Thematic Disunity

Learning Chinese is a big and actually fun challenge. It’s a tonal language, so that’s almost totally foreign vs English. While it adds that rather large hurdle right off the bat, on the plus side, it is devoid of verb conjugations and so far, grammar is pretty straightforward as well.  Word order in sentences generally tracks with English with only a few exceptions.   I’m able to function in an extremely (and I mean extremely) rudimentary fashion for some simple shop transactions, taxi rides etc.  We had a bit of a gap in our classes as we switched teachers. Our first teacher was ok as a teacher, just not so good as watch/alarm clock user.   The new teacher is far more punctual and a great teacher to boot. As a result of the switch in teachers, we started using an updated edition of the book we were using with teacher number 1.  The new book is a great change - easier to use, more clearly laid out and all around better.  Though we’ve barely scratched the surface and have so, so much more to learn, it feels like we’re on a good track. 

From language to bicycles and mountains....

I just did my first bike race in Taiwan - it was a hill climb.  In the US, most of those that I’ve seen or raced are basically uphill time trials.  That is, riders starting individually and racing against the clock essentially. Though you are on course with other riders, it’s usually spaced out to some degree.  Yesterday's race had a helpful abundance of people up the road ahead of me to chase. The race here was sort of a hybrid - mass start, race if you want, or simply participate for completion if you prefer.  The start is in age group waves to ease the crush of the 1800 people participating, but timed individually via a chip in the race number, so though one could start many minutes after others, you were timed based on when you crossed the start line (basically like most mass start running races these days - love that technology).  

It is a gargantuan climb - we started around 500M of elevation and 56Km later we finished at 3275M...I was pleased to finish 3rd in my age group as best I can see (I was registered in error in a different age category than I actually fall under), but in any case, I’m happy with how I rode regardless of where I finished.   Julia and I drove up this road back in April, and got some photos in the fog/haze, and they hardly do it justice, but here's the best of them, just to give you a taste for this mountain.  It's well above tree line and in the winter it can be snowed in up here - giving a marked contrast to the subtropical jungles below.

This photo was taken from about 3Km from the top, the road is on the diagonal cut visible on the far hill.  Finish line is in the saddle visible just about center of picture, just to the left of the clouds obscuring the peak.

Yesterday it was crystal clear as I was climbing, and the views were so good, I *almost* stopped to take some photos, but decided against it. Sadly it was all clouded over coming back down, so no dice for good photos then.  Speaking of stopping along the way on the climb, there were several riders I saw stopped by the side of the road taking a smoke break.  Maybe these guys were more participant than serious racer types - who knows, but in any case it’s a bit surreal to see a guy all kitted out, with an expensive race bike, stopped by the road taking a big drag on a cigarette....

And, for more thematic disunity, here’s a set of basically unrelated photos, to give a bit more of a glimpse of our world here...

This seems to be some kind of admonition against chopping your coworker's arm off, but I could be wrong about that.

I get the sense that the water drops on the left and right aren't confident swimmers.  Middle guy enjoys a dip more I think...

A pretty standard view on my rides around the area... these are actually small mountains compared to many nearby!

Down the block from our apartment.

This is a taken from a park near our apartment. The block where the park sits was supposed to be a convention center, they began construction excavation, and for some reason funding vanished, so they were left with a giant hole.  I've been told that they city held a design competition to decide what to do with said hole and this sunken park with a big pond was the result.  It's got nice walking paths and a teahouse/cafe.  The typhoon back in July raised the water level in the little lake by a considerable margin.