Learning calligraphy, watching the fireworks off Taipei 101, and climbing a volcano. That has been how I started 2020. Not a bad start to the new year if you ask me.
Calligraphy is like painting, but to a higher degree. Instead of being able to cover something up by redrawing a shape, calligraphy is all in the movement of the hand. If you press down to hard – its messed up. If you don’t use enough pressure – the line is too thin. I joined my students for their culture class to learn just what it takes to write Chinese calligraphy. The 3rd grade teacher, who I am trying really hard to be best friends with despite the language barrier and our nervousness, was the teacher. She actually takes classes outside of school on calligraphy and it shows. I missed the section of the class where they talked about the materials and their correct names and made it just in time to learn the proper technique. When you sit down for calligraphy you wet the brush with ink only halfway – too much ink on the brush will oversaturate the paper – then you hold the brush completely perpendicular to the paper and rest your right hand on top of your left to be able to alter your pressure vertically.
The third-grade teacher than tacked a piece of the calligraphy paper to the board to show the students. So not only was she writing calligraphy perfectly, but she was doing it standing up and not at the same angle as you would typically to show the children! It came out perfectly, I don’t care what she says. I felt like I was gawking at the final product. The kids then scampered off to wet their brushes and get started. There were definitely some artists amongst my students that I hadn’t recognized before. Not only were most of their characters good, but they also were painting little mice for the New Year on their red pieces of paper. The red piece of paper is the color of Chinese New Year, you write different characters on diamond shaped paper to bring good luck, good health, and good fortune in the next year.
The Director offered for me to try my own hand at calligraphy so between taking pictures of the student I practiced my hand in not only doing calligraphy my first time, but writing Chinese characters in the sequence the strokes should be written (a lot harder feat when you learned all your characters in simplified rather than the traditional characters utilized in Taiwan- for example, 面 and 麵 both mean noodles one is just in traditional and the other simplified). Each time we took a short break after writing a certain character the kids would all crowd around my table to look at my work.
Daisy said I did a pretty good job, but looking at what she drew I know I am definitely on a different level than the kids. After somewhat embarrassing myself with my artistic abilities combined with the fact, I forgot in Taiwan you write left to right instead of right to left, the class was over. The third-grade teacher acknowledged how I loved her pieces of calligraphy and ended up giving me what she had drawn in the class. Yes! And for the questions I know that are coming, calligraphy is an art here that you can actually major in while in college. It is considered a high level of education, somewhat similar to someone studying Latin or Philosophy while in school. It is not common for children to learn as much anymore. My school works towards building a stronger relationship between the students and their heritage and encourages them to try new aspects of their culture such as calligraphy.
Trying my hand at calligraphy
Fast forward and I was standing on a rooftop in Taipei after a 5-hour train ride into the city after school surrounded by Sean’s classmates from around the world. I have met most of Sean’s friends over facetime or while I have visited in the past and I find it a blast to not only catch up with them, but also get an escape from my more rural life. I was so happy to have been able to go to Taipei for the New Years celebration. Fireworks are literally shot off the side of Taipei 101, picture the Sears Tower of Taiwan, with light designs going up and down the building. Sean and his friends had made a playlist that combined middle school dance classics with everyone’s favorite Spotify songs of 2019. Holding a glass of champagne and a cup of grapes, it is customary to attempt to eat 12 grapes in the last seconds of the year for good luck in Spain – I joined Raquelle a student from Spain in Sean’s program attempting to eat 12 grapes each. We shouted a countdown with other Taiwanese families and National Taiwan University students and broke into a dance party when the fireworks started to go off. I’m glad we brought the speakers up because after the initial fireworks started, the sky became too smoky to see through them at the rest of the show. It looked more like the building was just on fire as every so often the cloud of smoke would go from red to blue. Regardless of not being able to see the whole show, from our rooftop (and I mean the real rooftop- not the balcony we expected to watch them from) we could see 4 other separate firework shows across the city.
What we were supposed to see
The rest of the night was spent between two parties, one of fun younger children around my age drinking, dancing, and eating pancakes and apple pie, the other was more professional. Filled with higher level Chinese speakers from Sean’s college program, the Chinese teachers in Sean’s program and their friends. We walked in and it was all in Chinese. It was fun and interesting to finally meet Sean’s teachers especially having met the teacher who aided Sean in translating my documentary interview questions into Chinese prior to the Taipei and Kaohsiung Gay Pride Parades. I was able to talk about my school, experiences in Southern Taiwan, and my documentary all in Chinese! I promised to send Sean’s teacher my finished product. She also fully enjoyed my “trailer” that I have been editing and will hopefully be posting soon! Although the professional, almost networking event, was fun and interesting, I did not enjoy it as much as the more relaxed party with the dancing. Dancing and apple pie are more my cup of tea than Chinese small talk and sipping wine without grimacing.
Sean also invited two other Taitung ETAs, Kevin and Sunny, to come to the party because they already had plans to go to Taipei and the more the merrier
The only sour note to the night was the presence of two Scottish blokes. Yes, that is exactly how I decided to introduce them. I don’t think I ever even got either of their names as all they were talking about all night was being Scottish and how to be Scottish you have to drink a lot. This was all said in order to justify the 19-year-old student in Sean’s program that got wasted and was asleep in his bed on his back covered in vomit. It was like going back to college. All the American students were going into action, including Sean, bringing him into the bathroom trying to get him to talk or make eye contact. The other Scottish kid kept getting in the way and saying he would be fine and it’s not necessary. I found it almost sad the relationship the two boys from Scotland had with alcohol. In talking it sounds like their culture (or at least who they hang out with back home) believe a night out has to end in a black out. That really is no way to live and I can’t imagine what their livers will look like in a couple years. I called it a night once the Scottish boy was in the recovery position in the shower. Justin (a friend of Sean’s from Massachusetts) was a gem and volunteered to stay up with him to check in.
I spent the next day in Taipei shopping to get ready for Morgan’s visit!! It’s only 15 more days!! By buying a whole new set of sheets, pillow, and blanket for her while she is here. Sean also got a GoPro!! We spent what seemed like a long time actually looking at all the applications you can get and what we needed. I had done my research, but staring at everything (with no price tags mind you- how helpful) made me start to rethink everything. We ended up walking away with a GoPro Hero 8, a new version, a tripod/hand mount, and a protective box for the camera.
What do you do with a new camera??? You need to test it out of course. That’s how I found myself booking another train trip to Taipei. I came Tuesday night and left Wednesday night (getting back at 10:30pm) only to leave afterschool Friday for Taipei again and leave Sunday afternoon. It’s been a quick turnaround. Crystal was making fun of me for being a city girl for the amount I am in Taipei, but for the record Taipei literally has everything. There’s the city with all its options for food, shopping, and museums. On the other hand, you can go an hour out of the city for some of the best hikes. That is exactly what we did. Sean and I got up early on Saturday to go to 7 Star Mountain, 七星山.
七星山 took approximately an 1 and a half maybe 2 hours to get too. We took the train, bus, and then walked the little bit to the trailhead. This isn’t just any hike up a mountain though. This mountain is technically still an active volcano. You stay on the trail because the sides have sulfurous crystals on the rocks and fumaroles, my understanding was these were hot pools of water with sulfur in them that were heated by the magma close to the surface. Whatever fumaroles are the danger signs in Chinese and English were enough to keep me from getting too close. The hike was at times more of a stair workout as there were stairs made up of these misshapen rocks that look like some poor construction worker ions ago carried each stone up the mountain to make the stairs. Unlike many of the hiking trails in the US, this trail was well maintained. The bamboo lining the trail was kept off the path, the rock stairs (albeit unlevel) were in good condition, and at no point was there any form of trash anywhere on that entire mountain.
It was truly magnificent. The beginning of the hike was so hot, but once you climbed higher the colder it got. At times I couldn’t decide if we were in the middle of a cloud or if we were in the smoke of one of the magma chambers – if that’s even the real name for the holes on the side of the trails smoking. The entire time it smelled like sulfur and bad eggs. I was lucky enough to somewhat get used to the smell, Sean on the other hand did not. Throughout the hike I waved around the new GoPro trying out all the settings. From time lapses to Hyper-boost stabilization we tried it all with good and bad results. I cannot wait to continue to use the GoPro to capture the rest of our adventures together, especially the Ping Xi Sky Lantern Festival in February – the lantern festival that the one in the Disney movie Tangled is based off of.
With all my traveling back and forth from Taipei and my focus on pictures rather than my work, I was left staying up past 10:30 solely doing the work I should’ve done earlier. I recorded the listening portions to all four tests for this week. All the kids are in a funk by the impending final semester tests and I am not a fan of the atmosphere right now. I cannot wait for a break to breathe and relax without feeling like when I get back from an adventure, I have to do lesson planning or another responsibility.
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