Vroom Vroom

So as some of you guessed, we bought scooter!! Although, I really want to know who the hell guessed that we bought a rat!! Seriously!! You think I'm gonna buy a rat?! The person who is scared to death of grasshoppers is gonna buy a rodent? Nope, nope, nope...

Sorry... got side tracked. Back to the scooter.

We decided that it was a wise investment since we were spending so much money on taking public transit. We can drive over a week on a tanks worth of gas and that only cost $100 NT ($3 US)... we figure we were spending 2-3 times as much as that easily. This way we can go to the store when we want or hurry and run errands and it doesn't take us hours and we don't have to figrure out what 3 buses to take to get there. So all in all we're happy.

So here we are!!! Now before you all go and have a cow. First off we were at the park in tha parking lot. Second - We NEVER go anywhere without helmets!!! We all have them!! Third - We typically don't drive with the kids and we never drive with more than one of them... no matter how much they beg us to. People here drive like this all the time, and sometimes have four people on it at one time!! I will take a picture and show you - oh, oh, oh, don't forget the dogs too.... they ride as well!!

Anyway you may be asking why did we buy a yellow one? Because most scooters are blue, red, black, or grey. And when I park it, I want to be able to find it again. The picture below only shows a few scooters. Try finding yours when you park in a parking garage with over 200!!

We had to take a driving test in order to be legal. The written wasn't too hard... of course we did actually study for it. And no it wasn't in Chinese, they had an English version. John didn't even have to take the written because he already had his drivers license. But I passed!! Yeah me!!

Okay, so now let's talk about the driven part of the test. It was much harder than it looked. Below you see the course. Yes, it's all there. Now don't get too cocky, it was difficult... at least in the little world that I've constructed for myself...

First off you have to drive straight about 50 meters down a path that's about a foot and a half wide. See the green path by the railing - it's outlined in yellow. You can't put your feet down and you can't go out of bounds. If you do, a lovely little siren goes off letting everyone know that you suck and can't do it. Oh let's not forget the red flashing light (like the kind ontop of a police car), yes we musn't forget that it gets to scream it's laughter at you as well. Not to mention that you have to take at least 7 seconds to do this in. I can walk 50 meters in 7 seconds let alone ride a bike!!

Then the path widens about a foot (amazing how much a foot gives you) and you make various stops at a stop light, railroad tracks, etc. That's it!! And you get two attempts. You think it's be cake huh? Yeah not so much!!

Of course we failed!! I never knew how hard it could be.

Then you have to wait 7 days before you can take it again. I passed the second time I took it. The kick in the ass is that you have to pay every time you take it!!

Here's John getting lined up to take on the eliminator.

... and here's John flunking... in fact it took him 4 times (not four attempts, but four different weeks) before he passed. He he, let me gloat for just a second.... okay done.

Yes, yes, it was a strong hit to his ego. Especially when he had to ride bitch while I drove. Then to top it all off... one day he was driving (because face it license or no, he's still a better driver with two people on the bike) and we get pulled over for an illegal U turn... anyway, the policeman was nice and didn't give him the $6000 ticket for not having a license, but he did get the U turn one.

Now I drive to work everyday, which isn't bad, but driving home is another story. I now know that I could drive for the FBI. In fact, I'm not so sure that the requirement for driving for the FBI isn't to see if you can make it home driving in rush hour traffic in Taipei. I'll try to tape it one day and post it. That's a little more difficult to do, we'll see what happens.

We love and miss everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Vroom Vroom!!

Lantern Festival

So as you know if was Chinese New Years. New Years last 15 days, and at the end you celebrate it with the Lantern Festival. The 15th day of the new moon is the first night that you can see a full moon. There are quite a few variations as to why people celebrate. It sums up to.............you guessed it good luck and fortune. They have lantern contests with decorative lanters... below you can see a few examples. Some are small, some are large, but all are amazing. All the creations are made with the rice paper that you see adorning traditional lanterns.

So in addtional to all the lantern float thingies, there was also other things to see. Notice the images on the building surrounding the float type thingies... they did this with lights...

We also wrote down our wishes for the New Year and hung them from lights.

The next night we took a trip up to "shen me, shen me, shen me" (pronounced shu mu)....that's Chinese for something something something... Couldn't pronounce the name of the place we went, therefor can't remember the name of the place we went. Anyway, we of course had to take a picture of the moon since it is the Lunar New Year. It was amazing and huge, especially since we were up in the mountains.

This is the town we were in. I took a picture standing in the middle of it.

A train runs directly down the center of it. Here is a picture of some people setting their lantern off. They are really large and you're suppose to write your wishes and hopes and basically just good thoughts on them. Some say they carry your prayers to the Gods. So along those lines, the higher they go the better your luck will be for the new year.

And here we are setting our own lantern off. It went very high and very far. Our lantern wasn't quite as decorative as everyone else's but it suited our purpose. The kids said they want to do that every year. It was quite the experience.

Like I said we had to travel to the mountains to do this.... how you ask... by my favorite mode of transport.... bus!! We didn't want to wait in line for over an hour to get a seat on the bus, so we oppted for standing for the bus ride. We figured stand for an hour to get a seat, or just stand for an hour on the bus and try to stay upright. It wasn't too bad, and on the way back, the kids got to sit on the stairs... which is a good thing, because they were very tired.

Notice Ashton's leaning against the panel... he looks awake, because he's still holding on, huh?

He was dead to the world. He feel asleep like this about five minutes into the ride.

And here is a video of them setting off a bunch of lanterns at once... and yes for those of you who are asking..."don't they come down", yes, yes, they do. Some don't make it up very far because they catch on fire (that has to mean bad luck... seriously, wouldn't that be like an omen), anyway after the fire burns down, they do come down and the mountainside is littered with lanterns. But this town is used to it and they do it year round, not just on New Years.

Play Date

新年快樂!!(Xin Nian Kuai Le!!)

Happy New Years!! It's the Lunar New Year or more commonly known as Chinese New Years. For New Years there's lots of fireworks, not just New Years Eve, or New Years day, but whenever... it could be at noon or 7:00 pm or ten o'clock at night or 3:00 am, or 4:00 am, or 5:00 am. And this last for 15 days. John said this is nothing compared to being in Shanghai during New Years! He says Taipei is pretty tame.

For New Years you give children red envelopes with money in them. The kids were way excited and of course the next question was "When can we go shopping?" So we went up to Keelung again, but this time no mountain climbing. We went to a toy store John found that sales (coughs) not so legit Wii games and bought like 13. They were only $5 (US) a piece instead of the normal $40-$60ish. So the kids, all four of them, bought their toys and then we went and ate and ate and ate. There's a huge night/day market there with excellent food. Especially this stand that sales noodles. They are very yummy!!!!

We get home and the kids, and by that I mean John, gets their toys out to play. But only like 5 of the games will work. Now when we got here John found a person who knew a person who could open the Wii up so we could play games that you could buy here. (All Wii's are region coded and will only play games from the magical land you bought them in.) So he had the pixy sprinkle his magical dust on it and it was suppose to magically let us play any game. John had all this done prior to our trip to Keelung, so the games were suppose to have worked, but alas poor Pinnochio was still only a wooden puppet and not a real boy. So the next day we go back to Keelung again. More toys, more food, and definately more noodles (same stand), but John has to leave the Wii so the little elves can look at it.

The next day we go to....Danshui. It's a city on the West coast. They have a place by the wharf where you can shop, eat and play games. We ate ice cream, extremely large ice cream and we shopped and walked around.

You can buy fresh fish...

Extremely fresh fish.... notice the boat behind the stand.

We listened to music played on an instrument I can't repeat the name of let alone spell it.

We then drove up around the top of the island along the coast to... you guessed it Keelung. But along the way we stopped at a couple towns and shopped and ate. Seeing a pattern are you? Well the wee folk actually fixed the Wii, so we take it and go home, but not before we go and eat more noodles!!! These people must think we're are totally nuts!!

We didn't just play games, shop and eat during the holiday, well mostly, but not entirely. We also went and rode bicycles along the river. It's really rather scenic. I don't know exactly how far along the river it stretches, but there's basketball courts, baseball field, fountains, running and biking trail, lots of things. In fact they have dragon boat races on the river itself. Hopefully we will be able to see that. We rented bikes and had a great time.

Here's John teaching Ashton how to ride a two wheeler.

And here's Ashton riding all by himself.

Could it be any more scenic!!! And in the picture above there were wild flowers with butterflies running along the path. It was incredible!! Straight out of a fairy tale.

So here they are folks... the Wii dancers!!!!

Not bad, not bad...next

And the grand finale....

(In case you don't know, push the play button to view the video)

I hope you all enjoyed that as much as I did... they were embarrassed when they found out I taped them. That made it even more fun!!!!

xoxoxooxoxo