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Published: October 26th 2007
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Chicken for Sale...
...under circumstances very different from the boneless-skinless-shrinkwrapped Thrifty Foods chicken we get at home. This one was clucking five minutes before I took the picture. Our only real regret, apart from (but I guess connected to) distances from family and friends is the fact that we have not had any company from Canada—except my friend Peter and since we lived in the Submarine at the time he had to get a hotel room.
How’s that for a run-on sentence? (And I’m supposed to be an English teacher!)
We have become friends with our newest colleague Betty, who is from Saskatchewan but who now lives in Fongbin. Now there’s a transition! There’s not a grain elevator to be seen, and you can only watch your dog run away for two minutes instead of three days. She stayed overnight with us last Saturday.
We went straight to “Carrefour” the French department store called “Jia le fu’ by the locals and “jelly fool” by the smart alecs (that would be me).
A gaggle of us went for a lovely Thai dinner on Saturday night. We went to a sit-down place called the “Myanmar” instead of the usual corner takeout place. The cuisine is exquisite, and costs a fraction of what you’d fork over at home—and no GST or tip.
We started Sunday morning off,
at our favourite local breakfast place, with “pagan cheeseh dan been” (egg crepes with bacon and cheese) and REAL coffee in REAL china cups, and then we set off to the market. Lao-puo’s camera takes video, and I was all set to film her in a discussion with a bedding vendor. At that critical moment, her batteries let go! Lao-puo asserts that her Chinese is inadequate, but she sure sounds good to me. I can give the impression that I speak Chinese, I’m getting good at charades, and people are very patient and kind with our efforts.
Unilingual Canadian soldiers in WW I France are responsible for the phrase "parlez-vous the ding-dong" (the ability to speak another language). Chinese grammar is very simple. Just add “ma” at the end of a sentence to make it into a question, and “le” to make it into the past tense. Include the word "yao" with your primary verb and it becomes future tense. You can also ask a question by saying the verb, then "bu" or "mei", both of which mean "no or not", then the verb again. For example, the verb "to see" in Chinese is "kan", so you would say
"kan bu kan". By doing this you have made a yes or no question: "see no see?" An example of using "mei" would be "yo mei yo" which means "have not have". There is not a real word for “yes” except “dui” which only means “you are correct” or "hao" which means ok. Thanks to my wife for the grammar details.
All this is to say that I know how to say in Chinese "My dog has been neutered". The building security guard asked me why Toby was wearing one of those plastic Elizabethan neck collars so he can’t bite himself, and I answered “yi er ke she mei yo”. (one two but no have).
The only downside to the market trip was that we had the car and had to park two blocks away, instead of right in front as would have been the case on the motorbike. For that matter, on my scooter we would have gone right inside the indoor part for our shopping.
What they don’t have in Chinese markets isn’t worth buying.
• Fish that were flopping five minutes ago.
• Chickens that were clucking five minutes ago.
• Exotic fruit, for
pennies.
• Taro root
T-shirts galore
• Puppies, kittens, and pet pigs
• Birds
• Clothing
• Piles of underwear
• Umbrellas by the container full.
We took Betty home to Fongbin in the afternoon, but not before a plot got hatched to go to Hong Kong for the New Years Eve weekend. It’s only 200 Canadian dollars return from Taipei to Hong Kong, and there are wonderful lights and fireworks. There will be fireworks of a different variety if I enjoy the Chinese beer too much. That is only eight weeks or so away, and it is really something to look forward to. My cousin Bob lives there now, and the only reason we won’t paint the town red is because the PRC has controlled the place since 1997 so the town is already red. Actually, there is a huge difference between Hong Kong and China, that you feel immediately when you cross the border.
Fongbin is a tiny little place—away smaller than even Guangfu, and Betty is the only western person in town. Everyone speaks Taiwanese, and nobody except for a few teachers speaks any English. The scenery is breathtaking around Fongbin, the air is
Who Said Sidewalks are for Pedestrians?
Where are we supposed to park, if that's the case? pristine, and IT IS SO QUIET! You can only hear the wind, and the river—and of course the surf when near the beach.
We had a seafood dinner at Shitiping. The pings might be shitty in the place, but the food certainly wasn’t!
There are no natural harbours on the east coast of Taiwan, so Hualien has a long breakwater. The one at Shitiping is covered with the most attractive ceramic tile, in designs of fish and orcas and dolphins. (You can go whale-watching here, by the way, but to my mind whale-watching is half an inch from harassing wildlife unless distance rules are strictly obeyed).
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