Contrast, Courage, Adversity and Overcoming - Day 2

 I am currently writing this post at 11:45 p.m. If I waited for tomorrow, I would get an angry phone call from my mom, so it's best to avoid her wrath.

This was our first full day in Taiwan, and my dad wanted to kick things off with a bang and play disc golf. The Fieldhouse family has this "tradition" in disc golf where we try to play it everywhere that we travel, so of course we had to bring our discs and play in Taiwan (the first country outside America that we've gotten a chance to play in). So, naturally, we had to wake up early to get our free breakfast and travel fast to beat the sun. The joke was on us, the sun always wins. Always. Remember that if you ever want to travel to Taiwan. 

A lot happened today, so during dinner, my dad and I broke the day up into 4 categories: contrast, courage, adversity, and overcoming. It was kind of like I was preparing to write an amazing essay about the day (thanks, Mrs. Brewer!).

CONTRAST:

Taiwan is extremely busy, especially on the metro, but it is the most orderly place I've ever seen. Everyone waits for the train in a line instead of a big blob, people who want to stand on the escalators stay to the right while people who want to walk up the escalators walk to the left. 

There are many short Asian people and very few tall, white people, so we get a lot of stares. We wanted to be like the locals and travel around on foot, so we didn't see any other white people until the sun went down because they were too cowardly (or wise, depending on how you look at it) to brave the heat.

Despite there being very few street lights, we've never felt unsafe. Unlike our home in good old B-town where my parents won't let me walk to get a slurpee from 7/11 down the street, even if it's in the afternoon.

Taiwan has lots and lots of shops that are all crowded next to each other on the streets. Some look like they could be over 50 years old and some look like they were built earlier this year, so you get a little whiplash walking down the street.

COURAGE:

My dad and I took an Uber for the first time ever, which was a huge risk because we can't read anything but English, so the signs in his car could have been from previous clients warning people that he was a serial killer.

We braved the heat and humidity for about 4 hours while we were walking around the city. California has nothing on Taiwan's humidity.

Food. My dad and I are not adventurous eaters, which is a bit of a problem when you fly to a country that doesn't label anything in English and seems allergic to anything remotely American except McDonald's. Guess what we got for lunch? McDonald's. We entertained the idea of eating like the locals and trying a squid BigMac, but it was quickly squashed. For dinner, my dad and I went to a night market, which are supposedly very popular in Taiwan. It was... interesting to say the least. But more on that later. I don't know what we expected to get for dinner, because every time we go out to eat my dad always gets a hamburger so he doesn't have a very diverse palate. I, on the other hand, am terrified of food poisoning so I'm very hesitant of eating any meat prepared by someone that doesn't have a sanitary environment to make the food or wearing gloves. We ended up buying nothing from any of the vendors and instead went into 7/11 and bought some Green Curry and Beef Cup of Noodles and some sodas. This is very courageous, because I had to eat with chopsticks and had never had Mountain Dew before, and the Cup of Noodles were two brand new flavors we had never tried.

ADVERSITY:

Figuring out how to order an Uber and have it pick you up and drop you off at addresses in a completely different language.

Mom bugging us every 10 minutes to take more pictures. Seriously, mom? We're doing our best!

TRASH CANS. Who knew that trash cans were so hard to find in Taiwan?? It's really weird because the streets are spotless but there isn't anywhere to throw your trash, so I guess the locals just drop it into another dimension or something. 

Overall, though, not too many things. Us Fieldhouses are good at adapting and overcoming. Speaking of overcoming...

OVERCOMING:

Navigation. Apparently there's a feature in Google Maps that likes to surprise you with which language it will decide to use each time we open the app, and it loves to assume that we flew a car all the way to Taiwan. Dad wants me to say that it's a good thing he's good with directions, but in reality, he barely knows how to open Google Maps so I was the one in charge of navigation, booking an Uber, and everything in between. Also, try navigating a metro system with a map that is completely in another language.

ATMs. We walked around for about 20 minutes this morning going through stores to look for ATMs to get some TWDs, but none of them took our card or spoke English. We finally found one in a hidden 7/11 that I bookmarked on Google Maps.

Language barriers. Many times today people spoke to us as if they thought we knew what they were saying. We just smile and nod. I wonder what about us makes it seem like we know what they're saying... I mean, we're the most American Americans ever to exist. We don't even know what language they're speaking (Chinese? Mandarin? Taiwanese? Is that even a language?), much less what they're saying to us. But fake it 'til you make it, right? It's a good thing we both have Google Translate.

Knives. I have yet to see a knife in Taiwan so far, so this morning I had to use a fork to spread jelly on our toast and dad made fun of me for it.

Pronunciation. We try saying each word 3 to 4 times with all of their misplaced or missing vowels. We're practically bilingual now. #nailedit

Here are some surprises and other random details about our day:

- We tried to get boba after we went disc golfing in the morning, but the boba wasn't ready, so we just got iced tea. It was AMAZING. 

- We've noticed that there aren't any buttons at crosswalks. You just have to wait your turn with everyone else. 

- Taiwan knows how to blast the air conditioning. It's very impressive, actually. My dad should take notes (he's very frugal with the air conditioning at our house).

- There are tens of thousands of scooters. The locals like to play a game called "How Many People Can We Fit On This Scooter". The most I've seen is 6. They've become so common that it's weird seeing a car.

- There was a pit toilet in one of the shops that we went in and the light didn't work inside the bathroom, so my dad had to squad and aim blindly.

- Eating with chopsticks takes a really, really, really long time. 

- The night market smelled like a cross between feces and wet dog, encouraged gambling games for young children, and cooked sea animals alive. It was definitely a culture shock and not something that I particularly enjoyed.

- Taiwanese people are very aggressive. They have a one-track mind: to get where they need to be. They are not afraid to shove past you if you are walking too slow for them.

Thus concludes day two in Taiwan. :)