April 3rd 2006

No change in my daily routine of study and work so far, time is passing by really fast this way. However, sometimes after a long day, I take a short time to listen to some music and recently it was more Chinese than English or German music. I remember that I presented another Chinese song over here some time ago (click here). Ok, so while this was an example for one of the numerous female singers, I want to present you one from a male singer or let’s say rapper right now.

Chinese rap? It’s also a little hard for me to get adjusted to rap besides the English language, for example I personally think that most German rap sounds terrible, especially when they want to copy the US style. However, in Chinese it somehow works out better, although it’s impossible to compare it to English or German.

Furthermore the name. The artist’s name I want to present you is MC Hot Dog. The first time I heard the name I really thought that he is only a very very cheap wannabe rapper with an even cheaper name. In Taiwan however, everything in music seems possible.

The following example is more a fun song than real rap, but I think it’s the song of the album which is the hardest to forget. The song’s name is “我家的母老虎” which you can translate as “Virago” in English, the melody of the chorus might remind you to your childhood days. Let’s see.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHACfybxs64

March 12th 2006

Unfortunately the happy holiday time is over, but work can also look like this:

However, this looks more relaxing that it really is. Although working at home has some advantages, there is only one thing which remains in the end: work.

What you can see in the picture is me listening and writing down the text of a DVD presentation in English, with this horrible Texas accent and words, that I hardly could find in any dictionary or internet. Briefly, the effort doing this is much higher than the traditional translation, even more when you have to listen to one single sentence like 50 times, which very soon leads to anything else than a relaxing work.

Fortunately I don’t have to do this the whole day, because meanwhile there is quite a good variety in my work schedule during the week. I teach German at a cram school for a few weeks already, of course with much less students than in English classes, however I was somehow surprised that I could even find some teaching jobs for German in Taipei.

Furthermore I still give private lessons, which lead me at least two times a week to various  Starbucks/Lavazza/Barista/another coffee shop. In Taiwan, coffee shops just seem to be meant for drinking coffee, in fact their function is more like an extended study hall or an office. I haven’t seen a coffee shop in Taipei which was not 90% full of students or businessmen with laptops.

And then there is still the translation work for actually I think five different companies, which contract me every now and then, sometimes more, sometimes less, preferably always more, when I don’t have time at all…

Oh, I almost forgot, of course I’m still studying Chinese, mostly early in the morning or late at night. To make it short: One day really can be quite short, if there is always anything to do and it seems that you never get finished. Interestingly it was the same situation last year. I remember something like 6 weeks of work without any free day and so on.

Anyway, I just can be glad about it. Recently I also had to deny a job offer, because I just didn’t have the time. I definitely cannot count myself to be a big income earner, not even with seven jobs at the same time, but it’s enough for living in Taiwan at the moment and with rising Chinese knowledge, possibilities should also increase…in fact I cancelled the aforementioned job offer only using Chinese on the phone ;)

February 26th 2006

Guys, this video is just hilarious! Philip Wang asks the question why Asian girls like western guys that much, but why there hardly are couples with Asian guys and western girls???

I fell off my chair while watching the video, because some parts are so really true. And when I think of my or Cindy’s friends, there are also just Asian girl western guy couples, but not vice versa.

Watch the video and find out why! Due to it’s size and length it’s unfortunately not possible to put in on my website, instead I offer you two links, where you can watch it.

Yellow Fever at Google Video

Yellow Fever at You Tube



February 15th 2006

The best offers are free, isn’t it? Cindy and I got that kind of offer last weekend, when we went to Nanzhuang to visit her God’s mom. She and her husband opened a guesthouse last year, better to say, they just let build a complete new one. I think calling it just a guesthouse is already undervalue, but see for yourself:

Nanzhuang is located at the foot of the mountains with a lot of overgrown smaller and bigger hills. It’s therefore a very famous destination for metropolitans to relax and I have to say that after a few months just having been in Taipei, it’s just the right place to go. Fresh air, fresh water, green hills, wild rabbits and sunny weather, five things you hardly can find in Taipei ;)

Furthermore the room style! Just the bathroom was worth the trip and the food was also just great. All together for a price of nothing and I gladly do some commercial over here :) However, even if I had to pay something I still would have been in the opinion that this place was the most comfortable and relaxing I have been in Taiwan so far, just a bit of beach would be even better :)

For some more details, here is their website in Chinese:

www.lilyvillage.com.tw

PS: The windmill is real and really an eye catcher in the landscape, particularly as it is the first windmill I have seen in Taiwan at all!

February 5th 2006

So here are the pictures from the last week about Chinese New Year and one of the best free time activities you can do: (almost) do nothing.

This year was the third time I could take part at the celebrations for Chinese New Year and I think I can consider myself as somehow experienced. So it started with the big family dinner at the evening of the lunar calendars last day. There’s always plenty to eat, hoping that your earnings in the coming year also will become plenty, thus tradition says, eat as much you can to become as successful as you can in the next year.

After that we got our Hong Bao’s (紅包), the red envelopes filled with money, much more handy than any Christmas gifts and I also don’t think that ever someone would have the idea to return a red envelope, because he doesn’t like it :) Furthermore you don’t have to make up your mind about the package, just buy a pack of 100 red envelopes and get the brand new bills out of the ATM. The bills have been that fresh, they were still steaming :)

We resigned to go to a temple in the middle of nowhere at 4am in the morning this time, instead we just stayed in front of the TV watching these funny, silly entertainment shows. For the rest of the week we mostly relaxed. The 7-10 free days of Chinese New Year is usually the longest holiday workers in Taiwan will have for the whole year, for some them it’s even the only holiday. Therefore everything what has something to do with work should be avoided, except for cooking of course, because it’s still very important to eat a lot :)

My favorite place within the week thus was the couch in the living room with TV, DVD or PC by choice, with two exceptions:

First some day there has been cute Yun-Qi, who kept me busy a couple of times. Since our Chinese is quite at the same level (..she is 2 years old) we didn’t have any problems to communicate :)

And second there was a trip to pick up strawberries in Dahu
and half of a day in an amusement park.

Strawberries

Amusement park

Last but not least I took the opportunity to visit one of the cheap hair salons. I also don’t know how somehow can earn money with the price of about 3 Euros per haircut, but the hairdresser also didn’t have the courage to cut my hair below the 10 millimeter line. Probably that’s his business secret. Cheap prices, but therefore don’t cut too much, so that you have to come back quite soon, just a pity I don’t know when this will be….

Enough hair even for two ;)

After eight days we had to return to Taipei, where it just started to rain while there was sunny weather in Taichung. Just one more reason to go back there quite soon, which would also be the best for my hair ;)

January 29th 2006

Happy New Year the second and Welcome to the Year of the Dog. Cindy and I are in Taichung right now to spent the holidays together with her family. We will go back to Taipei on Friday. I know that there’s a lot to do over here in the journal, but recently I didn’t get the time to do so, maybe next weekend back in Taipei. Just short for today. See you.

January 1st 2006

Alright, after we hopefully all arrived well in the new year I first want to say Happy New Year, 新年快樂 and so on. As I wrote before, Cindy and I finally went to Taipei City to watch the firework at Taipei 101. We had a fine and plenty meal for dinner earlier in a restaurant very close to the place we live. It was all you can eat and I always take great advantage of it until after two hours my stomach and mouth just refused to accept any more food :) However, regarding the following hours it was really necessary not  to be hungry at all.

At about 10pm we entered the bus going to Taipei City, and it was not that crowded than I thought before, which means in Taiwan, that it was still possible for two or three more persons to get in :) At the subway station it got worse. The crowd was so big, that the ways to the platforms had been closed temporarily to avoid pushing. In my opinion the best action I ever have seen in my career as professional user of public transportation in Taiwan, I wonder why they don’t do this every Friday evening! We could enter the subway after some minutes of waiting (and of course some pushing) and then the funny game began. At the stations 2 and 3 there was still some space for entering passengers, starting from station 4 it became quite difficult and at station 5 the train was so full, that not even a sheet of paper would have had space in between. Quite nasty that there still were some station to go for us , but I could take the opportunity to watch above the heads of hundreds or even thousands of Taiwanese which everytime is a quite exalted feeling ;)

The area around Taipei 101 was crowded as well, it seemed that the whole city and county came together in just one quarter to see some burning lights at midnight, how stupid, isn’t it? ;)

If it was worth it or not, you can decide by watching the following videos, the first one I shot with my digicam and the second one is a record of the TV broadcast. Watching this you can also learn and practice how to count backwards and to wish Happy New Year in Chinese….the next test will be in 364 days or in Taiwan in just 28 days when there is the Lunar New Year or Spring Festival to celebrate. However, at this time I definitely won’t use the subway…so far Happy new Year,  新年快樂 !

2006 Taipei 101 Firework Digicam

2006 Taipei 101 TV Broadcast

December 31st 2005

A last entry just before the year comes to an end. At midnight, Cindy and I will be near Taipei 101 to see the big firework which is supposed to be burnt down. It’s announced as “Taipei 101 will explode” and should become much more impressive than last years firework, which was impressive no question, but just too short. However, I decided to put one more live cam online, hoping that some folks will see the building and its “explosion”. I just don’t know how much there will be finally to see, but anyways I  give it a try:

Taipei 101 live cam click here

Don’t forget! Taiwan’s local time is UTC +8, please figure out yourself what it means in your local time since I don’t know from where you are ;) By the way, I wish everyone a Happy New Year and have fun at the parties. Take care.

PS: And for the impatient ones I put the video from the last year’s firework online for you to download:

Video Taipei 101 Year 2005

December 11th 2005

Exactly one week after Cindy’s birthday there was another anniversary for us to celebrate on December 8th. At this day 4 years ago we first met each other, how fast time passes over!

Due to this occasion we went to the German restaurant named “Goethe Gourmet Gasthaus” or just Goethe in Taipei. In my opinion it is the best German restaurant in Taipei and actually there a quite a few which compete about customers being curious about German food and beer :) Cindy and I have been so happy about the first three parts of the meal (bread, salad and soup) that we forgot to take pictures, so here we already start with the main course:

Cindy had

and I

with a wonderful

so that both

and

have been very satisfied.

Then we also had

and

What a great evening. I usually don’t make any free advertising for anything, but in this case I can only recommend you, if you are in Taipei and want to have some German food to a quite reasonable price in a very fine atmosphere, go over there! I took a couple of name cards and if you want to know where to go there just ask me by the given ways of communication at this site. Maybe we can also meet there and enjoy a good big glass of German beer ;)

December 04th 2005

Instead of writing too many words I will let some pictures help me to tell you the following:

December 1st was Cindy’s birthday and I bought her a pair of

Not cheap I can tell ya and also not easy to get. Well, maybe easy, but I had to speak Chinese only and I guess there are not many foreigners in Taiwan coming to a Birkenstock store and asking for Birkenstock sandals in size 36 for their girlfriend. At least I got this impression by the shocked shoe seller. Or why did I first had to gently inform her that she just can talk to me in Chinese, before she gave me any notice? For her ignorance I sent her down to the cellar twice to find the right shoes! ;)

In the evening we

walked and drove to a restaurant. I just walked and all the others went by bus, however I have been the first there although we started at the same time. Just proving that it’s faster just to walk than taking the bus in the evening time, furthermore you don’t get the problem feeling like never be able to get out the bus because there too many people standing in your way, which happened to me a couple of times already!

In the restaurant we could

barbecue or like they sometimes do in Taiwan

just put the meat on fire.

Luckily there was always a cup of ice cubes standing around to extinguish, otherwise the house may have been burnt down this evening ;)

Then we also had some

to cool things off and

and of course many

Well, so there’s just one more thing to say:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MY HONEY !!!