I never quite know how to begin first posts, so I suppose I shall just pretend like I've had this blog for a while.

In any case, today was a nice day up until about 3 hours ago when I lost my ATM card.. My parents arranged for a family friend to give me a bank card so that I could just withdraw cash when necessary. Within 15 minutes of meeting up with her and saying goodbye, I'd attempted to get 1000NTD, successfully taken said 1000NTD, and... didn't get the card back. I went to try and ask a 7-11 cashier for help, but it started taking too long so I went back, only to find out that someone had stolen my card :( My fault for leaving the machine unattended, but wah, now I must wait until Saturday.. oh well.

Speaking of 7-11's, they are quite common and very, very nice here. Wifi (that doesn't work for me, but I think it's a phone problem, sigh), bar to sit at, air conditioning (<3), and most importantly, TEA EGGS. I LOVE TEA EGGS. Had two for breakfast this morning before heading off to the opening ceremony.

We had a scavenger hunt today which was fun, especially since our team won :D 11 stickers! Even though we got owned during charades. Our prizes were postcards, I shall send out eventually. I can't really bring myself to rip them out of the book, they look so nice... Also had some lectures on entomology (I'm slightly ashamed that I said ticks/scorpions were insects. I should have known better! Immediate regret) and fauna of Taiwan, which were interesting as far as lectures go, but I definitely wanted to fall asleep just from being tired/hot. I'm excited for when we actually get to see the animals, live ^^!

I guess I should mention something about yesterday as well, since it was a big day of firsts: I made friends, who are all very nice and thankfully are helping me out with learning Chinese/translating for me into English. I'm sad that I didn't pay more attention in Chinese school :( but hopefully by the end of the month I'll be able to talk to them in mandarin! Had lunch at a train station which was pretty much a miniature mall, and ate beef noodles *drool* After the day's activities (memorial plaza, NT museum), we took a break and I met up again with... well, let me see if I can remember everyone's names: Dominic, Tracy (Wei-ning?), Zoey (So-chi, or something that sounds like it), Cassie...?, a girl from Maryland that majors in Ag. Econ whose name I've forgotten, Anbo, Fan (?), Vivian?

I think I did a terrible job but at least I can recognize their faces, which counts for something, right?

In any case, we went out to the night markets and ate and walked and ate and walked and ate, and walked, and ate... and walked... and ate some more. Tried a bunch of different things which were all delicious, hehehe. I don't think Shu-chi came with us. Also, ordered a che lun bing by myself! Sort of, Dominic helped @_@; Learned a term called "chi huo" which pretty much translates to "fatty"/"bottomless pit." Ended the night with shaved ice ^___^ Everything here makes my stomach happy.

On a related note, all of the people here make me happy, too! Everyone is so easy to be around, and I can't wait to see how the next 4 weeks are going to go. Looking forward to it.




Until next time,

emily