It seems like I just posted a blog here, but it's been a few days. I'm happy to report that I have discovered a new way to sit in my room. I've been putting my pillow on the floor and leaning back on my bed, and putting my laptop on a short foot stool. Yes my life is that much richer and enjoyable now that I can spend more time staring at my 12 inch computer screen. I still haven't purchased or otherwise acquired any chairs or tables. I shouldn't complain about it though, especially here in this "don't complain" culture, Wednesday night my 15 year-old service partner told me that her family might have an extra table they could give me. I had to reverse my complaining to convince her not to give it to me. One of my main reasons for not having a table is "I just haven't found the right one yet." My indecisive procrastinating qualities surface even here in this "new life" of mine, funny how your problems follow you. I found myself thinking "When I live in Taiwan, I'll always be on time to school and every meeting, because I'll be in Taiwan." It seems logical when you think it, but then you realize whatever it is that makes you late in America will probably also be in Taiwan, or wherever you go.

In addition to my new sitting and blogging (pillow on the floor) arrangements I have a new room-mate, yes, just as we had all hoped, a few weeks ago I saw a little gecko scurrying across the floor in search of a hiding place. I guess you could say, I've been blessed twice. I hope this one doesn't drown like the last one, I'll have to keep a wary eye out for any deep looking puddles of water.

Aren't geckos amphibious? Or are they just lizards?

Another new thing that I've experiences is an air raid drill, which isn't something I ever considered before coming here. On Tuesday our last teacher told us that between 2:30 and 3:00pm the next day their would be an air raid drill, complete with sirens. Actually that was the only way I was able to figure out what she was talking about, she made an air raid siren sound for us. Of course I had to imitate it myself for clarification, I wasn't about to let someone else do sound effects without me. Afterward, in another discussion about it, she asked me to do the air raid siren sound again, she said I was good at it. I'm not as embarrassed as I should be to say that I was quite proud of my air raid siren sound. I've also been asked to do a "you're in a night club dancing to techno music" impersonation more than once (while sitting). But I really shouldn't brag.

The air raid drill is interesting, for 30 minutes everyone who is driving has to pull over and stop, and everyone else has to go inside and wait it out. I guess they want to be prepared for being attacked by their "enemies" as my teacher said, I assume for a long time this has been mainland China, even though relations are improving nowadays.

I was a little bit disappointed with it though, it wasn't all that exciting. I think it would have been much more fun if I had been outside walking around and had no idea what was going on. But my teacher had to go and tell me ahead of time and ruin it.

Living in Taipei has been interesting so far, people come and go very fast here, I'm already starting to feel like an old-timer after a mere 6 months. There are so many brothers and sisters visiting here all the time too, many of them from Japan and Korea which are relatively close by. Which is funny because my friend Leah after her first time at a near-by stinky tofu restaurant said that she didn't really like that place and didn't want to go back, after she said that we've been back there about 5 times in a row because someone was new or was visiting Taiwan and we had to give them the "Stinky Tofu" experience. She's hoping to break the cycle after next meeting. Hopefully we won't have another new visitor to ruin her plans of escaping the cycle.