Ni Hao from Taiwan!: July 2012

Friday, July 27, 2012

The Mandarin Language.

Can we dicuss for one second how crazy this language is? It has almost been a month and I am still completely clueless is to what everyone is saying.... John is getting much better but I have been told to just stop trying and listen. So, I have and I hear a lot of 'nigga' and 'whoa' and nasal sounds, so I'm like Whoa, nigga(actually like nu guh but when said fast I giggle a little)! But then when I try again to recreate what I have heard... people laugh or give me looks.
Liiiiiike when we were shopping for furniture I had asked Yating (Matt's girlfriend) how to say "thank you" which is "shea shea" but with kinda a z sound. So I start saying it to shop owners who then give me a discusted look. Yating runs up behind me to correct it, apparently I was saying peeing (she she). I made this mistake about 4 times.
Last weekend, John and I ventured out to a restaurant and with John's great mandarin skills he orders, chow phan (we thought this was rice). The waiter pauses and looks at us and asked if we want bi fan(white rice).......but funny enough...if you ask for chow fan under the right context apparently it means sex. Sooooo this word has to be very carefully noted because it depends on where you say it. Obviously in a restaurant it means fried rice, but other places.... What did we learn out of that experience? Bi phan means regular olllll' rice and that is safe!
Other interesting words-
MAYO= no have, none...... so no mayo! hahahaha!
Boo-ka-ee= no way, not possible
Chi gua= watermelon :)
How= good and yes
Doe shao= how much
and that's about what I know besides the numbers. ANNNNNND lemmie tell ya how crazy the numbers are, if an object is a different shape the number word changes. So two is, ER, but if you are talking about a pencil(or some other object that there are two of) its Liang. And they also like to throw a GA at the end of the numbers which I think means some.
3-SAN-GA, 2- ER-GA, 8-BA-GA
Its sad to say but I have become one of those tourists that asks for everything in english, including menus BUT the alternative would be running around Taipei asking about peeing and sex so I don't care that much :) I figure if I average learning five words a month, that's like 50 in a year so that's decent right??? Naaa, I'm gonna start taking classes to help with the sounds.

My first Chinese characters!!

And I know how to write and recognize tree, big, and numbers!!

Monday, July 23, 2012

Wulai Waterfall Park!

The tiny island of Taiwan is full of mountains. If you leave the city of Taipei you are practically surrounded. We took a day trip up into the mountains to a park called Wulai. Taiwan is 50% forested and something like 20% of it are nature parks. Up in these mountains you can find dellllllllllicious foods, beautiful scenery, and of course waterfalls!!! Winding up into the mountains, we passed weird fist statues, which we discovered are actually aboriginal 'white power' symbols. Not really white power but they look like it... temples, restaurants, and of course 7-11!
And we tried some BBQ mountain pork on a stick, and the mossssssst amazzzzing BBQ chicken in the world! The best part of the trip of course was swimming in the waterfalls and rivers. We hiked through aboriginal territory to get to some of these places and in the end the trek was sooooooo worth it!

This is a huge pack of butterflies!! Taiwan has over 400 species of butterflies!

Check out this video-

The water was PERRRFect !

roasted chicken

bamboo rice

bamboo rice again

feasting after a day of hiking

chicken head!

white power

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Trip to Cost-Co!

WHOOOOA! What an experience, just to get some real cheese! It felt like we were riding through a part of Gotham City to get to this place, and then we arrived and IT. WAS. PACKED. on a Thursday at 7:30pm. It doesn't really feel like Asia or Taiwan is that crowded of a place, until you go to Costco. At least we got some American style pizza here!

Allllllrighttttt! I found some oatmeal, oh but wait.... its mushroom pork flavored?!??

Monday, July 16, 2012

Market Time!

A fellow American friend we met here believes in the near future open air markets for fruits, meats, food in general will no longer exist. Instead only supermarkets. He believes our grand children and possible children will never experience this fresh produce sold by the farmers and fishermen themselves. I am not sure whether I believe this, but I know that markets in Taiwan are where you can really find and see true Taiwanese, Hakka, and possible Aboriginals all together purchasing and selling their products. Just a 5-10 minute walk south east? of our apartment, John and I stumbled upon a food market about 3 average size city blocks in length. In this market you can find, fish, shell fish, chicken (alive and dead), pork, beef, vegetables, fruits, beans, spices, kitchen supplies, fresh noodles, rice, eggs, foods to eat, plus a few elderly men selling chinese medicines.
When we first walked through I had a hard time with the smells, mainly the meat smells, and also I'm guessing a few health regulations are being violated.... In any case it is quite an experience dealing with language, the overwhelming fruit and veggies, and how amazingly cheap everything is!