No, you are not hallucinating. That is really me on a bike. By myself. Without strings attached.
After a weekend at the Fulbright conference, Deborah, Eric, and I stayed at the Kaohsiung ETA’s apartment for two nights before we head out to Thailand. On Saturday we went to Cijin Island and rented bikes to ride around the island. It was my first time ever successfully riding a bicycle by myself and on the road! On our journey around the island, we passed a group of BMX-riders, a lighthouse, a model photo shoot, the beach, and a tunnel with glow-in-the-dark star constellations.
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This weekend, Monica, Kim, Deborah, Eric, and I headed to Hualien (on the east coast of Taiwan) to celebrate my birthday. We’d been talking about going to Hualien for weeks now since we heard that it’s one of the most beautiful parts of Taiwan, so we knew that we had to visit! So after teaching my Saturday class, we hopped on a train to Hualien!
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Oct26
So, I’m not sure what happened or who got fired, but somehow, last Tuesday I managed to pass my scooter driving test. I don’t know how, but i somehow managed to stay going straight long enough and not kill anyone or run into anything (or at least the judge didn’t notice) and left the Luodong DMV with a license to drive a 50cc-250cc scooter!
My Mode of Transportation Before
(above) Before getting my scooter, Eric was my mode of transportation. Trust me, the helmet was necessary. Haha, okay kai wan xiao. But, seriously, people would just sandbag me everywhere. I was the Official Yilan ETA Sandbag. I had to say the word zai so often, I made it a Chinglish word. For example, you can use it in the context of asking for a ride: “Hey, can you zai me tonight?”, or also in the past tense: “Yeah, my friend zai-ed wo.”
Soon after the crazy miracle, I bought my very own scooter (pictures to come)! It’s a cute 100cc and I’m so happy that I finally, after like two months of living in Yilan, have a scooter! Driving on the road is super scary though, I must say.
Life Skills Learned in Taiwan:
X - Riding a Bicycle
X - Driving a Scooter
O - Swimming
