Here are some photos of our train ride and life in Hualien so far. :-)
serendipity berries
(noun)
1. the berrylike fruit of either of two African shrubs that, when chewed, causes sour substances to taste sweet.
2. an old-fashioned blog started in 2008 that celebrates world travel and the adventure of life.
(This is what blogs looked like in 2008, and it hasn't changed since.)
17 October 2021
Hualien
08 October 2021
artists
"Artists must create on the same scale that society has the capacity to destroy.
05 October 2021
quarantining in Taiwan
Day 5! Woo hoo! 1/3 of the way through our 15-day Taipei quarantine! (They start counting at midnight the day you arrive, so "two weeks" is often more like 15 days, depending on what time of day you arrive.) Here's my brain dump (long message ahead!) in case some of it might be helpful-- especially for those quarantining with kids!
WHAT?! During quarantine? Let's just say the food has been a pleasant surprise. I'd seen an aloft video posted online, and I thought we'd be having rice congee soup for breakfast every morning and some rendition of meat/rice/veggies in a bento box for every meal. Instead, we had a delicious (slightly spicy, even!) Thai curry last night, Japanese sushi rice bento the night before, spaghetti the night before that...
30 August 2021
greetings from Guam!
12 July 2021
trying to get to Taiwan
What a saga it's been trying to get to Taiwan! It took us six months to get a visa for my husband, and after zero cases from April to December 2020, the island had its first outbreak about a month before we were scheduled to move there. We booked our flight for July 5th so we could celebrate our daughter's birthday and the 4th of July with friends and family before leaving, and everything seemed great.
Then, three China Airlines pilots brought COVID to Taipei without quarantining properly, so Taiwan shut schools and businesses down for the first time. The travel ban was scheduled to end June 28th, so we figured we'd be okay for July 5th. Nope!
The travel ban was extended to July 12th, so we changed our flight and notified our very kind landlord who has a furnished apartment waiting for us. We got a new flight for July 15th and were relieved to see cases drop quickly. Our plan was to quarantine for two weeks in our flat because it had two bathrooms (one per adult) (Taiwan's rules, not mine), BUT then the "Peruvian grandma" (a Taiwanese woman's nickname because she returned from Peru with a grandchild and brought the Delta variant to Taiwan while breaking her home quarantine) caused the Taiwanese government to cancel home quarantines/require hotel or facility quarantines and ruined it for all future travelers.
So, we were prepared to fly on Wednesday night around 1am, go to two separate hotel rooms because we're two adults (each with one child), and then do our 14-day quarantine where we would be delivered three meals a day-- and not be allowed to leave our rooms. But THEN, they extended the travel ban again, so now we've rented our house out, have a flat waiting for us halfway around the world, and can't go live there.
So, we spent hours calling the airlines and hotels again today, changing everything to fly July 28th, and now, to top it all off, we'll be celebrating our 13th wedding anniversary separately in two hotel rooms while quarantining.
I know these are all first-world problems, and maybe when we finally get to celebrate in person, it'll be sweeter because we'll miss each other more. :-)
So! Here's to looking on the bright side of things...
08 April 2021
free bystander intervention training
Hollaback's now Right To Be, but either way, their Bystander Intervention Training is empowering and informative not just for people who want to support our fellow Asians who have been harassed— this is a training that will enable you to help anyone being bullied in any way while staying safe yourself.
It's free and really well done.
07 April 2021
chinese exclusion act of 1882 - free on pbs now
PBS is currently streaming (for free) this powerful film on the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and like most of us, I had no idea this was a part of American history. It's heartbreaking that the Chinese were singled out as the only group in American history to be excluded from immigration while millions were streaming in from the rest of the world and how the Chinese were treated when they did try to settle here, and it's a part of our history that should not be forgotten.