First trip back to US

I completed my first trip back to the US for some work (and a bit of fun as well)... it was interesting to pay attention to what it all felt like - being back in Portland, seeing friends, seeing the town, you name it.

We’ve only been in Taiwan for 6 months, but it was a surprise how much had already appeared to change around town - houses and buildings that weren’t there when we left  etc (though to be fair, neither Julia nor I were in Portland much after Labor Day, and when we were there, we were pretty pre-occupied with getting set to move).  But either way, it reminds me how much will be different after 3 years have passed.

I was on a regional jet for my LA to Portland flight, which I mention not because I’m a plane geek, (though I am), but rather to point out that I walked off the plane into the outside air - no jet bridges at PDX for those planes.  Even with the jet exhaust etc, I was amazed at how good the air felt, how clean, how fresh,  how breathable and how different it is from the air here in Taiwan. It’s a bit scary to realize that I’ve gotten accustomed to Taichung air - perhaps I’ve just thrashed my lungs into submission already?

It was a similar experience in drinking water straight from the tap, happily and eagerly.  Here in Taiwan, drinking from the tap probably won’t kill you, but it’s rare to see anyone do it - I think it’s reasonably ok in terms of microbes, they probably chlorinate the heck out of it, but who knows about the water mains to get it to the tap.  But more likely an issue is the high possibility of chemical pollutants - which gives me a bit of pause when it comes to local veggies as well.  I see the water running out the back of factories into the waterways that irrigate farm fields and rice paddies.  What could possibly go wrong there?

Numerous people have asked what I missed most about Portland and the US.  At the risk of sounding too Portlandia for my own good, this trip helped me answer that question.  Kale.   We can get stuff that they call kale here.... but it’s not comparable to any of the kale varieties you see commonly.  It’s much more closely akin to lettuce or something - who knows, maybe it’s got loads of vitamins and stuff, but it looks and feels like it’s got a nutritional value only slightly above iceberg lettuce, though it is greener and leafier.  So there you have it.

I did also notice the difference in the noise of the city - even downtown Portland is not as loud as Taichung.  Same with the vegetation and topography - it’s very green here, and we have mountains (when you can see them) but seeing Doug Firs and Mt Hood every time I turned around - *that* was nice.

Sunset this time of year is profoundly different between US and TW...granted there's no daylight saving time time change here in Taiwan, but even with that, this far south, summer's a whole different deal in terms of time of sunset.  The sun set here in Taiwan today at 6:37PM - a far cry from Portland sunset today at 8:45 - and it's almost a month until the Solstice.

We haven’t been here long enough for real homesickness to take hold I don’t think - there’s been too much to do and to learn - no time to really get into that funk so far.  But I did notice that I felt very much like coming back to Taichung felt like coming home. I cannot see us living here forever, but it’s very happily home for now.

More Little Guys....

.... why?  Why not!...  (and if you're just joining in, this should help explain what these photos are all about)

He totally digs this coffee, so you probably will too...

He's reminiscent of the Little Guy on the box of Quisp cereal, it might just be the propellor head, not sure... this giant ship building is the sales office for a yet to be constructed residential complex on the East side of town.

Directly across the street from the sales office is this billboard... man are you gonna have fun if you buy a place in this complex... well, I wouldn't cause clearly you cannot bicycle if you live there...

As these photos illustrate, the Little Guy often has a helmet, and cape, and occasionally even a rocket pack... this is a Changhua City sign listing local bike paths... Good to know that Changhua City has their own Little Guy...

A fine whine....

Here's an advertisement for a locally produced wine that caught my eye on a ride and I thought it would be cool to share.  The wine, however, is not cool -  I’ve had some (long story involving stop on bike ride outside a shop/restaurant and a guy smoking cigarettes, chewing betelnuts and drinking this wine, which by itself is a whole other post for another time)....  

Back to the wine, it’s kinda like grape juice with hints of Sterno or something...  But this billboard has an angle that I’ve never seen elsewhere in a wine ad, apparently touting their adherence to the ISO 22000 standard, which as best I can tell, is a ‘thing‘ here in Asia...Many ads tout various ISO certifications... not that there aren’t ads in the US or elsewhere that do, but outside of Asia it seems they’re generally confined to trade mags or more specific, narrowly drawn ads.  Taiwan, China and Thailand all have many signs and ads touting compliance with one ISO standard or another across all kinds of products/services.   

As for the wine, if this catches on, I can imagine a future review in Wine Spectator   “It’s got a wonderful bouquet, great legs, and hints of strawberry, kumquat, old shoe leather and Sterno with a delightfully piquant ISO 22000 finish”... but seriously, why do wine reviews never mention grapes amongst the various fruit tastes in a wine?  Just wondering.

...

Earthquake part 2

The first earthquake was almost subtle compared to today’s quake.  You can compare and contrast between videos (and if you haven’t seen the video of the earlier quake, I’ll point out that the chandelier in this video is the *good* one of the two in our apartment...and they came with the apartment, ok?)

This quake measured 6.1 it appears. It lasted longer and started with a series of up and down movements, followed by much stronger side to side motion.  I’m not sure what if any seismic dampening this building has, but it was vibrating like a tuning fork.  The chandelier and the building seemed to find some kind of harmonic resonance as the pendulum action of the light continued to grow long after the actual earthquake seemed to have stopped.  If I hadn’t stopped it, I got the sense that it would have continued swinging for many minutes.

Unfortunately it sounds as though there was at least one fatality, and a number of people injured.  I don’t know of any significant major infrastructure damage.  I think they’ve got a pretty strong set of seismic requirements for all buildings here.  I don’t know if they shut down the high speed rail to check out the tracks and other systems, but I did see trains screaming by as I was out riding my bike this afternoon, so if it was down for inspection it didn’t last too long. 

Make it....

....Funky!

Riding the roads of Taiwan, I often encounter funeral processions. It will be good to learn more about Taiwanese funeral traditions, because they’re obviously very different than in the US.  One thing I see regularly involves a truck with people playing drums and gongs.  Since I only hear them in passing, I don’t know if there’s a standard set of patterns/’songs’ that they play or not, but so far, most of what I’ve heard sounds cool, but pretty much the same and not too special to my ear.  But the other day, there was a funeral drum/gong truck I heard that had something that always catches my ear, no matter the kind of music - it gets called different things,  groove, pocket and even, at times FUNK.  If I hadn’t been on a divided road going the opposite direction, I would have been hard at work chasing this truck to hear more.  Sadly that wasn’t possible, but the snippet I heard was enough to make me imagine the conversation before they started to play went something like this....(but probably in Taiwanese, of course)

Well, that was fun....

First earthquake here in Taiwan... nothing too big, 5.6 or something I think.  There were plenty of earthquakes during my time in LA, and a few in Portland too, but I've never experienced one from the 22nd floor of a building.  Kinda cool sensation.

I identify with this more than I'd like to admit....

..... but I will try to redeem myself by pointing out that, fortunately, I identify with Goat too, not *just* Rat, as you might have been thinking.  This has precisely nothing to do with moving to Taiwan... I just stumbled across the scan of this strip on my computer and had to share.

Pearls Before Swine (blog), website with strip archive