If you want to know what Taipei is all about, all you have to do is cross the street. If you don't get hit by a bus, it's quite the experience. As you walk though, you get mesmerized by the little green man on the city's "walk" lights. It doesn't just flash, he walks. And he doesn't just walk, he starts running as the seconds count down until the light changes back to red. As you cross, the street alongside you turns into a wall of trucks and buses, absolutely insane cabbies coming ridiculously close to causing 20 car pileups and an incomprehensible number of scooters (it would be nice to get a scooter to cruise around on except that i would a)surely die and b)i have a bit of a confidence issue after violently crashing my scooter in september). So ya, that is Taipei in a nutshell; absolutely frenetic at all times, everyone pushing to be the next to suck down more and more fumes.

You can tell that the city maybe urbanized too fast: unbelievable traffic, some very hideous buildings and dense dense smog. But hey, a city with such a ridiculously efficient subway system cant be all bad, right? In fact, it may just be worth travelling here. I am enjoying the culture the more time I spend here, as it is so much different than anything I've experienced. Obviously the cultures in Africa were very special, but the East meets West culture here is something else. My favourite thing so far are the night markets. They are, obviously, packed with people, with dumpling and noodle stands everywhere and knockoff clothes, just amazing. Today I had a day off so I went to check out the Longshan Temple, which is just a beautiful spot in the middle of the city. I went and hung out there for a few hours, and at one point a monk starts beating a drum and everyone in the temple starts singing for half an hour. An amazing experience, it was an amazing to see people of all ages, classes, etc... from homeless people to businessmen, all standing beside eachother singing.

I've started teaching now, and it's pretty hilarious. I've taught some adult classes, but no kids yet, so I'm sure that will get somewhat frustrating when that happens. My personal favourite was when I asked the question to the class, "what singer or actor/actress do you think is sexy?" and a 40 year old man answered that he believed, "robert deniro is an every sexy, handsome man". The other foreigners here just get weirder and weirder as I meet more of them. It has also come to my attention that there are 2 types of lifers: the nerdy, holier-than-thou types who sit at home and wait to come back the next day and teach some more english, and the lost souls who drink impressive amounts of anything they can get their hands on when they arent doing as many drugs as they can get their hands on. The common denominator for people who have been teaching more than a few years is that they interchangeably, and seemingly unknowingly, switch from talking normally to talking babytalk. It is very bizarre, please make sure that doesnt happen to me.

So ya things are good. Right now I am looking into volunteering in maybe Laos or Cambodia for the month of May before starting to travel. If anyone has heard of any good volunteer opportunities or interesting NGOs working in Southeast Asia, can you let me know? laaater