Shrimping

The new adventure for today was indoor shrimp fishing, or rather, just shrimping. I remember going when I was much younger on vacation in Taiwan, and I’ve wanted to go since I’ve been back in 2008.

We drove to a road down by the National Palace Museum full of indoor shrimp farms where you can get a rod and bait for $300NT($10USD)/1 hr, $500NT($16USD)/2 hr, $700NT($22USD)/3hr.

The bait consists of chicken liver (gross) or smaller processed shrimps (cannibals!!).

Then you set up a spot next to their indoor pools and wait for the shrimp to bite.

We paid for one rod for two hours because we had no idea what we’re doing. After one hour of lots of waiting and nothing happening, I finally caught one! It was a freakin’ huge one, and it fought hard. But here’s a picture of Michael with it since I was a bit freaked about touching it (and it kinda had pinchers too).

After two hours, that was the only shrimp that we caught. They provide nets that you hook to the side to keep the shrimp as you catch them. Some guy walked by as he was leaving and gave us his two shrimps that he caught. So with our one shrimp and the guy’s two sympathy shrimps, we had a grand total of three. Located in the front of the shrimp farm was an area with sinks, skewers, and ovens… so we washed our shrimps, skewered them, covered them in salt, and cooked them (and you have to do all this they were still alive, unfortunately, but you gotta do what you gotta do.) You only see two because one of the sympathy shrimps looked really dead, and we didn’t want to risk food poisoning so we only cooked the fresh ones.

Although the skewering and cooking part was a bit cruel and sadistic, the shrimp did turn out to be pretty tasty, especially considering those babies you’re looking at are worth $250NT ($7.86USD) each. (The better you are and the more you catch, of course the lower in value they become, but that goes without saying.)

2010
01/17
CATEGORY
cultural
food
tourist
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Hot Dogs

I have been looking for authentic American hot dogs to satisfy my cravings, and yet the best ones have been at Costco’s. Sadly, you can’t even get in without a membership or waiting in a line that goes around the block especially on the weekends.

Hungry Girl in Taipei and I did go check out a place called Hook in Zhongxiao Dunhua, but their hot dogs were the really thin, mediocre-tasting, non-American kind, and the wait for the food was really long even when we were the only two customers there.

However, I have discovered that Evans Burger does serve some good ole American hot dogs. They come with really tasty fries, relish, lettuce (???), and salsa. The bun’s kinda weird, but the hot dog is good. Evans also has some pretty good burgers. The one pictured is their Chili Beef Burger.

Ok, now I’m hungry.

2010
01/14
CATEGORY
food
restaurants
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Go-Karts

My horrendous middle schoolers have suddenly turned into angels overnight. Something must be in the air. Ok, maybe not angels, but the worst behaving kid has now turned into the one of the top students in the class. Everyone else has also fallen in line. Something is definitely in the air. Or maybe it’s just me. I’m just that good. Or not. Whatever, I’ll take it.

In other news, we went go-karting in Zhongli (website in Chinese, http://www.gf-racecar.com) this past weekend. I was in a horrible mood due to PMS and was not too thrilled about driving an hour to commandeer a machine that could possibly hurtle me to my death especially since I’ve never done it before. However, I have discovered the cure to PMS: the speed, the exhilaration, the slight loss of control, and the smell of burning tires in the air. They made us wear helmets (ew for not being cleaned in between people), and since I wore flip-flops, I had to wear their sneakers. (double ew. triple ew for not bringing socks. ended up wearing Michael’s instead.) Anyways, it was a good time, although I ended up with a huge bruise on my inner calf for taking those turns too sharply and very very sore arms and pectorals the next day.

2010
01/13
CATEGORY
teaching
tourist
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Heart Attack-Worthy

I got so furious today with my seventh graders. My second class is the worst of them all. They’re all rowdy and talkative and don’t seem to care to learn one bit.

They talk and talk and talk all through class, and I’ve long given up on yelling at them especially after the first few times because it strains my voice too much. Instead, I wait with a glare until they notice and shut up themselves. Today, after the fifth time of doing it in a ten-minute span, I was getting more and more frustrated.. then the kid in the front (remember the kid that no one likes, but he really  brings it up on himself) pipes up and goes, “Teacher, hurry, we pay $500(NT = $15.75USD) for this.”

Oh. my. god. That’s it. I blew up.

He was accusing me of wasting his time?!?!?! I CANNOT teach when 20+ students are talking to each other and not paying attention to me! After repeatedly asking them to be quiet and pay attention, after having to listen to them toss me snide comments in Chinese in response, and after having to ask them simple questions that I’ve gone over and over and over again with no comprehensible answers, he was accusing me of not doing MY JOB? I asked them if they went home and told their parents that they are paying $500 for them to come to my class and talk the whole way through. I am there to teach, but are they there to learn? Whose fault is this really??? It was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

Alas, but that lasted five minutes, and things were back to chaos again. SIGH.

(My first thought really was $500 per class, that’s it? No way, I know your parents are paying a lot more than that. But I didn’t tell them that.)

These kids are going to give me a heart attack at the young age of 24.

2010
01/04
CATEGORY
teaching
8 comments

Not-So-Happy New Year

My New Year’s Eve celebrations started off reasonably well. We headed to a club, which was going to be a good time because it’s been ages since I’ve been clubbing. We got there before midnight, mingled a bit, then went back outside to see the Taipei 101 fireworks. After the really short display, we went back to the club to dance the night away before we headed home in a merry and drunken stupor to peacefully sleep the first night of the New Year away.

Or so I wished that had really happened.

Instead, around 3am as we were leaving, I discovered that my wristlet had broke and the bag part containing all of my important stuff: keys, cash, phones, ID, debit card had disappeared, while the ring part had remained on my wrist. But the thing is I knew I had lost it in the previous 20 minutes because I was very aware of when I had seen it last. I backtracked quickly, but it was nowhere to be seen! So instead of heading home, we spent the next couple of hours searching among the throngs of drunk people and harassed every worker at the club from bodyguards to servers if anyone turned in my bag. But alas, it was not to be found. I left my information and headed home emptier and a lot more dejected about the new year.

This morning, I woke up and canceled everything. The suspicious thing is we called my phones a few times, and then suddenly they were turned off.. as if someone had turn them off (I’m pretty sure the battery life was pretty good.). I also went to the police station and filed a report and hopefully, in this land of con artists and phone scammers, nobody will try to use my identity.

To the person who took my bag: I hate you. You made me cry on New Year’s. I hope karma comes around and bites you hard in the butt. (Maybe you can be redeemed a bit if you turn in my stuff right now). But I really really hope you have a crappy new year and many more to come.

2010
01/02
CATEGORY
bars/clubs
personal
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