength of a tiger when we’ve tried to do this before and we’ve had to abort the attempt in fear of hurting her: long claws on leather lounges and woolen mats are not a good match!

Check a couple of quirky pictures today. Don’t think you can come to Taipei and hang your washing out in the public park like you’re used to at home, OK?
Tiling is not restricted to laundries and kitchens here: most veneers of buildings are tiled and parks get a quite garish, yet strangely aesthetically appealing tiling treatment as well: maybe I’ve just been here too long!
Last, but definitely not least, the curiously benevolent looking, Chinese Charles Manson! This sign adorns a restaurant on the way to the beach and never fails to get Ross and me in stitches. We wonder about the “Manson burgers” or perhaps the “Squeaky Fromme fries” or even the “Massacre shakes” that might be on the menu there!I have to stop this appalling rubbish now…put it down to the caffeine overload; I’m spinning out!!

obey the rules! 

tiling rules! 

bridge of beauty? 

great fun!

higher than it looks! 

dropping in

We’ve just returned from viewing the new Scorcese biopic on Howard Hughes, “The Aviator”. Cate Blanchett gave a scorching performance and deserves to win the Oscar for it and Di Caprio was more than efficient in the lead role. We’d again booked tickets online, a great service and most efficient, allowing us to waltz past the queuing masses, straight up the elevator and into the theatre. The Tienmu Warner Village complex is quite dazzling and the shops in the new department store are swish, clean and expensive………good just for a look!
The cinema has featured quite highly in our time off, as uncooperative weather with high winds and cold temperatures certainly restricted our beach activities. Cass and Cathy went to see “Closer” on a night mid week while Chad and I “babysat” the little chief, but we managed to drink far too many beers which slowed my activities to a crawl the next day. We also went out for Chad’s birthday on Friday night and again, quite a late night was had by all. It was a great boys night out and we told plenty of tall tales and undoubtedly solved the majority of the world’s problems…if only we could remember the solutions the next day!

Even though the weather has been far from inviting, we still managed to get out to the beach on many days. The hoped for excellent conditions were not forthcoming, although Ross and I got a rare window of reasonable swell and wind on Friday which assuaged our desperate frustration from the preceding days. Of course, if you have been following my most recent tomes, you will be aware that we meant to go in search of a mystery wave out on the north west coast. The conditions never relented to the point where we thought that we might find the break, let alone get some surfable waves. So, alas, that adventure was not taken, but gives us something to look forward to at a later date.

Cass and I have had some interesting dining experiences this week as well. Ironically and to be quite honest I find it comical, we have not found a decent Chinese restaurant round here. Being in “Little China”, this seems doubly bizarre, but the abundance of Taiwanese slop kitchens and evil smelling tofu soup shops far outnumber the places selling Chinese food and amongst this number just a precious few serving Cantonese style Chinese, similar to the Chinese in Australia. There are NO Chinese restaurants exactly like those back home: the Chinese food here is authentic and rather bland and unsalted compared to the Australianized version. The famous Fangs restaurant serves up a pretty good meal, but an establishment creatively(!) named “Beijing Restaurant” has opened just near our place on Chung Shan. Whilst still serving local favorites like shark fin and intestines in all sorts of exotic varieties, they also served up quite a tasty chicken in chili sauce and a steak with green onion…certainly worth another visit or three. Last night we again ventured to the Moroccan restaurant and we quite boringly couldn’t tear ourselves away from our previous orders. The tajine of slow cooked chicken was mouth watering with its subtle blend of herbs and spices, whilst Cassy’s steak was again melting in her mouth. Cass ordered the perfectly cooked calamari and we both had crème brulee for dessert. Ains was the most adventurous of our party and ordered a tajine of couscous with seven vegetables for her main, also with a ¼ slow cooked chicken…I’ll have to try that next time. Carl and Hiroko were set to join us but Carl somehow badly twisted a knee which he’d injured before; rest was needed, especially as he needs to be up and mobile for PE at school tomorrow.

Twice through the week Carl and I have visited a skate park, the first time just the two of us, the second he drove down with the family. What fantastic fun we had! It is a shame however that my nearly 43 year old body is not quite as resilient as when I was a teenager, taking tumbles, bashes and crashes as a necessary part of riding a skateboard with a limited amount of expertise. The day after and especially TWO days after, my hips elbows, knees and pads of my hands ached from the bumps and scrapes and my legs seized up completely if I got up after a period of sitting down. Falling from about eight feet in the air at a great velocity onto solid concrete is not recommended, but I managed to do this on innumerable occasions. Carl was a little more circumspect and subsequently a little (only a little!) less injured than me, but we both declared it to be enormous fun. We even had to climb through a hole in the fence to get in the 2nd time, so youthful memories were certainly amplified. The facility is very well designed and maintained and not a spray of graffiti is to be seen: can you imagine this back home? Steven and Sean had a great time and I thought they were quite fearless for their first time confronting these ramps. There is another facility offering half pipes of low to most frightening heights, which I’ll feature some other time. Photos today are courtesy of Carl and Hiroko’s new digital camera, which they tested out for the first time.Back to work tomorrow…..a slight pall of depression tends to come over me the evening before: today is no different!

firing up 

Gaylord Focker’s nephews are Dom Focker and Randy Focker apparently and the movie had degenerated into slapstick by this point. Nonetheless, we enjoyed this sequel on Friday night after a meal at Chad and Cathy’s place. Chad fired up the BBQ and we had hamburgers and accompaniments. Cass and I took a bottle of red wine and ended up drinking the thing in rapid time, as after we’d had a chat for a while and been joined by Doug and Jerry, there wasn’t a lot of time before we were due at the movies. Doug and Jerry flew out to India the next day for a week of warmer temperatures, massages and pampering. The little chief, Levi, went with Gemma, the amah, to Takashimaya, one of his favorite places apparently!

Carl, Ross and I had arranged to meet at the beach on Saturday morning but just in time for our week’s break, the conditions decided to be most uncooperative, a lazy wash of foam crumbling down little pop gun waves, the power generated barely enough to propel us. We left the water at different stages to congregate in the car park and ended up having a good long chat about allsorts, drinking from Carl’s thermos of tea and eating the curried egg sangas that Cass regularly makes for us. The swell looks like being terribly lame for days to come yet, a possible improvement in conditions forecast for later in the week.

Cass and I had a lazy day yesterday before I decided to take the scooter out to Damshui to investigate some other possibilities for a wave in the future. It’s quite an exciting feeling to venture down windy, muddy tracks, following your nose to the ocean, hoping to find a little inlet or reef that surfers are yet to discover. Our Pillbox wave was just that we thought, but we’ve since found an article by an American who spied a break suspiciously similar in 1967 as he was traveling on a bus from Damshui! The old Damshui road has since been superceded by a new highway, but from his notes we figure that it is probably the same break; discovered, left and rediscovered all these years later. I found a few little coves, but we’ll have to wait for some swell before we really know whether they’ll work or not. I was determined to continue investigating, but a heavy sea mist started to roll in, dank and thick, cutting straight through the jacket I was wearing and chilling to the bone. The same fog is still around this morning, not a zephyr to disturb it as it sits obstinately over a very quiet, pre Chinese New Year city.

Chinese New Year’s Eve is tomorrow and shops and businesses are already closing down. The city becomes quite a different place this week, a balloon that has a slow leak, the air of excitement and bustle slowing ebbing from it as each day passes. It is a family time and many people have already traveled to ancestral homes here in Taiwan or even China.
I have just finished my face to face commitments with another class and have some assignments to finish off, yet have already begun another research course online and done some assignments for it as well. Our next travel will be to Vietnam in March for 4 days for conferences and yet more credit points (I should say “point”!) and we’ve booked in a very flash hotel with views of the Opera House.

flippin' burgers 

cathy, doug, jerri and cass 

4 in the bed

I tried to get this picture to load on Monday, so I tried again today. Ross and Ains went ahead and bought the bed and had it delivered yesterday. You'll notice our pictues are a little larger now: always looking for improvements to keep our clients happy!