Tent Testing

On the last weekend in July, Matthew and I joined Lehi (the other Canadian in town) and his family on a camping trip. An interesting fact - Matthew and I met last year while camping, also on the very last weekend in July. It was a funny coincidence that this invitation just happened to be on the same date.

Anyhow, I'm not sure what most people think when they think of camping, but I wasn't expecting what we got. We went to Puli (in the mountains) and drove up a small mountain where we would be camping. It was pretty fancy. We had toilets, showers (maybe normal for a camp ground), but we also had electricity, running water, etc. Matthew and I have a small two person tent and this was the first time we got to test it out. Even though it was pretty cold that night, inside the tent was hot. We had bought our camping gear according to how big it is when it is packed because we need it to fit on the motorcycle. So, we bought sheets instead of sleeping bags, and we don't have any pillows, etc. Even though our sheets are as thin as most peoples' curtains, I was dying in there from overheating. I slept pretty well considering.

Either way it was pretty fun and at least we know the tent works. It was so quick to set up and take down. You forget how relieving something as small as that is until we watched the other couple who has their family sized tent; and just how long and complicated that process can be. By the time ours was packed that had only managed to take the fly off and was just starting to pull out the poles. Monica (Lehi's wife) couldn't believe we were already done. Then we were off to get home.

It was a fun trip, and here's a picture of the us on the camping trip. It's a much smaller group as the other couple only brought two of their six children along for the trip.
At the same location as where we were camping, you can also go hang-gliding. That's what the windsock is there for in the background.

Typhoon Soulik

Here in Taiwan we get typhoons. I went to work like any normal day on Friday, July 12th and taught a few classes like normal. The government makes the announcement of whether schools will be closed because of a typhoon. They made that announcement by the afternoon and so when 6:00pm came around everyone was to go home and stay indoors.

A typhoon day is kind of like a snow day except is applies to everyone. A typhoon day means that no students need to go to school that day, including the teachers. A typhoon day, unlike a snow day back home, also means that EVERYTHING is to close by at certain time, so no one is to go to work. So, after work on that Friday, Matthew and I went to the grocery store. This is probably the only time the grocery stores are actually busy; everyone is stacking up on food. We went home, ate some instant noodles, played board games, watched movies. Nothing really exciting. However, I did enjoy the most beautiful sleep that night; I like storms.

The next day, work was also cancelled. By Saturday evening things had calmed down and we went out for a walk. In our town there is a man-made river which is always empty and dry. It was constructed for this purpose, to aid in the prevention of flooding of the city during a typhoon. This is what the river looked like that evening (I'm not sure how deep it is, but it is deep enough that if you fell in you would have a hard time climbing out).

This walk was refreshing but short as it started raining again; I guess it wasn't quite done. The next day (Sunday, July 14) though, Matthew and I wanted to see what we could find outside. We came across a number of fallen fruit trees that day. Here is what we found while scavenging.

A papaya, little bananas, oranges? (I'm not actually sure what that last one is) And by Monday everything was back to normal.

Oyster Farming, Up Close

The sun is strong here. Even though it takes a lot for me to get a sun burn, it still happens here. Matthew on the other hand, it takes about 30 seconds of direct sunlight contact. So, when it comes to taking the motorcycle out for short leisure drives, he prefers to leave in late afternoon when the sun isn't as intense. We decided to just drive west toward the sea. We evetually ended up at an oyster farming spot. Since it was late afternoon, the tide was low, and we could acutally drive on the roads that are normally under the sea. We drove out pretty far from the shore using the road and got an up-close look at what the oyster farmings really look like.

 

While we were looking around, we even saw a few farmers. Some like to be modern and use motor-vehicles to haul their goods, while others like to be more old school/traditional and continue to use ox. You can also see some buildings in the background, that's where the shore and land can be found. All of the sandy area is underwater during the morning and early afternoon.

We stayed and watched the sunset before heading home.