Coming soon... to a medivac near you...

From bottom to top... on a street motorbike and a scooter... no roads and even less common sense... adventure awaits...




Trekking through the bamboo forests, where these machines were never meant to go.







Sliding around corners, ducking trees, jumping boulders and perilously balancing on cliff edges...

...Murphy's adventure...

... coming soon. 

Burnt bridges.

"The hardest thing to learn in life is which bridge to cross and which to burn."
- David Russell

It's time to start crossing and burning. I've quit my contract and my boss tried to extend it for me to make my life easier, can't be done. So, my "Honorary citizenship" will expire and I will be forced to leave the country. Or, I can surrender my "string free" vacation and sign with a school now and keep my "Citizenship"... not exactly a string free vacation, as it will involve a trip to a Taiwanese embassy that doesn't actually exist, but that's a whole new story.

Long of the short, I'm pretty happy.
I don;t really want to leave my job, just to be thrust into another, I want to see the world, and... I NEED a break. Just need a break. I've been feeling a little bit of burnout, not much, but a little here and there.

What a way to see the world! I get to go on a vacation in Asia, for an undisclosed amount of time, to almost anywhere I like, free of all time constraints. I can get an open ended ticket to and from Vietnam, so, if I venture out of Vietnam, I must remember to venture back to get home. This leaves me with the purpose of heading west to India and back, one hell of a long trip though, some air travel may help. Or, maybe I'll just spend a week in India and forget the rest of Asia. Come back to Taiwan, relax for a week, then start all over as I did 2 years ago, job hunting... but with experience.

My worst case scenario? Go home. Yep, if it all hits the toilet with a big splash, I get to spend time with my awesome family that I have so missed.

I have arranged to sell my bikes (temporarily), and my cash card works outside of Taiwan.

Nothing like burning bridges, with a parachute... just in case. However, I am as paranoid now as I was when I came here. I can't see anything preventing my best plan from working.

There's always China, always have wanted to do that... even for a little bit till I get Taiwan back in my sights. Wow, the possibilities are almost endless. I can't seem to come up with a worst case scenario here... If I'm just a little careful, things only seem to go up.

I know what my dad and Jay Leno would say about this...

To me, a week's vacation just means you're now a week behind."
- Jay Leno.

...however... a week behind whe you're unemployed is a week behind in nothing.

The cow flew over the moon when the stool ran away with the vaccuum.

Alright, I almost died, I swore in Chinese, and the Asian powers that be are trying to smite me for it.

Well, the powers that be, turned up my heat and have smitten my air conditioner. I had a man come to fix it, but he said that the 5 year life span on my air conditioner and passed 2 and a half times, damn good thing my a/c's Buhddist, Christians only get to live once. My conditioner's 13 years old. The cord that is supposed to be at 40 amps is running at 73 amps.

Anyways, he said it was dirty (the radiator part). I got my vaccuum out to suc the crap from between the plates, standing on the wooden stool that the fix-it man was on. CRASH! The folding stool folded before I was finished, should have inserted another quarter. I landed on my bed, and the stool punched the bottom out of my book case and punched a hole in my box spring... the air conditioner was still screwed.

It does "work". If you smack it around enough, the compressor will turn on. But, it will turn off in the middle of your sleep and your windows will be closed and the fan off, you will wake up in the solar inferno of a cooker where the blinds once shaded me from (we got rid of those blinds a month ago).

Next, in class on Tuesday, I swore... in Chinese... loudly.
"Cow" is a swear in Chinese if you say it in the same tone as English swears. I was describing 'suddenly'. When you are driving your motorbike at 100km/hour and a dog... no, a cow!!!... runs into the middle of the road and you shout COW!!! As you try to stop suddenly. It was an accident and the kids were in hysterics, I told them to not be so stupid. I meant a real cow, guess that's about as common here, as Palm and Bamboo trees falling on the road in Northern Sask. Whatever, go watch 'Lost in Translation'.

The powers that be decided to try to smitten me once more tonight with a Typhoon, but far out of season, I think something's up... maybe it's an ingenious attack from China.

Anna's back, had a wicked BBQ tonight. Ii want a Typhoon day tomorrow, but I'm living in the wrong county. I had an idea to change all the highway signs to the YuLin county (where the typhoon day is), but it's raining alot... guess I'll just go to work.

Raising anchors.

Well, I raised the anchor today, soon, the ship will have sailed. I had the final discussion with my boss... I'm leaving. So, we sorted out my classes, we managed to come up with a plan to merge all of my classes into other classes except for one (it's at full capacity). So, it looks like I have created a machine that no longer needs an operator as I am irreplaceable (as I like to think). So like all great ships, I hope the name emblazed upon this planning ship isn't Titanic. No, I hope this plan soars... but not like the Hindenburg did.

Anyways, I asked Keith about extra holidays this summer and he said no, that prettymuch cinched it. He said he'd help me find a new job and give me a great reference letter.

So, now I have the vacation I have dreamed of. Backpacking through Asia. I have money in the bank, and I will get my year end bonus. Asia is pretty cheap, outside of Philippines, Taiwan and Japan. I figure if I start in Hong Kong, I can work my way through China, Vietnam, Laos, Burma, India... possibly... "The Lumpy Koala"? I'll stop before Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Crooked Cops

I used to want to be a soldier and go to war, defend my country and kill all the bad guys. Maybe till I was 16 and then some...

Now, I'm terrified of being in the millitary.

I always thought of the Western world as upholding civil liberties and defending the defensless. When the "baddies" were wreaking havoc in WWII, North America came to the aid. Canada, even though it was not under attack, sent help over the seas to another continent. We didn't have to.

Now, I have seen what America had done with it's brave 'defending' force. Men and women with the braveness to lay themselves on the line in the name of a better world.

Alas, the time has come, a crisis has come, all the baddies have conspired upon the 'axis of evil', yes, all the little 'terrorists' have decided to use the western philosophy of Supply and Demand and sell their oil for what it's worth.

The troops are marched off into the battle, a battle that no one wants to be in, just so there is more petrol at the pumps and a lower price tag. Also, the public is not focused on the troubles at home, when we are causing much more havoc in the East.

It's sad that all of this bravery and heroism is wasted upon some black, Earth destroying filth.

Some argue that the 'defenders' have taken out evil governments, but Iraq has been 3 years and Afghanistan has been a little more and things haven't seemed to change much for the better. Luckily, these countries have oil intrests and hopefully, they will show some appreciation of these 'liberating' efforts, either thru generosity or force, I don't think the 'liberators' care which one.

So, if it truly is on the up and up, why has Africa barely been touched? Are diamonds really that worthless? There are powerful people in Africa that are up to less good than Afghanistan and Iraq, but I guess there's no Halliburton embassy in Africa, is there?

The last thing I'd want, is to stick out my neck for all the wrong reasons. I guess even the 'world police' have crooked cops.

Taking breaks.

My weekend.

Friday night was a blur at work, Mother's Day crap, so trying to do crafts with my kids... the young ones all came out unscathed, but my older writing class couldn't seem to figure anything out! Was glad to get home from work. Had dinner with a Taiwanese friend, cleaned my bathroom, played Xbox and went to bed.

Saturday, I got up at 10:00 and met up with Freda, a girl who moved to TaiJung. We went for lunch and then grabbed strawberries on shaved milk ice and went to the park at the art museum, then we checked out the museum. She left and I put new shocks on my bike and a new clutch in my scooter. I got some really cool custom shocks, had to modify my bike so they would fit, they did a good job, my shocks were shot and my back tyre was rubbing on the fender on the bumps. Then, I went shopping at Costco, had a Costco hotdog and went to bed.

Saturday, played baseball, it was great.
The ball went through Stu's legs and he missed an easy catch. He said, "that sucked!" Everyone agreed, but Stu was referring to the fact that in his recovery, he had stepped on his beer and there was none left and the inning had just started.
Me? Well, I was up to bat about 7 times, got 3 runs, hit the ball 5 times and twice, it was caught my the pitcher and I had smoked it hard. His pitching was ok, but he's got lightning in his glove.
I was in the outfield and the first 5 hits went straight to me, I only got two of them, the inning was over. Next inning, the first hit was straight to me so I asked one of the better players to just come stand next to me so we can win this bloody game as I'm some magical incompetent ball magnet.
The next inning, one went past 3rd base and to me, as it so happened, Jaco had called my cell cause he might come out to play. Well, third base missed it and I was next, I dropped my phone to cathc the ball, it went through my legs and as I turned to chase it, I stepped on my phone. I love Nokia, made from pure Kevlar.
Phil slid into second base and broke his arm, so someone took him to the hospital. When he came back, he said he had, "a radial fracture of his radius." So, he's out for 6 weeks.

Tonight, I had a BBQ with Jam, Ady, and Paul from Toronto (the guy who invited me to Xiao Lui Chiu Island). Went all out, Shishkebabs with Cherry tomatoes, red peppers, sausages, we had blue cheese salad with croutons (toast busted up) and we had steak... that will NEVER get old. I bought some mangoes for dessert.

Oh yeah, it started to rain before the baseball game, so we got drunk waiting to see what would happen... we still won the game, 14-12. Also, I have blisters on my hands and feet. Great day!

Tumbling through life.

My week has developed into a fantastic tumble of not not knowing which way is up.

Friday night was booked to have a BBQ with Paul (Vancouver) but stuff happened and we didn't get together 'till about 11:30PM. He was going to Thailand on Saturday morning, so we decided to have a goodbye get together (he was going for a whole ten days!!! ...any excuse works, right?). Well, I went to his place with some beer, vodka and orange, he had about 100 cans scattered in his kitchen from various get togethers from days past as well as roommate functions. We drank some beer, got hungry, walked to the 24 hour grocery store for some pizzas, sausages and some chicken curry rice corndog things... don't ever try the corndog things! Even without the chicken PASTE and the rice outer bit and the crappy covering, they were terrible, not even bad, but terrible! Luckily, we had the sense to buy way too much. We watched Cinderella man... wow, what a slow movie! We fried up the food, added cheese to EVERYTHING and ate most of it. I got home at 9am and phoned Jaco to tell him I wouldn't fly today.
I had a BBQ on Saturday, Jaco said he'd come, and he'd drag his beautiful girlfriend over. Well, guys will eat meat and nothing else is fine, but women like the greens. I decided to try to make some Shish-kebabs, I bought some peppers, tiny tomatoes, mushrooms and some sausages. Bought some funky lettuce for a salad, potatoes and steak. I made some wicked kebabs, a great salad with some croutons and cheese, baked the potatoes and some garlic toast. I watched the steaks like a hawk... until I was showing Jaco some stuff on my computer...
I took the steaks off the grill and asked Jaco how he liked his steak. He said it was kind of late to be asking, I told him he should still answer the question. He said medium so I gave him the really well done one and kept the burnt one. Stupid me, leave it for 5 minutes and you get a grill fire. Anyways, I grabbed the other steak from the fridge and threw it on.
Jaco's girlfriend wasn't coming till later, so we chatted for a bit and had a good time. She came and then Rory, a crazy fun guy from flying, called so we invited him over, too. They had some kebabs and some beer and Jaco's girlfriend went home and the boys went to the bar.
Wow, we had fun, I got home at about 4am.
Sunday? I backed up and reinstalled Jaco's computer. Six hours of waiting, I got to see some of his pictures from South Africa (a beautiful place) and some from when he was in the Parachute military in S.A.
Sheri, thank you. I used your talent of incompetence. We didn't know the user name or password for Jaco's internet, so his girlfriend (Taiwanese) called the internet people. They told us we had to go to 7-11 and fax a letter and our phone bill to the company to reset the password. Whenever I get into trouble... I ask myself... "What would Sheri do?" My sister Sheri has this magic ability to get things done, against all policies. So, I called the internet company.

Recorded Chinese answering services are no match for the 'Brother of Sheri', I just kept hitting buttons until I heard the "hold music". I was told this would never work, as they don't speak English. A guy answered the phone and I asked if he spoke English, "Sure I do." So, with that, he told me to go to 7-11 to fax my bill. I decided that I didn't know where a 7-11 was and that "it's so far away." So, out come the verification questions.
"Where are you?"
"In my home."
"Where is your home?"
"In YoChang area."
At this point, Jaco's girlfriend offered to say our address, the illusion of incompetence would then be revealed, can't do.
"Do you know what road?"
"Ummm, it's in Chinese."
"Ok, sir, just a moment."
"What would you like your new password to be?"
Finished. Thank you Sheri, the only girl who can get a phone line hooked up on the same day when there is a 6 week waiting list... "Ummm... hello?... Ummm, my phone is broken... it was working last year in my old place... number? Ummm, I don't know my number.... today? Ummm.... ok, thanks, teehee!"

Monday, I went to bed at 4am, got up at 9am to pick Anna up from the train station. She's a friend of Michelle's, I said I'd help her out. I worked and came home, taught her how to drive a scooter, we went for a walk at the Lion Temple (with the little lake and the hill) and then home. She went to bed at 11:30 and I started my computer. I fell asleep, woke, opened my internet, fell asleep, went to gmail, fell asleep, woke, realized that I typed it wrong, turned off my computer and went to bed, didn't even check my mail.
I was teaching "never" in class and my Jerry said "not never, neever, long e" I told him that English was crazy and thet he was sort of right, just not today. The sentence was, "I have never been to England." I told my students that I actually have never been to England. "Why, teacher?" "I don't know why, have you ever been to England?" "No." was their response. "So, I don't know why I have never been to England, I just haven't."
Jerry stood up, "I know why, teacher."
"Why?"
"Because they don't know how to spell."
This is not exaggerated or made up.

Tuesday, bed by 11:45 and slept 'till 2pm, teachers meeting at 3. Worked, one of my student's gave me a Mother's Day rose... WTF?!?!?! Whatever, it was a nice gesture. After work, dinner at a Thai place and then to bed.

Today... woke up at 6am to a broken air conditioner and a bedroom thermometer at 30C (85F) and sweating. Remember the blinds I took down? The sun was in my room, too. So, I'm STILL up. After punching the air conditioner in the "sweet spot" it seems to have come back. Time to hit Subway for a sandwich and go to work.

So, my week feels like I've been flying through the air in this crazy and fun tumble, never knowing what direction I'm headed. Anna leaves for a greener job market (Taipei, why? I have no idea.) after 2 days in Kaohsiung. Paul is gone for the week, and I think this tumble may straighten out soon.

Holy Cow Roe!

I bought my 'Cow Roe De DiFang' or 'BBQ thing'.

I've been wanting a BBQ for a while, tired of rice, not satisfied with the 'Western' food here and can't afford the truly great. I decided to buy a BBQ, I asked some of the guys from ball about BBQ's in Taiwan. They said B&Q (Home Depot.tw) was the only place around for gas BBQ's. I was online and ivited Jaco over for a BBQ, as soon as I went to get it. Sure!

I raced off to B&Q and the only ones they had were about 4 times what I wanted to spend. Special order from Taipei, arrives on Wednesday. Crap, pan fried. Went to Dollars to buy some sides and stuff, got home 5 minutes late to find Jaco waiting. Then I asked him for the meat he was going to bring, he politely pointed out my illiteracy as I reviewed our chat on MSN. We ran to Dollars to get meat, beacause I can't bloody read and it was my job to get the meat.

I marinated the steaks in beer and steak spice, pan fried 'em, made instant mashed potatoes, a funky salad (it wasn't lettuce, I knew that when I bought it, it was better, still don't know what the leafeys were, but I added some tomatoes and a blue cheese dressing) and buttered super thick toast. It was pretty good, but... pan fried? It beat the crap out of going out. Watched some Jackass movie and he went home.

Tonight, I went to pick up my BBQ. Hmmm.... now, I'm standing in the parking lot with a huge BBQ and my scooter... I thought to myself... when in Rome... what would a Taiwanese person do??? ... I know, bring a car! ...no got... ...second option? ...I've got ONE bungie cord under my seat! According to Taiwanese custom, that is one more bungie than what is required to transport a BBQ on a scooter!!! So, I strapped it on and headed to the propane shop (no, B&Q can't sell propane tanks, that would be too easy). I pulled up to one of these fancy motorcycles with propane racks on the back in front of the shop. Told them what I want (10Kg prop tank) that fits the nozzle in the box on my bike. They opened the box and tested the nozzel. Needed a different tank, but they had one.
They got my address so they could deliver a refill when I needed it. I went to toss the BBQ on my bike and get the tank, but he kindly offered to take them both for me. He drives faster than I do and he's set to blow!

My BBQ is set up on my balcony and my steak was great!

I'm debating skipping town or flying and BBQing this weekend.

Skip town: Go to TaiJung to see a couple friends.
Stay here: Fly on Saturday, fix a computer, have a bbq, sleep in on Sunday, play baseball, have another BBQ, go to bed.

Since I really have nowhere to go, I might stay here.

ISO SWM seeks WEEK VAC

I need a vacation or a new job. Just getting stressed out, feeling like weight is upon my chest, waiting for the weekend.

Nothing in particular, Keith and Andy have been in my classes lately, it was my birthday, student report cards were due on Friday (finished them tonight with the other teachers cause we only got a weeks notice as Keith never told anyone), my afternoon class wrote their Level 3 final test on Thursday, we all went to the zoo on Friday, it rained, so we went to the science center instead... they were actually well behaved!

My core temperature is closing in on meltdown. Luckily, most of the crap's done. I have a meeting with Andy tomorrow to discuss the class he watched. I keep worrying about my job, but I can't see them taking it from me. I have the golden triangle appeased... almost. The parents are happy, I haven't lost any kids, my kids worship me, testing? My afternoon kids all passed their level 2 tests, my other classes aren't perfect, but I think they're good now.

I've put my feelers out again for employment oppurtunities, just listening, not actually looking. I think I have a couple of good oppurtunities if things fall out. Still, I love my kids, my books, my school and most things about my school...

...a week off? To do what? Who knows? Just a week off...
... last ditch effort, tell my boss I don't want to stay on next year, then he'll leave me alone till my contract expires in July... but then I'm in the same boat.