A Guest!!

My brother Patrick's coming to visit! He arrives on Saturday, I can't wait! This semester has been intense since I decided to take an intensive Mandarin course in addition to my masters program. I've been studying Chinese 3 hours a day, then most evenings I go to class for 3 hours of my masters' courses. I also have weekend classes, some weeks I have school 6 or 7 days a week. It's a fulltime job. And I realize I've forgotten this beautiful city! I'm either studying, or feeling like I should be studying, so it's a rare occasion that I go for a joy walk or try something new. I'm so excited for Pat to come, not only to see him, but with him here I'll get to see and explore Taiwan with newcomer-eyes. And just to have family here! I missed family... It'll be great!

I can't wait to see Patrick's reaction to things. He's my older bro by 22 months. He's been in China for the last three weeks, so I think he'll be broken in a bit before he arrives. Taiwan is heaven after China! All of a sudden, there's Dunkin Donuts, and other establishments you wouldn't dream of visiting in your home country, but recognizing the food (a donut!) or being able to read a menu is such an achievement, you just feel so happy and relieved to see something familiar.

I've become used to Taipei. Most of the time I don't feel like a foreigner; I don't hear the garbage truck playing fur elise every night even though it's there. (When you hear that song, most people have to run outside to deliver their trash to the truck. The truck doesn't pick it up like back home). I've been lucky... I only had to do this when I lived in the dorms for 3-months. There was no kitchen, so if I neglected to deliver my garbage, it wasn't stinky. I've heard from many foreigners that they put stinking waste, such as compost, in the freezer since no one can be around to meet the fur elise truck. Beethoven should be so happy his song is the garbage jingle in Taipei!

I've also forgotten the 7/11 clerks that all shout every time you enter a store... (they're saying welcome in Chinese, but it just sounds like "Morning, morning!" in a nasal voice when you don't understand the language. You feel entirely awkward because you don't know what to do in response. There's also the tea-boiled eggs and stinky tofu... smells (stenches) that are unavoidable when you first arrive, and somehow become normal, and even find I eat these stinky things from time to time.

All these precious experiences Pat will now experience for the first time, and I'll get to remember what that felt like. Must be a lot like being a parent. Haha!

I've been so excited about this visit! I still unfortunately will have class, but I remember when I visited Tina and Mark in China, Mark went to work every morning, and Tina went to class for a few hours. It was nice to have a few hours in the morning to wake up, figure out where you are, overcome the culture shock, drink coffee and catch up on email... I feel I am passing the torch and I'm sure Pat will equally enjoy the solo morningas much as I did.

Here's our itinerary for the weekend: he arrives at 1pm on Saturday. I will meet him at the airport and bring him home to settle in for a few hours before we head to Shida, a college neighborhood 15 mins away. We'll have dinner with one of my best friends, Vanessa. Then explore the night market for about 10 mins. I can't bear the crowded-ness of the night markets and I know Pat will feel similarly. Then it's back to my neighborhood, the zhongxiao fuxing area where we'll meet my MBA classmates at 1am at a nearby bar. It's a Barcelona final soccer match; one of our classmates is from there so it's a big event. On Sunday, I'm planning a picnic up north at the beach (Baishawan); hopefully the weather will cooperate. Then in the evening, we'll go to qi-gong and Buddhism classes which involve drinking tea, talking with people from Honduras, India, South Africa, Russia, France, Japan, you name where... there's probably people from at least 30 countries in the room. Then we do qi-gong which is a yoga-esque exercise -- it involves a lot of focus on breathing. And finally, at the end of the evening, a person who's said to have achieved enlightenment will come and answer any questions we ask. It's a bit like having an live eight ball in the room. He usually has great insight and also delivers smack-downs when needed, which I think is hilarious. In being an expat, I know sometimes foreigners in a foreign land get so far from their element, they wear clothes they would never wear back home, wander around soul-searching when they're past forty... this man helps to bring back a little reality. Someone will ask a question, and before he answers, the teacher will look long and hard and proceed to ask, "how long have you been wearing that pair of jeans?" The asker will get an ear full on how the first thing it is they need to do is go out and get a new pair a jeans, find a girlfriend, and stop thinking so much... then they will get their answer on how to live in the moment. He's a teach by example guru with an edge. I love it.

That's all for now. I will try to post back, and let you know when the boy arrives. Good night or good morning, wherever you are!

Such a big week for the US. I heard the news of Bin Laden's death after reading a facebook post by one of my classmates, a friend from Holland. My first impulse was to call my Dad, which I did. Then I got sucked into the news. Strange to watch everything unfold being outside the US. Right now I have no classmates from home. My closest friend is from Honduras, then I have friends and classmates from all over the place: Japan, Germany, the Philippines, Ecuador, Spain, Korea, Panama, of course Taiwan, and many more countries.

I think I went through all of the cycles I bet most American's did. A weird excitement, feeling proud of Obama, relief Osama is finally gone - some validation of our struggles. And disbelief we have such a large special forces team trained to carry out missions like this.

After an hour or so, I started to feel how savage the attack was. Osama was not a law abiding person to say the least, but was it right for us to act similarly? It's reasonable to extinguish something that has caused and continuing to cause so much damage. I feel toward the US much like i feel toward my family. I can judge and criticize, but when others place judgment, I'm a little defensive. People around me have been sensitive. There also hasn't been a person that's come to me to try to celebrate or express relief at what the US achieved in killing Bin Laden. Why would they? I'm not worried to much about that, since I think any other country in the same shoes would have behaved similarly. But how come we can't take total pride in this? It because it wasn't handled in a way that used to be viewed as American.