Have a dreary day!

pathetic fallacy

noun

the endowment of nature, inanimate objects, etc., with humantraits and feelings, as in the smiling skies; the angry sea.

Parenting Awards

Can you think of a word to describe a person who has the following thought process:

When Blogs Attack

Man, I love blogging.

But honestly, if there's one thing I love more than blogging, it's when people blog about me and don't even tell me! Especially when somebody challenges me to do something! How unfair is that?

Recently, on his blog, a scientist named Bruno

EPA: "Idling OK in Moderation"

The EPA recently banned vehicles for idling for over three minutes (story here). After reading this story, I couldn’t help but notice the many absurdities surrounding this new regulation.

The EPA openly admits that “Emissions from motor vehicles are the main source of air contaminants in urban areas and have a severe impact on air quality and public health,” yet at the same time is condoning

Swim Rage!

[Disclaimer: I swam competitively for almost 15 years, which means I'm used to swimming in a lane with maybe only 5 or 6 other people that swim around the same speed as me. Taiwan is the FIRST place I've ever swum by myself in a public pool during open swim hours.]

Here are some things I've learned about swimming in Taipei, mostly at Daan Sports Center. (Note that these observations have taken place at only 2 pools in Taipei, so please don't misconstrue this as a rant against any group of people.)

Zen ma ban?

"Zen ma ban?" or "怎麼辦" is a pretty common expression used in Taiwan, literally translated as "how to do?" As far as I've been told, it is basically a semi-rhetorical way to say "Now what?" or (with a cocked head and eyebrows and shoulders raised) "Welp, what can we do?" It is sometimes, in a way, implying that there isn't actually anything that can be done.

To flush, or not to flush?

***Disclaimer: If you are eating, I'd recommend checking back later. We're discussing bathroom etiquette today.

In many stalls in many bathrooms throughout Taiwan, there is a little trash can situated next to the toilet. It is apparently widely understood that, upon completing what we can refer to as "#2," the tissue should be placed in the trash can, and not flushed down the toilet.

(It's about to get graphic...)

This custom raises a lot of questions and crosses many, many moral boundaries. I understand the fear of clogging the pipes, but honestly, if what I just flushed can make it through the plumbing, then a little bit of wet paper should have no problem following it. I'm just sayin'.

And here's another thing: I don't want to smell, and I REALLY don't want to see the remnants of your business while I'm taking care of mine. It's a bit nauseating, to say the least. Along those same lines, Taiwan has some really interesting, greasy foods that sometimes don't agree with my stomach. Therefore, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that you also don't want to have to look at my very own oil-spill clean up efforts. It's just gross, and we'll leave it at that.

According to my ClustrMaps counter (which tracks where/when you people check my blog, so yes, I know there are more than 10), 79 viewers that are located in Taiwan have checked my blog in the past month and a half.

If you are one of those 50 people (because let's be honest, at least 30 of those views are from me), please continue reading:

When researching for this post, I stumbled across this Reuters article. If you aren't interested in clicking it, look here:

It's called "Flush so we don't blush, Taiwan city says," with {commentary from me!}

(Reuters) - A city in south Taiwan began training potty users this week to flush toilet paper instead of throwing it in the trash, to reduce 340 tonnes of stinky waste generated daily, local media and officials said on Tuesday. {Potty training?? Is the bowl so small that they need to practice their aim?}

"An old habit is to throw toilet paper in the trash can beside the toilet, which causes a major stink that's bad for public sanitation," city Environmental Protection Bureau Director Chang Hwang-jen told Reuters.

"Japanese and Western visitors {That's me!!} who come to Taiwan find this Taiwan toilet habit to be quite poor," she added.

Taiwan's plumbing can now handle toilet paper without clogging the pipes, a break from the past, the city of Tainan told its 764,000 citizens at a news conference {was the conference called for this reason only? because that's awesome} on Monday.

Leaders in other Taiwan cities haven't gotten off the pot on the issue, Chang said. {haha, I get it!}

Toilet sitters in Taiwan and China customarily target {implying they don't always hit it?} trash bins instead of the porcelain because of pipe backup worries. Clogged pipes in Tainan are caused by the flushing of other objects, such as toothbrushes, Chang said.

Sticking non-recyclable toilet paper in the trash also costs the city T$4,600 ($151) per tonne, or T$600 million per year, to treat, local media said. {that's basically like wiping your ass with dolla bills.}

This article is almost 2 years old, and I can assure you that not everyone has converted. This is my effort to spread the word.

Well, Taiwan. The ball is in your court, and the paper is in your hand. Where do you want to put it?

(and stop flushing toothbrushes down the toilet...)

Extended reading: http://www.poopreport.com/Techniques/good_ass_bad_ass.html

How's the weather?

The weather? In a word: wet.

In the month of May, the average precipitation for Taipei is 8.4 inches. That's over double what Port Jefferson gets (3.97 inches). Even PJ's rainiest month of the year is only 4.22 inches. For added comparison, the average rainfall for May in London is 1.86 inches, and in Seattle is 2.03 inches.

To be fair, it's not always May. With that being said, in a year, Taipei averages about 80 inches of rain to New York's 40. We're practically drowning over here!*

I read a poem to my class the other day about the 5 senses, which opened with the following lines:

Hear the winds blow,

See the blue skies.

After reading it first, I explain each line, then we get interactive with it.

Hear the winds blow, (have all of the kids blow and make wind noises.)

See the blue skies. (have all of the kids look outside at the ... uh oh.)

"Teacher John, the sky is white."

"Well, in some countries, they have blue skies."

If it's not raining in Taipei, it's probably cloudy. I used a phrase awhile back, "perma-fog," to describe how there's always a blanket of clouds hovering over northern Taiwan. The rain coupled with the almost rain can really create a dreary atmosphere sometimes. That's why whenever I see a ray of sunshine, I try to get outside as soon as possible.

In just over a week, I'm taking my 3 week vacation. I still have tentative plans to thoroughly explore the entire island of Taiwan. As I travel around, I'm also looking for a place to relocate to. I've heard that as soon as you leave Taipei County, the weather gets better the further south you. (Better weather = less extreme temperatures in the summer and winter, and a LOT less rain!)

So, world, how's the weather?

*some of the numbers I used were approximations from http://www.worldclimate.com and www.weather.com.

Obstacle Course

I'm not saying that Taiwanese people are completely oblivious to personal space/their surroundings, but they're somewhere between that and hyper-aware.

If you'd like, you can attribute some of this ranting to the fact that most of the situations happen in the morning on the way to work, so I might be a little cranky. My only argument is that it's not the only time of day it happens.

There are quite a few people that start their daily commute at around 8:00 AM, including myself. Living on the 23rd floor (out of a possible 24), I'm usually the first one on the elevator. I also usually plan for the elevator taking an extra 3 or 4 minutes to get to the 1st floor, since we stop. at. every. floor. on. the. way. down. Being the first one aboard the elevator, I inevitably end up in the back. This morning, as 1 of 7 passengers, I was the only one getting off on the 1st floor. The rest were waiting for B1, B2, or B3 to get to their vehicles. However, when the elevator stopped at the 1st floor, not a single person thought anyone would want to get off. Even as I tried to politely say "excuse me" and squeeze my way to the doors, everybody in the mirror-walled elevator pretended not to see or hear me. They were content with not pushing the "<||>" button and letting me join them in the basement. With a fair amount of force, I finally broke free from my corner and made it to the door just as it closed on my shoulders, then spit me out, and I stumbled outside.

I shook my head in disbelief the whole way to work as I dodged fellow pedestrians on the sidewalk. And when I say "sidewalk," I really mean "scooter parking area." The space between a row of parked scooters and the wall of a building is just big enough for an average sized person to fit. In Taiwan, these areas are used as pit stops so you can adjust your shoe, put up/down your umbrella, decide to suddenly start walking like a snail, or, my favorite, wait with 4 other people for your breakfast. Amazing.

Rainy days are the most interesting days because every single person has an umbrella. Just another thing to not be aware of how big it is or how it's going to affect other people around you.

On the bright side, walking to work wakes me up because it forces me to be alert and think outside the box for solutions to what seem like easy problems. I'm just sayin'...

[by the way... thanks for all the comment love! I think the joke was lost in translation, but I wasn't just fishing for responses or for you to say you miss me. I know you do! All 10 of you!!!]

Right of Passage

I think now that I've been here for over a year, I can start to vent some pet peeves and idiosyncrasies about Taiwan. Every place has them, and most probably aren't exclusively practiced in one place, so that makes it fair to point them out.

When navigating your way through Taipei's train/subway system, the "right of way" is granted exclusively to those pedestrians boarding the train/subway car. And in crowded Taipei, there are a lot of people trying to board trains. As soon as the car doors open, they simultaneously drop their shoulders and try squeeze through.

Here's the issue: You're heading into the city and Taipei Main Station is your stop. You and everybody else in the train are bunched together in a cluster at the door, they slide open and you're met by a frenzied group of juggernauts that have no regard for you, each other, or anything but the inside of that train. They can't put it together that the train passengers need to "alight" before they can get on. But they try to make it happen anyway.

So the typical situation is you standing in the doorway with nowhere to go. You are a stone in rapids, a rioter against a fire hose, Simba against stampeding wildebeests. Frozen in place, catching shoulder after shoulder to the chest until somebody realizes that if people get off, there will be more room on the train.

What may be even more obnoxious is that it also happens on a smaller scale. In my building, when I take the elevator down to the 1^st floor, where it's quite obvious that I'm getting off, I'm never surprised to be in a 1-on-1 battle with somebody who insists on getting in the elevator before I get out.



To be fair, I don't think everyone in Taiwan does this.