Takeoff

Whenever I get on a plane, I have this sudden urge to write. I wrote down a lot of my thoughts while on the plane ride from Utah to San Francisco, and from San Francisco to Taipei.

Leaving Utah, I have never seen the sun so red. It was probably because of the inversion, but against the backdrop of the mountains, the sun looked huge. And it was funny, flying east to west just as the sun was setting because it looked as if the sun decided to fight against time and stay up for a little while longer. Even the sunsets on Maui have never looked so intense, so simply beautiful. As we rose above the inversion, it looked like the sun was in the middle of two halves of the sea.

No matter how many times I travel by plane -- by either the small Cessna planes we rode in while in Alaska, or the larger planes to Hawaii, around the US or to the UK -- I'll never cease to be amazed at the beauty of this world. Whether it's God's creations or the creations of man, both hold so much beauty, it's almost too much to contain.

When we got off the plane, we had to go buy a bus ticket, since no one was meeting us there. It was really confusing (<--notice the picture, yeah confusing), since it was about 6:30am and we didn't know if we should call anyone from the school to help us. Some of us bought the wrong bus tickets to another place, while in the end, all of us bought the right bus tickets but got off at the wrong bus stop...it was a two hour bus ride and we all fell asleep. But help came eventually, while we waited in the city of Taichung at the train station. We rode the train to Feng Yuan, where the school is located. We went shopping for food, got our pictures taken, and got our bikes. ^_^ We went riding around the block at night to get a feel for things, and I'm hoping that we won't get hit...riding in the city at night is a little scary...I might get a flickr account just so these pictures will be a lot easier to see. I took about 100 photos just on the first day. lol. ^_^

We're staying in the city of Feng Yuan, it's smaller than Taichung, but still is pretty confusing.

More to come...

The Taiwanese Wanna-bes...

In exactly one week, we are supposed to be on the plane to Taiwan. All our goodbyes would be said, all our bags will be loaded in the plane, and we'd be on our way.

However, not a single person in our group of teachers has their visa yet. Or even our passports back, for that matter (because we all sent them in for the visa application).

Every single person has encountered problems with their visa application. We just want to work and teach the little kids English, gosh darn it! But the government won't let us in, until we have fully completed our work permits, which required our diplomas (I just barely got my official one today), and WE'RE LEAVING NEXT WEEK!!! AAAUUUGGGghhhhhhh......!

Then they said we could get a visitor's visa...if we send in our bank statements to prove we have enough money to sustain us while we're there...but we're all broke college students who are going there so we can make money! It just really shed some light on the immigration issue, and how countries only want rich immigrants...bleh.

I know some of the teachers were able to prove they have enough money through their parents, but I know my visa application was rejected, because I called them this morning. So now I just want my passport back so I can actually get on that plane and just pick up a landing visa in Taiwan. Then in a few months, I'll have to travel to Hong Kong to fill out my working visa. Oh well. At least I'll get to see Hong Kong too!

Keep lookin' on the bright side... ^_^

Getting ready for Taiwan

The count is on.

13 days 'till we leave for Taiwan. I thought it was about time that I should get packing.

So I cleaned out my closet to go through my messy, messy, mountain of clothes and separate what I will take with me, clothes I will donate to DI, and clothes that are too ragged to let anyone else wear in public. It was amazing how many memories there were in just that closet. I had a whole world in that closet.

I found a beach coverall that was stained browned on the bottom from getting wet too many times on the beach on Maui. I found a skirt I bought on the streets of San Francisco while visiting Erin. I found a Star Wars t-shirt I got when I went to the premier of Episode 1, with a kid I didn't know (he just wanted a date). I found a shirt I got in London that I had been keeping for memories sake (but it had pit stains...sadly...). I even found a shirt that I wore on the first day of High School. The shirt I wore on my first date with my boyfriend. The shirts that said, "Don't worry, be happy!" and "LOVE MORE." My old scrub tops when I used to work as a CNA. The many shirts I stole from old college roommates. The ol' stained nightshirt I took from my uncle who passed away last year. The many shiny Chinese-style tops my mom used to buy for me that I never wore...

Most of them ended up in the DI box. It's kind of sad to see them for the last time, but they'd just sit there doing nothing if I didn't get rid of them. It was just nice to see physical reminders of places I've been, people I've met. Sometimes I just get caught up in what I have to do today and I forget about everything I did in the past. Sometimes I just get so frustrated with my life and feel like I'm going nowhere, but my closet disproved that. I've met people, made friends, reconnected with family, discovered my family. My life, as a whole, isn't as bleak as I always feel it is. There are the memories, and those memories motivate me to live for the future.