First week in Hualien

I made it through my first week in Hualien! It's been fun, but very hot and the bugs here thirst for my blood unceasingly. This is a picture of a banana tree, and you cant really tell, but right across the street is the Owl Preschool where I live.

Everynight there is a night market. It's only about a 3 minute bike ride from the preschool. They sell food there, and it feels a lot like a carnival. Most of the food I'm not ready to try yet, but this stand sold pizza, so I was ok with that. It's kind of hard to order because everything is in Mandarin, but with a bunch of pointing, you can pretty much order what you want. There is also a fruit/smoothie stand I really like going to. They have a menu in english! And the fruit here is amazing!

On Friday we went to an aborigine festival. It was really cool, there was lots of food, cool costumes and dancing. This lady was really happy to get a picture with Americans. Lots of people here want to talk to Americans. A lot of times, instead of saying, "Nice to meet you," they will say, "Nice to see you."

 

This was one of the things I tried at the festival. It's tomatos covered in pretty much just plain sugar. The sugar was hard and was a bit too sweet for me. 



Before Japan overtook Taiwan, it was actually called Formosa. There was a bunch of dancing at the festival which I didn't really understand. And the people I was with didn't know much about it either, but it was cool to watch.



Saturday, I set out and found the ocean! It was actually pretty easy. Hualien is like the opposite of Utah. Instead of having mountains on the East, they have them on the West, and I knew that if I went East enough, there would be an ocean. Here's my bike also. It's rather rusty, but works just fine, except for the brakes are kind of sketchy. 

This is known as a sea termite. They were everywhere on the rocks by the ocean.



On the way back from the ocean was the most random thing ever. Fireworks were going and this parade was going through the middle of the street. It was pretty long too. Some of the people around us tried to explain what was going on, but I couldn't understand their english. Apparently this kind of thing happens a lot.

 Other than the heat, bug bites and difficulty in finding normal food, I like it here in Taiwan. The people are very friendly and a lot of them speak english. This weekend it's been raining, which I like cuz it makes it cooler. And it doesn't make that much of a difference because in rain or shine I'm still just as wet. It's just a matter of whether it's rain water, or sweat.