My First Trip to Moscow

            I broke the process of getting to Moscow into steps.

            Getting dressed?  I could do that.  I did that every (okay most) days.

            Leaving the apartment?  It was a simple matter of opening the door and closing it behind me.

            Walking to the bus stop?  It wasn’t so far.  A ten minute walk maybe.  I like walks!

            Getting on a bus?

            My chest seized up.  One step too far.

            I don’t speak Russian?  What if they speak to me in Russian?  And then the metro!  What if I get lost?!  I mean, obviously I’ll get lost!  It’s me!

            I moved back a few steps and focused on changing my minimal sleeping clothes for something more appropriate.

            I wanted a day pass for the Moscow Metro.  This is something the website (  http://engl.mosmetro.ru/pages/page_0.php?id_page=8  ) promised me existed.  But I had no idea how to ask for this in Russian.  I had emailed a Russian-speaking friend as well as my head teacher asking what I could say to convey this.  But that was the night before and no one had responded, and my Russian skills were limited to the swear words that my boyfriend would yell out and the swear words some classmates had taught me to say back to him.

            My body froze with my dress still half unzipped and an arm positioned awkwardly over my head in the process of remedying that.  I knew the word for one.  I knew the word for day.  Leaving my dress open in the back I bolted for my small Russian phrasebook to double check these words.  Even if they weren’t grammatically correct, surely saying “one” and “day” to the woman selling tickets for which they had a one day option would understand.  Suddenly all the steps in my process seemed manageable.

            Was playing “Eye of the Tiger” not appropriate as celebration?  Too much?

            Well I played it anyway, only then finishing zipping up my dress and running to put on a bit of make-up.

            Volume up full blast, my email chimed happily and I skipped over to check it, restarting the song as I did so.

            It was my head teacher.

            He said he didn’t know how to ask for a day pass in Russian.  He said that I had lost.  That the other teacher who had arrived had already been to Moscow and he had only been in Russian for one day.

            My mood soured and I shut off the music.

            Now unhappily, I packed up the rest of my things and headed for the door.

            Stupid other teachers. 

            I waited no more than fifteen seconds once reaching the bus stop before the bus arrived.  I filed in behind the other passengers and watched them pass of their money and quickly take their seats.  But something about me apparently seemed off.  I handed the bus driver my money.  He looked at that note and then up at me.

            Don’t… I thought.  Please don’t…

            But he did.  He started to speak to me in Russian.

            My eyes widened and my mouth fell open.  “Uh…” was the response that I summoned.

            He stared back at me, but with a slightly more exasperated look.

            My eyes darted into the bus as though I would find help there, but I realized the absurdity of that idea.  I returned my gaze to the still-waiting bus driver.  “I don’t speak Russian…” I said in Russian.

            So of course, he repeated what he had said in Russian.

            Seeing that my admission of ignorance had done no good I could only shrug and shake my head.  “Uh…” I repeated, hoping it was universal.

            He only stared.

            I didn’t know what else to do.  Had I paid too little?  I reached for my wallet to see if that is what he wanted.

            But the bus driver stopped me with a wave of his hand, a huff, and a roll of his eyes.

            I was more propelled down the bus than I walked as he sped off before I had time to turn toward seats.

            I could feel eyes on me as I walked to the back of the bus.  I didn’t care.

            Getting on a bus?  Check.

            Sitting in the middle of the five seats at the far back of the bus I had no view through any of the windows, as many of them had had their curtains pulled shut and the others were obscured by the awkward angle and the heads of other passengers.

            When the bus came to a stop and nearly half the passengers made to get off I leaned over to the woman riding next to me, “Excuse me,” I managed, hoping my pronunciation was at least understandable, “Is this the metro?”

            “No,” she replied simply.

            I sat back once more.

            “Thank you…” I said sheepishly.  I told myself I wouldn’t bother her again, even though I knew it was a lie.

            But I didn’t have to.  A few stops later she turned to me and informed me that this stop was the metro.

            I sent my best rendition of ‘thank you’ in Russian as well as a wide grin as I gathered up my bag and a deep and followed her off the bus and towards the big red “M” marking the metro entrance.

            There was no question as to which way to go.  In fact, I don’t know if I could have managed to work against the stream of people pushing towards the metro line, but I diverted myself to the ticket counter and waited behind only one person before it was my turn to try for my one day pass.

            “Do you speak English?” I tried first, figuring my lack of Russian could possibly be a nonissue.

            She responded, but I couldn’t hear her through the thick glass.  I leaned in to indicate that I hadn’t heard.  “How can I help you?” she asked in English.

            Relief washed over me.  “I want a day pass,” I informed her.

            “What?” she said in Russian.

            My eyes narrowed.  She didn’t speak English at all.  I wonder if she had more phrases than the one.

            “One day,” I continued in English, because I knew English grammer.

            She shook her head, not understanding, and pointed to the sign that listed all the tickets and their prices.  In Russian.

            I slid my money through the opening.  “One. Day.” I tried in Russian.  That paired with the correct amount of money, 200 rubles, listed on the site seemed like it should work.

            “Four?” she asked in Russian, holding up four fingers.

            No.  That is what her answer should have been when I asked if she spoke English.

            “Four?” I repeated in Russian, realizing that perhaps I had more Russian words than this woman had English.  I slid 200 more rubles through the slot.  I honestly didn’t care.  I wasn’t going home without getting to Moscow.

            She held up eight fingers now.  And I realized what she was doing.  At 50 rubles per ride she had absolutely no idea what I wanted.  I decided to just take the two ride pass.  This was clearly not working.

            “No.  Two.”  I hope my begrudged look wasn’t too apparent, but I could feel it cross my face.

            She nodded in understanding and gave me back 300 rubles and then passed me a bright red card with, I assumed, two rides on it.

            I said my thanks and made for scanners.  Scanning my card a bright one appeared on the screen.  One ride left.

            It wasn’t until I was staring up at the mess of Cyrillic telling me which track went which way that I realized that I had completed more steps with relative ease.  I was basically done.  Speaking new languages and figuring out buses may be daunting, but metros were a snap.

            Kuzminki to Taganskaya.  Taganskaya to Oktyabrskaya.  Done.

            Kuzminki was nothing terrible interesting.  But getting off at Taganskaya, being on the center line, it was much more ornate.  It was the kind of stop that people spoke of when they talked about the Moscow metro. My snail-pace reading of Cyrillic and my awed stares at the structure around me clearly marked me as not belonging, so I held my Lonely Planet guide in my hand unashamed as I didn’t think I could look more out of place anyway.

            I finally emerged into the day once more to find it cloudy and windy and that I regretted my light dress as the skirt whipped this way and that, but mostly upward.

            I sat at a bench under an huge statue and took in the fact that I was in Moscow for a moment.  The feeling was one of contentment.  I had never seen content as something good.  Happy was always the goal and contentment had felt like settling.  But looking at the onion domes of a small church next to enormous buildings and statues and gardens and the buzz of traffic all within my field of vision I felt the full sort of feeling that is meant, I believe, when people say content.

            Skirt pinned to my side with one hand and my guidebook positioned in the other I stopped a pair of Russian women to ask them where Gorky Park was.  They pointed across the rush of traffic and I thanked them, waiting for them to leave before I stared at the streets with no crosswalks.  It took my longer than I care to admit to see people descending stairs in order to cross below the street.  I followed their example and walked down the sidewalk until I reached a park.

            Gorky Park is an amazing place.  But I would find this out later.  Much later.  Because the place that I went to was across the street from Gorky Park: Art Muzeon and Krymskaya Naberezhnaya.  Though I would walk through believing I was in Gorky Park and tell people for the next week or so that, yeah, I had been to Gorky Park.  I had not.

            Arriving at around 9:30 in the morning, it was still fairly empty, but sets of statues with solemn looking expressions greeted me on the way in and, between the protection of the buildings and trees the breeze let up enough to allow me to release my rebellious skirt.

            I walked the paths through green, contrasting the town of Dzerzhinksiy where I now lived.  The playgrounds were surrounded by grass and tress rather than dirt and soviet-style apartment buildings.  It took only a few minutes of walking for the roar of the busy road behind me to fade away and I could listen to the sound of the wind through the trees and families talking in hushed voices, seeming to not want to break the spell of silence within the city of twelve-million.

            Throughout the park there were statues.  The first I came across were twisted metal depicting, more often than not, beasts or people from assorted myths.  In a gravel-filled square there were sculptures upon sculptures made of stone.  And just beyond that were metal sculptures, busts from mostly famous Russians, but others joined them as well.  I tried to take my time on these, but reaching above the trees was a man on a ship, standing tall above everything else around me, and I continually worked towards that until I reached the Moscow river.

           

I allowed myself to sit in awe.  I settled myself into a bench and looked across the Moscow River at, not only the statue of a man on a ship triumphantly holding a golden scroll, which I would later discover to be a statue of Peter the Great, but also at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, this one I recognized immediately.

     I opened my book to the history of Moscow and enjoyed the warmth of the sun that was escaping from between clouds and making the gold in the Peter the Great Statue and the Cathedral glimmer brilliantly.

            I could have sat there all day, but was interrupted by a call from my boss.

            The landlady was coming to my apartment.

            Now?!

            Apparently.

            I informed her that I wasn’t home and that it would take me probably an hour and a half to get home from where I was.

            “Great,” she said.  “We will see you then.”  And she hung up the phone.

            I put my phone away and closed my book, though my finger held my place, reluctant to give my time up in Gorky Park, as I was still wholly under the impression that that is where I was at.  I took another look across the Moscow River.  Even if the day had been cut short, it let me know that I could get where I wanted to be.  I hoped Moscow wouldn't go any place before I could get there again.

Courage

“You’re really brave.”

How many times have I been told this recently?  Too many.  Far too many.  Because it simply isn’t true.  Courage is being scared, terrified, and continuing on anyway.  And really, I haven’t been scared.

            So when someone has told me how brave they thing I am all I’ve felt is an overwhelming feeling of guilt because I struggle to think of a single time I’ve been truly scared and overcome it any sort of commendable way.

            No.  I’m not brave.

            Sitting here and looking out into Russia with thought of Moscow dancing through my mind I realize that I’m truly frightened.  And that I’m a coward.

            I’m a coward because I blame the rain or jetlag or simply having too many things to do as the reason I haven’t been yet.  But the real reason is that the idea of venturing out into the biggest city I’ve visited, boasting only a dozen or so Russian words, alone makes my breath catch in my chest.  My heart flutters, fast and weak.  I find myself unable to swallow down the growing lump in my throat.  And I would rather hide in my apartment and wait for someone to come and hold my hand through it than risk being any more scared than I already am.

            I don’t want to be a coward.

            I wanted a chance to be brave.  And I suppose this is it.

            Moscow, here I come.

Getting to Dzerzhinskiy

“Have a safe and boring trip! (You're had to many 'exciting' airport adventures lately!)”

     This was the message Katelyn sent me before I made my way to PDX.  I laughed as I thought of recent airport drama, but this one was bound to be easier.

     I said my difficult goodbyes to friends, family, and my dog and then loaded up the car with all of my belongings that had to weigh less than 117 pounds total.  My mother’s friend Trisha drove, my aunt Tiana rode shotgun with my nearly empty carry-on (due to Transaero’s rule of it needing to weigh under 17 pounds), and my mother sat in the back seat with me.  She held my hand the entire way, telling me how much she was going to miss me and how much she loves me.

     I kept my tears at bay.

     The group had agreed to come in.  I was terrified that my bags would be overweight by a pound or two and I was not willing to pay $100 for an extra sweater and they were prepared to carry anything that exceeded the weight limit.

     The JetBlue agent called for anyone who was headed for JFK to come to the front of the line.  I skipped the small group of people ahead of me to get to the counter, at this point feeling unworried as I had more than two hours before my plane was set to leave.

     I held back a celebration when my first bag was weighed at 49 pounds.

     “Yes!” I exclaimed when the second bag also came in at 49 pounds.  I turned to Trisha who had clapped when the number came up and we shared a fairly epic high-five.

     “Third time’s a charm?” my mother asked from my other side with a laugh.

     I ignored her because telling her I had weighed and reweighed my bags more than three times didn’t seem like an effective comeback.

     “And we need proof of onward travel,” the woman at the counter said.

     My expression surely changed and, when my eyes moved from the “49.0” on the scale to her face, I could tell she was expecting that I didn’t have any onward travel.

     “I don’t have any,” I admitted, “I’ll just overland into Ukraine,” I said, listing the first country bordering Russia that I knew I didn’t need a visa for.

     “Overland?” the agent asked.

     “Like a bus or something.”

     She smiled at me and held her index fingers and thumbs in a rectangular shape, apparently indicating a ticket.  “That’s great.  I just need to see proof of a bus ticket then.”

     Despite my reasoning (why would I have my bus ticket already? I was going to extend my visa, etc.) she was adamant that it was JetBlue’s policy to protect themselves.  Also, I would likely be denied entry into Russia without onward travel.

     “That isn’t what I was told,” I argued.

     The woman rolled her eyes at me, like she was the expert on visas and how dare I challenge her authority.  “By who?”

     “The Russian Visa Center,” I said with narrowed eyes.

     But she was steadfast and asked me and my group to stand aside until I had forward travel.  Oh.  And JetBlue doesn’t fly out of Moscow.

     Panic ensued.  We had three smartphones going trying to book travel, any travel, out of Russia for as cheap as possible.  Travel that I was certain not to be able to take.

“Mine keeps going through the same three pages!” I said in panic.

     “What does it want for this expiration date?! I’ve entered everything I can!” Trisha said of Expedia via her smartphone.

     I waited on hold with Expedia hoping that I could ask them what they wanted for the expiration date of which we had entered every possible entry we could think of (0320, 320, 03/20, 3/20, Mar. 2020, March 2020, Mar 2020, 032020, 03/2020, and on and on).

     An hour in I was gulping in huge mouthfuls of air hoping that it would keep the tears away.

     “It’s fine,” I was consoled, “we have time.”  But we didn’t.

     Tiana approached me calmly as I sat on hold with Expedia bouncing my weight from one foot to the other nervously.  “I’m just playing around on here,” she said extending her Iphone out in front of me, “but would this be right?” she asked of the itinerary.

     “Yeah,” I said.  But why would she be able to do what we had been unable to do for the previous hour.

     Someone answered the Expedia Customer Service line just long enough to be completely unhelpful regarding my simple question and to start trying to book me before Tiana said, “Alright, we’re good,” her tone just as steady and unassuming as before.

     “We’re good?” I think all three of us said as we rushed around her phone to view the onward travel.

     Trisha took the phone to the new agent that had traded with the old and I hung up with the Expedia agent after a quick, “We actually got something booked, thanks!”
     "Well I'm getting an Iphone...?" my mother said half jokingly and half begrudgingly.
     "It's important to diversify," Tiana said through a giggle.

     I didn’t feel any more relaxed with the boarding pass in my hand, as boarding started in twenty minutes.  We set off for security only to find it backed up and not moving.  My heart sank farther.

     “You are more than welcome to stay in this line,” someone on security began over the intercom, “but know that we only have one line open.  If you walk down to the other security check they have three lines open.”

     “Go!” Trisha yelled.  And the four of us made for the other end of the airport at an alarming pace.  Retrospectively, perhaps more dramatically than was necessary.  But at the time it seemed more than appropriate.

     We said hurried goodbyes and I was through security within ten minutes and arrived to my gate five minutes before our scheduled boarding time (nearly half an hour before we actually began boarding).

     Begin transit mode.

     I was going to take notes on what was going on.  Or maybe I would journal.  Or do some creative writing.  I would certainly at least read my book.  But I didn’t do any of these things.  As usual, I was completely useless on this first flight, through my eight hour layover in JFK (half of which I spent lounging on the ground waiting to check in with Transaero, classy-like), and my next flight.

     I met another teacher on the flight who would be working with Language Link.  She too had flown JetBlue and had not been asked to purchase onward travel.  The JetBlue agent’s face came to mind, frozen in the moment she had held her hands up in a rectangular position, with an eerie sort of clarity in which one might recall a childhood trauma.

     The woman on the other side was a Russian woman traveling with her son.  Switching seats with her and then switching once more with another mother and son had ended up moving me from an aisle seat the most middle I could get.  But this woman was grateful for it and spoke to me in heavily accented English with a broad smile.

     Upon landing she was the first to begin clapping and half of the plane joined her.  She turned to me with a grin and told me, “I am thanking God!” before thanking me for the wonderful company.

     I left the plane feeling ready to be in Russia.

     For the first time in my life, my bags were among the first dozen at baggage claim and I quickly strode through the archway marked “nothing to claim”.  One of the security guards said something in Russian, but I hardly noticed and stupidly continued on through.  A second security guard stepped in front of me and repeated the same word that I could only imagine was some word meaning stop.  I came to an abrupt halt, looking at the security guard in front of me with wide eyes, then at the two sitting to my left, and back again.  “I don’t speak Russian,” I managed to say in Russian.

     The two to my left exchanged an incredulous look and the other repeated to them that I didn’t speak Russian.  “Put your bag here,” said the one who had stopped me, indicating my absurdly large bag.

     I did as I was told and asked, “All?” indicating my other bags.

     “No,” said the same guard.  “Just one.”

I rolled my other bags to the opposite side of the scanner and waited for my apparently sketch-looking luggage and the go-ahead to enter Russia for the first time.

     My first sight before I had entirely left security was a glamorous blonde woman watching expectantly and holding a piece of printer paper with my name boldly printed across it.

I grinned mostly out of relief and she smiled back.  This was my first impression of my principal.

     As we left the airport together I saw a man in a track suit leaning disinterestedly against the wall holding a somewhat crumpled sign that said “Language Link” in one hand and his smart phone, which was receiving a good deal more attention, in the other.   I was happy with my choice as I followed my principal out into the open air as she asked happily about my flight.

     After much effort, we got my bags into the small car that my school uses and the three of us, including our driver, took off down the highway.

     In traffic leaving the airport I had more than enough time to take in my surroundings.  My driver and principal spoke amongst themselves in Russian, though my principal sent questions my way at polite intervals.  Russian songs played on the radio, interrupted every now and again by Russian commercials.  All the billboard around us were written in Russian advertising products I had never seen before.  But it certainly wasn’t the first time I had heard or seen Russian.  I wondered to myself when it would really feel like I was in Russia.

     “I’m sorry,” my principal turned to face me, speaking in a hushed voice, “our driver cannot without a cigarette.”

     I watched as he took both hands off of the wheel and took several unhurried tries to light his cigarette.  The end lit up bright orange as he smoked and I stared at it with a strong fascination as though I had never seen a cigarette before.  It appeared that it had just as much of his attention as well and he filled the cabin with feathery strands of smoke that lazily made their out the only slightly cracked window.  With each drag he exhaled the smoke in one breath and the next was a breathy cough that, if it persisted, he would wash down with another drag.  For some reason, by the end of that cigarette, the butt of which he lowered his window in order to toss, I realized I was not home anymore.

     A blur followed.  We entered Dzerzhinskiy (also spelled sans the final “i”) between their nuclear reactor that sat sleepily idol and lifeless looking blocks of apartments.  Apartments seemed to be the only thing that the city had besides these three reactors and all of them looked alike.  Each time the car would slow in the slightest to take a turn I was sure that this apartment, even though it looked just like that apartment, was to be mine.

     And of course, eventually, one of them was.

     My principal helped me drag my bags up to my apartment, while our driver had another cigarette, and at some point I began unpacking.  Her husband came to set up the wifi, but the router didn’t work.  She went to buy a pillow.  I made tea.  I know all of these things happened, but I can’t tell you in what order.  It had been too long since I had slept.  My principal told me that I should call the head teacher once I was less tired and he would show me to the school.  I’m sure I nodded or indicated understanding of some sort, and I was left in a depressingly dirty and empty apartment, with only the wallpaper to make me laugh (and only at how absurd it was).

     My phone rang for a split-second before going silent once more and the screen informed me that the head teacher had tried to call me.  Not being able to decide if it was an accident or not, I called him back and, somehow, agreed that after my shower I would power through the day and go see the school and the city.

     Did you know you’re expected to hold the shower head the whole time?  There is no place to hang it up.  I’m not a fan.

     The head teacher took me the “scenic route”, but I didn’t actually expect it to be scenic.  But after less than five minutes we turned a corner to see golden onion domes in the distance.

     And before I knew it we passed Dzerzhinskiy's eternal flame.  Here the head teacher had some sort of interesting facts to share, but my mind only had enough power to watch for the flame, dim in comparison to the bright sun.

     I had already seen pictures of the monastery, though I didn't expect the real thing to look as brilliant as angles and Photoshop could make a photo look.  How wrong I was.  The path we walked clung to the edges of a lake and as the path dipped down slightly the surrounding trees thinned out enough for us to glimpse the monastery across the lake.

     Entering the complex I knew I couldn't go inside the building with my hair uncovered, but I was surprised at the women who could go inside.  A woman, probably in her mid-forties, passed me in a bright yellow dress that never even dreamed of reaching for her knees and a matching translucent scarf that was wrapped haphazardly about her hair that cascaded down her back well passed the hem of her scarf.  After this sight, the cows they used to keep the grass down didn't seem so surprising.
     People of all ages walked around the pond within the complex feeding the swans, ducks, pigeons, and other assorted birds and laughing among themselves.

     We passed a park full of sculptures.  The clean lines carved into the white stone gave the faces of the statues a spooky look to them and added a contrast to the wooden cross on the back of the sculpture of Jesus.

     "Now, I'm taking you through the alley of lovers, or lover's alley," he announced.  I wished he wouldn't have commented.  I stood an awkward distance from him until i was assured that "Lover's Alley" or whatever the best translation of it was not an apt name.  After passing a soccer field and a school on one side and watching a bulldozer spew pollution into the air on the other, I decided it was appropriately un-romantic.  I still didn't speak for a while.

     The final thing we passed was explained to me, I'm fairly sure.  But the afternoon had worn on and I was fading quickly.  I only remembered to snap a picture because I thought about the unlikelihood that my parents would have let me crawl all over rockets as a child.

A Long Process

August:  “Hi, I’m Chelsea.  I plan to teach in South Korea.”

September:  “Yes, that sounds lovely, but I’m going back to South Korea for sure.”

October:  “I mean, like, South Korea or Turkey.”

November:  “Saudi Arabia?!  Of course I’ll go there!”

December: “Just getting ready to go to Saudi Arabia.”

January:  “Still waiting to go to Saudi Arabia…”

February:  “Fuck it, I’m going to Turkey!”

March:  “I just signed a contract for China.”

April: “They said I’d have an invitation letter…like…a week and a half ago…”

May: “No, It’s fine.  I’m sure they’ll have a visa for me soon.”

June:  “Fuck that.  I’m going to Russia.”

July:  -ignored visa worry while in Taiwan-

August:  “I’m definitely going to Russia.  When?  Oh.  Tomorrow.”

PRE-TRAVEL

Yes.  Tomorrow.  It has been a long process which much more drama than listed above (and certainly more f-bombs).  But my passport has a visa and my plane leaves tomorrow.  I’ve started my regular pre-travel process already.  Said process has progressed as such:

                First, I tell myself that I have plenty of time.  I need not worry.

                Next, I worry.  But, I don’t yet do anything terribly productive.  Maybe I pack a bit here and there.  But for the most part I just daydream about my trip and drool a bit on my Lonely Planet.

                The next step involves the complete preoccupation with all the things I’ve yet to do.  I can’t hike or write or sleep or eat because I am too busy thinking about how I should be doing things.

                Finally, I start doing things.  I copy my important documents.  I pack.  I weigh my bags.  I unpack.  I repack with fewer items.  I weigh my bags again and unpack again.  And then, and this is an important step, I sit among my things and cry.  If you are following my step-by-step guide, please allot plenty of time for this portion of the process.  It tends to drag on.

                I repeat the phrase “I’m not freaking out.  I’m fine.  I’m fine.  I’m not freaking out.”  This is my mantra.  I asked my boyfriend the number of times one can say said phrase before they must admit that they are indeed freaking out.  Seven was the answer.  Since my quota was more than filled, I began to actually and seriously pack.  This time with an eerily detached attitude and a feverish sort of speed.

                And that brings us to bed time last night.

                I woke up this morning and threw a few more things in my bag before heading to my local coffee shop (is this the last time I’ll be here?).  In trying to write this post, my gaze continually wanders out the window, taking in the view of my hometown.  Though I can write that these are some of my last glimpses of it for a long while, I can feel that the realization has not entirely hit.  Because once it does, the pre-travel portion will have ended and the travel portion will begin, marked by the final zipping up of my luggage and the chattering of my teeth.

TRANSIT MODE

                I don’t know why I shake.  I don’t feel scared.  But maybe I don’t feel scared in the same way that I don’t feel stressed.  I don’t know that I’m truly stressed until I’m stressed enough that it is hard to eat and my muscles ache and I grind my teeth at night.  I never acknowledge the stress, but my body lets me know that it is there once it is too much to bear.  So maybe I feel scared in the same fashion.  I’m too simple to realize that I’m scared until my teeth are chattering on the way to the airport and whoever is driving me turns up the heat thinking that I must be freezing.

                By the time I reach security I will have entered transit mode.  Which is to say that I will have become entirely useless.  My transit mode should be studied as it is a strange and new defense mechanism.  Much like the fainting spell of the myotonic goat.  I enter a trance-like state of simply existing in order to deal with the boredom of long flights and layovers (this time 5 hours 6 minutes PDX to JFK, a 7 hour 53 minute layover, and then 9 hours 5 minutes JFK to VKO).  Which it a normal thing to do.  Because I’m not freaking out.

                I’m fine.

                I’m not freaking out.

                By the time I land I will have convinced myself that I am fine.  I’m calm.  I’ll be ushered to my new apartment.  I’ll claim the better room (sorry, Morgan, should have gotten there before me), crash for at least ten hours, then wake up ready for the next step.

CULTURE SHOCK

                Culture shock is apparently a problem for some people.  I was told to expect something that looks like this:

                Honeymoon Period:  Everything, literally everything, is awesome.  (Lasts a few days to a few weeks)

                Rejection: The moment you realize that it isn’t awesome. A brief moment of language difficulty or cultural difference.

               Culture Shock Period: You realize, no everything is not great.  In fact, everything is hard and different, too different.  You’ll want to isolate yourself.  You’ll want to go home.  (Lasts several weeks up to two months).

                Adaptation Period: You come to terms with what is amazing and what is less so.  You’ll see the new place for what it really is and, hopefully, be alright with it. (You’re good from here on out).

                Reentry Shock: You go home and aren’t terribly please with it.  But I won’t be dealing with that for quite a spell.  So you’ll gloss over this.

If you would like a more eloquently put rundown of this I recommend this page.  It isn’t exactly what I was told, but not one article is.  I think this follows closely what a more normal person would experience: https://www.hthtravelinsurance.com/travel_center/stud_international/023.cfm

This is a long process.  Too long a process.  So I have, totally on purpose and not at all by simply being a crazy person, adapted an expedited version of the culture shock stages.  I follow this time.  It isn’t fun, but it is fast.  So I highly recommend it.

UPON ARRIVAL: (Honeymoon Period on Speed, lasts eight to twelve hours): 

You’re not freaking out.  You’re fine.  Really…fine…

                In fact, isn’t this the coolest, best place you’ve ever seen?!  I mean, yeah, it’s the airport.  But the best airport ever, right?!

Are they speaking [local language]?  Isn’t it cool that they’re speaking [whatever language obviously they ought to be speaking in this country]?  Don’t you wish you could speak [that language]?  Well you can!  You have watched like eight Youtube videos and have opened your pocket language guide on multiple occasions!  This will definitely not be a problem.  Ever.  You might skip the culture shock this time!  You said that last time.  But this time is different.

Whether you get on local transit or have someone picking you up, it is the best choice you could have made.  This is so easy.  And the view is great!  Are those buildings different from other buildings you might have seen previously?  Yes!  And only in the best possible way.

You arriving to your accommodations and, not matter what, they are the most amazing accommodations you’ve ever set foot in.  Toss your bags aside, take a shower and a power nap, you’re going out there!  Because, I mean, you’re basically as prepared as a native!

GOING OUT AND ABOUT FOR THE FIRST TIME (Honeymoon Period Continued, but not for much longer, lasts up to an hour):

                Going out within eight hours of landing was an awesome idea.  Good thing you learned so much of [language you don’t actually speak more than a dozen words of].  You’re definitely prepared for your adventure of [going to a grocery store/coffee shop/restaurant/bank/etc.].  You’re so smart.  This won’t end badly.

               Go ahead.  Greet the person working at this establishment.  You learned how to do that!  Oh, shit…they responded.  You didn’t learn that.

                Uh…uh…just point at what you want.  Fuck…what did they say..?

                Shit…shit…shit…they’re looking at you.  Say the right thing back.

                That wasn’t the right thing…

THE RETREAT (Let Culture Shock and Isolation begin, lasts four to twelve hours):

                Hurry back to your accommodations (man, do these accommodations suck).

                What were you thinking?  You don’t speak [local language].  You don’t know [local culture].  You should never have gone to [place you just ran away from].

                In fact.  You should have never gotten on that plane.  You made a horrible, terrible, irreversible, mistake.  Just crawl into bed.

                Why is this bed so uncomfortable?

                Why is this place so [hot/cold/humid/dry/whatever the climate happens to be]?  You hate [that climate].

                Don’t cry.

                Okay.  Cry.  But only for a few hours!

TOUGHEN UP

                Now go out again.  It wasn’t quite so bad as you thought.  No one was laughing or rolling their eyes or anything of the like.  If you want to have the full culture shock experience, then you can lollygag.  But if you want the expedited experience, get back out there right away.  Go and be stressed.  Realize that it isn’t so bad.  In fact, you were right to be amazed and excited at first.

At least I know that I’m in for a whirlwind sort of ride.

                Tomorrow…

Old Town Centre of Taipei

                I didn’t make it until noon.  The moment I had written “zoo animal” that is what I felt like. I felt trapped and confined in what is actually a rather spacious hotel room.  I made the decision that I would go out just for a short walk.  Turn to the right, I said to myself, just walk straight and don’t cross any streets.  I would just check it out before I felt more confined and unwilling to get out into Taiwan.

                My goals would be simple and attainable.  Stay out for an hour, find an ATM, get some money, and find a store.  After much pacing back and forth in my room, preparing for a short stroll as though I was preparing to set off cross country (though I suppose that is easier in Taiwan than other places) I left my hotel for the first time.  A quick glance to the right revealed that there were no sidewalks to be had.  “Left,” I said out loud, hoping that it would stick better that way after repearing 'right' to myself a million times before that.  I turned to the left in time to catch a young man taking a photo of me.  I shot him a glare and he responded by taking another photo.

                There.  Now I truly felt like I had returned to Asia.

                Though I had strolled so confidently past the hotel lobby where Comedy and Tragedy still sat, I realized that I needed help finding an ATM.  I recalled their inability to speak English and flipped open my China language guide to the short section on Mandarin and found the word for ATM.  I walked up to them confidently.

                Comedy picked up the phone as I walked in and began making a call, she pointed to Tragedy and I got the feeling that she simply didn’t want to talk to me.

                Great… I thought sourly to myself.  “Ni hao!” I said with a smile.  “Nali,” this time I got the tones of the word sorted, falling raising, and then falling for “where”.  I opened my mouth to read the word for ATM, but I faltered, “Zidong…uh…zi…”  I turned the book over and pointed at the Chinese characters for her to read.

                “Zidong qukuanji?  You need to find an ATM?” she asked.

                I could only blink for several moments.  “Um…yes.  Yes.”

                “Okay!” she said with a smile.  “Come with me.  I will show you.”

                So I followed her back into the heat of the day, the rough streets of Taoyuan City.

                Still animated, she turned back to face me, a look of almost panic across her face.  “You need an ATM?  Or you need to exchange money?”

                I shook my head, “An ATM is fine.”

                Her bright smile returned.  She held her hand to the left, “There is a 7-11 there.  They have ATM.  But,” she motioned kitty-corner, just across the street, “If you have to exchange money there is a bank there.  You can exchange money there.”

                “I don’t have to exchange money.”

                “But you can there,” she reminded me.

                I nodded in understanding.

                She nodded back with a final sort of, “Okay.”

                I thanked her and set about my tasks for the day, wishing I hadn’t nicknamed her Tragedy the night before as it seemed wholly inappropriate in the light of day.

                Taoyuan was not what I had been promised at all.  Taipei.  How many times had I been told Taipei?  I hadn’t yet seen Taipei, but I imagined it with sidewalks.  I hopped here and there in order to cross the street, weaving through crowded and narrow sidewalks (crowded with scooters awaiting repair and boxes of who knows what) before I had to jump down and into the lanes of oncoming traffic when the sidewalk suddenly disappeared.

                The trek to the 7-11 wasn’t all that bad.  There was sidewalk most of the way and the ATM was pushed into the corner next to the hot coffee like it had been for all of the Korean convenient stores (and maybe in US stores too, but I never need cash there).  Upon feeding the machine my card it gave me the option of English and things proceeded smoothly.  It would have been less so had I not deleted a 0 when I nearly took out 30,000 NT, which would have been near 1000 USD when I wanted only 100USD.  But crisis averted, I had completed the tasks of finding an ATM and getting some money.

                The next task was mostly burning the clock.  I thought how much of a baby I was being.  I told myself that I was saying that Taoyuan had nothing of interest to put off being brave and adventurous.  But as I walked I began to wonder if this was true.

                More scooter shops.

                Empty storefronts.

                A chain burger joint that had seen far better days (I could only hope).

                Maybe I could turn down this street and-nope, just brick walls.

                I had been out about forty-five minutes and decided that I had been right to start with. Taoyuan sucks.  Villahermosa level sucks.  I headed back towards my hotel, keeping a better eye out for a grocery store of some sort.

                Apparently while I had been focused on 7-11 I had not noticed the store directly next door to the hotel.  My last task was waiting for me upon my return.  I entered and drew looks from all around, but felt a sense of pride in having dragged my jet-lagged ass out of my room to actually get something done instead of waiting for my next meal to arrive.

                Alright, Chelsea. I thought to myself.  Find something you’ve never had or seen before and buy it.  Ooo! Is that kimchi!?!  No…focus…  But I had seen all of it before.  Produce lined one side in open refrigerated shelves: fruits I had eaten, kimchi, milks and yogurts, eggs, tofu, lotus root.  I could name everything in that aisle.  On the opposite side was microwave meals of curries and such, but without a microwave, even if it was brand new, I couldn’t eat it.  Ramen and pasta filled the next aisle.  The ramen, or ramyun in this case, was even the famous Korean brand.

                Finally I grabbed carrot cookies, putting back the pineapple cake knowing it couldn’t actually be that different, as well as the kimchi and some “ohayo” brand chopsticks.  It didn’t feel terribly Taiwanese, but at least carrot cookies was something.

                I returned to my room with plenty of time before noon and snacked slowly on my items, waiting for my food.

                It never came.

                By the time two o’ clock rolled around I had given up on it and finished my purchased food.  I was thoroughly confused as to what this “provided food” meant.  Perhaps I was meant to drink the tea for breakfast and have the burger for lunch?

                A nap would make me feel better I decided.  I have an inability to nap in most circumstances, but I was worn out enough that I thought I would give it a shot.  I crawled into bed, setting my dress to the side and sleeping in my underwear.  After a lot of moving this way and that in the sunlight filled room, I felt that I might drift off to sleep.

                Knock, knock.

                It didn’t take another set of knocks for me to lunge out of bed.  I had my dress in hand but it had got twisted up in its cut out back.

                I could hear women speaking in Chinese outside of my door.  But I didn’t know what to say to make them not come in.  I continued to struggle with my dress as their key turned in my door.  “Yes!” I called out.  “Hello!”

                They were not thwarted by my clever tactics.

                Dress still tangled up in itself I slid it over myself, finding only one arm hole to use, but being mostly covered.  I stepped out from around the corner to block their entrance into my room.  “Um…”

                Again, my way with words did not serve me.  They stood at me, taking in my sleepy eyes, disheveled hair, and bright blue bra-strap where there ought to be a sleeve.

                They spoke to me in Chinese.

                “Uh…” I could only shake my head and continue to block their entrance.

                “Bu yao,” the woman said.

                I knew that one!  Don’t want.  “Bu yao,” I repeated, shaking my hands in front of me and shaking my head.

                Both women, the one in my room with a mop and the one behind her pushing a small cart, began to laugh boisterously.  “Sorry, sorry,” the with the mop one said through her laughter as she left and shut the door behind her.  I heard them laugh all the way down the hallway.

                I wondered as I dragged myself back to bed if they had been coming to see the leak I had been complaining about.  But there wasn’t anything I could do about it.  My productivity was limited to deciding to nap clothed.

                My second nap attempt was interrupted as well.  I begrudgingly returned to the door to find Tragedy ready to inspect the leak and take me to my new room.

                “I will take you there.  And you can say if it is okay or no,” she offered.

                So I changed rooms to a nearly identical one, except this one had no leak.  I took the key back downstairs and was surprised by the “pack” that I had been promised.  I took the one for my roommate who would be coming very shortly at that point.

                T-shirts and instructions for the camp came in the pack, as well as my food allowance and an explanation that the hotel provided breakfast.  Hence the burger.

                Later that night, my roommate arrived.  Instead of a full of herself, didn’t want to travel with me, twenty-something Joanna that I had created in my head, a mature, retired lawyer Joan showed up.  We chatted for a while about our combined awkward experiences and decided that we both wanted to head out to explore Taipei the next day and would do so together.

                Our day ought to have started far earlier than it did.  But we wanted our free breakfast, damn it.  I told Joan that my food had shown up about 8am the day before, and so we sat and chatted and planned for the day until nearly 9 before we saw fit to ask if food was going to come.

                Tragedy and a young man were at the front desk when I arrived to ask.

                “Is there going to be breakfast?” I wanted to be clear, but tried my best not to sound presumptuous.

                She looked at me a bit confused, as though she had not heard me correctly.  “Uh…yes.  Here,” she motioned with her hand but moved out from behind the counter deciding it would be best to walk us there.  “The restaurant has breakfast.”

                Just beyond the hotel lobby was a room of vacant tables and a buffet line of Taiwanese fare.  There were side dishes of cabbage, greens, rice noodles, eggs, and much more, plenty to ensure I didn’t have to ingest a single bite of meat!  There was rice and porridge, coffee and milk tea.  Steamed buns, this first steamed buns I had ever seen without filling, sat in a warmer, ready to eat.

                We filled our plates to overflowing and sipped coffee leisurely once we had eaten.

                This was the provided breakfast.

                I have no idea why I had received a burger the day before.

                “Wonderful!” Joan called to Tragedy as we finished and were ready to leave.  “Thank you very much!  My name.  Is Joan.  What is your name?”

                She looked surprised.  “Oh.  My name Rita,” she said with as smile and a jerking sort of bow.

                I hadn’t thought to ask since, the first night, it seemed so clear that she didn’t speak any English and that my shortest attempts at Chinese were unintelligible.  But Rita.  That seemed much more appropriate than Tragedy.  I introduced myself as well with a bow, thanking her and the others in the restaurant for a wonderful breakfast.

                Armed with a bus number and a plan for the day I asked Rita how to get to the bus station.

                She seemed appalled.  “Where will you go?”

                “Taipei.”

                “You take the train.  It is very convenient.”

                And convenient it was.  It was between a five and ten minute walk from our hotel and fairly simple.  We purchased a public transit card (a yoyoca) at the same 7-11 where I took out money and loaded it at the same counter.

FIRST TIME ON TRA/MRT

                I couldn’t help but think that Taiwan’s public transit system was a lot like Korea’s.  For those of you without that particular frame of reference: good.  It is really good.  We stood at the train station, having walked through the queue and scanning our yoyoca.

                For the TRA, the train that we needed to take from Taoyuan City into Taipei, and that goes all over Taiwan as well, as well as the MRT, the metro system within Taipei, you pay the same as in Korea: by distance.  You scan when you enter and you scan when you leave at it charges you accordingly.  However, buses are different as we would find out when we tried to scan our cards the same way.  You only pay once for buses as it is a flat rate.

                “Is…is this the right one…?” we stared at the signs, every last one of them in Chinese, and then at the tracks across the way.

                “Excuse me,” Joan asked to a young, shy looking Taiwanese woman, “Do you speak English?”

                The woman giggled and shook her head and hands, “No.” she said through a laugh, repeating it six or so more times to be sure we didn’t try to speak to her any more.

                “Taipei?” Joan continued.

                The woman covered her mouth and turned towards her boyfriend, who had also begun laughing and was physically turning the woman back to us and egging her on.  “Yes,” she finally managed.  “Taipei.”

                Good enough.

                We waited patiently for our train to arrive and, as we were doing so, another woman, this one perhaps in her late forties or early fifties, came up to us.

                Crystal.  This woman had lived in the US for the past 27 years with her husband of the time, and then to continue raising her daughter who hated Taiwan.  She told us about how, now that her daughter is in law school, she had purchased a condo in DC flat out and given it to her daughter.  In doing so she felt that her motherly duties had been fulfilled and she had come back to the country she had missed so much.  She was very proud of all the progress that Taiwan had made and was thrilled to be back.  She was maybe more thrilled to tell us all about it and appoint herself our guide to public transit.

                It brought me back to Mexico City.  Like Mexico City’s metro, Taipei’s MRT consists of lines from one end to the other, no loops, and you simply find the last station on either end and that tells you which direction you will be going.  It is also color-coded, making it a snap to follow.

                But unlike the sweet unnamed woman in Mexico, Crystal insisted.  She lead us through transferring at the Taipei Main Station and showed us to follow the signs labeled “MRT” and then the signs with our needed color to get to the right place.

                And with that, she left.

                The best way to navigate the MRT is to download the app “TaipeiMetro”.  It is just a map, but this map is in both English and Chinese, making it easy for English speakers to read, and easy to ask the locals for directions as you can just point to the Chinese.  Though there are no shortages of Crystals to get you from point A to point B if your eyes are big and confused enough.

CHIANG KAI-SHEK MEMORIAL

                Just off of the red line (line 2) or the green line (line 3), Chiang Kia-Shek Memorial Hall has its own stop and, once you get up on the street, it is hard to miss.  The hall and its surrounding buildings are enormous and gaudy.  The colors of the hall, having been finished in 1980 hasn’t had time to fade and stood out brightly against the much more subdued blue of the sky.

                We came upon it on the side of the concert hall and assumed we had to walk through the building.

                “I think that that’s just a gift shop,” I called to Joan who had stepped up to a door.

                But she hadn’t been thinking of the memorial hall, she had been dreaming of air conditioning.  “Well, let’s just step in for a bit.”

                We stepped into the AC and moved to the right hand side first, a book shop with little trinkets, but they weren’t really themed for the building they resided in.  I stumbled upon packs of postcards that I thought were perfect, though I would find out later that they were the same postcards sold at every major sight in Taipei.  I was excited anyway and purchased them along with the proper postage for them to make it to their destination.

                The other side of the air conditioning, er, I mean room, was a sort of café.  I ordered myself papaya milk, something I had never tasted before, and sat down to start to write some postcards and enjoy the coolness o f the room while I could.

                Having finished our drinks and food we moved through the quiet building until we reached a door to the outdoors where we stepped onto the center complex.

                The tiles were arranged in partial circles going this was and that.  It had a dizzying effect that brought my eyes upward and away from the ground, but it stretched on so far that it was hard to fully look away while still taking in the scene around me.

                Tourists filled the square, but up the stairs to the concert hall some Taiwanese were practicing choreography with fans.  Across the way there was music, and behind us there was construction going on.  With all of this real life going on in all directions, myself and the other tourists seemed to be funneled from the square in the center towards the memorial hall.

                89.  That is how many steps were supposed to be from the ground up to his statue.  I don’t know why I couldn’t take their word for it.  Joan was appreciating the beauty of the sights around us a speaking to me, but I only offered back uninterested “uh-huh”s and nods as I focused on my counting.

                The golden statue sat before us.  A flag sat on either side and, a little bit closer to the velvet ropes keeping us at bay, stood two life-sized statues of guards.

                Fuck!  My heart leapt into my throat as I realized that those unmoving statues were people.  I don’t know why it caused me such a jolt, but felt better when it caused Joan the same level of distress.  The stared blankly at one another and I found myself staring at the one to the right, waiting for him to move or blink or falter in some way.  But it didn’t happen.  I did, however, catch the other one shift unsteadily on his feet and fight back a smile.  My head snapped to the other side hoping to catch the one on the right cracking a smile back at the one on the left.  No such luck.

                The ceiling extended upwards for what felt like forever and, in a deep dome, housed a white sun on a blue background.  Try as I might, it was simply too big to get a decent picture and I had to settle for a less than mediocre one and some extra gawking to make up for it.

                The information desk informed us that the guards change ever hour, on the hour, and we could wait another 45 minutes to see the next one.  We decided not to.

2-28 PEACE PARK

                It wasn’t until I had already showed them the Chinese characters in my Lonely Planet and flashed them a smile that I realized I had asked the wrong people.  I made a mental note that this was what Taiwanese hooligans looked like.  But it was too late.  I wasn’t about to show them that their cold stares and snarling frowns made me nervous.  They dismissed me with some angry sounding Chinese and a woman with short-cropped hair stood, dropping her cigarette and looking at me challengingly.  She stood at maybe 5’1’’, but I decided to give them a quick bow, a “Xiexie” and take my leave.

                “They didn’t know?” Joan asked when I returned to her.

                I shook my head, “I guess not,” and I walked quickly to the main road figuring I could ask literally anyone else.

                Seeing the Presidential Office Building in the distance before us and knowing that the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall was behind us, we are able orient ourselves and easily find the park to our right.

                This park is dedicated to those who died in the series of massacres that began on February 28^th, 1947.  While it was a beautiful park with water features, plants, paths, and playgrounds with children running about, there was a peaceful and respectful sort of silence, even in the midst of Taipei. 

                Coming upon a stone foot path, I paused.  Looking both ways as though I were about to cross the street, I considered continuing on, but found myself slipping off my flats and gathering my maxi skirt in one hand.  The feeling couldn’t be described as pleasant or comfortable.  I started down the path with every intention to take just a few steps, but ended up all the way down the path before I realized this meant I would have to walk all the way back again.  At the other end, Joan passed off her phone to a Japanese tourist and joined me on the path.

                I watched as the pain registered on her face and she reached out to grab my arm for support, relieving her own discomfort by pushing me farther down into the stone.   I let out a combined scream of pain and a laugh as Joan continued with her “oh, oh, oh…ow…oh…”

                This was the only moment that the man captured.

                We walked by the 2-28 Memorial Museum and saw the white ribbons and photos mourning the loss of life in the terrible massacres.  I used the lack of English in the museum as an excuse not to go in, but if truth be told I simply wasn’t ready to go from a stroll in the park and laughing on the stone path to hearing of the horrible acts of violence that people are capable of.  We continued on and I made an effort not to look back on the ribbons, but they had left a weight on me.

                I’m not sure if I regret not going in.

PRESIDENTIAL OFFICE BUILDING

                It was nearly midday at this point, and the sun was unforgiving.  Clouds loomed someplace off on the horizon, but served only as a tease and a source of more humidity.  And also to be a blemish on my pictures of the Presidential Office Building.  The walk towards the enormous red and white building was full of wondering if we could go in.  The guidebook spoke of “exhibits”, but was I reading the correct entry?

                Another tourist asked us to take her picture and we decided to ask her.  She informed us that you had to make an appointment “three days in advance”, which she hadn’t done either.

                “We’ll just ask,” Joan said.  “If we start walking past what would they do?”  She joked (I hoped she was joking) that if we don’t get kicked out of at least one building then it wasn’t an adventure.

                As we got closer I asked her to pick a building to get kicked out of that wasn’t surrounded by armed guards and army trucks.  It didn’t look terribly inviting.

                I lowered my eyes as we turned the corner on the block and a helmeted man holding a gun over half as long as the man was tall.

XIMENDING

                I can’t say how thrilled I am with the openness and helpfulness of the Taiwanese people.  They truly want to share their country with you and make sure that you find anything and everything you need.

                That being said, this woman was not going to find what we wanted.

                My tactic in these circumstances was to thank them and wait until they leave to find what I really wanted.  But this wasn’t meshing well.

                “No,” Joan said, “Not just coffee.  Food.”  She pantomimed eating for the woman.

                The woman, who had walked us more than a dozen blocks to this particular café spoke in Chinese with the woman working there.  She turned back to us after a lengthy discussion.  “You can buy bread downstairs and bring it up her and drink coffee and eat your bread.

                Before Joan or I could say I word she had lead us back into the elevator.  The doors chimed as they opened happily back into the humidity and the woman motioned us towards to the affiliated bakery.

                I spoke before anyone else could, “Thank you for all your help!  We will look around.”  I gave her a smile and she smiled back, wishing us a wonderful time in Taiwan and hurrying off to whatever she had been doing before she had appointed herself our guide.

                Joan said that she didn’t particularly want to eat bread and I told her that I was in agreement, but that that woman was going to show us a million places when it would be easier to just walk through the shopping district and find something.  Joan nodded in agreement.  "Coffee maker," she said.  We had come up with this expression after the men at breakfast kindly spent well over half and hour trying to figure out a coffee maker in order to give us coffee that was nice, but had become much more important to them than it was to us.

                We walked down several streets that sold only shoes, followed by only clothing stores, and moved through Ximending in this fashion.  Logically we thought we would come across a section that was only food.

                I stopped only briefly at a vendor selling some sort of liquid that I was ready to purchase before I was pulled away.  We had been appointed another guide.

                This one took us quite a ways telling us she would take us to good food.  It was several blocks before she announced that we were nearly to the Japanese restaurant.

                “Is there Taiwanese food?” I asked hopefully.  I honestly hadn’t seen any.  Not street food or restaurants or anything but Japanese food for days, maybe 6 McDonalds, MosBurgers, HotBurgers, and on and on.  What did the Taiwanese people eat?

                “Taiwanese food?!” she stopped in her tracks and looked back at me in almost disgust.

                I tried to stop just as abruptly, but nearly walked right into her.  “Yes,” I said as I righted myself once more.  “What is a good Taiwanese food?”

                “Beef noodle soup?” she asked as though I was the one to know.

                I could feel the corners of my mouth turn down at the word “beef”.  I had to remember that, like in Korea, this month broth was simply a reality for me.  So I nodded.

                The place she took us to was cooled by a tiny and ineffective fan and the free cold tea they offered.  The menu fortunately came in English, but the sheet of paper they handed us that we were expected to check off what we wanted did no.  I called them over and pointed to the noodle soup.

                It came quickly and with enormous chunks of beef in it.

                I couldn’t do it.  I pushed them to the side and ate the noodles and vegetables.  My vegetarian hearts bleeds to tell you that it was quite good.  My frugal heart rejoices that it was 100NT (about 3USD).

RED HOUSE

                Ximending was not precisely what I expected.  It was a mixture of crowded stores selling things clearly for locals, such as scooter parts and kitchen supplies, as well as clothes and shoes and the like.  But the reason I had really chosen it was for the Red House (Red Pavilion our guidebook said, but nowhere else did as it called this).

                Ximending had tons of maps posted all over with a compass rose and “you are here”.  It listed the Red House and we made our way there, not sure exactly what to look for.

                “Hold on,” I stopped our forward motion.  “Let’s look at that cool building for just one second.

                We took what we thought was a detour to take a picture of a brick building that looked quite old in a very commercial district.

                There was a summer camp full of children all in neon green that ran up to us happily.

                “Hello!” Joan called with a big wave.  “What is this building?”

                The girl turned to look at it.  “This is a very old building,” she said, satisfied with her English and smiling to show it.

                “Well I can see that,” Joan said with a laugh.  She continued her discussion with them, announcing that we were English teachers and asking for a show of hands of who spoke English.  They all put their hands up, though I wondered who fully understood the question.

                The children took to her like I took to the building.  I saw a sign and made a beeline for it.

                “Red House,” it proclaimed in English.  It described the same history as the “Red Pavillion” and I realized that they were one and the same.

                “Joan!” I called over to my companion, but she was in the midst of taking pictures and bonding with the children.  “This is it!” I called anyway.

                We made our way into the octagonal building to a place that was part museum, part café, part gift shop, and all air conditioned.  Most of the building was still functional, for music performances and the like, so the reading of the information took only a few minutes, but I marveled at the state of a 1000-year old building, but at the same time, was surprised at its plainness.

TIEN-HO TEMPLE

                “One of central Taipei’s most beautiful Buddhist temples,” Lonely Planet told me.  And it was just next to the Red House.  Popsicles in hand, we left the Red House and walked back towards the intersection.  We didn’t cross any streets, just walked around a clothing store in the way and into a very commercial street.

                In the Taipei heat my roselle popsicle had been reduced to slush before we made it to the street corner.

                We walked farther than we thought we needed to.  And then we walked some more.

                I consulted the map that assured me it was there.  Somewhere.

                We circled around the back of the Red House to try again.  “You know,” I said to Joan, “That is a very old building.”

                “Is it now?” she asked with a smile.

                Back at the clothing store we had circled around before we looked again.  All the way down the road all we could see were shops.  Narrow storefronts, like the ones that Lonely Planet had mentioned, lines the streets crowded closely together, but not a temple in sight.

                The woman in the clothing store was not particularly happy to see us, guidebook in hand, obviously about to ask for directions.  “Wait,” she said curtly without a glance in our direction.

               We started to wait, but I really wasn’t much good at it.  And there was a group of Taiwanese, probably college aged.  The boy in the group was glancing our way and nonchalantly dancing to hip-hop music inside the store.  “How did he make such an action nonchalant?” you ask.  He didn’t.  But it was clear nonchalance was what he was going for.  His eyes kept darting in our direction and then looking away whenever we spoke to one another.  The tell-tale sign that he spoke English.

               We called the group over who were more than happy to speak to us in English, trying to point out a sign in Chinese that told us where to go.  I nodded after saying I didn't see if a dozen times and told him we would find it anyway.

                Moving away from the station we walked on the right side of the street, but still could almost have passed it by.  It was no bigger than one of the tiny storefronts around it and we wondered if this was it.  But walking inward, there wasn’t any doubt.

                Water streamed down into a small koi pond on one side, a miniature temples built into the rock like they were cliff faces.  A man leaned over the water, ignoring the statues of an elephant on dragon shooting water, and looking instead the excited koi churning the water and hoping to be fed.  I took a few steps up the stairs toward the temple and took in the scene of people praying, moving from one spot to the next in a solemn sort of way.

                As people passed I dropped my head in a meek sort of bow and no one seemed to particularly mind me.  But I took in the scene from the outside, unwilling to stand in the way of something that was so solemn to them.  I stood off to the side and looked in, able to see the back of the temple with the grand golden statues and fruits piled on a long table.  People held their incense and bowed solemnly, eyes shut tight in thought and prayer.

                The detail of the temple was beautiful, but the people inside struck me the most.  I moved out of the way towards the exit where I could still see the intricacies of the statues on the building and the people milling about inside.  I could smell the incense and hear the chanting like music.

                I admitted that I didn’t know how much was appropriate for me to be in the way of or taking pictures of.  I felt like an intruder, a voyeur, on something that was very important and sacred to them.  But I felt content just being near it and hoped that they didn’t mind me on the outskirts.

                I placed a few coins in the beggar’s hand how stood to meet me as I left.  I hoped, a penance for tromping through their temple and thanks for welcoming me anyway.