This week at school was strangely eventful building up to a huge weekend. The first two days of the week saw me at home recovering from a bad dose of the flu while the third and fourth days saw Cassy staying home nursing a face burnt by an exploding potato! The fifth day of the week saw both of us meeting and greeting and catching up with various old friends and colleagues who had flown in to attend the mega Cathy Funk farewell on the Saturday night, as well as me getting to hold a real, used in the torch relay, Beijing Olympic Game’s torch!My two days at home saw me wallowing around feeling sorry for myself mainly, cancelling my Monday Chinese lesson and watching some movies. On Tuesday night Cassy was heating some potatoes in the microwave and when she set the plate on the bench, one of them exploded all over her, including right in her face. I raced in and Cass was standing there shocked, so I grabbed her head and put her straight under the running cold tap where she stayed for about 20 minutes. We then kept her cheeks moist with a cold moist washer and scootered over to mad old Dr. Tseng down on Chung Shan, sect 6. He was pretty good, and gave Cass some cream, but only after inquiring after her bowels and trying to give her aspirin, which she had to point out three times might not go so well with other blood thinning medications! He really is quite a spaz, but as long as you don’t need a diagnosis, he’s a very quick and easy source of first aid! Cass had to stay indoors for a couple of days, her face blistered slightly and reddened, but now it is pretty much OK again after she slathered cream all over it for a few days. Whew!
On Friday, as I wandered down to another section of the school in the afternoon, I came across big Garry, the MS deputy holding an Olympic torch! He was talking to one of the kid’s mothers who had brought it in to show the kids after her husband had run with it the week before in Beijing. It is quite beautiful, with a pattern of red scrolls etched into the ergonomic, aluminum torch. It is quite light, but very well balanced for running with, and an extra little touch is that even the grill where the gas comes out at the top of the torch is shaped in the scroll pattern….a very cool experience to hold and examine this torch up close! Also on Friday, we saw and spoke to a cavalcade of out of town visitors, some of whom we hadn’t seen for about 5 years or even more. I won’t name them all, but there were people from Doha, Dubai, Singapore, Beijing, Shanghai, Mumbai, Manila, Hong Kong, the US and many other spots. Two of the people we really wanted to see, our old superintendent from Germany and DJ from Myanmar couldn’t come, DJ for the obvious reason of the devastating cyclone that just hit his country. It was great to catch up with this diverse group, although we didn’t manage to get much work done in between classes. They had all poured into Taipei as the doyen of the middle school, the principal with the most amazing longevity I’ve ever heard about, was having her retirement dinner/farewell at the American Club in China, Taiwan branch on Saturday night.
I had some beers on Friday night with Coombsy in from Hong Kong and a stack of the other visiting males down at the Red Hut later on Friday night, along with our usual crew of local suspects. On Saturday, Dan enticed me out to the Green Ball for a surf and it was excellent, both of us getting some great waves with little competition, slashing them up in some rare form (for me at least!) After paddling against this rip for about 3 hours I’d had a real workout, but needed to regroup for the evening ahead. Dress was semi formal, so I was suited up and Cass frocked and off we went. The night was actually quite pleasant, mainly because Ms. Funk herself would be horrified if the food was “pig at a trough” style. She is very classy and hence the fine food and wine (all on the school’s tab…even better!) and the fine dressing. We listened to a succession of amazing tributes: it was quite stunning to hear some of the best leaders in education worldwide tell how they would often defer to Cathy’s greater judgement, or rely on her as a mentor and confidante. Time and time again from these very successful people, a pattern certainly emerged: I wouldn’t want to be following in her footsteps, that’s for sure. After some extremely clever work by the two resident drama/singing experts on faculty, the other bizarre “Broadway” acts by the admin team fell fairly flat, but it was all in good fun and the guest of honour stated that it was amongst the best nights she had ever had, so it was worthwhile in the end.
Today, we breakfasted late after a sleep in then had a magnificent lunch at “The Top”, an amazing open air restaurant complex perched high, high above Tienmu on Yangminshan. A Bedouin tent setup and cushions, umbrellas and chaise lounges all add to the relaxing effect: yet the stunning cityscape is the real draw card. We had a sumptuous lunch and decadently stayed and chatted for many hours, lingering over three courses and coffees, all the while soaking in the revitalizing view. We’ve had a magic weekend…you can probably get the vibe! Photos: out last night, at "The Top".