First post: Welcome to the motherland

The countdown is over and I am finally starting my 3-and-a-half month trip overseas. After so many weeks of anticipation, even my initial arrival at LAX gave me goosebumps. This will be my first real dabble in independence. Even though I lived away from home throughout college, I always made sure to visit often to check up on my parents and my dogs— I’ve never truly been away from home for such an extended period of time…not to mention being in a foreign country.

LAX → Taoyuan International Airport is a grueling 13 hours, nonstop. On a long flight like this, exit row and bulkhead seats with extra leg room are basically the best spots in the cabin, as they have the most leg room, offer quicker exit at the end of the flight, and are often closest to the bathrooms—everyone wants these seats! I was exceptionally lucky to get transferred to an exit row seat when I checked in. These seats aren’t available for reservation directly online, since several requirements must be met (over the age of 15, responsible for emergency exit duty, single traveler), and I only got the chance to transfer since I was one of the first in line to check in.

I was happy to see that Eva Airline had an extensive entertainment system comprised of a touch tablet that included movies, music, TV shows, games, and shopping. There was even a USB port for popping in your personal material. I watched two movies from their library and played sudoku during breakfast.

And the food….I was pleasantly surprised by how delicious everything was.

Dinner: parmesan chicken with mushroom rice pilaf and broccoli, bread roll, smoked salmon with dijon potato salad, cantaloupe and honeydew melon, dragon fruit cake

Breakfast: congee with ground pork and veggies, bread roll, green beans, pineapple and orange

Even with the spacious seat, variety of entertainment options, and good food, I was still so tired and so dead at the end of the flight. I always find it difficult to really fall asleep on a flight, and this time was no exception. I think I only “slept” for at most 4 hours. I looked like a disaster at the end of it, with a tangled nest of limp hair and dark eye bags no amount of concealer could hide. It was already 11:30 PM by the time I exited the arrival gate, and I can’t even describe how grateful I was to my aunt and my cousin for being there to pick me up at that late hour.

Nevertheless I am finally overseas in the land of my ancestors…Taiwan! I am so excited to be here—it’s wet and crazy humid and everything kind of has this Asiany smell…I love it all. The next day my aunt took my grandma, my cousin, and I out to her house in Yangmingshan mountain for the weekend. During the drive the bright sunlight suddenly morphed into pelting rain at some point—the first signs of the incoming typhoon. Boy, do Taiwanese people whip out their umbrellas fast. At the first signs of rain, everyone outside was suddenly brandishing a colorful umbrella or wearing a rain poncho as if they had sprouted out of their hands at the sense of wetness.

Taiwan is also the Land of Mopeds. There are mopeds everywhere, and everyone rides them, even dogs. Literally saw a dog riding on the floor of a moped today like nobody’s business. Yeah I know, pics or it ain’t real, right? But unfortunately that particular moped passed by so quickly I couldn’t get my phone out fast enough. Also, my DSLR is currently out of service just because I couldn’t find its battery charger anywhere in the house before I left, and also it’s got the dreaded Error 99 that I still need to troubleshoot once I have a good battery in. It’s part of the reason I feel so off here…I desperately want to record everything, but there’s only so much I can do with a cell phone camera, and I am still easing into using a camcorder 😦

Anyway, my aunt’s house in Yangmingshan is absolutely beautiful. As with most houses in Taipei, it’s apartment style (because unlike suburbs in America there are just so many people and there is no space for regular houses), and it has AMAZING views. The whole unit is spotless white marble and minimalist elegance with huge floor length windows in every room that basically blow up your retinas with the magnificant sight of a vividly green and lush Yangmingshan mountain outside. Further words won’t really do much justice to how beautiful it was so I’m inserting a few pictures of the apartment. Sorry, since my DSLR is out I had to pull these pics from my videos and they’re quite blurry.

SO…that’s it for now. I am trying to withhold on too much blogging until I get my life here in order (aka get a charger for my camera) just because I want to do this properly and that requires more legit pictures! But yeah, be at ease friends, I am alive and well in Taiwan but the real challenge ahead lies in figuring out how to navigate the public transportation system o.O I promise next time I’ll have better pictures to show!