Taipei Flora Expo

Saturday, I spent the night with some locals and another foreign English teacher.  They took us to the opening ceremony for the 2010 Flora Expo. The expo will last until April of next year. We met at Taipei Main Station around 6pm in order to get there early and to get good seats. Of course, it was raining. But it wasn't raining hard; it was more like a drizzle or light sprinkles.  After riding the bus for about 15 mins and walking for at least half a mile, we finally arrived to Taipei County. We walked to a spot right next to the river and the bridge.  I learned that they shut the bridge down after 6pm due to the fireworks.  We arrived there around 7pm and the fireworks didn't start until 9pm.  So, there was lots of waiting, getting rained on, staring a foreigners (meaning them staring at me), and good conversations with people that wanted to work on their English conversational skills.  It was the first time that someone talked with me for 30 mins and didn't say "Sorry! My English isn't very good." I'm still having a hard time understanding that one. I guess their confidence is low or they are not meeting their extremely high self expectations that I always hear about. Either way, it was nice!  I did have a local say to me "Your English is very good!"  I looked at her (with confusion of course) and said thank you.  She went on to explain that she "likes the way I pronounce my words."  She said it is kind of like I'm "singing" when I talk. I have never been told that before, but I guess it makes since to people that speak with 4 different tones.
 I have never seen so many people in one place.  There was enough people to fill up the Razorback Stadium and still have a crowd outside waiting to get in. The fireworks were cool! They are the masters of fireworks in my book. I guess you have to be if you play with them everyday. The fireworks ended around 10pm and we had to walk to the bus stop. The bus was full because of all the people. After getting off, we had to walk a few blocks to get to the MRT.  They just opened this MRT on the 3rd of November. It was very nice and I didn't have to ride long.
 I got home around 12am and passed out.  My feet were hurting so bad. I got as much sleep as I could because the next morning, I had to leave my apartment by 8:15am to get to church on time.  There was a girl that I met through a friend that wanted me to show her how to get to a church.  I met up with the girl around 9:30 and walked to the church.  Before the service, the pastor introduced himself to us (although I met him once before) and made the comment that our English was good and their wasn't an accent that he could detect.  We both laughed and explained that we were Americans. He blushed and explained that most of the people that he meet are from South Africa, Nigeria, or the Carribeans.  That is a common assumption here when it comes to the black population. Some teachers at my school didn't know how to introduce me to their class.  They were afraid of offending me (they are so nice!). I told them not to say that I was African American because then they would have to explain why I was African American and had never been or lived in Africa. Some students still get confused when I say that I am from America.  I think it is good for them to get this exposure at an early age.  One of the locals told me a story about her friends' daughter that got into a little argument with a boy at school. The little girl is white, but she was born here in Taiwan.  The little boy argued that she was American (because of her color) and she argued back that she was Taiwanese (because of her birthplace).  I can imagine their faces as they were arguing.
Monday, I finally got to play volleyball!!! It was great! I got to talk English and work on my skills at Taipei American School. I haven't touched a ball in 4 months. They invited me back as a regular.  It takes me an hour to get there, but I will be going back.  Of course, I felt the muscle soreness come on today.  I need to stretch better. Speaking of stretching, I have to lead the cool down stretches this Saturday at our Sports Day event.  All the students and their families will be on our campus to watch some friendly relay races, dances, and performances. The students have been practicing very hard and they are so cute! I will take videos and pictures tomorrow because I have a feeling that I won't have any clear shots on Saturday. Because we are working on Saturday, we get Monday off. That is going to be weird and much needed.  Well, I have posted videos of the fireworks. You can see some of it.  They had so many going off that a big cloud of smoke stayed around during half of the show.  The glowing whiteness on the right is the bridge that was strung with fireworks to make it appear as if it were a waterfall.  The poor birds got scared and began to fly away.  Enjoy!