Beacon Hotel Taichung

... words. It amazes me how a word pronounced "tang" can have 2 meanings depending on the tone that you use. It can me sugar/candy or soup! We have been learning thus far using pinyin (not sure on spelling) but it is were is use English letters to represent the sounds. Allowing me to read the words. Our teacher hinted to us that we may be stopping using pinyin next we and be switching over to using all Chinese characters! It could be interesting! Our ...

... whole week pirate themed. We have to organize games, spelling lists, writing prompts, a treasure hunt and an art project. I was able to get a lot done today but we still have a lot of work left before it will be ready. It will be fun for all the students so I am excited for them. I will be sure to post pictures after the events take place. <br><br>Also at school we had another case of H1N1. This time it was one of our Chinese ...

... week has been pretty busy because we had our monthly reports due. Our school gives grades every month! And teachers in the states complain about report cards 3 times a year! Our monthly reports consist of giving the students grade plus finding the class average so that the parents can see where their child stands in comparison to the class. On top of giving all the grades if a student has a grade lower than a C+ you have to write a ...

... at 3:30) For this half hour everyone needed to be off the streets. It is crazy how it really did clear the streets. This is a drill they do every year I guess. One of the teachers was telling me about how she read an article by an American who experienced these drills once but had no idea what was going on. He was on the street and a military guard told him he needed to get inside. He was shoved into a 7-11 where no one spoke English. He thought something bad was happening so ...

... We were looking for a Thai restaurant but couldn't find it and we were all too hungry so we settled for Domino's Pizza! It was yummy....though they put some weird things on pizza. Corn is pretty common on pizza....no thank you! After scooting around all day I feel a lot better on my scooter! <br><br>Sunday was a day of relaxing. Dawndra and I sat around and watched movies all day! It was wonderful. I will be nice and rested for my week ahead! <br><br>Until later.....love ya and miss ya!

... up her garage door and started getting the grill ready with the other Chinese teachers. They could not get the charcoal (which is not the same kind of charcoal we are used to, it looked more like black woodchips) to light. So, her uncle (who came out of nowhere) rolls a humongous tank of propane gasoline and brings the huge welding torch over where he proceeds to light the grill like he is Tim Taylor from Home Improvement. Now that is what I ...

... home before nightfall (the swim began on Sunday morning). We declined taking our scooters to the mountains in what would have resulted in about a scooter ride of over two hours. Instead, we went to the bus station in hopes of obtaining a quick ride to the lake and returning before it got too late. When we arrived at the station, we had just missed the bus. However, the bus manager organized a taxicab ride for us to take for the price of about $10 each (the bus ...

... or more scooter accidents in our first two months in this country. Finally, my ARC allows me to open a bank account in Taiwan. Which means another important thing: I can finally get paid. Yes, it was a glorious day to finally receive my first paycheck as an overseas educator today. All of the stresses that come with teaching 2nd grade, then team teaching 2nd grade, then teaching 3rd grade, and then back to 2nd grade suddenly ...

A family friend of ours, Rees Roberts, e-mailed me this morning with a rather alarming message. The message asked, Hey, just noticed you had a 6.0 magnitude earthquake. I suggest you update your blog with your impressions. Rees The message was accompanied with an official announcement from the National Earthquake Information Center/US Geological Survey showing that, indeed, Taiwan was hit ...

... way to come up and find me to wish me a happy birthday. It really made me feel pretty special. However, after working at school and on my way home, things got a little rough. On my way out the door, for the first time the whole trip, it started pouring outside. What made things even worse was that I left my poncho at home! So, I had to walk out to my moped and drive home in the rain (despite my attempts to kill time for an hour and a half by ...