REN SHAN REN HAI (people mountain people sea)

Taiwan is the second most densely populated country in the world, and it shows. It feels even more so when every single one of the capital city's 2.7 million inhabitants is carrying an umbrella (yu san) as a feeble defense from the cruel June rains. It has been pouring rain every day since I arrived and is forecast to continue...
I thank my lucky stars that no one here knows enough of Seattle's reputation to make that eternally unfunny joke that I must be used to the rain. Good thing, because I am not, in fact, used to a perpetual tropical downpour. The extremely moist climate supports lush greenery in the city and surrounding mountains, but wreaks havoc on human-built structures. It seems that any building more than a few years old starts to sweat from all the heat and humidity. It makes for kind of a run-down looking city, despite all the bustle and affluence.

This is the main drag of my campus, National Taiwan University.


Here is Xindian avenue, which borders one side of the campus. It's kind of like "the Ave" in Seattle's University District, but also, um, different.


And it's Asia, so of course we're talking serious scooters.


I haven't got a picture of it yet, but the coolest thing I've seen is people driving scooters while their dogs ride perched under their legs. How they do it, I'm not yet sure, but when they are stopped at a light, the dogs sometimes jump off and run around a little. It would be awesome if one day they did a dog version of Chinese fire drill.

Aside from gawking at dogs in scooters, I've accomplished a few things. I've found a place to stay temporarily -- my own little room in an area with hardly any other foreigners. I've gotten the hang of the ultra-modern transportation system and started to explore the city during its dry spells. I've met the good friend of my friend Alia, Hsu-Chi, a law professor who has in turn introduced me to some of her students. I spent my second day here with one of them and got to practice practical applications of my Chinese. It turns out it is less useful to be able to discuss the pros and cons of euthanasia than to be able to say "Even Taiwanese people enjoy the film Shrek". I have also been invited to a "dj party" on the weekend of the dragon boat races, for which I am very excited.

Aside from the inedible airplane food, my flight over was very pleasant. We had a layover in Japan and flew by the magnificent Mt. Fuji (click the image to make it bigger).


I was adopted by my seatmate, a woman from Taipei who spoke little English and had been visiting her sister in Los Angeles. She insisted in seeing me off the plane and accompanying me on the bus towards the train station and gave me her phone number and an affectionate squeeze when her stop came. Having traveled a fair amount, I am afraid that it is easy to almost take things like this for granted, but it really is incredible how many very welcoming and generous people there are around the world. Hooray for them!

The only unpleasantness of the last few days has been the school situation. I'm having trouble trying to balance being in the right level of Chinese with the requirements of my fellowship and a number of factors have combined to put quite a lot of pressure on me. But I really WANT to speak Chinese and to speak it well and I haven't got anything better to do, so I'm feeling relatively hopeful.

Now if only it would stop raining and I could fit my giant foreign feet into the desperately cute shoes the ladies here are sporting I would be hen gaoxing.