so not high class

so the other day, me, my sister, and a family friend was treated to a pretty high class resturant, except i didn't know it walking into it. so i think if you usually eat at these resturants.. you know how to space out all the "stuff" or appetizers before the main dish? well i didn't know how many there were gonna be!

first there was bamboo, then they gave us a piece of bread, then a piece of pain with garlic sauce, then our choice of soup. honestly, by this point i was already full haha. i didn't know there was gonna be so many different dishes! cuz i think we just ordered the "套餐" so its not like we choose anything.. so after i was already comfortably full, we had fish with tofu, shrimp, scallop, and finally a salad. and finally, after all those, our real entree came, more meat with a bowl of ru rou fan. and me not wanting to waste any food, tried to finish everything up until the most expensive part --> the main entree cuz i really couldn't finish it. sigh. then of course there was fruit, and creme brulee. even the dessert had two parts!!! i wonder if ppl can actually eat like that everyday...

im pretty sure i ended up eating half my weight that meal. crazy.

accents

i found another mosquito in my keep-mosquitos-out net!! SO SAD. i've had mosquito bites in all the worst possible places except near my eye (this is really bad cuz it swells up so you can't see!!) this summer.. this morning i woke up with a mosquito bite on the joint on my finger and also on the side of my foot :( this are the worse cuz you use well when i type i feel the finger bite, when i walk i feel the side of my foot bite...

anyways! so yesterday we were walking in a night market. so apparently people can tell that me & my american friends have accents (obviously) but i don't know why, they never guess that we're from america. so the first guy who heard jackie speak guessed that she was from singapore. and then the gua bao (taiwanese hamburger, but it wasn't as good as other ones ive had so a little disappointed..) guy thought i was from hong kong. wha?! im 100% sure that i don't have a canto mando accent esp from hearing jennie speak chinese a lot :P haha plus! when i went to hk, they just looked at my face and knew i wasn't canto and started talking to me in mando instead.

well, obviously i still need to work on my chinese :(.. my goal.. is to have someone not realize that i'm a foreigner for at least the first 5 minutes of a conversation! haha thats gonna take a lot of work..

hong kong

hi all(aka my less than 5 readers)!

so two weekends ago, i went to hong kong! here's the proof:


SEE i was there! haha so when ppl ask me where i went in hk, all i really say is the peak, since being with jennie, we just ate and shopped a lot haha. my favorite place in all of hk was the EGG SANDWICH PLACE! it was so good, you won't understand unless you go there. i remember taking pictures.. but i can't find any pictures on bridgets camera (which is all i have right now, since we switched cameras for the time being) so yeah.. maybe eventually i'll upload hk pics onto facebook but now nowww. we ended up waiting over an hour in the heat for this really small dim sum place that was good, but personally i'd rather go to jennie's resturant and have dim sum there :D though right now i guess thats even further from me :(

so what really surprised me about hong kong.. was the height of all the buildings. theres were sooo many tall buildings right next to each other. when i look up to the sky i just see buildings!! all the buildings were scraping the sky (ha ha ha) and even though taipei is very ppl-filled, there aren't as many tall buildings in taipei. and theres a lot more ppl in hong kong than in taipei i think.. more foreigners too.

i wish i had stayed longer though, there definitely wasn't enough time to do everything that i wanted to do! i think one weekend anywhere isn't enough, but afterall we only went cuz bridgets visa expired haha :)

i want more egg sandwiches...

sneaky picture

I'm jealous of the two rooms next to me. While my workroom is windowless, they have a really good view. You can see the mountains! and blue sky! I've been wanting to take a picture for weeks, but theres always people in the rooms, and its kind of awkward to just walk in and take a picture and walk out haha. But yesterday, it looked like everyone in the room had left early! So I quickly snuck in and took a few pictures :) Makes me happy! I haven't uploaded it yet, so maybe i'll post up some of the pictures in a bit. Its moments like this that makes me wish that I brought my d300 with me :( but for now my point and shoot will have to do.

So I'm watching Inception tonight! I hope it doesn't become another Wall-E... I remember how I was so excited to see it! everyone was tellig me that it was amazing all summer and then when me and jin finally watched it, we were like ". . ." whats so good about this movie haha.

fat mosquitos

today.. i found a mosquito inside my keep-mosquitos-out net. i guess it had a feast last night :\ im still not sure where it had its meal.. but im sure i won't like it. thankfully it was so full that it flew really slowly and was easy to get rid of. stupid mosquitos!

so i'm finally back from the TTT orientation and have officially started work!

i was a little disappointed to learn that i wouldn't be in a cubicle.. but im sure thats for the better. instead me & a coworker get a room to ourselves and it seems livelier that way or else i would probably end up asleep.

i was excited to learn that i get this cool card that lets me into rooms! knowing me i'll probably forget it one day and screw myself over. booo. but its cool! i have access to places not everyone has access to! haha. hey... getting excited over little things will be good for me in the long run!

so my job. i could probably completely bs it but i think im going to 努力的 work hard! they honestly didn't assign much.. so i might as well do what they assigned well haha. learn some more html/css while im at it.

oh and i already got my paycheck! and an extra 10,000 NT for traveling expenses.. i thought they gave a lot of extra when i saw the amount.. but then i actually calculated it.. and if we have work 5 days a week for approximately 7 weeks, even with my student discounted bus rides at 12 NT each.. my total comes up to almost 900 NT.. so i guess i get ~100 NT extra... whats 3 extra dollars gonna do for me. haha i guess i can get 3 cups of bubble tea!

so i work from 9am to 6pm on the weekdays.. which i think is good for me, cuz its air-conditioned!! so for the hottest hours of the day, i will be indoors. i guess that also means i won't be seeing much daylight.. well i do get a one hour break for lunch.. and my advisor introduced us to a back alley which had tons of food. (ps the other groups advisors treated them to lunch, but heck it was to the company's cafeteria food!) this allowed me to finally try the bubbletea brand COMEBUY. this is what my new friends (aka bridgets friends) from hsinchu said was the best brand around. i think i might buy one everyday for lunch haha.. just to have something to drink while at work.. since when i come back from lunch i still have 4.5 hours to go. but one thing that i am quite upset about is Taiwan's 芋香奶茶... apparently COCO and COMEBUY don't offer it. what is up with that? how can china's COCO offer it but Taiwan's doesn't? disappointed bubble tea industry. disappointed.

the island jail

its funny how i don't get mosquito bites when im out on a tropical island but when i get back to taipei i get attacked by mosquitoes. what is this!!!!

so after being stuck in taipei for a week. i decided to crash a senior graduation trip with bridget. hehe. well i didn't realize it was a senior grad trip until i already was going


for this ride.. we actually were able to find seats for the most part of the ride.. very unlike the train ride back to 台北. but anywayys. i don't remember this picture being taken but im sure bridget was saying something pretty ridiculoussss. i mean. just look at my face!


let me introduce you to.. the guy who had to survive a lot of my company XD the poor guy who ended up having to be my ride for the whole trip hehe. but its so much funnn. even though i once put the helmet on backwards :( was wondering why it felt funny >__<

so.. we went to a place called 綠島 which means "Green Island" apparently when my mom was young, saying "im going to Green Island" meant you were going to jail.. i guess it was pretty famous for the jail that was on it.. and apparantely there are famous stories where ppl tried to escape but wouldn't haha. theres still a jail now!! as picture below. but there are only 176 inhabitants today. the main part of the island is now all the tourists! theres a bunch of jail tourist shops.. and the ice shaving place is called the "ice jail" i guess everything has the jail theme.



but there were still some pretty sites! even though it was rainy & cloudy for most of the trip >__<
so there were a bunch of naturally formed rock sculptures. like below. can you spot a fat general sitting/contemplating battle plans?! and a cow head? haha.


yayyy cmu alumni :) we're missing karen though.. oh. and everyone knows the fobby peace sign. haha. everyoneeee.


so we met this guy who took pity on a bunch of us college kids and decided to take us on a mini tour up the cow head mountain. he told us about this plant that has leaves that sticks to clothing!!! cool right?


oh and i met a twin/long lost family relative!! for those of you who konw my chinese name.. its 廖克玟(liao4 ke4 wen2) and his name is 廖可文(liao4 ke3 wen2) but yeah. yay for the liao family!


and finally we ended with a meal in taipei :) i can't finish anything anymore -_- it didn't even look like that much stuff but i was the only one who couldn't finish :( like today's meal i couldn't finish either!!! whyyyy. i'm in taiwan -_- i need to enjoy my food and finishhh. but what. in this picture if bridget stealing from my bowl?! bridget you are caught in action -_-; but actually.. i think before this pic i had been about to eat.. and then then they were like.. another picture! and i was like ugh. i want to eat. haha.


sorry that my posts are always so long.. but i like to include lotssa pictures! :D is that so wrong :( i like pictures... even though i didn't bring my d300 -_- i kinda wish i did.. so i could play with it more hehe. but im a loser and i didn't cuz i was afraid i was gonna lose it smash it break it anything..

deprived of young people

so as most of you know.. im in taiwan! however, i still haven't had any chua bing, bubble tea, or any sort of street food. i know right? what have i been doing.. most cmu ppl aren't back yet, so me, being an abc, and all my cousins are either not in taipei or old and working.. so yeah i've been pretty deprived of ppl my own age. so talk to meee!

well. this is what i've been up to:

first thing i did when i got off the plane was go straight to a hospical for the physical required for taiwanese citizenship. wasn't too bad... just had to get my blood drawn and got an xray.

oh and my plane ride book was chronicles of narnia! i think next time i should follow vivians way of getting traveling books.. go to the library and buy a bunch of 25 cent books.. so you can just throw them away afterwards.. though if i end up liking it i prolly won't throw it away anyways >_<

so the only place i've been really is gong guan.. probably cuz its nearby. the first day i definitely had a problem.. every store i walked into i had to get something >_< KFC!!! :) super yumm. i ordered a number 2!

i know i didn't really focus correctly but trust me. it was really good :) .. the fries were not that great. america is still best for fries i guess. but the sandwich was good.. american kfcs should invest in these kinds of chicken sandwiches.. i don't think they have them. do they?

and now for the best part...

i looked on their website first.. and they have like three different ones o.o so i decided to try them allll! but i think they looked better on the website..

thats just one kind haha but its was still pretty yum :) i still have to try the other 2 kinds.. since i only ate one. even though i didn't finish the fries the sandwich seemed to stuff me.. surprisingly. haha

im always scared of ordering.. cuz the ppl see me and expect me to be completely fluent in chinese -_- im sorry i suck!!! but can you talk a little slower??? geez. but i managed to get my order in w/o too much of a problem.. but i think the lady thought i was crazy since i ordered a meal.. as well as a box of six dantas (egg custards) "for here". haha i finally asked for a bag in the end but she repeated that like twice to make sure thats actually waht i wanted -_- until i finally asked for the bag hahaha. prolly thought i was a fatty for ordering so much >_<

so i was super excited after kfc.. when i realized that there was a bookstore right next to it that actually had a decent amount of english books.. even though a lot of them were wrapped up so i couldn't read them.. but they still had some that were not wrapped up and readable! super exciting. i came across a couple interesting books.. for example:

whaaa? was someone that intrigued by pittsburgh that they wrote a whole book on the "mysteries" of pittsburgh? i wanna know what these mysteries are.. too bad it was in chinese.. maybe i'll skim through some but it would take me forever :( so i ended up reading a nicolas sparks book which wasn't too bad :) just a normal nicolas sparks book haha.

oh and the reason i haven't gotten bubble tea? cuz im scared to stand there and try to decipher the menu -_- so i decided to snap a quick picture and bring it home to study haha :) but then i realized the place i found was tenren!! (we have tenren's back in dc metro area). i didn't realize it was one of these until after i took the picture haha. oh and i just realized that they have english -_- but anyways.. was taro milk tea always with green tea? o.o cuz i never noticed that before. haha well i'll have to try it.. but mann two dollars for milk teaa. isn't it supposed to be cheaper in asia T_T i guess it is.. i think in america a small is like 3 something or 2.75 or something..
so this is how my days have been these days. i need to get out more.. find out where to get yum breakfast foods.. and such. but i feel bad cuz my uncle makes me a lot of food.. or what he thinks isn't a lot i think.. cuz he eats a lot more than me.. and these days i haven't been eating that much.. i eat one of those small asian bowls of rich with some veggies on top and im good. maybe when im jetlagged i don't have much of an appetite.. which .. yeah. i've been pretty jetlagged. yesterday i slept from 2pm to 10pm. pretty sad i know. but today i was up at normal hours! i woke up at 8am and i've been awake ever since and its almost 8!!

actually i think i just jinxed myself. i am now. getting tired... its only 8!!! oh knoooos...

Hello Goodbye

Anyone recognize the quote in my title/header? ...I hope someone does! Because its from my favorite book... and if you haven't read it yet. read it! Dooo it. Gogogo. Because I said so!

Hello out there. I'm crossing my fingers right now that I'll actually update this blog every once in a while. Remind me please! After I watched Julie & Julia, I really did want to start up a blog with a purpose, and had my heart set on it.. But then I got distracted. The biggest obstacle to me accomplishing anything: a short attention span. I know this blog doesn't exactly have a purpose either.. but I'm hoping that after posting a few times I'll figure it out. But I mean, I can blog just to blog right?

So I guess this means I've finally given up on xanga. Poor xanga... And I was so resistant to leaving xanga too! Kept on trying to revive it haha but it never worked. I guess this is the official goodbye to perkystrawberry. So long. Farewell. No more xanga layouting or Eprops. Sad sad sad - but good times. :)

So its finally spring break - that means I can take off that post it now right? I have so many plans for myself and goals to reach that it seems impossible. Does studying/homework ever get done during spring break.. haha I don't even know. Maybe if you're in the infamous 251.. haha jk I do need to work on schoolwork. No joke.

May this spring break be a productive one for all!