Some Observations

Just some random thoughts:

My watch is still set to Greenwich Mean Time. I can't change it just yet...give me a couple more days and necessity will probably force me to reset it.

Y'all know I got a haircut yesterday; I really look like a Taiwanese girl now. Their hairstyles...how do you explain it...if their hair is medium length or long, it seems like the hair all end in a point. The ends are thinner, wispier, like if you take the shape of the hair, it looks like an upside down raindrop. My ends are quite wispy now and she took off several inches. It doesn't look bad, just different. The hairdresser took a comb with a razor attached at the base of the teeth and basically brushed/shaved the ends of my hair. Afterwards, she said, 'There. Doesn't that look nicer? It doesn't look so heavy now.' Thanks, but I liked my hair more when it was that thick and longer. Oh well, at least it wasn't an ugly haircut. She also cut a thicker fringe (bangs) for me.

My auntie keeps saying, 'Now that she's back [in Taiwan], we have to make her prettier.' You sayin' I wasn't pretty before?! (What she meant is that while living outside of Taiwan, I don't take as much care of myself (or so she thinks). I'm just not that frivolous and plus, it's not that cheap to do all these 'beauty treatment' stuff! *Sigh & frown*)

Everyone who's seen me has said, 'Oh, you haven't changed that much. You're just grown up now!' They've also commented on my colouring: 'You're so dark!' or 'How come your face is so dark??' Um, yeah. Does everyone have to say that? It's not fashionable to be so dark over here, obviously. Everyone wants to be fair, like Caucasians, while in the West, we all want to be dark. How topsy turvy.

I was discussing names with my cousin Ray and Yi Ming today. In Western cultures, a cousin is a cousin is a cousin and it doesn't matter which side of the family they're from. In Chinese/Taiwanese culture, we have different names for everyone. My paternal and maternal cousins have different names, which are further differentiated by age (relative to myself). My paternal and maternal aunts and uncles have different names as well, which are then differentiated by age relative to my parents. It's quite funny how different everything is. For example: in the West, one wouldn't call one's in-laws 'mom' or 'dad'. On the other hand, my mother calls both her mother and her mother-in-law 'ma'; you'd just call them by their names. The same idea goes with her father-in-law. Here, it's a matter of being polite, especially to one's elders. People would be horrified if a daughter- or son-in-law went around calling their in-laws by their names - the scandal! Haha.

I still feel a bit lost. My Taiwanese and Chinese is a lot better than I expected though; Yi Ming said the same thing. It's just certain phrases I don't know how to say, which I'd normally fill in with English. I feel like so much flotsam floating around. At least I found CNN International on channel 5. I don't have to work so hard to understand the news when I watch that (phew) and it keeps me abreast of all the sports news, like American football. There is ESPN here and I did watch a bit of the Balitmore Ravens and Denver Broncos game - good 4th quarter.

The brightest moment of my entire day was when I was in the car with Ray and Yi Ming and we were discussing how much it is for an apartment around Taipei. In the city itself will, of course, be quite pricey but it wouldn't be hard to find a nice, decent one-bedroom nearby for just over NT$10,000. That's only about £162, or US$300; I was paying £350 in Cambridge! That totally makes everything feel more attainable. I can't wait to have my own place, my own space. Knowing that makes me feel better.

Want to know a secret? Well, I guess it's not much of a secret if I post it on here but oh well. The first night I got here, when I was falling asleep, my last thought was, 'I don't think I can do this.' We'll see. That's a line from The Lord of the Rings, The Return of the King. When Frodo and Sam are almost to Mount Doom, Frodo turns to Sam and says in his quasi-English accent, 'I can't do this, Sam.' Sam then says, 'I can't carry the Ring for you Mister Frodo, but I can carry you!' That made me laugh.