Hoping that a picture does indeed paint a thousand words, I intend to be unusually brief with the text and perhaps a little more generous than usual with the pictures for two reasons. The first reason is that I have plenty of photos of events we’ve enjoyed this week, the second being that I have far too many words to type for various assignments to spend much time here!
We started our 4 day Thanksgiving break with a surf of unremarkable quality at a windswept Shalun beach and followed that with far too many beers at the Green bar later, still decked out in footy jumpers and tracky daks. The tracky daks enabled me to unwisely attempt my Harry High Pants routine, usually reserved for the sanctity of my own home and to Cassy’s absolute horror, so one can imagine how frightening this public display was!!
Recovery Thursday ended at Chad and Cathy’s place for a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. We have been delighted to accept their invitation each year we’ve been here and this 5th invitation will be the last as they move on next year (although Cathy seems pretty convinced we’ll go to Singapore to join them for dinner next year). The dinner party then went on to see Harry Potter; we demurred, which was wise as we were both quite sleepy when we got back.
Ross and I went for a surf Friday morning and were very disappointed in the sloppy fare served up; we went out but found it far from satisfying. Subway derivative, the curiously named “Subber” for lunch (seems Taiwan makes only the most rudimentary attempt at skirting trademark laws!) and then multiple episodes of Lost on DVD.
Saturday walk down the Shi Dong, Cass to Takashimaya to get boots fixed, me to Chad and Cathy’s to pick up forgotten camera. Walked up Chung Chen, had a good long talk to Rachel and Aaron, mainly about Sri Lanka, then onwards to find some lunch. It’s probably been there the whole time, but in the bowels of the Jasper Villa complex (which we’d never previously visited) we found one of our favorite restaurants, the Japanese Aubergine curry restaurant. We used to ride the scooter downtown to visit another outlet! Harry Potter, which dominated nearly every screen this weekend in Taipei had bumped the movie we wanted to see so we ambled on back. On the way, we joined a protest to save the baseball stadium from development (ironically, a new school!) and donned protest headbands, signed petitions and shouted Chinese slogans…great fun!!
On the way home we had a cup of tea at a new cat lover’s café, Genki Cat, on the Chung Shan Rd. Cats roamed around, above, below and ON all the tables as we dined. There were only two other customers, so the nine cats were very attentive!
Sunday has been very lazy for me, although Kristin and little Cameron paid a visit and I got Cameron to help me “put up” our Christmas tree, very early, but it gave us something to entertain her with. Cass and Kristin and Cameron had a tasty lunch on the deck at Wendels backerie while I stayed home and watched the Kiwis demolish the Aussies in the league test. Enjoy the photos!