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Kristina's
Journal:
January 15, 1998
We are in Taiwan because this is where David's biological
father, Bill, lives with his Taiwanese wife, Ling-I, and their 2 1/2 year
old son, Willie. Bill works as an English teacher at the University in
Tainan, which is in Southern Taiwan.
We arrived in Taipei, the capital city in the North,
originally planning to see the sights there and then take the train south
the following day. We had no guidebook, and no idea where to find budget
accommodation, so we booked a hotel near the train station from the airport.
It was very expensive, but necessary. We took the airport bus which dropped
us a few blocks from the hotel and walked from there.
After we checked in, we went to the train station
to buy tickets to the town near Tainan where Bill lives. We bought our
tickets, satisfied with how easy it was, after we had someone at the hotel
write the destination for us in Chinese. Wrong! When we called Bill to
confirm our arrival time, it turns our we had bought tickets to the wrong
location. After much hassle, many phone calls, and the return
and purchase of new tickets, we discovered that we still had the wrong
tickets, but they were much closer to where we needed to go, so we just
stuck with them.
After all of this, and a departure time around noon
the next day, we saw virtually nothing of Taipei. The train ride took about
4 hours and was uneventful. We expected to see farmland as we traveled
down the cost, but is seemed like the cities never ended.
January 19, 1998
The Object of Fascination
Never in my life have I been stared at so much simply
because of the color of my skin or my hair. Of all the places we have been
before, no matter how remote, it seems that there have been many tourists
there before us, jading the locals into looking at us as a source of money,
not facination. Taiwan, however, does not get many western tourists and
there are very few people who speak English, nor are they many signs in
English.
We went into a department store in a shopping mall
and walked through the first floor to get downstairs. The first floor entrance
was like any other department store in the States, filled with cosmetic,
skin care, and perfume counters, staffed by overly made-up Taiwanese young
women. What was slightly odd to me was not the abundance of recognizable
name brand cosmetics, but the pictures everywhere of the white super models
who represent them. It seemed that these companies were still trying to
sell idealized western beauty to Asian women. And here I was, the only
white woman for miles, with no makeup on, in bad need of a haircut, feeling
like I should live up to the standard as well. I felt like these girls
were staring at me, expecting something more from me, a female representative
for my entire country.
And it wasn't just in the department store that
people were curious. In restaurants people watch us to see if we are capable
of using chopsticks. Bill says people comment to him all the time on how
well he uses chopsticks and he replies that he's been using them for over
forty years, longer usually than the person asking the question has been
alive.
We haven't really done much since we've been here,
but that's not why we came. Dave wanted to spend some time with his Father
and time getting to know his little brother. Bill showed us a photo he
has of David when he was the same age as Willie is now and the similarities
are really amazing, even though Willie is half Taiwanese. We've spent most
of our time reading, resting, and writing. It was good not to have to do
anything for a while. We did have some good meals here in the little town
they live in and in Tainan city. We went out one night for Sushi and another
to a place famous for its streamed dumplings, which were indeed wonderful.
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