Wow, time flies huh?

Aiii, so sorry for no updates recently lah, been busy and lazy, haha. A lot of things have happened since my last entry about the Taiwanese K-TV.

So, it's basically a routine now; class from 8-10, then we spend some time in a classroom doing homework etc. We are such good students! Actually, we usually spend most of the time chatting, haha. But it's fun, we help each other with things, Joey and John's Chinese is way to good to be in our class, so they like to help us when we need it.

We went bowling to celebrate our first test - so much fun, we just spent an entire day eating, bowling, arcade games, dart and pool. I've updated my photo album - please have a look!

Like you may now, I hurt my ankle a couple of weeks ago, so I basically missed the last week of the intensive period. That really sucked. But, I'm back now, playing 3 times a week and I'm so happy about that.

Except school and basketball, we like to just stroll around in Taipei, getting to know the city. Shopping here is great, and it's so much cheaper than Norway! We girls in class spent a fab day together last week. After class, we went to do our hw, then we ate lunch at Syabu Syabu, it's a hot pot place where everybody has it's own hot pot and can cook whatever we like. Yum... And then we went to a famous tea parlor. They're famous coz of their fresh made "black pearls". Chewy small balls in all kinds of tea. Then we went over to Jackie's to play in their pool and jacuzzi, muahahaahahahah. That was so relaxing. After splashing around for a while, we went to The Sofa, a really nice lounge in Taipei's East District. We ate dinner and had some drinks, and spend so much time there, just chatting and having fun. We took so many stupid pictures during that evening, haha. There are sooo many things to take picture of, like the food we eat, the weird tea drinks we drink etc, but Nooooo, we only take pics of ourselves being silly.. It's becoz my dig.cam. is dead, and I simply forget to make people take pics... Tssss... I promise to be better at taking pics - so you guys can see more of my life here.

It's really getting tougher and tougher waking up every morning. In the beginning, I had no problem getting up at 6.30, taking my time, buy my fave breakfast etc. Now, it's really a struggle, but luckily I'm not the only one. The classroom usually looks like a zombie grave yard every morning, haha. No offence guys.. Hehe..

I'm looking for a new place to live atm, I wanna live right next to school coz the bball practice is sooo late, besides, I'd have more time in bed if I lived next to school haha.

I'll be back later with more stuff. Miss and love you all.... Tata...

There's a Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerooooooooo....

Hahaahaah.... My first KTV (Karaoke) experience yesterday! I went to the KTV's with three of the girls in class. Jo is a KTV pro. Jackie, Cindy and I were.. well, maybe less experienced and talented. We got a room, ordered some food and beer, and picked some songs. Jo was the only one able to sing Mandarin songs... So she sang in Chinese while the rest of us tried to sqeak in English. Hahahahah.. But it's a good way to learn Chinese, so we switched over a couple of times. It's difficult to sing songs you've never heard before!! Next time, I promise to be more prepared. I'll start to listen to lots of Mandarin music from now on! The four of us had soooo much fun yesterday. Just chatting and joking around.. I feel sorry for Mariah Carey - her songs are abused everyday at the KTV's, I'm sure! Just be glad that you guys weren't there, haha. Can't liiiiiiiiiiive, if living is without youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu.....

Jo: I don't feel anything..!!!?
Jackie: You're not supposed to feel anything!!
Jo: Oh....

Cindy: My cheeks are so tired everyday from laughing!! I'll get dimples soon!

After the KTV, we bought a b-day cake for Eiren, also a classmate. First time I heard her speak Mandarin, my jaw dropped. She's an American, and she speaks Mandarin very well. I think she's spent more time in Taiwan than some of us. It's her birthday today!! Happy Birthday lah!!! 生 日 快 樂 (Yes lah, just learned how to type in Chinese. It's really cool, I know).

Oohhh!!! My dearest Michelle is arriving on Monday!!! Wow, that's tomorrow!!!! Geez, I haven't seen her since summer 2001, that's when we met, and together with Yenni and Ray, we were inseperatble. Aww, I'm sooooo happy!!!! It's been five years... How time flies...

Away from the polluted city

Weeee!!!
Skipped school on friday to go to 烏 來 (Wu Lai), some tropical mountains about an hour outside of Taipei. I was lucky enough to go there by car and the others rode their motorbikes. 16 girls, off we go! The whole trip was a combo of cardio work-out and bbq by the river after running. So were supposed to run to the riverside. About 4 km. Veeeery excited, I was curious about whether I could last so long. The car drove to the riverside with the food etc, while two of the girls followed us on their scooters to make sure that nobody would get run over by a car or something. I have nooo idea about what I thinking about, but I managed to twist my ankle all of a sudden.. after like only 1 km. But I didn't stop coz it wasn't that bad. One of the girls who ran behind me ran up to me:

Her: Did you twist your ankle??
Mar: Nooo.. It wasn't so serious.
Her: Yeah, you did!!! You twisted your ankle!! Stop running!!
Mar: Nooooo, I can still run, see! (runs like a constipated duck)

She yells for the ass. coach who was riding the scooter...

(still running like a duck)

Ass. coach: What happened?
Mar: I dunno, just stepped on something
Ass. coach: Get on the bike.
Mar: Noooo, I can manage, I'll let you know if gets worse.
Ass. coach: (Frowns) Fine, let me know at once!
Mar: Yes, yes.. (speeds up to catch the rest of the team)

So, the trips continues, with ass. coach riding next to us with music and rooting for us.

Finally we arrived at the bbq place. Everybody stops to stretch out. We always stretch out together. I was fine, hardly felt anyting wrong with my ankle. Until I bent down to stretch my legs. Ouch.... I had to break out of the circle and limped over to ass. coach... I was very disappointed, but had to admit that I'd hurt my ankle. So she taped my foot and started to limp down to the riverside, with team mates carrying my stuff and supporting me. The girls are very sweet - whenever somebody gets hurt, it's like the entire world stops and all focus and worries are pointed at the injured person.

Anyways, the surroundings there were so beautiful. There were falls all over place, splashing lagoon blue water into the river. We crossed over the river, to a really big waterfall to play in the water. So refreshing! I went grocery shopping with some of the girls the day before, at Carrefour (big big store where you can find basically everything needed for a home and leisure time). Anyway we fell in love with a big colourful inflatable dragon. You should've seen it - girls in their 20's playing with a plastic dragon made for kids. Haha..

I will upload some lovely pics asap! We spent the day by the riverside, eating like crazy (of course, we're Chinese) and just playing around. I sat by the water to cool my ankle, and the girls would bring me food and drinks - a really great feeling to be included you know...

We packed our things in the afternoon and the others had to run the same way back. I had to sit in the car... *Sigh* Next destination was the hot springs. Taiwan has lots of natural hot springs, it's supposedly very healthy to soak in that water. The water was 70-80 Celsius hot in one of the tubs!! I wasn't allowed in the hot water coz of my foot.. So I just on the side, with one of my legs in the water. To cool down, we could swim in the huge cold river next to us. So again, I sat next to the rest of the girls, with my swollen foot in the icy water. We were just joking around, having fun. One of the girls climbed up next to me, but slipped and fell on my foot... The injured one. I had no time to react so I kinda cried out scaring the lights of the team. I wasn't able to walk anymore.. Hah... My team mate felt so bad and was really out of it, but hey, not her fault... So yeah, stupid ankle got worse.

On our way home, it started to rain like crazy. So the girls had to be really really careful when riding down the mountain. Two of the girls had brought their puppy along on the trip and held her in their arms while riding the bike. But poor puppy got wet, so I got to cuddle with her in the car. Aww.. Cutest thing ever. So tiny. I was drying her off and then she fell asleep in my arms. We stopped at KFC to grab some dinner. At that time, my foot was so swollen that you couldn't see the ankle. The girls were making doctor plans for me. But since I haven't applied for the Social Healthcare card yet, they were talking about me using one of the girls' card. They do plan everything for me, since I'm not familiar with the system. Haha.. Fraud, Fraud! It's so much cheaper if I use the card. I'll go to a Chinadoctor for the first time tomorrow. With the rest of the injured girls. Stupid foot lah....

I'm Lovin' It

Life is good...
I get up at 6.30 am monday-friday now, and I'm actually liking it. It's because I really look forward to school now. I know that my bball team is there, and my class is the best.

Just some points which will show you why I love my team:

- I don't know many basketball terms in Chinese, so one of the girls actually made a list with terms. Written in Chinese and Taiwanese phonetics so I know how to pronouce the words. The terms are translated to English, and she has also sketched out who plays which positions, so I'll be able to learn their names at the same time.

- I've gotten some "heat blisters" on my upper lip. So the girls brought me to a famous tea-shop and bought me a really really REALLY bitter tea which will cool my body down. They're teaching me all kinds of things, what's good for this and what's bad for the body blah blah.

- The assistant coach lives right next to me, so she offered me a ride home on her motorbike after dinner today. Everybody on the team rides a motorbike... It was raining like crazy, so girls supplied me with a rain poncho and of course a helmet. So from now on, I'll be able to catch a ride with the ass. coach. I'm seriously experiencing everything the Taiwanese do.

- The girls are really patient with me, so everytime I screw up on court (which happens often atm..) they only give me comforting words. The team spirit in general is great - I've never heard anything negative.

So except for my body being in a really bad shape (I'm still sore...), basketball here is so much fun!!

And why I love my class:

I've already found my "buddy". We just joke around and try to be such good students. If we've learned some phrases or words we like, we use it all the time. Seems like we have the same kind of humour... Mwaahahahahahah!
Like mentioned earlier, the teacher is awesome. We discuss lots of things when going through the textbook and we are joking all the time. It's not even like a class, we just sit around, read some text and talk about everything that comes to our minds. I can already feel my Chinese improving and it's much more fluent.
Yayy!!

Oh, I better stop rambling now.. Have to get my homework done, we'll have tests all week.
Talk to you later.... Love you all :)

1st day at school

Haha, I feel like a 5-year-old...
Just wanted to let everybody know that my class is GREAT!! Actually, I got to school early today, at 7.30. (Yeah, for those who know me well, know that this is really amazing) But I went and said Hi to my new team mates when they were running their asses off. Class started at 8.10. Shy and quiet start, but after a few minutes, it was a great atmospheare. All of us has the same background!!! Well, except one.. The rest of us are Taiwanese who grew up abroad - I'm the only one who didn't grow up in US. There is one American among us, but she grew up abroad, and has probably spent more time in Taiwan than me. Her Mandarin is really good, and she writes ten-times faster and prettier than the rest of us.. Haha.. Our teacher is also great. She has a strong personality and is very lively when she teaches. Most of us wanted to change to intensive classes, but after class today, I think we changed our mind, and will stick to this class. Yay :) Since all of us can speak Mandarin, we will improve a lot quicker if we get a heavier work load, but we made an agreement with out teacher to speed things up, so we can learn as much as possible. So we jumped from chapter 1 to chapter 5 today.

My classmates' reading skills blew me away at first... But luckily I managed to keep up the pace. Some of them have watched a lot of Taiwanese TV-series, that's how they learned reading, while I've just been lazy... I really need to step it up a notch so I wont fall behind lah, but so far, so good!

Me and a classmate went out for lunch after class. We heard something about a famous place for eating special Yong Kang sliced noodles, so we set off looking for that place. We asked for directions about 4 times.. The ppl here are sooo nice and helpful! And silly us, didn't know the characters for YongKangDaoXueMien, so one very nice lady wrote it down for us.. Haha.. So embarrassing - hao diou lien ah!! We walked around in the heat for ages, but didn't manage to find the place. So we just went in to a random place and ate beef noodle soup with some side dishes. We got along really well. She's some years older than me though. She's a post-graduate, and has some work experience, so I assume she's maybe 4-5 years older than me. We actually had a lot in common, and it's so much fun to have conversations in Mandarin. But we had to use some English words every now and then...

Can't wait to go back to school on Monday!! Woohooo!!! I'm a neeeeeeeeeeeeeeerd! :D