It’s very difficult to get motivated to write today and you can tell that this malaise was evident last week as well when I didn’t bother! I have just spent the best part of 24 hours churning through my latest assignments at the Uni of San Diego and thought that at least while my two fingers are on a roll, I could write something.
This time next week we’ll be back for the start of a nine-week break and we’re really looking forward to it. The end of year busy period has just been chaotic here and I still have a heap of things left to do. We went out surfing on Saturday, Monday and Tuesday afternoon and our efforts were ill rewarded, with a tiny wind swell barely big enough to support us on the waves. Similar scenes were evident on the web cam yesterday and this morning so Ross and I elected not to go over the mountain. Carl is heading over today, but doesn’t hold out much hope for a wave. Weather conditions have been stifling here in recent days, the heat heavy with humidity and sapping of strength. We get to school after our 15-minute walk nearly exhausted before the day has begun and collapse back home in the afternoon to cocoon ourselves in the air conditioning. Our TV is still not fixed, so we hope we can get something in train so that this issue can be resolved while we’re away, apparently Grundig does not have a service agent in Taipei and the other repairmen are reluctant to take on the job, knowing that spare parts may have to be ordered from Germany.
Virg’n Mary seem to handle the heat very well, in fact they pretend that it is cold when we turn the air con on, cuddling up together in their “octagon” or seeking some extra warmth on Cassy’s lap! We have been stocking up on their food, litter etc, readying them for the break and our minder Poonam is all set to do her duties.
Cass has already worked out how many dinners she will get on our flights home and the business class fare should be excellent in comparison to our usual. Chris and Val rang yesterday and were keen to come and collect us from the airport so we accepted their offer, even though we often just hire a car to save anyone the bother. It will be nice to be chauffeured home!
We just got back from downtown where we saw “The Day after Tomorrow” which was quite spectacular and we had to line up for ages to get in. Cass decided it would be the fodder for heaps of nightmares, with storms, tornadoes, massive waves, floods and freezing temperatures all vying for the most terrifying. We both agreed it was so much better than the trashy “Troy” which we saw last week; a cross between Gladiator and Lord of the Rings Part2, it wasn’t a patch on either of those movies. In fact, we decided that the scriptwriter should be taken away and shot and the historical consultant and continuity guys should never work again! We flashed down on the scooter and declared that we’d miss our trips zipping around the city (!), and arrived in sapping heat with full sun. Somehow, life imitated art in the intervening few hours, because when we emerged from the pictures a full-scale tropical storm was lashing the downtown area. After we had some lunch, it had calmed enough for Cass to go back on the train and me to get the bike home without getting totally saturated. That achieved we watched a great game of football between the Pennies and the Dogs, still lamenting the Knight’s loss to Melbourne last night.
Just a few hours after we return home, we’ll be at Energy Australia Stadium cheering on the Knights against Parra and we can’t wait. See you next week!

A couple of Californian laid back dudes, two Aussies and two Kiwis stood around in the beach car park after a great relaxing surf, drinking ice cold VBs and having a few jokes, drinking a few more well into the dark. The six had traded boards and tested out each other’s new boards, from mini mals to fun ‘fish” and got some decent little lefts and rights on a stormy peak. Probably not that unusual a scene, but Friday night on the northern tip of Taiwan had not seen that before, I reckon. Bob had picked up a carton of VB at Jason’s marketplace down at the 101 and had borrowed an esky (NZ:chilly bin, U.S.:cooler), filled with ice and put them in to chill on the way over the mountains.
We followed this up with a few more beers, tall tales and a game or two of pool before Ross and I called it a night around midnight, a couple of the others no doubt tripped the light fantastic on the bar down at trendy nightclub Carnegies till well after that.

We struggled up at 7, a little headsore and saw on the cam that Jinshan was dead flat yet again. I phoned Ross and we agreed to give it a miss and try again on Sunday. Cass was champing at the bit to get downtown to pick up her earrings, so we had a lazy breakfast, read some clippings from the Herald (thanks Mum, of course!) and scootered down in a quite terrible blazing sun. Joe had done a superb job with Cassy’s earrings and the sapphires looked even bigger when teamed with some quite substantial diamonds in a white gold setting, the remainder of the setting in yellow gold. They are really quite spectacular, so Cass was very excited. When we got home, I had a bit of a snooze before we settled down to watch the delayed telecast of the Knights/Broncos game. We’d been in a self-imposed media blackout and we glad we had been. What a game! What incredible ticker displayed by those Knights! We were so impressed and managed a few war dances around the lounge room, especially when Danny scored and Kurt Gidley’s wobbly horror just scraped over the crossbar. After all that excitement we lazed around a bit more before heading off to Kari Curry for tea.

Ross and I headed off to Jinshan bright and early on Sunday morning promising to meet Carl and family out there. In the sweltering conditions we were glad we’d had the air-con fixed a few days before, a story in itself. We had scouted out a tiny mechanics’ workshop, with space for just one car in the back lanes behind Mingde road and were flabbergasted when the guy could speak some English! I mean, how many mechanics, or many others for that point could speak and understand enough Mandarin to be understood back in Australia?! He did a great job giving a tune, changed the plugs, changed oil, re-compressed the air-con and fixed some new wiper blades, all for a very reasonable cost.
When we arrived at the beach, it resembled a glistening lake, complete with lolling surfers content to just soak up some sun and refresh in the water, as waves were certainly not in evidence. We didn’t even get the boards off the car, had a quick body surf and then were stunned to see the “surfers” making a merry dash for shore. No, not a shark, but a large floating infestation of baby jellyfish, which had given everyone a good old stinging.

We contemplated going to the new Tienmu Warner Brothers cinema in the afternoon, but by this time the sun was beating with such intensity, we couldn’t bear the thought and there didn’t seem to be much on offer. I took Cass over to the supermarket on the bike and we loaded up with great bags of kitty litter and other supplies. It’s amazing what changes have occurred just in the few years we have been here. In the local supermarket, which doesn’t cater for foreigners at all, we buy Australian rice (bit like shipping coal to Newcs!), Aussie oatmeal and corn, Golden Roughs and Kit Kats and the latest, wine in a can! Aussie of course, the 250 ml cans give just enough for a glass of wine each at dinner. We sampled one yesterday and declared it to be just the ticket, a pleasant quaffing wine, either Chardonnay or Cabernet Shiraz, all at a very reasonable price.

Enough said about the 3rd grade camp, which I went to on Thursday and Friday and school is heating up for the end-of-year boilover. We both have reports to write soon and I am attending the Learning Community Council all day on Thursday, supposedly to steer the school in the right direction for the upcoming academic year (I’ll have some help!!)
I’m also determined to get my 15 assignments done for my latest study over the next two weeks, so that should be, well, very frustrating and time consuming. Virg’n Mary the double headed furry mother of god continue to entertain with their antics and have quite taken to the GCSU. It will all be over for another year soon!

I tore down the main road of Tienmu on “Blacky” the scooter, wildly grasping at a plastic bag full of bottles in one hand and desperately trying to navigate, accelerate and brake with the other, dodging in and out of traffic, relentlessly gaining on my elusive foe, the recycling truck. What on earth was I doing? Was my life reduced to chasing a garbage truck through the streets of Taipei in the evenings? Did it really matter if those bottles stayed on our back verandah for another few days? The answers to these questions were far from my mind as I determined the truck coming at odd times would not beat me!

A calm opening to the week like this certainly set the tone for what was to come, culminating in our semi destruction of a brand new Mercedes yesterday (slight exaggeration…hook for reader to continue). I went to B&Q on Tuesday to purchase all the requisite materials to build the “Great Cat Shelving/Resting Unit” (hereafter referred to as GCSU) on the weekend. We’d decided to use the cat gym as the first launching pad for an intermediate shelf as a step, then a wide shelf for resting and looking out a new window which I installed in the spot reserved for an air conditioner in the back bedroom’s wall. The cats could then enjoy a high seat with a direct view to outside. The GCSU had been planned for some time, so I was pretty confident I knew what to get, although the Chinese labels and Chinese speaking staff proved a little problematic. Still, with a concrete project easily explained with drawings and figures, I managed to arrive home with the shelves, brackets, screws, mouldings, nails etc necessary. I “borrowed” some cushiony felt from the school’s art department and a staple gun, so Cass and I could cushion and cover the big shelf. We got the pane of glass in and nailed the moulding on the fitted the brackets with the help of Chad’s hammer drill. The GCSU has proved to be a great success, the cats not even coming down to say hello to us sometimes! Cass sewed some elastic rings on each corner of a few towels and we screwed some cup hooks in under for them to attach to. It works very well indeed and even the destructo kitties have been unable to rip the towel off!

Ross and I braved the six-inch surf on Friday afternoon, only to arrive home to the news that our new (2 years old) Grundig multi system TV had “blown up”! Cass just turned it on and there was a puff and a smell and no picture. The salesman at Takashimaya where we bought it said they don’t stock Grundig anymore, but he’ll ring their rep on Monday. We’re really hoping it is not major, but it doesn’t sound good. We lasted about a day and a half without a TV before I went round and borrowed Ross and Ains’ spare that they haven’t been using. The DVD and video isn’t hooked up, but at least we can watch our beloved ABC Asiapacific. We spent most of Saturday building the GCSU, so it worked out fairly well after all.

Sunday’s beach trek started at 7 am and a light offshore breeze was tempting us into wonderful images of glassy swell and plentiful waves for all. It was certainly glassy and the waves were a beautiful shape, but no one had told the god of swell to visit. We got a few small waves early on till the wind picked up, the tide came in a bit and I decided to head in for a drink and a sandwich. Ross persevered for a ½ an hour or so longer and then finally gave up. By this time the local boys were just starting to turn up in numbers, (a curious thing here: unlike other parts of the world, the local boys seem to have a great aversion to going for an early surf when the conditions tend to be at their best. We’re not concerned of course: we generally get at least a couple of hours in before anyone joins us!) and the surf was offering nothing more than the occasional shore dump on the set. Quite violent wind squalls were whipping up by now and we had taken the precaution of bagging our boards and putting them at the back of the car to protect them from the wind. As we sat on the bonnet looking out and discussing the merits of the various surfers, a terrible gust picked up one of our boards and cart wheeled it through the air till it thumped quite resoundingly against the brand new black Merc parked beside us! The girlfriend of the owner (who was in the water) jumped out and preceded to shout, cry and perform assorted histrionics, while pointing to the fairly significant dent the board had made on the otherwise pristine bodywork and duco. She yelled for the guy to come in and by this stage, quite the event was happening. Every guy at the beach came up and offered their opinion to the owner, who was ringing body shops all over Taipei to get quotes. Ross and I were very apologetic, repeating it was an accident, and a couple of guys, including the ubiquitous Johnny Rose, of surf shop fame, came to the rescue with some translating. After we laughed down the first quote of NT$30,000 we eventually settled on NT$5,000 and Ross (luckily he had his wallet and card with him) headed off to Jinshan town to get some money out of the bank. I stayed with the boards as a “security” and although I felt a bit like Typhoid Mary, relations were cordial. I think we covered ourselves and all foreigners in glory by being reasonable and not arguing that we weren’t liable, so I imagine our presence at the beach will be even more welcome in the future. So, some good does come from all that bad luck!

Ross was particularly cautious on the drive home and we promised each other to be careful for the rest of the day after that bit of bad luck! Poor old Carl had to go to Hong Kong for the weekend, and no, I’m not being facetious: he had a nightmare schedule where nearly every minute was accounted for poolside looking after the swimming team.
Finally, how good are those KNIGHTS??????!!!!!!!!!

On Tuesday night we scootered off to the Taipei Arts precinct to meet Cassy’s cousin, Ashley for dinner. We met him at his hotel and chaperoned him to the Café Onion for dinner and we enjoyed a tasty dinner and a great chat about family, home, travel and our respective lives in general. Ashley seemed pleased to be able to have a night where he could relax and not worry about everything he said, as he is usually a guest of business contacts during his visits. He certainly has some whirlwind trips: at time of writing, he’s visited another 3 countries with 3 to go! It was great to catch up with him, he’s great company and we enjoyed a little slice of decadence on a “school night”!!

There are few things more frustrating than to dash out of work on a Friday afternoon, ready for a quick surf, fly home and get the boards on, beat a few lights, take any number of short cuts and back roads up to the top of the hill and then get caught behind one of the habitual slow crawling traffic criminals we often encounter on the windy Yangminshan road. We eventually got to the beach of course yet the massive swells battering the coastline (in our dreams) had sadly dissipated while we were stuck behind those slow coaches. We had a refreshing break and caught a few little tiddlers, reminding me of the comp I’ve started at school amongst the small surfing set. Inspired by some nut recently surfing a 60 footer in Hawaii, we are going to try to surf the world’s smallest wave instead! Documentary and pictorial evidence are essential, and early entries suggest that 6” might be a good starting point…..you can see how delirious we’re becoming in this last 5 weeks of school! Carl, Ross and I arranged to meet at the bar across from the Green at 8.30, so I picked Carl up on the scooter and we had a few games of pool and some relaxing "sherbets", before heading home before the witching hour.

Saturday was set aside for Cass to go downtown with her friend to the mysterious jeweler who has a shop in a back lane and only lets you in after you stand on his doorstep setting off an alarm. Apparently this was a great success and he quoted Cass the exact amount of money she had set aside for the setting of her stones, so that seemed to be an omen of sorts (of what, I’m not too sure!). She can pick them up in two weeks so she’s quite excited about the whole deal. I lazed around and did some book reading and cat amusing and then watched the football and listened to the patchy performance of the Knights on the internet. Speaking of which, apparently our seats at the football in the new concourse are ticketiboo after Chris and Val made a call just before they headed off to the game on Saturday evening.
We made a foray into the flash hotel part of downtown on Saturday night to the “G’day Café” situated in a tiny side street. Belying its name, it was not staffed by Aussies or serve “Australian” food, but rather the Filipino waitresses and cooks produced some scrumptious Mexican meals. It was cheap and super delicious and we’ll be heading back there for sure.

Sunday’s surf conditions were tailor made for an attempt at the aforementioned record, but apart from that, would only attract the lake lover. Ross couldn’t stay away, but I let him trundle over the mountain with Ains for company, as I couldn’t see the possibility of catching anything except a sunburn and a case of the grumpies. Cass and I headed back down to the pictures after a late breakfast to see Tarantino’s Kill Bill 2. Whilst not a comic book splatter fest like the first one, we both enjoyed the character development and flashbacks and forwards of this film and the homage paid to 70s martial arts films and others. It was very enjoyable and we had a tasty lunch at the section 2 version of Curry Champ before heading back to watch the Bulldogs beat the Broncos (always sweet to see those Queenslanders go down!)

Mum had brought a cake tin over for Cass during the Spring Break, because the tins here (at only one store mind you) were either too tall, too big, too small, or had some other imperceptible problem not immediately apparent to a cake baker extraordinaire like myself. Anyway, Cass had sought out all the necessary ingredients at about 3 different places and used our little baby benchtop oven to bake the most mouth-watering apple cake! It was indistinguishable from her efforts at home so she was very chuffed with the result. The only slight negative to all this was that 3 pieces needed to be taken to school for her team which I decided was a far too generous gesture.....what? only half a cake for me?!

At work today we heard that the flash new Warner Village cinema complex opened over the weekend just up the road from us (near the Green Bar), so that’ll be something to check out soon.

I have to speak to 80 teachers from local primary schools for an hour on Wednesday afternoon, telling them how we run the ESL program here at Taipei American School. I’ve got the data projector and the laptop booked and the PowerPoint ready to go, so if my crapping on fails, technology will hopefully come to the rescue. Cass is teaching the American Civil War at present, so be sure to quiz her about it when you next see her: she knows it all (!)

I’ll write again in a week….bet you can’t say the same thing!!!!

I finally paid Clayton from Margaret River the money I owed him for some deck grip and a leg rope this weekend as I spied him amongst the crowd gathered for the inaugural Taipei surfing competition on Jinshan point this Sunday. He’d been recruited as a judge for the events, as “imports” such as us, were not permitted to enter the competition proper. Quite a crowd had gathered as we pulled up and the various rules and regulations were being broadcast. A few TV vans and sponsors’ tents were in evidence and the swell, while a bit messy, certainly had some size to test the skills. While we were tempted to stay and watch for a while we headed on to some less crowded waves (Taiwan speak for “just us”!) at the Rocket and Ross and I had mixed success, getting a few beauties and just as many shockers, as we’re both still getting used to our new boards. We’d been to every spot along the way that we’ve discovered so far: Pillbox, Baishawan, lookout, restaurants, Jinshan and Green Bay before settling on the Rocket.

This trip had been preceded by our attendance at the dawn service for Anzac day, held at school, but attended by a wide cross-section of the Aussie/Kiwi community here. As we’ve experienced before, it was a quality service, quite moving at times. These things seem to have even more resonance for us here, so far from home and things that we know best. It also amuses me at times that we’ve (Cass and I) gravitated to other Antipodeans for our social and friendship needs, even though we do have a smattering of friends from all sorts of other countries, the people we tend to stick with most are other Aussies or Kiwis, especially in terms of trust and friendship that means a lot. In saying that, we’ve certainly forged some very solid friendships with people like Chad and Cathy, so I suppose it’s the type of person rather than the nationality per see.

Cass has been hyped right up for her middle school play makeup duties, so she was busy most of the weekend. Thankfully, it’s over for another year and she did a great job with it from all reports. Now she knows the ropes, she’s tentatively selected it for her duty again next year, especially as she worked so well with the costume designer (another Aussie/ Brit!)

Apart from the fact that we’re coming home in June for 9 weeks, we’ve already booked our flights home for Christmas as well. We’ll be at our Merewether unit of course, but it looks like we’ll be joined by Chad and Cathy and Levi for some of the time and we’re flying to Tasmania for a few days around New Year to attend a colleague’s wedding, which should be a real blast. Shaun is the Aussie who we met in the lift at the job fair so many years ago now and he was looking as shell-shocked as we were at the time! We caught up with him a couple of times at the fair, but we didn’t realize he was at the same school till we ran into him in the lobby here on our first day.

Mum brought a whole Saturday Newcastle herald when she came, along with various other clippings etc. I’ve finally read the whole lot; having just given them over to Carl for a good weekend read this last weekend. It’s funny how your perspective changes over here: I was so excited to have a whole paper, days later I was still reading out the fine print of the 5th grade cricket results, much to Cassy’s disgust!

I know after receiving an email from Mum just the other day, that she has distributed her various treasures to family members, no doubt well received, a little taste of Taiwan that I didn’t know much about (the jade market) and to be honest, don’t want to know much more! Speaking of which, Cassy is going to a jeweler downtown on Saturday with one of her friends (she’s American!) to see if she can get her sapphires set into earrings.

Well, that’s about it from here: school is reaching that last two months zone, where everything that should have been done is suddenly rearing its ugly head: not a pretty sight for the serial procrastinator, but one which I’ve seen often enough before!

Looks like Mum just made it out of here on time, as the days since last weekend have been progressively hotter, today producing the first real knock you flat humid heat that feels like a wall when you first step into it in the morning. We’ve slowed our walk to school down a notch to avoid arriving drenched in sweat and the dust and breeze just seem to exacerbate the scorching temperatures. Ross and I will desperately need to get the car’s air-conditioner fixed before we embark on another trip to the beach!

Carl, Chad, Cathy and I are beginning our quest to gain 40 more university credits so we can move up another pay scale. We considered doing another Master’s degree, or even a PhD, but we hope to fast track this, so we’re taking independent study courses through the University of San Diego. The first packet arrived and much to our collective horror, contained no less than 15 assignments……it might not be quite as easy as we’d first hoped! We’d planned to keep pumping out the subjects, enrolling in each one before we’d finished the last, to ensure a constant regime, all in the hope of finishing all 40 credits before September 2005 in order to go up the pay scale the year after next (academic year for us here). We’re sharing texts etc, but there is no escaping the fact the work needs to be done, so wish us luck!!

Exciting news for me mid week was the long awaited arrival of my new 6’ 4” board. The custom design, penned in a sketch with textas, was magnificently translated into a board that looks great and rides very well. It was a massive learning curve for me as I expected, moving back to a short board after 12 years on the mini mal, by shoulders and arms screaming for respite after the first paddle out, the matchstick-like qualities of the board not giving any stability like my old board and the fact I now have to sit another 10 metres in to catch a wave, all adding to the strange sensations of pleasure and pain I had when christening the board after work on Wednesday afternoon. I was heartened to stand up most of the time and even managed a cutback of sorts on one wave, but in between times, provided great amusement for the fishermen on shore by having one foot on, one foot wildly swinging in midair, shifting weight so far forward that I tumbled over the front of the board and actually totally sliding off the thing when going for a wave! Well, I always knew it wouldn’t be easy, and I was right. Still like most things, I’ll persevere long after some would give up, I suspect because of sheer pig headedness and not wanting to admit defeat. Ross has taken to my “old board” like a fish to water, so I’ll probably have to persevere, as it will be very difficult to get it back off him!
Carl’s board, a 6’ 10” with a bit more width and depth through the middle is a similar success, he’s so convinced it’s right for him, that he is now looking to sell the other one. His design also turned out just as he had planned and my “knights” theme board will eventually get an airing on the photo page when we take a few more shots and get them developed.

We’ve quite missed Mum this week, but have been kept very busy by the demands of the start of the last quarter of school and all the associated hoopla. Cass has been kept extremely busy in her role as “makeup queen” for the middle school play, an extravaganza quite incredible to behold as you’d expect from this school, her budget seemingly without limit and already spent US$500 just to start on makeup alone! She has a hectic time coming up, with a dress rehearsal last Saturday, leading to mini performances at matinees for the little kiddies this week and the sold out big three performances this weekend. Fast but very furious, it will all be over for another year this time next week.

We’ve scammed ourselves onto another Cathay business class promotion for our trip back in June and our return in August, so at not that much more cost we’ll enjoy the extra space and all the trimmings. We’re very excited to be coming back in June after our European sojourn at Christmas; it feels like a long, long time since we’ve seen good old Newcs! See you all soon………..

Mum was keen to check out some more jade and precious stones on Saturday, so we made our way down to the weekend jade market late morning, another first for us. We found it uneventfully, nestled beneath the N/S expressway’s outer end. What an awesome sight greeted us! The market had every variety and grade of jade, precious stone and rock in every imaginable carving and setting stretching out, seemingly for miles under the glaring light of thousands of strung halogen globes. There were at least 8 aisles of merchandise packed onto individual stallholders tables, each aisle nearly a km long! You can imagine my delight at traipsing through this labyrinth of all things boring, but for some reason, Mum and Cass seemed to lose all sense of time and reasoning in here! Many purchases were made, but I won’t spoil the surprise for any who may be the recipients, suffice to say, they were many and varied and Cass’ birthday money from her parents must have been burning a hole in her pocket as she bought some beautiful, big, unset sapphires, which she’ll get made into earrings at some point. When I got a chance to “break the spell” it was close to 3 o’clock and my stomach was playing a merry hunger dance. When looking for a quick emergency meal, we relented and went to Maccas, but I assured Mum it was part of the cultural experience: you do have to check if it really IS the same the world over (it is!!)
While Cass slaved over a hot stove making a Japanese Bon curry for tea, I took Mum up to the “Mother of God” catholic church for the Easter vigil mass. The priest was Mexican, I taught the Korean altar boy, and knew the American and Taiwanese boys from school, the assistant was a black African and the congregation were a mix of American, Canadian, Taiwanese, Chinese, Australian, Korean that I know of. Mum quite enjoyed the experience, and we came home to eat a tasty tea and watch the “Bourne Identity” on cable before retiring.

We’re having a lazy day today as Cass and I try to get our minds round a return to work tomorrow. I took another of Mum’s films to the developer this morning and we’ll pick them up later and Cass has just returned from doing the weekly food shopping. We might wander up to Chung Shan to have a look at the pottery shop later, but haven’t got any firm plans. Daniel is all prepped up to whisk Mum off in his limo to the airport at 1 tomorrow afternoon…. we’ll feel a little lost with her gone and we’ll have to adjust to our normal Taipei Life for another 8 weeks.

We’ve had a very full and interesting week here with Mum and have had the experience that often occurs when guiding a visitor around of discovering a few things for ourselves.
We visited Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall on Tuesday after a trip on the gleaming showpiece of the Taipei public transport system, the MRT. We tried all our local tricks to secure seats, like moving to the front of platforms and we were pretty successful. We viewed a hunger strike outside CKS of students protesting the election result before wandering past the Koi ponds to see the changing of the guards in the hall. Mum was impressed with the precision movements of the “toy soldiers” as they changed and we ate in the food hall of Shin Kong Mitsukoshi after a train ride back. Mum was very adventurous and ordered a Taiwanese style chicken wrap with oyster and Mirin sauce, which I’ll try myself next time we’re there. We caught a taxi from here to the Bade Rd jade and antique alley and although some stalls were shut on the weekday, Mum made some purchases and enjoyed the experience. This alley doesn’t even rate a mention on the maps; we’d spied it after speeding past on the scooter to the east of the city some time ago. We MRTd it home and Cass cooked some salmon mornay for tea as we introduced Mum to the delights of Chinese cable TV and the omnipresent Ultimate fighting challenge on Newasahi.

We had an easy morning and put some photos in for developing before posting some postcards for Mum and finding the local “Mother of God” Catholic Church for Mum to visit on Saturday night for the Easter vigil. We guided the car down the hill to give Mum a tour of the school after this and viewed just the highlights, including Cassy’s class, my office and auditoriums, indoor pools, tracks, post offices, cafeterias etc. Later that afternoon/evening, we drove down to the framers and on to the Shilin night market, which was mercifully “empty”, just enough people around at that early midweek time to make things interesting rather than claustrophobic. Mum made a few more purchases here and savoured the sights smells and sounds that are ever present in this bustling centre of street commerce before heading home to a meal out at the local Kari Curry.

I snuck out for a surf at the Pillbox early Thursday morning after spying a raging swell on the Jinshan web cam. It was pretty hectic out there, big, stormy and pouring rain on the coast. There were a few good waves to be had, but I wasn’t really enjoying it by myself, so made it back by about 10.30, picking up Mum’s photos on the way. We took the inner NS expressway into the city, a novel experience for us as we’d never driven downtown and the scooters are diverted way to the west before joining the city traffic. We made our way to the south east of the city to the world’s tallest building, the Taipei 101. After parking in the basement car park and having a casual lunch at Barista Coffee on the 4th floor, we investigated the “Page One” bookstore. This amazing store is at least twice the size of any bookshop we’d ever seen, almost all titles in English! We were absolutely blown away and checked some favorite authors, only to find that they not only stocked the latest offerings, but the whole collection of works of most of these writers. A most exciting find! We bought a ladder on the way home at B&Q and headed off to the local Teppanyaki restaurant for tea where we met up with Carl and Hiroko and the boys. The cooks were in great form, flashing spatulas and cooking all sorts of seafood, sprouts and eggs with their characteristic flair. Mum proved to be more than competent with the chopsticks, surviving various “tests” with aplomb, including bean sprouts, diced cabbage and the ultimate, a whole fried egg! We had a relaxing coffee and cake at a lovely little teahouse called “English Romance”, just down a nearby alley with Carl and Hiroko after the boys took themselves home after the meal.

On Friday morning, Cass and I took the kitties for their rabies shots, which was fairly uneventful except for Virg taking great exception to her jab by viciously clawing and biting her handler (me!) before we took them home to calm down. We then caught the MRT all the way to the end of the northern line to Damshuie, where we wandered the waterfront and Mum took a 10-minute shoulder massage from a blind masseuse. Refreshed from this we then embarked on a ferry ride to Fisherman’s Wharf, another adventure we’d been meaning to take for years now, so it was great to be able to play tourist guide again! There was a most innovatively designed bridge at the wharf and a very impressive fresh seafood restaurant, yet even though we were quite hungry, we decided to catch the ferry back to Damshuie for lunch, owing to the exclusively Chinese menu (a constant irritation to the limited reader of Chinese characters!). We checked out the 50NT Pizza in town, and Mum and I had a very tasty seafood one, Cass the vegetarian, so we’ll try the local Teh Shing Rd outlet some time in the future on the strength of that. We came home and watched the “Shipping News” on DVD before heading to the previously “written up” Big Nose Pasta for tea. We all had the melt-in-your-mouth snapper dish before heading over for a quick look at the local Takashimaya department store, where the girls looked at some beautiful things and Mum wondered at the massive aquarium and array of specialty international shops, including her “own” Georg Jensen!

Well, it’s two weeks or so since I’ve written here, I apologize to my faithful readers and….. whinge, whinge, no emails for Davey!
Of course, these past weeks have been very busy as the school wound done for Spring Break and we had reports and portfolio conferences to attend to, watching various borrowed DVDS from friends like The Office (series 1 and 2) which was about the funniest thing I’ve seen since the first run of Faulty Towers and believe it or not George and Mildred series 1 (!)
We’ve been watching the Knights’ progress with ever increasing alarm since Joey’s injury and don’t hold out much hope for a flying grand final visit this year, although we won’t give up all hope!
The big news is the arrival of my Mum on Saturday night! Mum has had her visit planned for some time and we were really looking forward to her arrival for this break. She did arrive safely but not before various complications, including delayed flights and the non-arrival of her big bag. We arranged to have the bag delivered to school on Sunday, whereupon I decided I’d collect it on the scooter, which was quite a sight as I couldn’t turn the handlebars, so had to lean precariously into each corner before getting it home safely. We’ve had some interesting adventures already, including taking Mum shopping to the local supermarket to view the various exotic goods and show her our walking route to and fro. Yesterday, Cassy awoke on her birthday to receive some wonderful presents from Chris and Val (brought by Mum) of money to go on an extensive shopping trip(!) and a combined present for her and me from Mum of photos of Newcastle commissioned from my sister, professional photographer Sue (unashamed plug coming up…. fotojenik (02) 4961 3362, for amazing, innovative photos for weddings, events or portraiture) The photos are quite incredible and two very large prints of Newcastle harbour on Maritime Festival day and another of a kite surfer over Newcastle beach are better than any of the commercial prints we have on our walls here right now. 4 more beautiful and interesting shots around the city add to the overall effect and we’ll get them framed while Mum is here. Cass received a phone call from Sue as well as her Mum and Dad, so she was well satisfied, even though she’s now the older woman again for the next 9 days!
We embarked on a journey to the north east coast in the mid morning, traveling along the main road to Baishawan beach, where we met up with Carl and family, a lovely surprise as we had expected to meet them at Jinshan. Apparently Carl had left me a gigantic message in the sand indicating where we’d gone….who needs a mobile phone when you’ve got friends like this! (I’m sure he’d think otherwise) I stole Carl’s board for a quick surf, while poor Mum and Cass looked on, but we didn’t stay long, mainly due to the rapidly deteriorating conditions. Onwards passed the newly discovered (and named!) surfing spots of “the lookout” and “restaurants” (fodder for another blog), past the Temple of the 13 dogs to Shimen Arch, where we stopped for a look at the scenic coast. They are doing heaps of work there at the moment stabilizing the great natural arch, which limited our photo opportunities a tad, but we wandered out on the rock platform and over the Givernyesque bridge between rock islands. Mum’s knee was doing a sterling job on all sorts of uneven terrain, so we were all very encouraged, especially as we’d also negotiated our 3rd floor stairs heaps of times as well by this stage! On to Jinshan beach, which um immediately recognized from her careful scanning of the web photos page, then, as time was getting on, to Jinshan town’s 7/11 for some takeaway lunch, which we ate next to a mountain stream half way up the mountains on the way to our next adventure. After lunch, we wound our way up the mountain to the fumaroles, which were putting on quite a show of steam venting and bubbling boiling sulfurous water. Not content to leave it at that, we called in to Yangminshan Park to do the short walk to the viewing pavilion. Poor old Mum followed us diligently to the top, whereupon she suggested a short rest…….we’d been charging around with our usual intensity of course!
After a few more photo ops, we went home via one of the interesting very narrow back roads and pointed out the monolithic Taipei American School on the way back through. After some quiet time at home and a bottle of champagne, we went to the Indian restaurant, The Spice Shop, for a very tasty dinner accompanied by some Argentinean red, a present from one of my colleagues. Cass had a very enjoyable birthday and we chatted till about midnight before hauling ourselves off to bed.
It’s another spectacular day here today, so we’ll make the most of it by traveling downtown. We’d like to show Mum the frighteningly tall Taipei 101, the Living Mall, Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall, the Jade market and the Shilin night market before she leaves, so we’re hoping the weather stays fine for a few more days at least.
Just before signing off, I must also report that Mum was my scooter pillion passenger on a petrol station run and also to the bank, so is a certified scooter rider in Taipei now. I have threatened to take her on a “real” run downtown…………we’ll wait and see!!

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!

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!

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 (!)

I had a bit of a reality check on Saturday when I found myself driving down the main road of our suburb Tienmu, straddling the line that divides both traffic lanes, scooters whizzing down the inside, cars towards the centre of the road swerving over the centre line, while avoiding others “parked” in the outside lane, hazard lights indicating their temporary status in this spot. It’s a riot becoming a Taiwanese driver. Not only do many of the “streets” we navigate up the mountain more closely resemble tarred Billy goat tracks than a real road, you also become used to an amazing spatial perception: knowing just how close you can go to oncoming cars on one side without snapping off your side mirrors, while avoiding the drainage ditch on the other, the latter always open, deep, wide and dangerous. I have knocked mirrors a few times at speed, but they’ve managed to stay on the car and although I haven’t done so myself, I have witnessed drivers smacking blissfully unaware scooter drivers straight off the road into aforementioned ditches.

The rule seems to be: whoever gets there first, goes - disregarding traffic lights, signs and other traffic. If it’s behind you, it doesn’t exist. Pedestrians too, take their life in their hands if they cross on a green walking man signal. The newcomer foreigner is one who is often seen dodging traffic when they have right of way, unaware of the rule that the car is king, regardless of signals. Cars will swerve across three lanes of traffic to make a turn, causing near accidents for hundreds of metres behind them, cars will park in the middle of the road and compound their stupidity by opening their door into the narrow space left for following traffic. Taxi drivers, some of whom are off their heads on Beetle nut, are the worst offenders and will often mow a path through a phalanx of scooter riders if they sniff a fare. The ubiquitous blue truck is the next worst offender, drivers again suspiciously crazy, flashing the odd maniacal grin revealing bright red teeth and gums, the tell tale signs of the “nut” addict. Taiwanese work trucks are all in the same shade of ugly blue for some reason, we suspect that they test the level of nut in the blood before you can buy one…the more the “bluer”!

Still, in all this mayhem, no one ever gets aerated, harsh words are barely muttered and drivers are serene under the most awful traffic pressures. Ten-kilometer traffic snarls are caused by one car stopped in a lane to get something at a shop, drivers eventually passing the offending vehicle without even a sideways glance. I sometimes still imagine the road rage that would accompany any such behaviour back home: strings of expletives to outright physical violence and realize that here, in this situation, they’ve got it right. It is frustrating at times, but if everyone does it, you too can stop where you want, pull out into lines of cars when you need to and abuse every road rule you have ever learned if the need arises. In all this mayhem, it is not an uncomfortable experience driving here in Taipei: just know the “rules” and learn to adapt.

We have driven for half an hour behind a very cautious driver doing 30 km per hour up the winding, narrow streets of Yangminshan, champing at the bit to get to the beach, but realizing that if we pass, there will be another nutty squirrel to take this one’s place!
I can also park now in places that I wouldn’t even attempt at home, sometimes with just a few inches front and back. The reverse park takes on a whole different feel here, with no room to maneuver, driving on the left of the car, on the right side of the road and managing gears etc in the right hand as well. Thank god the pedals aren’t switched around; that would be just too much! Another thing that aids the park in the tight spot is the acceptance of the bump and grind technique; that is, if you need to, feel free to bump your way into the park by smashing into the car in front and behind! Who would buy a good car here??!! Plenty actually, Taipei having the highest per capita ownership of top line Mercedes in the world. These cars are not spared the treatment and owners seem to accept this as the price to be paid in a teeming, car owner’s city with very limited parking.

We have been absolutely stoked to get emails from Sue, my Mum (twice), Thurza and Cassy’s Mum and Dad (twice) over the latter part of the week and the weekend. It gave us a real buzz, so thank you all for your entertaining, newsy emails. That doesn’t excuse you other slack bastards! (You know who you are!)
We were also excited to get news that we’ve sold one of our units at Horizons, finally getting out of half of an ever increasing burden, especially with us over here and trying to communicate our wishes, needs etc. We just need to move the other one and we’ll have a real celebration!

Just quickly, surf on Friday after school (pretty good), surf on Saturday (a little better), party at Chad’s Saturday night (good, but we were a bit tired) and saw Cold Mountain (great) and had a flash lunch on Sunday (5 courses, very yummy, no tea!). Happy Birthday to my little sister on Sunday, she’s just turning 10! Have a couple of sherbets on Sunday night for me Bud!!

Taipei’s jade market nestles under the intersection of two massive overhead expressways in the south east of the city. Hundreds of tiny stalls and shops are jammed into a labyrinth of crisscrossing alleys and lanes, with extra items sold from cardboard boxes outside by smaller operators. People typically haggle over every price, a process I’ve never been comfortable with or very good at, much preferring to say "That seems pretty good", then studiously avoiding similar looking items further on, just in case I got diddled on my own purchase! Of course this is very un-Chinese and the retailers seem to gain as much pleasure from the exchange of horrified looks and raised eyebrows and other over the top histrionics at the customer’s proffered offers as the sale itself. We thoroughly enjoyed a few hours here on Saturday after jamming the scooter into the most minute of spaces on a footpath a couple of blocks away, after going to the pictures earlier in the day.
Love Actually was a delightful experience for us both and we savoured that peculiarly British way of bringing cinematic tears and laughs almost simultaneously, as well as the understated way of telling a simple story, linking a few vignettes together through the course of the film. We had a tasty lunch down at Cinemark and succumbed to the call of “Maccas” for tea when we got home, which I got on the scooter and brought home. You know, it really is quite miraculous how their stuff manages to taste the same wherever you are in the world. I must confess that, apart from the deliciously French salad dressing in Paris, the teriyaki burger in Japan and Taiwan’s peculiar obsession with promoting a murky grey copy of the ubiquitous mess served in various slop kitchens around town, you could be anywhere when you eat this fast food. It’s kind of comforting in a way; I suppose too, that’s how they’ve been so successful.
As you can no doubt guess, we didn’t go the beach on Saturday, partly because we dashed to the coast after our PD day at school on Friday afternoon, and partly because the alarming lack of swell we experienced then could not have improved in the 12 hours before we were due to head off again. Plus, it was Valentine’s Day (!) Today saw the conditions improve somewhat, and we got some nice little left-handers at Baishawan beach, about 14 km around from our usual haunt, Jinshan. Ross and I arranged to meet up with Carl and his family out there and we were surprised to arrive before them. When Carl pulled up a few minutes later, he related the story of the “flying board”. Apparently, in the strong winds and high speeds of the drive out, his ocky straps had actually snapped in two. None of us had ever seen or heard of this before, but the evidence was there for us to see. Carl’s board, in cover, had flown off his racks at high speed and landed back down the road, barely missing decapitating several scooter riders in the process! We inspected the damage and while not unscathed, the board had survived this terror flight remarkably well, all things considered. He will have to repair a big ding to the tail, which unfortunately broke through to the blank, but the board was OK apart from this. The boys are improving with every session they go out; they’re so quick to learn and seem very excited with the whole deal.
After the last month or two, you’re probably wondering why I’m not moaning about the weather again. Much to our surprise and delight the skies have cleared, the air has thawed and somehow, everything looks a little brighter, figuratively and literally. I even got a little sunburned today, but just in case my Dad has some kind of cosmic line to this communication, “No, not my nose, it had cream on it!”
Anyway, that will do for now: write us an email anyone reading this! Short or long, we’d be interested if you just tell us what you had for tea last night!

It’s been a bleak and miserable week here in Taipei, in large part due to shocking weather and the general malaise that often seems to accompany such dreary days. To say it has been unseasonably cold is a massive understatement: some 20 year veterans prepared to say it is the coldest winter they have experienced. We have had our little fan heater working overtime, the kittens running from their room in the mornings and afternoons when released from captivity to bathe in the little ceramic glow of heat it valiantly tries to blow around the room. Taiwan’s high humidity adds just that extra bit of zip to the single figure temperatures, gusts of wind whipping through the hardiest of jackets and piercing leg coverings like a thousand little needles, chilling to the bone.

These most frigid conditions did not preclude us from making our usual weekend pilgrimage to the beach, however! Leaving Cass tucked up inside nursing her two little balls of heat, I picked Ross up from his last class at school for his current Master’s course, met Carl in his car and headed off to our new-found secret spot at the southern end of the Green Bay beach. Anathema to we Antipodeans, the beach is actually privately owned by the Howard Plaza resort which flanks its outer edges, but undeterred by such strange happenings we flagrantly disregard the private beach signs (we can’t read them, we’re foreign), park in their overflow car park and trot along their pathways to the water. We may find some more resistance from the guards in summer but, at the moment, I’m pretty certain we are just providing the greatest amusement for anyone who sees us!
The waves were very poor quality even by our latest standards and we found it quite difficult to latch onto anything approaching a decent rideable wave. Wetsuits must be removed at some point and it is this moment that starts the real teeth chattering, tongue-tying chill that doesn’t stop till a long, very hot shower back home.

Cass and I were keen to see a movie today, but scanning the paper’s movie listings did not inspire us. We decided instead to treat ourselves to a delicious German lunch of sausage, bread, mash and sauerkraut bookended with a warming bowl of soup and a lovely piece of home made cake and coffee. We then braved the conditions to get a few supplies at the Carrefour, including a whole stack of downlights, as ours had all decided to extinguish roughly at the same time in the last week.

During the week, I was mesmerised by a very strange sight. As I stood on our verandah in the early evening, I watched some strange orange glowing lights drifting across the park opposite, light flickering as they rose higher and higher. They stayed alight as I strained to see them as they turned to fiery pinpricks far away. A succession of these lights passed by before I realized they were lanterns for the Chinese New Year, set aloft, the embers inside providing the lift to keep the paper in the air. This was just a precursor to even stranger sights and sounds. A caravan of small open trucks each with a cargo of fervent drum bashing youths onboard wended their way down our tiny lane, accompanied by the constant strident bleating of an unknown instrument sending shivers of displeasure down our spines. A woman’s voice from the temple across the river, amplified at what seemed a ludicrously high level, seemed to call the faithful to the various proceedings about to start. Later, with a hypnotic jungle beat of drums as background, constant volleys of fireworks were sent skyward, cymbals clashed, people sang and shouted, as children’s screams of delight drifted across to us, the start of some great celebration. Taking stock for a moment, it once again amazed us that we live and work in this great melting pot of strange and wondrous events, trying to appreciate and understand it just a bit: we don’t want to become blasé, or I wouldn’t have anything else to write about!

The big freeze has continued in Taipei this week, a slight lull coming just in time for the weekend. Dramas aplenty yesterday as Ross was ensconced in a cell like classroom at school doing his Framingham course, no doubt doodling pictures of stick men surfers riding impossibly perfect waves while listening to his lecturer drone on and on. This was not the drama though. Carl was due to pick me up in the new car to make the trip to the beach for the boy’s inaugural surf. He rang as I waited to tell me his battery was flat. I entertained thoughts of getting some jumper leads down at the Carrefour only to realize it was far too early. Carl went to school to hunt some down, I zoomed up on the scooter, met him with the borrowed leads then came back to get our car to do the charging. I couldn’t believe the key turning in the ignition to NO response whatsoever. Ours was flat as a pancake as well! Carl got a colleague to charge his car and came round to charge ours, whereupon we set out for the coast very late. We took both cars in the end to make sure they got a good run. The arctic conditions of the past week or two must have had something to do with it, or else it was just the freakiest of coincidences.

Suffice to say, we got to the beach and enjoyed some nice 3-4 foot right handers, breaking on a shallow bank, Sean and Steven getting plenty of quality time on a few foamies and nearly making it up a few times on their first day: an impressive debut.
Cass and I made an ill fated attempt to find the Chocolate War on DVD down at Asiaworld (yes, it actually is called that!) after a hectic scooter ride downtown in the mid weekend traffic. We had some curry out for tea and a quiet night at home with kitties, but not before buying an oven, ostensibly for all manner of cooking, but really to heat my new found pies. It’s an interesting contraption, quite large enough to bake things and grill others, the Chinese substitute for a wall oven. Anyway, we’re yet to christen it, but it looks quite impressive on our kitchen bench!

Surf again on Sunday, but alas, for Ross in particular, the surf was not offering much in the way of size. It was however, a glorious day: one of those rare ones in Taipei where the air is crisp, a zephyr of wind saw the sun just sneaking out to have a peep every now and then and a perfect temperature. We’re expecting another cold snap this week and ironically, even though we’ve had plenty of rain in the last few weeks, the northern parts of the island will go into water restrictions soon. Apparently the problem is the terrible inefficiency of the dams and the pipes, with 80% of water leaking from pipes on the way to the taps!

Virg’n Mary continue to delight us with their antics, but we’re hoping their affections for us continue after we take them back to the vet for some shots this afternoon. Carl and I are seriously considering buying some short boards to get a bit more zip in the water: a great idea in theory, but perhaps not when our shoulders begin screaming from the extra paddling effort. With this in mind, I’ve started lifting weights again regularly (well, just started again today!) after a long lay-off. That combined with a bit of karate should help shouldn’t it? (!)

Cass got her throat infection on the weekend, but was able to immediately identify and hit it straight away with some antibiotics we’d brought from home for just such an eventuality and she’s feeling pretty good, all things considered. School continues to throw up its fair share of challenges, but somehow, we’re never as stressed as we were back home. The worst day here probably equates to an average one there and we wonder if it perhaps is our new attitude and renewed enthusiasm for our teaching that is the difference. I think we’re just enjoying life!

Traffic snaked up the curves and rises of Yangminshan, occasionally coming to a standstill, scooters wending their way through impossibly tiny gaps to beat the cars to the top of the mountain. Officious police, frustrated in their job of traffic control as they limited the number of vehicles accessing the top mountain road, blocked the upper reaches of the mountain. The unthinkable had happened: snow had fallen on the tops of the slopes, creating a frenzy among Taipei’s citizens to get to the top and view this rare phenomenon. Those who made it to the top early proudly displayed little snowmen trophies on their bonnets as they drove back down the hill, probably only exciting further a group who were prepared to endure hours of traffic chaos to get a glimpse of the ice and snow. Incongruously and to the open jawed amazement of many, Ross and I guided the “Auburgino” the opposite direction with our two bagged surfboards on the roof. We had just “enjoyed” one of the most unforgettable surfs I have ever experienced. Temperatures had plummeted to previously unthinkable lows in the past week and although officially 7 degrees, the biting, ferocious onshore breeze found us shivering with cold before we even entered the water. Our thin spring suits afforded us just the barest of protection and we sat hunched on our boards, dangling our bare arms in the water to avoid exposing them to the icy winds. We had searched the north east coast for the best part of two hours for something rideable, until we weaved our way past a tiny temple and ducked in and out of residential parking areas, emerging at a sheltered end of the Green Bay beach. The waves were a fun 3 to 4 feet and peaking up on the outside before providing a deliciously tempting full ride on our backhand before speeding along an inner shallow bank. Finding it difficult to leave our new found sheltered haven, Ross and I stayed out for two hours, ensuring that my feet were numb when I eventually did get out, two slabs of surprisingly heavy meat dragging at the ends of my nearly equally frozen legs. We shook uncontrollably while we got changed in lightening fast time before enjoying the car heater on full as we guided the car up to the aforementioned strange scenario.
Apart from the arctic conditions, Cass and I have enjoyed a really relaxing, fun break, ending all too soon tomorrow. I have read the latest Sue Grafton book “Q is for Quarry” which was a wonderful way to while away a few hours in our cosy apartment. Her characters are so real and familiar to us now; it’s like pulling on an old pair of slippers as you slide into the invented world of PI Kinsey. Cass has been voraciously reading all manner of tomes in between being entertained by our new rampaging, fizzling friends Virg n Mary. These little kittens are such a delight. They’ve amazed us with all sorts of antics this week, they’re dexterous little beggars and have entertained us with back flips and leaps, playful fighting with each other which sometimes gets a little out of hand, one or other of the little fuzz balls letting out a long, deep growl of discomfort. They’ve taken to their gym and “new room” quite quickly as well and we have been very heartened to cup their ever growing fat little bellies in our hands. The two of them are real lap cats, belying their initial spitting, hissing frightened withdrawal from us in the first few days, they now contentedly curl up together on one or other lap, or sometimes separate so we have one hot little bundle each. They are also beginning to groom themselves well, at times, damp kitten pelts providing another new smell to the ever-increasing bank of different aromas!
Carl has bought a new car! We investigated an area of used car lots out on Weh Lin Rd before Chinese New Year together and made ourselves understood by scratching various numbers and years into the dust on car boots and bonnets, often with the addition of some numbers we know, in my case garnered through watching girly ads with phone numbers on the TV advertising all sorts of exotic goods (they feature on the fight/martial arts channel which I watch quite regularly, at least that’s my excuse!)
It’s a real beauty, quite similar in size and age to ours, so the Lochrins will no doubt be having lots of car adventures from here on in as well. Carl did a great job making himself understood by the Taiwanese salesman, with help of mobile phones and friends assisting with translations and question asking and answering.
We were invited to a special Chinese New Year’s Eve dinner with the Lee family downstairs and although filled with trepidation, our stomachs and noses escaped relatively unscathed. Linda, Mr. Lee’s daughter had invited us down with the promise of “special foods” especially prepared for the New Year. After experiencing some rather nauseating items at George’s house two years ago, to say we weren’t looking forward to the celebration is an understatement of epic proportion. Although I covered a reflexive gag when trying to consume a dumpling filled with marinated, raw, fish roe, the rest of the meal consisted mainly of cooked seafood, only some of which smelled as if it had been filtrated through used toilet paper. We had a great laugh with the family and gathered all sorts of local information, from the daughter’s jobs to the loud, obnoxious and very un-Chinese neighbour who seems to have commandeered Mr. Lee’s private park on the opposite side of the street!
Of course, we’re back to school tomorrow, buoyed by the possibility of Mum visiting us here for Spring break in April and the thought that we’re now in another downhill stretch before we once again arrive home in June for our long break. Taipei Life continues to throw up all manner of adventure and sights and sounds for us to savour: we can’t envisage why it won’t continue to do just that for some time to come.

Clandestine activities, secretive meetings and information gathering were all part of the past two week’s activities. This all culminated in the arrival to our home of two very cute kittens, Mary and Virgil (Virg ’n Mary) last Friday evening. They are about 6 weeks old sisters, basically tabbies, slightly fluffy and with a splash of white on their faces and bellies. They look very much alike, Virg being identified by a slightly whiter face and a reddish tinge on the shoulders. It was our 16th wedding anniversary and I snuck out to collect the kittens that had been kept at the local vet’s for the past week and a half. Cass nearly died of shock and has asked me not to give her such a fright in future, even though she thoroughly enjoyed the end result when she had calmed down a little. At first, the kittens seemed impossibly tiny and frail, shivering with fright and hissing and spitting at us every time we came near. After just 3 days with us however, they are becoming more used to our place and us and have entertained us with their speeding, skidding runs around the marble floors, tumbling over each other and fighting and leaping on one another. It’s actually quite mesmerizing watching them play, we were worried at first at how violent they were with each other but, after a half hour or so of the most frenetic fizzling, they trot back into their little bed and fall asleep on top of each other, cuddling up inside the old wool cardigan that Cassy has donated to them. Virg is purring contentedly when we have her on our laps and is the definite leader when it comes to adventure and naughtiness. I have had to kitten proof the place a little, even to the extent of taping plastic over the front of the video/DVD cabinet and stuffing books and pieces of wood in the cracks at the back to stop an ever inquisitive Virg from getting lost in the labyrinth of wires at the rear, which she did 4 times in succession on the first day! Mary is much more timid and when not acting as Virg’s punching bag, she prefers to sit and doze and make the occasional foray to the food and drink tray and also the litter tray, which both kittens, much to our horror, seem to have decided is another giant play pit that they can jump in and out of with gay abandon!
We lock the kitties in our second bathroom overnight and they seem perfectly content, not crying or whimpering at all. When we let them out in the morning, it is usually time for some celebratory high jinks, which have to be seen to be believed. As Cass said this morning, it’s like watching a cartoon on fast forward. In just a few days they seem to have put on a little weight which is great, their little round bellies belying the tiny faces with big ears and the little string bean tails.
I had asked around all the “cat people” at school in the previous weeks and they gave me some good advice, the last being to check out the local vets as people sometimes bring in abandoned kittens. When I enquired at one such vet’s close to our place, they informed me that two kittens had been brought in that morning. They were minute, but still full of fight and they were so wild that the assistant had to bring them out one by one cocooned in a towel. They hissed and scratched at me, but, wisely or not, I decided they were just what we wanted.
We have bought all the associated paraphernalia, including a quite impressive cat gym, with 3 levels of playing and house areas complete with scratching posts and a mouse on a string for boxing practice!
Apart from this, which has been pretty much all consuming this week, we have made a few trips out and about. Ross and I have been surfing in the increasingly frigid conditions at Jinshan point, and took advantage of our freedom on a weekday to surf yesterday, just the two of us. Unfortunately, the surf has not been kind to us and we were flung around like rag dolls in a very stormy and unfriendly swell, trying to catch reforms on the inner bank only to be crunched on a very shallow bank, or cleaned up by unrelenting sets when we made it out the back.
Cass and I set off down to the Taipei 101 (previously mentioned tallest building in the world), where the mall at the foot of the building is in full swing. The building itself is not open to the public yet, but the adjoining mall is lavishly fitted out, marble walls and floors and every brand name store in the world setting up their Taipei branches.
The most exciting find for us however, was Jason’s market in the basement area. Apart from fantastic cooked and uncooked foods from all types of world cuisine, there were a few other little gems. Just to mention a few, how about, Crunchies, Violet Crumbles, Mint Slices, whole ranges of Masterfoods and Fountain sauces and condiments, cook-in sauces, incredible range of Australian wines, Sanitarium products, Aussie breakfast cereals and wait for it….MEAT PIES! The latter come from Victoria and I have two secreted away in the fridge at this moment alongside a vegetable pasty for Cass for a “special occasion”. This kind of excitement may seem extremely bizarre, but we were like kids in a candy shop down there. Of course all these items come at a shocking premium in terms of price, sometimes quadruple what we’d pay back home, but a few special treats like this are very exciting.
We are having Carl and Hiroko, Ross and Ains, the amazing Gurecki and Himiko round here this afternoon for a few drinks and nibblies. Chad and Cathy were due to come as well, but Cathy has caught the flu and can’t make it. I’m sure the kitties will be a big hit with some of our visitors, and we need to go and clean up a bit before they arrive.

Prague’s airport was kind of cute after the monolithic, futuristic Hong Kong and the faded glory of Heathrow, but things went smoothly and the Air France city hopper delivered us to a strangely empty Charles de Gaulle in the early evening. After taxiing to the hotel at our well-known Cite Bergere in the 9th arrondissement, our room was a bit of a shock after our luxurious Prague digs. Typically Paris, especially on, perhaps not a beer budget, but cheaper red wine (!) our room had a bed and a TV on a bracket, a small cupboard and that’s about it! The bathroom had just been enlarged and remodeled and it was perfectly functional. To sum up, all that you need when you plan to soak up some sights and sounds by day and by night.
As expected, Cassy began babbling away in beautiful French straight away and I assumed my previous position of mute sidekick. One funny incident occurred however, when a lightbulb in our room blew and we sought a replacement from the desk. Cass had forgotten the word and launched in to a long-winded explanation of the object for the bemused man at the desk. After a while I just said “light bulb” in English and the man said “Ah, the bulb, the bulb!” I still had some limited use!
We wandered the immediate area on the first evening and started the inevitable comparisons. I think we both decided that the cities were very different. Paris has its own buzz and feel, decidedly busy and even a little haughty, while Prague exudes its own brand of laid-back charm relying on its architectural wonder to dazzle the visitor. Paris, of course, is not devoid of its own external beauties, and it couples this with an amazing surfeit of some of the most stupendous art to be seen anywhere in the world, be it built or painted or sculpted.
Bruno’s pizza and the first of many pichets of vin rouge were had for dinner till we went back to prepare for a week of adventure. The Pompidou centre had been closed for renovations on Cassy’s previous visits and we were both keen to go. A snaking slow line of disgruntled and cold looking visitors waiting to enter was a bit off-putting so we instead just wandered through the shops and made a few small purchases before watching the ice skaters in front of Town Hall and lunching on some takeaway baguettes overlooking the Seine. We went to Les Halles and bought our first of many carnets of 10 tickets to the metro and went to the Champs Elysees where we pre-booked some movie tickets to “Lord of the Rings” at the same enormous cinema where we saw “Titanic” some 6 years before.
The next morning I nearly died of shock when my sister Jen came walking into the breakfast room of the hotel. Somehow, she had acquired a new Italian husband and daughter, had lost her ability to speak English and learned fluent Italian and French, but it was Jen all the same. She walked and talked like Jen, she wore similar clothes, she was the same height and build and LOOKED just like her, but of course, it wasn’t. After summoning up our courage, we approached the at first bewildered family to explain why we had been staring open jawed at them. They were most fascinated with Cassy’s story (I was again superfluous, standing, grinning inanely!) and we took photos and swapped email addresses with a promise to send a photo of the “real” Jen on our return.
After that great excitement, we tried the Musee D’Orsay (long queue, raining) and experienced the same at the Louvre. Oh well, another day. We took a long walk in the icy conditions to the Eiffel tower and soaked up some excitement there, spoke to the first Aussies we’d heard on our trip to date and then went off to our movie which was an amazing spectacular, a fitting end to a beautifully worked trilogy. I pretended I was going to buy the new Mercedes sports car, which was one of the mercs on display in the showroom on the Champs Elysees, and we were given a French brochure, mainly for our capricious inquiries I suspect!
The next few days were spent visiting all types of galleries and museums, large and small, but all in their own way housing precious treasures that we viewed and wondered at, storing memories of their beauty till we return. The Pompidou Centre, a vast open design housing works of art from many eras was mind blowing. Rooms of Matisse led to rooms of Picasso and Liechtenstein, Mondrian and Renoir. After taking our fill of these paintings, we moved to spaces of a more esoteric nature, modern art installations that were thought provoking to just plain bizarre. To Cassy’s horror I surreptiously added a tiny key from my pocket to one such installation which just looked like a big room that people had thrown rubbish into. Perhaps it was just a French joke perpetrated by the gallery’s management!
The Musee Marmottan is one of Paris’ better-kept secrets. In a relatively tiny house in the suburbs, 65 of the most significant works of Claude Monet are displayed on plain curved walls with an unobtrusive lime-washed wooden floor. We wandered in a dream through this space, taking time to sit and watch these paintings in beautiful, serene surrounds. The impact of this space had lost none of its punch since our previous visits, in fact, it was enhanced if anything. It was truly a highlight for me, as I had this as my number one must-see on pre-trip itineraries.
The Musee D’Orsay was similarly stunning and we took the liberty to go straight to the areas that most interested us, no doubt bypassing a wealth of magnificent sculpture and art in so-doing, but allowing us not to get too museum weary. Once more impressionists were high on our list and more Monets and Pisarros and Sisleys were enjoyed with some delicate side dishes served by the not in consequential Renoir and a room of Van Gogh.
A press of humanity from French school holiday art lovers saw these spaces fairly crowded which decreased our viewing pleasure a little and we did endure an hour queuing to get in, mainly due to increased security checks, which were evident everywhere we went. That Osama has a lot to answer for!
We did a similar visit to The Louvre, selecting areas we wanted to see, and going to areas we had bypassed on other visits. Along with the impressionists, we also saw amazing Roman and Greek antiquities as well as corridors and rooms, seemingly without end, of ancient Egyptian artifacts.
Of course these visits were interspersed with lots of eating and wine and coffee drinking! We enjoyed a wide variety of Parisian cuisine, deciding, however that the best meals were had at the tiny, smoky bar/tabac in Rue Montmartre with its resident cat, Taqera, visiting each table to say hello. The Euro has certainly taken its toll on prices in the city. We didn’t worry too much about it, but it was very noticeable since our last visit. Paying $20 Australian for 2 cups of coffee at a small café probably sums it up!!
Cassy has insisted that I mention the cakes: I must admit that they were delicate and extremely delicious, the coffee éclairs that we ate in our room one night were divine.
We braved the super crush on the Metro on New Year’s Eve to get to the Eiffel Tower for midnight’s celebrations. We drank some beers and loved the atmosphere, crowds in front of the Palais de Chaillot pulsing with excitement as the time drew nearer. The tower was the focal point of course, but ornate old-fashioned merry-go-rounds and regular volleys of fireworks certainly added to the party atmosphere. The tower itself went off like a cracker at midnight, thousands of electric blue lights flashing all over the massive steel framework, an incredible sight. Getting home was another adventure, Cass getting her first taste of a really crowded train, the kind where no one needs to hang on, crushed unceremoniously into the carriages, breathing in the alcoholic fumes of hours of partying only to be disgorged into crumbling underground stations that never seem to lose an uncomfortable scent of stale urine.
Paris has not lost any of its sizeable appeal. The streets are always abuzz with action, the food fantastic and the spaces, monuments and museums unique. After this wonderful trip we wondered how we’d adjust back to life in Taipei, but after a long trip back, our driver waiting patiently at the airport for us, ushering us into his big, black car for the trip home we both had a sense of relief. This city is a second home to us now and we were happy to be back.

My late grandfather Dave came to mind more than once on our trip, the miniature
fairytale town of Old Prague as seen from afar, with its various spires and turrets frosted with a fresh night's snowfall, brought back memories of his Christmas dinner plate completely covered with a thin layer of salt, the turkey, ham and high sharp angles of pumpkin and his beloved sweet potato. The Christmas analogy didn't end there for me either as we passed by 100s of decorated spruces, cut from a forest and chocked up quite unceremoniously in various squares, streets and surprising little nooks and crannies. They were festooned with lights and decorations adding immensely to the Christmas atmosphere there and the myriad of historic gorgeous buildings were themselves like something from a fairytale. Cass and I were just filled with wonder day and night as the city was just achingly beautiful: it's difficult to believe that it survived so intact through wars and communism's decline and fall.
We'd just come in to the internet cafe after wandering the Charles Bridge again in the early evening. We were stirred from a little rest by the sound of screams and laughter coming from the street below, only to see a
wonderful fall of snow drifting down onto the street and people illuminated in the spotlights from the lesser town tower not 15 metres from our door. We walked the town each day and travelled on the metro as far as the end of
the line, giving us a jolt back from this storybook view to the stalag-like housing on the far reaches of town. The sterile and somehow frightening concrete blocks are placed so precisely, their car parks and recreation areas so bare, it must have been soul destroying to live and work in and from them. The great solace for the people must have been the thought that whatever deprivations they suffered could have been assuaged slightly by
visiting their beautiful inner city.
Puppets and crystals and garnets and hats and gloves seemed to make up the vast majority of touristy shops and how they all make a go of it was beyond us. Cass bought some garnet earrings in one shop and the man told her there were "no tourists" here at this time of year. You could have fooled us!
However, we were pleasantly surprised at the paucity of loud tourists and those we did see and hear were invariably Czech, German or French.
The food was incredibly good, from potato pancakes and soups to pizzas and cakes and lots and lots of strong flavoursome coffees!
The cold was intense; we could feel it seep through the layers of clothing penetrating to the bone...slow and unstoppable, till we entererd a super heated shop or restaurant to feel our faces and hands tingle with shock and sit and wait till the heat crept up through the rest of our bodies.
We booked some tickets in the middle of the first row of the balcony for a Christmas Day gala concert at the Rudolfinum....Mozart, Smetana, Dvorak and Christmas carols with various famous Czech soloists etc. It was an amazing concert. The Czech Philharmonic came out for encores and vigorous applause to our delight and to top the evening off, we walked home afterwards through a gently swirling snowfall.
We had planned to eat our Christmas lunch among the excitement of Old Town Square at one of the flash outdoor eateries. We wouldn’t freeze, as they had huge gas heaters at every second table and we planned to eat, drink, be merry and soak up yet more of what must indeed be one of the world’s most beautiful cities.
Minus six degrees gets pretty cold when you’re exposed for a few hours and we regularly ducked into little cafes to have an espresso during our outings. Stripping off the layers of coats, jumpers, scarves and gloves got just a touch wearisome after a while, but we got very skilled at it. While waiting for the coffee to be delivered we always felt our faces tingling as they adjusted to the heat and a slow thawing of our chilled bones was complete just before we decided to venture out again for a few hours. Darkness began to shroud the outlines of Prague by 4pm each day and it was night by 5, but a magical quality of the dusk was the lights coming on over Charles Bridge, just vaguely illuminating faces of passers-by, buskers and sellers, but always in a soft, golden light. We enjoyed our walk home each day at this time, with great plumes of condensed breath billowing out in front of us as the temperature seemed to drop even lower. We always came home over Charles Bridge, carefully sliding our feet over slick cobblestones to avoid a fall, and slipping into our little haven to the obvious surprise of many, so close to the end of the bridge. We usually did our thawing routine and popped under an incredibly light and warm silk quilt for a read or a quick viewing of some quirky and completely incomprehensible Czech TV before heading out again for tea.
The restaurants were plentiful and varied in menu, to the extent that we were never sure what to eat. Cass took a real liking to the traditional Czech fare of potato pancakes and goulash, while I was very keen on the “new” Czech fad of pizza! So many little restaurants had pizza on the menu, but with a twist. They were always wood fired and had that distinctive smoky taste and texture, but had the freshest of ingredients you could possibly imagine. In fact, one ‘Hawaiian’ variety I tried didn’t really work, because the pineapple was too sweet and delicious for the tomato base and the ham too flavoursome. Ah well, not too much to complain about! Our breakfasts were part of our accommodation package and we ate at a very flash, slick restaurant just up the road from our apartment each day. Mouth watering omelets with smoked salmon one day and full English breakfast with roasted tomato, bacon, eggs, sausages, toast and baked beans the next, always washed down with fresh squeezed grapefruit juices and the ubiquitous power packed double espresso. If this wasn’t grand enough, our apartment service contact Helena had organized an alternative venue for breakfast on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day as our usual would be shut. She arranged for an open voucher at Prague’s newest and flashest hotel, “The Aria” for those days. My Dad would have been proud of both of us in this “pre-paid” heaven, as we partook of all the freshly cooked delights and pastries etc with great gusto and enjoyed our luxurious surrounds. After our liveried doorman eventually farewelled us, we were well fortified for another day’s adventure in the cold.
An interesting experience was a cruise on the river, which, while a terrific experience, was not the real highlight. The cheeky guide and commentator was cracking extremely funny jokes which no-one else on the boat seemed to get. He was a scream as he described what he saw as the government’s failure to build a super highway from Wenceslas Square, through the heart of the old town, across the river and through the mountain on the far side. We were rolling around laughing and he gave us a little wink, but most of the others on the boat seemed to be horrified as his deadpan delivery didn’t give much away. The great thing was that he didn’t dissuade them from their views and after a number of quips about knocking down old buildings and building skyscrapers he had stunned his audience to complete silence!
We had many other highlights, too many to mention. Suffice to say that Prague is a fairytale city, old buildings with ornate facades stretch from one end of the city to the other, down every back street and nook and cranny, the grand and famous buildings around the town square just the appetizer to a smorgasbord of architectural allure. When snow dusts the roofs and the streets its magical qualities are even further enhanced and buildings illuminated in the evenings just take your breath away.
As the taxi drove us over the hill of old Prague and out along the flat stretch before the airport, we were jolted back into some sense of reality as the intricate stonemasonry and quaint designs of houses gave way to communist era concrete blocks again, sterile and confronting, yet I had a tiny stab of pleasure as I noticed the graffiti on the sides of some: a little piece of creative expression that certainly would not have been tolerated before 1989.
We wondered how we would react to Paris after Prague. Had we been so well seduced by this city that Paris would pale in comparison? In just a couple of hours, we’d find out.