June 2006 Archives

Wednesday was my first day of work here. I met Tomo in front of a giant store called PARCO (Tomo says it’s pronounced “Palcoh”) at 8am so that he could show me how to take the trains to work.

I’m staying in Ikebukuro but my work is in Nakano-sakaue (both are sections or wards of Tokyo) so I have to take two trains each morning. The train stations are similar to the bigger subway stations in New York, but here the different train lines are operated by different companies. So you have to make sure you buy the right ticket for the train you need to take! The first train I take is the JR Yamanote Line from Ikebukuro to Shinjuku. The train goes very fast, and it seems that one arrives every two or so minutes! And the stories of jam packed trains are true… people just keep getting on and getting on even after you think there is no more room. After I get off at Shinjuku Station, I have to make my way to the Tokyo Metro Marunouchi Line. This train is usually less crowded and it’s also a shorter trip. The trains thankfully display the next stop in English, so I have some idea of when to get off!

The office is a short walk from the train station, located on the 23rd floor of Harmony Tower. When you enter the lobby, there is a giant crowd of people waiting to get onto the elevators. When an elevator door opens, the crowd lurches forward and fills the elevator to the brim. On the way up, I actually feel the pressure change in my ears… I guess 23 floors is pretty high up! The office has a lot of windows, and it’s a pretty amazing view! Tokyo is incomprehensibly large, the city just sprawls out as far as you can see in every direction. And I’m talking big city, not suburbs!

Work was work. I didn’t stay late even though most of the guys there work from 9am to 9pm or later (often MUCH later). There is actually a chime at 9am to announce the start of the work day, and one at noon for lunch, at 1pm to signal end of lunch, and the last one at 5:30pm to announce ‘end of day.’ As far as I can tell, 5:30pm is when you can technically leave for the day, but no one actually does. The only other thing of note is the bathroom… there are no towels in the bathroom. You know how annoyed you get when you discover that a bathroom only has those stupid hand blowers and no towels? Yeah, well you don’t even get a hand blower at this place! Apparently you are supposed to bring your own towel? I saw one guy pull a washcloth out of his pocket to dry his hands… I have to wipe my hands on my pants.

I left work a little before 6pm because I was meeting someone in Ikebukuro at 6:30pm. That someone was Akiko Takeuchi, a foreign exchange student that my family hosted 15 or so years ago. We’ve stayed in pretty regular contact with her since then, last time I saw her was 4 years ago when she came to visit Portland and Seattle. Our plan was to meet in front of PARCO, and I secretly wondered if I would be able to pick her out of a sea of Japanese faces. I figured even if I couldn’t, she’d have no problem finding the one white dude standing around! But I did recognize her, so we talked a little and decided to grab some dinner. She took me to a place that served Tonkatsu, which is breaded pork. I got the meal that came with pork, shrimp, and potato all breaded and fried in the same batter. It was pretty tasty! After dinner we walked around a bit and she took me into a giant electronics store. We went up to the 3rd floor to look at video games (she desperately wants a Nintendo DS, but they are constantly sold out everywhere in Japan). I didn’t know of any games that I might want to import for the DS, so I just looked around a bit. After that, she had to go, so we said goodbye and I found my way back to my hotel.

Thursday was another uneventful day at work. I left work around 6pm and walked to the train station. When I got there, I discovered that the type of machine that I know how to buy tickets from was out of order. The working machines were much lower tech and didn't have any English on them... This is kind of a big deal, because you don't just buy any old ticket. You buy a ticket worth a certain amount of yen depending on how far you are going to go. For this leg of the trip I needed to buy a 160 yen ticket, so usually I push the 160 yen button, drop the money in and away I go. But these machines didn't have a button marked "160 yen." So I decided to just stand there and watch a few people use the machines.

Almost every person would walk up to the machine, drop their money in, and then hit the upper left button. I figured they all weren’t going the same distance, so the upper left button must be a “sell me a ticket worth the amount of money I just put in you” button. So, I went up to the machine, dropped in 160 yen, and sure enough the LED on the button lights up “160 yen.” Booya.

Once I got to Shinjuku, I only bought a 130 yen ticket because I planned to make a stop in Takadanobaba. Earlier in the day I searched online for English bookstores and found a store called The Blue Parrot that wasn’t too far from the Takadanobaba station. Yes, I bought a book before I left Hawaii (Ender’s Game, more on that once I get back) but it was SO good that I finished it by Wednesday morning! I hoped to find the sequel called Speaker of the Dead, but they didn’t have it… I browsed all of their fiction section and finally decided on Dune: House Atreides. I’ve kind of been avoiding this book for quite some time, but now I didn’t have much of a selection…

Walked back to the station and rode the train to Ikebukuro. There was a DS game I decided to import, so I went back to BIC cameras to see if they had it. I had to search for SO long because I knew the game in English characters (Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan) but it was labeled in Japanese characters. I knew this going in, but I figured I would recognize the game box… but all the games were on their sides, so only the titles on the box spines were showing! So, I pretty much had to pull each game out and look at the front of the box to find it!

Walked back to my hotel, read my new book, played my new game. Slept.

Friday was my last work day in Tokyo. Left before 7pm. I wanted to check out Akihabara, but I had all of my work equipment. So, I went back to Ikebukuro, dropped off my stuff, then went back to the station. The ride to Akihabara took about 20 minutes, and by the time I got there it was nearing 8pm. I looked around a bit, but was a little disappointed. Everyone said it was Otaku central, so I was hoping to find a bunch of super obsessed people dressed up like anime/videogame characters… but I only saw a few girls dressed up like English maids. And then everything started closing, so oh well.

Did it seem like I wasn’t blown away by Tokyo? Cuz, yeah, I wasn’t… I wrote a rant about it, but I think it might be a little harsh, so I’m debating whether I should post it here. I mean if I post it, then archive.org will record my words for all time… I guess just posting this has doomed me! How about I make it available by request only. Send me an email if you want to read it, and I’ll forward it to you. And, no it’s not racist or full of obscenities or anything, it’s just… grumpy.

So I didn’t like Japan… but guess what. I LOVE Taipei!! It’s quite possible that this is all in my head, but this city seems magical; the people here seem so happy. Funny, I just searched for ‘taipei magical’ to see if it was just me, and I found a letter written by Tapei’s mayor in 2005 that contained the following sentence “Taipei’s magical charm and Taipei citizens’ happiness do not come about without reason.” I guess at least the mayor agrees with me, on both counts!

When I landed at the airport on Saturday, I had absolutely no idea what to expect. As I walked toward the quarantine area, I saw a large white sign with red letters that said “TRAFFICKING IN DRUGS IS PUNISHABLE BY DEATH IN THE R.O.C.” Woah! But then I was a little surprised by the seemingly lackadaisical passport inspection and customs… They didn’t ask me a single question and no one was even standing at the customs counter. In Japan, they asked me a bunch of questions about why I was there and how long I was going to stay. Here, they scanned my passport and let me walk in.

The day before, I realized that I’d be spending my weekend in Taipei so I better find some things to do with my free time. One thing that stood out in my search was a Taipei City bus tour. I emailed a place about it before I left, and they told me to call them as soon as I landed in Taipei. In Japan my cellphone didn’t work, but it did here! But I had no idea how to make an international call from an American cellphone located in the “international” country in question! There was a tourism counter in the airport, so I went up and asked the guy at the counter. “How… do… I… call… this… number… from… American… phone?” After a week of practice in Japan, I think I’ve gotten pretty good at speaking slow, simple, deliberate English. The answer was to drop the country code, but add a zero at the beginning…

So I called the place and a lady answered the phone in Chinese. I asked “Is this Edison Travel?” which carried the unspoken question “Do you speak English?” She said “yes” so I told her that I emailed them yesterday, and I would like to reserve a spot on the Taipei City night tour for that evening. She said ok and asked me what hotel I am staying at? I said “Forward Hotel” she said “Fowo Hotel?” I said “FORWARD Hotel” and she said “… do you have telephone number?” I gave it to her and she told me to wait while she called them.

When she got back on the line, she said my hotel was too far away for pick up, so could I take the train and meet at a different hotel? I said ok even though I had no idea if I really could or not… I had no idea what the train situation was, no idea where my hotel was, and no idea where the hotel she wanted me to go was. But, yeah, will do. She said “Ok, the hotel is call Seesaw Park Hotel.” I said “Seesaw?” She said “I spell, C-?-?-S-A-R P-A-R-K, SeeSar Park Hotel.” I missed some of the letters, and I still wasn’t quite sure what she was saying, so I asked her to spell it again, but she didn’t understand… I said “Can you spell it again? The letters?” She said “I start over.” And this time I caught it all, be at Caesar Park Hotel at 6:05pm. Ok.

Now I needed to take a taxi to my hotel. As I exited the airport, a guy approached me and said “Taxi?” I said “No” (I learned that lesson back in New York) but he was adamant. “Where you go? My car very cheap!” Me: “No.” This happened two more times before I made it to the official taxi stand. When they asked me where I wanted to go, I handed them a page that I printed from the hotel website. It had the hotel’s name written in Chinese characters and a map. They said “ok” and I got in the car. As I went to put on my seatbelt, the driver said “No, no, no.” I said “No? Why?” But he said “map.” So I handed him the map, and he took off. But I’m still wondering, why can’t I put on my seatbelt? Then I look down and notice that the buckles are not sticking out of the seat. Ok, no seatbelts… hmmm.

My taxi ride was interesting because I’m just trying to figure out where I am. The driver speaks no English, he looks like he could be sinister (don’t all cab drivers?) and I have no idea how ‘safe’ Taiwan is. Oh, and I’m not allowed to wear a seatbelt! Now, I’m not super freaked out or anything, I’m just paying attention and trying make sure everything is on the up-and-up. Of course, I also have no idea how far the cab ride should be, and I can’t read the highway signs, so I’m really just helpless and clueless. Meanwhile the cab driver asks for the map twice more along the way… does this guy even know where I need to go?

Apparently so, we eventually pull over and he says “Ok?” and points. I see the hotel and say “Yeah.” He says “Ok?” and I say “Yep, I see it.” “Ok?” Right, no English… “Ok.” He pulls out a sheet to show me how much I owe… $1280.

Now seems like a good time to describe the New Taiwanese Dollar… Let’s see, they call it a dollar, and use the $ sign, but 1000 Taiwanese dollars is worth about 30 American dollars. The smallest denomination is $1, which is a coin ($1, $5, $10, $50 are coins, and $100, $500, $1000 are bills) and they don’t have cents. Things are a bit more expensive than they are in the States, but the different pricing scale makes things look REDICULOUSLY expensive (at that price, it better be life sized!)

Anyway, I got to my hotel room, and WOW it’s HUGE and very nice! The furnishings are very contemporary and high quality. There is a walk in shower, the bathroom is all marble tile, there is a control panel next to the bed that controls all of the lights in the room. It’s really quite impressive. When I walked in, I actually said “WOW!” and the bellhop laughed. Free internet, so I hooked up the laptop and looked up how to use the train system. It appeared to be WAY easier than Japan’s system so I headed downstairs to see if I could find my way to Caesar Park Hotel.

Piece of cake. There was enough English on all the signs for me to buy my ticket, find the train, and get off at the right stop. I got to the area about two hours early so that I could spend some time walking around to take in the sights. The first thing I noticed was how many American stores were here! McDonalds, 7-Eleven, KFC, and a ridiculous number of Starbucks stores. The sidewalks were cleaner than I expected and there was quite a bit to look at. As I walked further away from the station, I noticed a lot of greenery down a side street. I figured it was a park, so I headed toward it to investigate. Wow was it ever beautiful! There was a giant Koi pod and some pagoda gazebos and a VERY unique sculpture/fountain. I’ll try to describe it, but I think it’s impossible to do so with words. These pictures are of just the upper part of the sculpture, the base is covered with a thin layer of water, and there are stepping stones so that you can walk to the center where the water cascades down 20-30 feet underground. Water also falls all the way around the outer ring of the base. I think it is the most creative and original design that I’ve ever seen.

There were many people walking around the park, and everyone seemed so happy. At the same time, there was a somber feeling to everything, like this place had spiritual significance. I didn’t even find out the name of the park until late that night after returning to my hotel… 228 Peace Park. At first, I thought the name was weird, like they named it after the street address. But then I noticed the number 228 elsewhere when searching about Taiwanese history. And that’s when I discovered that the sculpture and park are a memorial to the victims of the 228 Massacre. A translation of the memorial inscription which describes the tragedy can be found here.

After I left the park, I walked back to the shopping area and went into a giant department store. This place was a 12 floor shopping wonderland! I checked out some of the clothes sections and found some very interesting clothes brands… Marlboro Country and Jeep! I was very tempted to buy a Jeep shirt, but they were very expensive… I eventually made my way to the 8th floor which was all toys and videogames! I browsed the videogames, but they were super expensive too! I noticed a crowd of kids standing in a little section, so I walked over to see what the attraction was. They were all lined up in front of these miniature arcade cabinets, playing a game called Mushiking: The King of Beetles. The unique thing about this game was when you put money in it, it’d spit out a trading card. And then you could swipe that or any of your other cards through a card reader to build up your beetle. These kids had huge stacks of cards! I stood there for a while trying to figure it out, but I ran out of time and had to get over to Caesar Park Hotel.

I'm back in Hawaii now, but I've got tons of stuff written down about my Taipei trip. I'll be posting entries about once a day until I run out.

The tour bus picked me up 20 minutes late, the bus was kind of run down, and the microphone that the tour guide used kept cutting out, but hey, it only cost $1200. First we had to make the rounds to pick up the rest of the people. The crowd ended up being me, an elderly Vietnamese woman that lives in Washington D.C., a Japanese woman and her mother, and 4 Korean guys here for the tech show. Our first stop was Hwahsi Tourist Night Market. This place was pretty neat, basically a bunch of stands selling food, bobbles, clothes, but it had kind of an underworld feel to it. There was a place that sells drinks with snake blood in it, and I got quite the show there…

A man with a microphone taped around his neck spoke in Chinese and stood up on a platform. To his right were two dead snakes hanging from little rope nooses, to his left was a sign that said “No taking pictures.” He continued talking while he crouched down to pull a live snake out from a cage. He held the snake right behind the head and showed it around a bit. This snake was definitely alive… and then within a blink of an eye, he shifted his grip toward the back of the snake and swung his arm downward as fast as he could. SMACK! It was such a sickening sound and I wasn’t fully aware yet what it was… It was the snake’s head smacking down onto the floor. He quickly brought the snake back up and hung it from an empty noose. The tail end of the snake coiled up on itself, still somewhat alive. The man grabbed some scissors and cut into the underside of the snake. He peeled back the skin and gently pulled out a giant vein. While pinching the vein, he snipped it in half, then pointed the open vein into a glass. The glass filled with blood as he raised the tail end of the snake above the glass. So gross… I feel kinda sick right now just typing about it.

After we walked through the market, we walked over to the Lungshan Temple. The temple was beautiful, and it felt kind of wrong going inside. There were so many people inside meditating and burning incense; this was their place of worship and I was going to walk around gawking and taking pictures? But there were lots of tourists in there, so I went in and tried to be as respectful as I could while intruding. As I entered, it felt like I was being transported to a different time and place. The air was thick with incense and it smelled so good, there was chanting music playing softly, I started feeling drowsy as the environment lulled me into a relaxed state. Periodically I’d hear a CRACK sound, and I noticed that people were throwing pieces of wood at the ground.

The left the group for a while to wander on my own, but when I returned I asked the guide what deal was with people throwing wood pieces at the ground. He grabbed two pieces (they looked like orange wedges, curved on one side and flat on the other) and showed them to me. He said you make a request to the appropriate god and throw the pieces of wood to the floor. The god communicates an affirmative message if the two pieces don’t match (one curved side up, one flat side up). He handed them to me and told me to try. I threw the pieces down, and both flat sides came up. He said try again, you get 3 attempts. I threw them down again, and got the preferable mismatch. He then passed them around and everyone in the group also got mismatched results. Now, I’m no statistician, but I’m pretty sure the odds of seeing a mismatch on one throw is 50%. And if you get 3 attempts, the probability of an affirmative result is .5 + (.5*.5) + (.5*.5*.5) = 87.5%. Those are pretty good odds at getting your wished fulfilled!! (If my math is wrong, let me know… I really don’t remember much probability math any more).

After the temple, we all loaded back into the bus and the driver took us to a Mongolian BBQ restaurant. The buffet was exactly like Chang’s Mongolian Grill, but with less selection (though they did have venison). There was also a boiler thingy on our table that we could dump food into and then pull out what we wanted when it was cooked. Both the boiler and the big cooking surface were heated with burning wood, so the restaurant smelled really good! At the restaurant, I really hit it off with the Korean guys. We talked tech for a little while, and then their boss pulled out a bottle of vodka (I think). They poured me a glass and said “be careful.” I think they thought it might be too strong, but it’s strength and taste was like vodka, so no big. Now I don’t enjoy hard liquor, I’m a beer guy all the way, but I sacrifice in social situations.

We joked around a bit while we ate, and some of the guys were really hitting the sauce hard. Then, one of the guys went to the bar and bought another bottle. They poured me some of that and said “58, be careful.” Ok, now THIS stuff was strong! I’m guessing that 58 meant 58%, but I honestly don’t know if that’s very strong or not. But MAN, this stuff burned! Like Bacardi 151 burned, and they poured me a bunch. My first thought after I tasted it was, “there is no way I can drink this.” But, I downed it little by little, and they were all happy and impressed. The other guys finished the bottle, I can’t imagine how they did it! They weren’t mixing it, just drinking it straight. One of the guys chugged like 2-3 shots worth and I said “Man, you are CRAZY!” and they all laughed and laughed. It was a really fun time!

After dinner, we got back in the bus and headed to Taipei 101, the tallest building in the world! I was really looking forward to this, I mean going to the top of the single tallest building in the whole wide world! Wow! And the elevators are the world’s fastest, going 37.5 mph to get you to the top in less than 40 seconds! But when we got there… it was closed. The tour guide said it was because it was too cloudy, I suspect that we got there too late… I was bummed out, but determined to make it to the top before I left Taiwan.

So, we got back in the bus and the driver dropped us off at our hotels. Antonio (the Korean guy I talked to the most) asked me if I had a business card. I didn’t and he didn’t, so we were a little sad because it would have been cool to stay in touch. I got dropped off before the Koreans did, so I waved and said goodbye. Took the train back to my hotel and realized that I just had one of those days that will stand out forever in my mind. This was an 11 out of 10 kind of day, easily finding itself in the ‘Top 10 Jake’s Vacation Days List.’ I love Taipei.

Sunday morning came and I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to do. I thought it would be neat to go to a museum to learn the history of my new favorite country. The Taipei National Museum in 228 Peace Park looked like it might be my best bet, so I took the train back out there after I had breakfast at the hotel. When I got back to the park, I wasn’t quite sure where the museum was, so I walked around hoping to find it. I ended up in the north side where I sat on a bench for a while and watched some people practice Tai Chi. When I got up to walk around some more, I saw a sign for the museum that pointed south. So I started backtracking when I saw a Chinese family with two little girls feeding the fat squirrels. I noticed these squirrels the day before during my visit to the park, they were really big and so dark that they were almost completely black. These girls were sticking bread on the end of a single chopstick and holding it out for the squirrels to take. I recorded a bit of it, it’s kind of a large file, but it’s pretty cute!

I eventually found the museum but I wondered if there would actually be any English on the exhibits. I asked the ticket lady “Is there English?” and she said “Yes” and handed me a pamphlet. I paid the $20 entrance fee (remember, divide by 100, multiply by 3) and walked inside. The first exhibit was the skeleton of a wooly mammoth, and the description was in Chinese. I thought “uh-oh” but then a lady said “there is English on this side.” I thanked her and asked if the museum has any exhibits about the history of Taiwan, but she said no… So they didn’t have what I wanted, but I figured I’d look around anyway. I quickly discovered that the wooly mammoth exhibit was the only exhibit in English. Oh well again…

It took about 30 minutes to look at everything in the museum. Once I was finished, I headed back outside to the 228 Peace Park. I noticed a Taiwanese man sitting in front of the museum painting with watercolors, so I walked over to watch. He was very friendly and wanted to show me all of his paintings. The paintings were mostly of animals, and they looked very nice. I saw a cute painting of the Park squirrels, so I told him that I would like to buy it. He said it cost $50, and I said ok. I was still pretty fresh to the Taiwanese dollar at the time, so I thought I was paying 15 US dollars... I thought, a little expensive, but it’ll be a nice souvenir. It was later in the day when I realized that I only paid $1.50 US!!! What a deal!

As I was paying the man for the painting, the first raindrops of the day started coming down. I wanted to keep my newly acquired painting dry so I ran to the nearest train station. Once there I bought a ticket and started my journey to the zoo. I hoped it wouldn’t be raining over there, but if it was I figured I’d buy another umbrella. When I finally arrived (2 transfers and 3 trains later) it was raining VERY hard. There was a woman standing right outside the station selling umbrellas for $100. I bought one and walked to the zoo ticket stand.

This was the best zoo I’ve ever seen. They had every animal that you can imagine and they had many of each kind! Not just one or two of each animal, they had like 15 zebras! Here are a few of my favorite pictures:

White rhino covered in red mud
Close-up of chimp
Gorilla eating
Formosan black bear
Lotsa monkeys!!!

It rained hard all day, but the air was very warm. The air was SO humid, and there were many stairs and ramps to climb, so by the time I had reached the back of this giant zoo, I was really exhausted. I tried to find the shuttle bus to get me back to the entrance, but I couldn’t find it so I walked all the way back. I missed the camels on the way in anyway, so I got to see them on the way out. This was really quite an amazing zoo, if you like animals at all I’d say this is a must-see while in Taipei.

After the zoo, I took the trains back to Taipei Main Station and walked around a bit. I ended up back on the 8th floor of the department store to watch more Mushi King and this time I had enough time to figure it out. It’s essentially a game of rock, paper, scissors… Before you start, you swipe one of your cards to determine which beetle you are going to be. Then you get to swipe up to 3 more cards to determine which move will be assigned to which button. Your opponent does the same, and then your attack strengths for each move are displayed (I assume that certain moves are stronger with certain beetles, etc). Then the kids simply play rock, paper, scissors and the winning attack knocks off a certain amount of health (determined by the strength of the attack). It was kind of funny because after I watched for a while it finally dawned on me that they were playing rock, paper, scissors. And then not more than 15 seconds later, I noticed that on the buttons were pictures of hands in the shape of rock, paper, scissors… At that point the game became completely disinteresting. Not only because I figured it out, but that it turned out to be such a banal game underneath… The card reader/dispenser thing is pretty neat though.

I was pretty exhausted from a day of walking, so I headed back to my hotel and took it easy for the rest of the evening.

Monday was my first day of work in Taipei. I worked from my hotel for the first part of the day, and then headed to the show grounds in the afternoon to set up the demo. After I finished setting up, I headed back to the Taipei 101 building to see if I could catch a ride on the world’s fastest elevators. They were open for business, so I bought a ticket and got in line.

It didn’t take long until I was on an elevator for the short ride up. While we ascended the 89 floors in less than 40 seconds, the ceiling of the elevator displayed a light show. I was a little disappointed by the almost nonexistent sensation of acceleration… I don’t know how they did it, the elevators feel like they are traveling normal speed. Once at the top, we filed out and were free to walk around the observation deck. The views were spectacular as you could walk completely around the deck and see the city of Taipei stretch out in all directions. I was about halfway around the deck when I saw a familiar face! It was Antonio, one of the Korean guys from the tour two nights before!!

We talked a bit, he told me where he went on Sunday and showed me some pictures on his camera. We took some pictures together, and then he told me where his booth would be at the show. He said that I must come to their booth and we could exchange business cards. So we said goodbye, and I continued my circuit back to the elevators. A quick ride down the elevator, a not so quick bus ride to the train station, and an even longer train ride back to the hotel.

Tomo and I had planned on eating dinner together so I let him know when I got back. He asked me what kind of food I would like, and I said anything is fine. So he took me to a Japanese buffet where you get raw food and cook it on a grill in front of you or in a boiler like the one at the Mongolian BBQ restaurant on Saturday. I ate a bunch of weird stuff and had no idea what I was eating. Sometimes I would ask Tomo what something was and he would just say “You eat, I’ll tell you later.” I figured “what the hell, if it doesn’t taste bad, it can’t hurt me.” After dinner he said “Do you remember that soft dark tofu-like thing you ate? That was duck blood pudding.” I thought “Wow, that’s kind of gross, but it didn’t taste bad, so no big, right?” Then he said “And you know that stick of dark rice? That had pig blood in it.”

Now I have to admit that I started feeling a little disturbed… It was really quite a strange sensation, because every time I would start thinking about it, my stomach would start feeling really upset. But, that seemed odd since it didn’t taste gross or anything. For the rest of the night, I had to actively keep my mind off the blood food or I would start feeling really sick. At the same time, it seemed that my mind wanted only to fixate on the blood! I went to bed that night trying not to obsess on my plasma infused meal.

The next morning I skipped breakfast, not ready to eat food yet. I got to the show and started up the demo and then stood there all day. There is really nothing more soul draining than working a booth at a tradeshow. There is so much downtime where you are just standing there bored to tears and counting the seconds to freedom. After I while I couldn’t take it any longer so I left to walk around the show floor for a while. Even the show floor seemed pretty boring to me, just a bunch of companies spending too much money on extravagant booths. There were also many girls there in very skimpy outfits, hired by the companies to bring attention to the booth. This really seems out of place to me. I mean, I’d expect it at a beer convention, but these are respected, professional companies, and they are paying scantily clad women to draw people in. I thought “Surely such a large and international company like Microsoft wouldn’t stoop to such levels.” So I made a point to visit their booth to confirm my faith in my alma mater. But I was dead wrong, there was a tall Asian girl in a tiny tank top and miniskirt plastered with Windows and Microsoft logos. Shameful.

During my day of boredom, I met a few guys that go to most of the shows for TI, an Indian guy named Suman and a French fellow named Robert. I chatted a bit with them over lunch, and by the end of the show they had invited me to dinner with them. We went to a Thai restaurant in Taipei 101 and had a delicious dinner (paid for by Suman, who worked for TI). We had a few beers with the meal and I think I had a little more than I should have. I didn’t make a fool of myself, but I definitely felt a little sloppy. I’m guessing they didn’t even notice, but I had concentrate a little harder to keep my speech regular.

After dinner it was back to the hotel for a good night’s rest.

The next day at the show was twice as bad as the first. Pain upon pain, boredom upon boredom, I will try my very hardest to never work another show as long as I live! That night Tomo, Fukuchi-san, and I went out to dinner at a Chinese restaurant. This time I told him I didn’t want any weird stuff. He said ok, and ordered a bunch of stuff (the menu was only in Chinese, so I still had to trust him). The first thing that came was pureed fish liver, he told me not to eat this one. But it didn’t sound too bad to me, so I tried some… it tasted like salmon paste; not something I’d order on a regular basis, but it wasn’t gross. The rest of the meal was pretty normal stuff including some “chicken” which I could tell from the goofy way Tomo was acting that it wasn’t really chicken. I figured it must really be frog, but that didn’t bother me either, so I ate it. The next day Tomo “revealed” to me that it was frog, not chicken… duh Tomo.

Thursday was my last work day in Taipei. I had to go to the show for a few hours to show Fukuchi-san how to run the demo. Around 1pm, Tomo came and picked me up to go to a few customer meetings. The first meeting was kind of interesting, because we were brainstorming/designing a new consumer electronic device. The second meeting was boring as it was just introductions and business.

After the second meeting, the company took us out to dinner at a traditional Chinese restaurant. To get to our table, we had to walk along a wooden walkway above a koi pond. The meal was very tasty, the best meal I’ve had in Taipei. One dish that REALLY blew me away was half of a papaya filled with seafood (scallops, shrimp, etc) and topped with melted cheese… it tasted incredible! After dinner, they took us to the bus station and we bussed back to Taipei (the second meeting was in Hsinchu).

The next morning I got up early to grab some breakfast and then walked around for a while. Most places were still closed, so I went back to my hotel and packed up all my stuff. At 10:30am I checked out of my hotel and waited to get a cab to the airport. My cab driver was very friendly and we talked all the way there. I told him that I really enjoyed Taipei and that I wanted to come back. He told me all about the many places that I should visit when I return. I can't wait!