Betel Nut

If you've arrived in Taiwan you may notice a lot of people chewing and spitting horrid red saliva. When I first seen this I merely thought they were chewing tobacco. Later I was told that its what the locals call betel-nut or 槟榔 (Binlang).

What it is is an areca nut wrapped in a betel leaf which you chew, the feeling (what I've been told) is similar to a caffeine rush. The majority of people I see chewing these are builders, truck drivers and anyone else who have to work long hours.
   You can find betel-nut all around Taiwan, on most streets you'll see florescent lights advertising betel-nut. They also sell beer and cigarette too, but the main income i guess comes from betel-nut. If your lucky you might even seen one the many "Betel-nut beauty's"

Now when I first seen these scantly glad women I mistook them to be prostitutes. I was later informed they are selling betel-nut. Now I could write a whole post on "Betel-nut beauty's" which I will in a later post. But in short it stems from competition between betel-nut sellers, and they started to use attractive women to entice the mainly male buyers to buy from them. Anyway this has evolved over the years, and you can see the women have started to wear less clothes to attract more business. One misconception is these women are used, I have been told that some make more than the average lawyer here so all I can say is don't judge a book by it's cover until you read a little deeper.

The major reason why I don't try betel nut is the secretion can stain your teeth ( Like the image above) and excessive chewing has been linked to an increase in the chances of  oral cancer. So my advice is give it a go, but don't get hooked on it. 

Time to Judge

Tomorrow I've been roped in to judge a speech competition. I have to mark the children on their pronunciation,  intonation, fluency and stage manner. I'm not sure If I'm more of a Simon Cowell  or a Gary Barlow?

Rain Rain go Away!

Today seeing as it is pouring outside, I'll take a little time to explain what the weather is like out here. Depending on the time of year you'll arrive, you will experience different weather. For example, If you come to Taiwan from April all the way to September, it will be extremely hot. Sometimes the temperature has hit 39 degrees with 99% humidity. You will need to wear light clothes, and drink lots of water, try staying out of direct sunlight too. I tend to move from one air conditioning unit to the next. The summer also brings rain and the start of the typhoon season. I feel in Taipei, there are only two seasons. Hot and wet/cold. After September the temperature will start to slowly drop, and it will start to rain more. When the winter finally comes, you will feel the cold more then you would think. Sure the average temperature rarely drops below 12 degrees, but you will not get the warm feeling you would get on returning home. This coming from the fact most homes have no central heating for the winter, single pane windows and tiled floors.  All these are ideal for the scorching temperatures of the summer, but leaves you freezing in the winter. My advice would be to buy a small portable heater you can plug in to warm you up. Also to not just bring shorts and t-shirts when you come, bring a couple of jumpers and trousers too. Now this advice only reflects Taipei weather, if you were to visit the south things might be a little different. I know in summer the temperatures in the south are normally a little higher, also when typhoons hit they normally make landfall in the south first. i hope this information helps you a little, if you have any questions leave a comment and i'll get back to you.

No advertisements

Just to let everyone know I've decided not to plaster adverts on my blog. I have had a lot of people say ' dude you should start to monetize your blog' and to them I have said no. I want this blog to be advert free, I want the content to appeal to people not to make money from. That is all.

Mr. Kon Ba Kon Kon video Two

After we arrived In Taiwan and I was interviewed on the local news, they were eager to see more videos from me and the Kon Ba Kon Kon guy. So the video I'll post today is the second attempt to please these eager fans. Enjoy

It took me ages to place his head on each frame of video.

On the roads in Taipei

When you arrive in Taipei you will notice how people drive here. Basically here in Taiwan people don't really pay much attention to road safety so this makes it dangerous to attempt to drive on the roads. I have been in a number of situation where the driver has nearly crashed. I know friends who ride scooters here who have broken their arms, legs and have came off it a few times. They'll say "It's not IF you crash, it's WHEN". This is the reason after two years living here I still choose to take the buses and MRT. If you're a risk taker, and not scared to dance with the devil, then sure you can try to learn to ride a scooter here to get around, just personally I've seen some nasty accidents here which has stopped me from attempting to drive here. I will give you the top five vehicles to avoid started with the worse.

Number One

 Firstly Taxis, these vehicles you have to watch like a hawk. Make sure you give them a wide berth as they all drive erratic and unpredictable.

                                                                   






                                                                                       
                                                                                            Number Two 

 Secondly Buses- The drivers of the buses here will not care If he pulls across two shoulders with his 5 ton bus and completely takes out your scooter and you in the process. Avoid over taking buses while they are entering and exiting a station.

                                                                                               Number Three

Thirdly other cars, just like the drivers of taxis here, people have no clue on how to drive. They will pull U-turns in the middle of the road, pull out of parking spots without indicating and without any care of the oncoming traffic, pull into a lane without looking and many others.

        
 Number Four  

Fourthly other scooters, these people really get me the most steamed while on the road. They will insist on joining traffic without looking for oncoming traffic, we have had some close calls from people like this. Also they will try their hardest to get right at the front of the lights, weaving through traffic like a snake.

Number Five

 Fifthly are people on bikes. Yeah I understand It's healthy and better for the environment, but not when inpatient drivers overtake them and crossover to the oncoming traffic forcing you to maneuver to avoid a head on collision. Also a lot of them petal slow and not close to the curb. 

 Also I want to mention, the ones which didn't make my top 5, which are stupid pedestrians who just walk across the road without looking at the oncoming traffic.  Lastly old ladies who push piled high trolleys of cardboard. You can see these people everywhere in Taipei, they push their trolleys down the middle of the road completely oblivious to the traffic. What I've seen which amazes me are the drivers in their cars won't even honk their horns, they'll just follow patiently until the road widens then gun it. I hope this little insights helps you on your decision to drive here. If you have any stories related to anything I've mentioned I would love to hear.  

                                                                              

Manners of Taiwanese

Now when it comes to manners in Taiwan you will quickly observe that they differ from those you grew up with back home. I'm just going to quickly go through the ones I've observed, or the lack of them since I've lived here. Firstly burping- Now when I was a kid, when I burped I had to say 'pardon me' or 'sorry' If I was around anyone. Even to this day I cover my mouth If I were going to let one go, however In Taiwan I've noticed people burp whenever they like, and in front of complete strangers. I will recall my first experience of this, I was return home from a class on the bus. I noticed a seat free next to a very smartly dressed business woman. So I smiled and sat next to her. I was minding my own business when all of sudden she let rip some throat rumbling burps, the kind you hear from construction workers or football supporters. Anyway I was shocked and she didn't even batter an eyelid or say sorry, nor did anyone sitting next to me or behind. I was left feeling shocked and in amazement she could do that. From that moment I noticed everyone doing it from kids all the way up to seniors.  Secondly Pushing and shoving- Now this I have noticed more from the older people here In Taiwan. They will not say excuse me in Chinese or Taiwanese, if they need to get past you they will just push you out the way. This is one of my pet hates here, my reaction is to push them back unless I would end up breaking there hip where I would just bite my lip. I believe this tolerance with the elderly here comes from the teaching or Taoism where you are told to 'respect your elders' no matter what. A lot of the old people abuse this belief in people and I feel its time that they earn respect then having the right to it. So as soon as you arrive get ready for them, as you will have them pushing you in the back on the MRT, pushing in front of you while your waiting in line and even walking on the street, to them you are invisible. So be warned. Now these two are the ones I witness the most, I could write more later, but for now I'll leave it at two . If you have had any experiences of the two in Taipei I would love to hear.

Working out in Taipei

From the moment I came to Taipei I wanted to find somewhere to workout. I firstly looked at California Gym, which I didn't like due to the forceful approach the sales people have to try and get you to sign up to one of there absorbedly priced membership. All I wanted was a price per month or per session. After leaving with a bad impression of the place I then started looking at local council run gyms, which were miles cheaper (around 50NT per hour) and allow you to pay and go which is what I wanted. I found a good gym, which I still use, it's located next to Chiang Kei Shek Memorial Hall

http://www.jjsports.com.tw/booking.htm

It's not one of your fancy gyms where you'll see supermodels working out, but it suits my needs. They have a good selection of cardio equipment,  they have weight machines and benches for squats and chest. The free weight dumbells go up to 37kg, so if your looking for heavier you'll have to jump on a bench if you can get to one. The best time to go is early mornings or before 4:30pm when the college students start pouring in and rotating themselves on one machine which I hate. So If your looking for a place I would give this one a once over. There are other council run sport centres scattered over Taipei which offer similar pricing, but I'm not sure of what equipment they have. If you have any further questions please leave your comments below. 

The video that made Geordie Dave famous in Taipei

If you've ever watched the news in Taipei you will see they tend to show a lot of Youtube videos. While the BBC are addressing current issues about war and the economy, Taiwan news will mostly consist of random people complaining, car accidents, food and the Youtube videos. Well let be start my firstly backtracking to before me and my wife came to Taiwan. When we lived in the UK we had previously came to Taipei to visit. While we were here we watched local TV a lot , and there was one reoccurring advert about some guy who could help you with your back troubles. The advert mainly consisted of the guy talking to camera and reading script. What made it funny was the fact he hardly moved, and you could see that he was reading his lines from a prompter. Anyway we decided one day after a couple of bottles of wine to remake the advert ourselves starring me as the guy. We posted it on Youtube and noting really happened. Until three months later my wife kept getting emails from friends in Taiwan say 'OMG your boyfriend's been on TV' or something along those lines. We checked our Youtube account and the numbers were crazy, one day hitting 45,000 viewers. The following video is the original, and what follows are some other videos of me on TV when I arrived in Taipei. The video is in Taiwanese which made it more appealing to the Taiwanese audience to see a foreign guy trying to imitate a popular advert. I hope you enjoy this, also If you can remember seeing it on TV let me know.

The original video 

I didn't like the comment this news presenter was saying about the video. The whole thing was a joke! not to be taken seriously.

In the following video Formosa TV took me to meet the guy from the video and had me try to rein-act the video with the guy. The whole experience was surreal. 

Le Parkour in Taipei

When you get bored in Taipei what can you do?
Well you can eat, there are hundreds of places to satisfy any hunger. You can also visit the many beautiful attractions Taipei and the surrounding areas have. Or.. Once you've done all that you decide to take one of your friends to the local park to shoot a video. This video will hopefully be the start of many more to come. I have done a few others which I will gladly share with you beautiful people in the near future. And for all those of you who live in Taipei, the location we shot in was Da an Park.

Enjoy

Student Dave

Today marks the day I try and learn Chinese. I have currently signed myself up to study Chinese at Shi Da University

http://www2.ntnu.edu.tw/en/index.php

I will be starting at beginners level and studying for two hours everyday. Today was my registration day where I had to take my application and pay the fee. My lovely wife accompanied me to oversee everything. I filled out the forms, waited in line and even had to take a 40 minute reading and writing test all in Chinese, even after I told them I couldn't read Chinese Characters. ( later on I found out I didn't have to sit the test, as I'm a beginner) After this little hiccup the rest was straight forward. All in all it took around 2-3 hours. So from the 1st of December I will be finally trying to improve my pitiful Chinese to something more than ordering coffee from 7-11. If anyone wishes for more information on what courses Shi Da has to offer, please leave your comments.

My first post

Hello everyone

Today is my first day to start to tell you about my life in Taiwan. Let me get you all up to speed. I have lived now in Taipei for nearly two and a half years now, and I think it's time to start to share my experiences and impressions of life here. This blog will cover everything from the places I eat at, the places I travel to and a whole host of other interesting things I feel that you would like to read about. So over the next 3 months I will try to write all the exciting things I have done over the months I have spent here, and also the keep you up to date with the current events. I hope you tune in regular and look forward to seeing your comments.

Regards,

Geordie Dave