Taiwanese Weekends

It's been a while but I have a pretty good excuse....a dog ate our computer chord and I've been too busy to visit an internet cafe. We literally received the part today from Dell in Canada; after two weeks of waiting.
So how did a pup eat the computer? Well, we had a beagle named Abu (or maybe it was Apu) for exactly one day before it was evicted. Too bad, because it would have been nice to include an animal in our family life at 315 Fujian Loo.
I've been meaning to elaborate on my last three days in Korea. It was an awesome trip, really, and so great to see familiar faces. Melissa and I went to Chun-cheon for a visit with Sung-yong (my buddy from Laurier's MT program). We had a packed day which included lunch, tarot card readings (two each!), and karaoke. On Friday Melis and I headed to the DMZ and were fortunate enough to see North Korean soldiers up close. You might notice in my pictures the difference between the North/South gear, what a juxtaposition!
That night Mark came in from Taejon and we had dinner with Sung-yong and a couple of his Korean friends. After a night of dancing and visiting a night market in the freezing cold (poor Rachel was wearing high-heeled sandals, all in the name of fashion) we slept in and went to a day-market on Saturday. Most of the shots are from this expedition, notice how there are markets above and below ground. I have never seen so much merchandise in my life, we could barely navigate our way to the exit.
Saturday night was M&M's friend's birthday. The evening consisted of good food, once again, lots of red wine, and a visit to a night club at a swanky hotel.
On Sunday it was time to say goodbye to Melis and Mark. They took me to Seoul station and helped me find the shuttle to the airport. What a great visit. You guys are awesome!
The past three weeks I've been working like a fiend. I started tutoring a new English student and my bushiban has an additional four hours for me as of next week. So, all told, I'll be up to 31.5 teaching hours per week.
The weekend after returning to Taiwan, four girls, including myself, decided to visit Kenting National Park and beach. Will post pictures of this tonight hopefully!
Last weekend I went to Maolin National Park and stayed in the Dona Village. Man, what a great escape. I have many beautiful pictures of this mini-trip too. Will elaborate with the captions.
And....drum roll...this weekend I'm finally going to Taipei! We have a national holiday on Tuesday and I decided to book Monday off. Desiree and I are going for three nights. More on this once I return Tuesday evening.
So that's been February in a nutshell.
Except....
I'M HOMESICK FOR CANADA!! I miss reading English signs, speaking English easily in shops, MOM'S COOKING (that's a big one: could really eat some chocolate cake right now, but not the bakery stuff, the real deal straight from mom's kitchen), what else do I miss: oh, definitely my friends and my fam. I miss being able to hang out with a bunch of different people every week. As much as the ex-pat community here is chill, there's only so many people! They say that it's important to befriend locals, so that's an extra incentive to step-up the Mandarin lessons.
So, I haven't been in Canada for 4 months, and that means that I haven't been in Ottawa for five months! The ex-patriots who I've spoke to say that this is typical: at about 3 months (it's been exactly this since I arrived in Taiwan minus time away in HK and SK) most people start to feel homesick. Well that's me right now!
Funny though because things are still really good. I'm loving my work and the time passes by so quickly. Mandarin lessons are coming along and let's be honest: I'M GOING TO TAIPEI TOMORROW! Whooee!
So that's the update. Many, many, many pictures will be posted soon depicting my Taiwanese weekends.
lots of love and a little bit of homesickness,
Rach