Lantern Festival 2011

Last week, a few of us made the epic journey (really, it was pretty nuts!) up into the mountains for the annual lantern festival.

From what I understand, the lantern festival marks the last day of the Lunar New Year celebrations.  People buy or make their own lanterns, write their hopes and wishes for the new year on the outside, attach a stack of gasoline-soaked paper money to the inside, then light and release! If your lantern makes it to the sky, your wishes will come true!  Sadly, not all the lanterns make it -- some end up exploding into flames!

The entire night was incredibly surreal - red lanterns floating away into the misty night sky.  I've never felt more like I was in an anime movie.  This festival has been my favorite so far, definitely a "must-see" if you're ever in Taiwan!

So surreal and beautiful

Attaching the paper money to our lantern

It was packed!

Our lantern made it!

Others weren't so lucky....

Is this real life?

Vacation part 2/3: Thailand

The day after returning from Taroko, five Yilan ETAs and I exchanged our "business casual" weekend attire for shorts and T-shirts and headed out to Thailand!

This was my third trip to the Kingdom of Smiles, having been a Rotary Exchange Student there in 2004-2005 and returning for a brief visit in 2009.  It felt awesome not only to return to the sunshine and delicious food but to be able to show off the country to my friends.

After spending a day seeing the Bangkok sites, our group split up -- while four kids flew north to Chiang Mai, and I hopped on a plane south to the beach!

We did a 3-day snorkeling trip on the Similan Islands, a protected National Park made up of seven islands in the Andaman Sea.  We saw barracudas and hairy chicken crabs!

After a night in Phuket, we flew back to Bangkok and hopped on a bus to visit my old host family in Rayong.  We stayed a night on Koh Samet, the small island off the coast of Rayong, and then bounced back north to the ruins of Ayudthaya, Thailand's ancient capital.

We spent our last day doing absolutely nothing except sitting poolside, reading and sipping margarita coolers.

My favorite food - Somtam!!

How many people can YOU fit in a tuktuk?

Boat tour of Bangkok

Dante's new friends

Similan Islands

We stayed in these tents

No durian and no doing it in this cab!

Host Mom, Pom, and host sisters!

Vacation part 1/3: Taroko

I'm finally back at school after a wonderful 3-week, 3-part vacation. 

Part 1: Taroko

To kick off the winter break, the entire Taiwan Fulbright crew made our way to Taroko Gorge in Hualien, Taiwan.  Hualien's an hour south of Yilan by train and had been previously visited by most of the Yilan ETAs (myself not included for obvious reasons, namely pure laziness) when they ran the Taroko Gorge Half-Marathon earlier this year. 

Taroko Gorge is nicknamed the "Grand Canyon of Taiwan" and is one of the must-see places on the island.  To top off the natural beauty, we were there on official Fulbright business -- meaning that we got the 5-star treatment all weekend long.

We spent one of our lunch breaks at this pagoda

Taiwan!

Lunch-time hike to the hill pagoda

It's trippy inside

View from the pagoda

Our hotel!

We had to wear helmets because of rockslides

Tunnel through the mountain

On the train to Hualien

January Highlights

Here's a short video with some highlights I've managed to capture on film this past month.

Scene 1:  K-Pop star in the making
Scene 2: If only you could see what was going on behind the camera...
Scene 3: New school pet
Scene 4: Ruth interviews the awesome PE teacher while another kid goes BANANAS in the background. His faces are priceless.

Here's the transcription for Scene 3:
Student:  What are you filming?
Me:  The chicken.
Student:  Huh?
Me:  The chicken. See?
Me:  Whose chicken is it?
Student:  I don't know.  It's been here for a week.
Me:  Really???

Shortly thereafter, the school janitor offered to kill the chicken for me.
I politely declined.

Publicity!

Fulbright Taiwan ETA webpage

American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) - Fulbright Event Photos

Vacation and Jiufen

T'was the day  before vacation and all through the town,
Everyone was anxious, busy bustling around.
Red couplets were hung from the doorways with care
In hopes that lucky money would soon be there.

Children were finished with their testing in school,
Now sleeping at their desks they had begun to drool.
Responsibilities finished, my bags all but packed,
I settle into my desk chair with an Asian-style snack.


WINTER BREAK STARTS IN 2 DAYS!

To start things off, the other ETAs and I will spend 3 days attending the Fulbright Midyear Conference in Taroko Gorge National Park, known as the "Grand Canyon" of Taiwan.  FSE always puts us up in fancy hotels with the best meals, and this trip will be no exception.  See and be  envious: Silks Place Taroko.

The following day, a few of us will be taking off to my beloved country of Thailand for a little R&R in the sunshine.  While the rest of the group heads north to hills of Chiang Mai, Dante and I will be making our way to the south for a 3 day snorkeling trip on the (mostly) uninhabited Similan Islands, off the coast of Phang Nga.  We'll spend a night visiting my host family in Rayong and hopefully do a little more island hopping / ancient ruins exploring / sunning before flying back to Taiwan on February 2nd - Chinese New Year's Eve!  Then it's Chinese New Year, my birthday, and a train trip south along the west coast of Taiwan, hitting up Taichong, Tainan, Kaohsiung, and Kending before school starts again on the 14th.

It's gonna be busy and hopefully full of sunshine and red envelopes full of lucky money!  Keep your eyes peeled for pics!


Due to an English Village scheduling mistake, we ended up with an early vacation day last Thursday!  Dante and I headed north to the foggy mountaintop village of Jiufen.

View from  Jiufen

The town of Jiufen, one cafe in particular, was the inspiration for Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki's animated film "Spirited Away."  If you've ever seen the film (and if you haven't, you should!), the likeness is pretty unmistakable.

We spent the afternoon drinking fancy "Oriental Beauty" tea at Jiufen's oldest tea house, wandering through the small alleys filled with touristy crap, and eating the famous Taro Ball Soup.

Fancy tea house

We sat at a weird bed table that had a built-in charcoal pit and tea serving tray

Good taro ball soup with an even better view!

:-)