Formosa: "Beautiful Island"

Hey! Good to see you again. Thanks for stopping in again. I know, I know......lazy blogging. I'll do better, I promise. Ok, so here we are with a new set of pics and some fun (for us to tell, at least) stories. Before we get started, however, here are some fun facts about Taiwan:

1. Pepsi’s slogan “Come Alive with the Pepsi Generation” translated onto Taiwan’s billboards as “Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the dead.”

2. Taipei is the second most densely populated city in the world (second to Bangladesh).

3. Taiwan is home to just over 23 million people and has 1 scooter for every 2.3 people (that's a lot of scooters!)

4. The year 2006 is the year 95 in Taiwan.

5. The Postal museum in Taipei is the largest museum of it's kind in the world (6 storeys showcasing around 80,000 stamp specimens from over 120 countries and more postal memorabilia). Taipei is also the home of such curious museums as the transportation museum, the museum of drinking water, and the paper museum.

6. Taipei is home to the world's tallest building "Taipei 101," and this building, interestingly, houses the world's fastest elevator (they can move 24 passengers up at a speed of 1,010 meters per minute (about 60 km/h).

Now wasn't that fun? Ok, now where were we.....I think we had just gotten back from Cambodia. So, upon returning home from our trip, we jumped in whole-heartedly into teaching. Ellen started by developing a science summer camp at an American school in Taipei called "Happy Kids," and Rube began teaching at Hess (the largest cram school in Taiwan). We will break it down for you a little later, but the main idea here is that Ellen, for the month of July, was working upwords of 50 hours a week and Rube was working at a school that was his definition of "teacher's hell." Here are some photos from our teaching exploits (the kids having fun and smiling are Ellen's students and the kids not smiling in a sterile, drab room are Rube's students).













































Ok, so Rube has one picture with smiling students. But he had to bribe them with candy to smile.


It became apparent to us, entering into the working world, that our recreation/travel opportunities would be rather limited. So we turned into full-fledged weekend warriors.

Here, for example is a picture from Yang ming san (bright sun mountain) national park. Yang ming san Park is just 30 minutes from Taipei and is a haven for outdoor pursuits. Here, we hiked up a mountain called Cisingsan (seven stars mountain) and the view was pretty darn good. This is a view from Cisingsan looking south toward Taipei.







This is a picture of the two of us on the top of Cisingsan. It was a bright, sunny, hot day. A bit cooler on the top, a lot breezier, and the sun bore down on us fiercely (Ellen's bright red shoulders tell a tale of a tree-less climb and a tank-top).










And here we are looking northeast. The town you see in the distance is the town of Jinshan a small town on the north coast of Taiwan.












On July 21, Ellen's good friend from forever, Melissa, came to Taipei for a short visit. It was really nice for Rube to finally get a chance to meet her and for Ellen to spend some time with one of her favorite people. While Melissa was with us, we explored Taipei and went on a trip to Wulai, a town about 45minutes south of Taipei.

Melissa is a phenomenal photographer and here she is loading more film for some more photos. This here is famous Wulai Falls. We spent quite a while admiring it's beauty and then took a gondola to the top of the falls where there is a fun park. There, we took advantage of a swimming pool filled with mountain spring water (chilly).








The view from atop Wulai Falls. Pretty.


Alright, so enough about our recreation time.....more about real life stuff - our everyday issues - the true nitty gritty. So Ellen was hired to develop and implement a curriculum for a science summer camp for 1st and 2nd graders that was to last for the month of July. She was also given zero orientation with the new school, zero guidance as to student's English proficiency levels, zero assistance with resources available and wholly inadequate preparation time in which to accomplish her goals. Pretty tricky, huh? Well, to top it off, her "1st and 2nd" graders really turned out to have English ability more in the range of Kindergarden to 3rd grade. That's a pretty hard age range to teach to, particularly when the subject is science. To add insult to injury, on top of the full time work load at her summer camp, Ellen also teaches adults conversational English for two hours every Tues. and Thurs. nights and took Chinese lessons for two hours every Mon., Wed. and Fri. Whew! That's one busy month!

Ellen's summer camp ended at the end of July. Her regular school year after-school teaching gig didn't start until August 14th. Therefore, she had 2 weeks to relax and recharge before starting right back up. Now, before we get into Rube's employment saga, let's just say that Rube just happened to have some free time between August 6th and August 14th too. Therefore, more fun and recreation.

"What the heck is Ellen doing?" is a question you may be asking yourself right now. Well, quite simply, she is pointing in your general direction. She is standing on the southernmost tip of Taiwan pointing across the Pacific Ocean to beautiful America where our friends and family are far, but not far from our hearts and thoughts. As a fun adventure, the two of us took a trip to an area known as the Kenting National Forest.




















Kenting National Forest occupies the southern tip of Taiwan and is one of the top travel destinations in Taiwan due to its favorable climate, its plethora of hiking opportunities, its magnificent diving appeal and spectacular scenery. There are few major roads in the area and no form of public transport to get around, therefore, to properly tour around Kenting, one must rent a scooter. So that's what we did. Below, you will see a picture of Rube aboard "Harold" our trusty steed for the week.



We did some great hikes in Kenting and took a wonderful scenic drive around the entire National Forest area from the interior mountains to the beaches. We didn't have perfect weather (a typhoon actually threatened the area briefly) but we made the best of it.

A hike through Kenting Recreational Area took us through caves, crypts, and crevices. And look at this little critter. Kenting turned out to be a great place to check out wildlife as lizards, insects, crabs, snakes and other critters abound.







This is a photo from the southern tip of the island. It was a beautiful and peaceful spot.






















From the southern tip of the island we continued our tour of the area and drove north up the east coast of Taiwan until we got to a small town named Jialeshui. There, we explored the unusual eroded rock formations along the coast. It felt like we were on the surface of the moon. It was a fun to scamper among the crazy rocks and watch the waves crash against the towering, rugged sea cliffs.























From Jialeshui, we headed west across the island toward our homebase in the city of Kenting. We were fortunate to be in town for a special traditional celebration that was to take place in the evening. In the town of Hengchun (15 minutes from our hotel) they were holding a very special Ghost Month celebration. A woman at the visitor's center tried to explain the premise to us, but her English wasn't very good and our Chinese isn't very good, but you definitely have to see it to believe it.


So here's the set up. They have this huge apparatus that consists of four huge posts and a platform on the top. The four main posts are greased with a thick layer of something (didn't ask, don't wanna know). There are four teams comprised of about twelve men each and they race to the top of these greased posts. It was truly bizarre and truly wonderful.




















The following day we awoke and ventured to find a hike that was supposed to lead to a beautiful waterfall. So we staked out and battled the rain and the wind and somehow found the trailhead despite the lack of English signage. The hike took us through amazingly beautiful forests and crisscrossed a river many times and allowed us to view tons of mini waterfalls along the way.



















Ropes were strategically placed to assist in river crossings and in some places, we were practically climbing the ropes in order to scale the waterfalls. It was a highly rewarding hike and the scenery was spectacular.

We finished up our Kenting vacation by visiting the National Museum of Marine Biology. The day had become increasingly rainy, so the museum (aquarium really) was a great respite from the rain. It is a good aquarium, but not a mind-blowing experience. We are big fans of the Monterey Bay Aquarium in Californina, so perhaps our expectations are a bit lofty.

Our trip to Kenting was a really great opportunity to see different parts of Taiwan and get out of the city and breathe clean, forested air. Wonderful!