I went down to the 7 Eleven to buy some milk for cereal and tea, and then came back to my room to hibernate until it was time to go to the gym. I was feeling very scatter brained this morning, like all I wanted to do was hang around and not do anything. Haven't had one of these days in a long time. But alas, it was not meant to be. I had to go to the gym.
We walked over there at about 9:30, and it was already getting hot. The walk over was enough of a warm up, we were already sweating by the time that we got there. After a couple of small mishaps while signing up for the gym card (ie, my brain was so foggy that I could barely even answer simple questions), we finally got to the weight room. It is actually a decent size, although the air conditioning could use some work. Although I think it is possible that Taiwan is simply so humid that no amount of air conditioning could ever remedy that.
I regret to say that my first day back in the gym did not go nearly as well as it should have. I kept getting super light headed, and I was sweating like a pig. I haven't sweat that much in a long time. I stayed for about an hour, dragging myself through the motions, but honestly, I was just not feeling it. Baby steps, right? I'll go back tomorrow. I think it is mostly the heat that is just getting to my head. I have never dealt with the heat well, to say the least. It made me feel better than Jan had the same "how am I functioning right now" look on his face that I am pretty sure I had on mine. It was quite the out of body experience.
Walking back to the dorms, about 15 minutes away, in the heat and all sweaty, was not the most pleasant experience I have ever had in my life. I'm afraid to say I had a rather one track mind at that point. I wanted food, and a shower, and a quiet afternoon. I grabbed some bao, and then headed back to my dorm. I was technically supposed to be going on a trip to Maokong this afternoon (which is the tea section of Taipei) but I needed to get a little bit of energy back before I was going to make that trip.
I'm not going to lie, all I wanted to do was fall asleep. I almost did. But eventually, I dragged my ass out of bed at 12:30, to get some lunch, and meet some friends at 7 Eleven so that we could all go to the subway together. As it turned out, only Bo and I had bikes, and Josh didn't, and it was along way to go. So we did what any real Chinese people would do: we shared the bike.
At first, I rode the bike, and then Josh sat on the bike on a small rack over the back tire, but that was super wobbly. I was white knuckling the handle bars, and was very very convinced that I was going to die. Well, actually, that both of us were going to die, because our fates were temporarily intertwined as we wobbled down a rather busy road. After narrowly missing a collision with 4 other people, we realized this wasn't working. So we tried the other way, with Josh riding the bike, and me sitting on the back. And that actually worked splendidly. There were a couple close calls, and I was more than happy that I couldn't actually see where we were going, but we got the job done. And all three of us (me, Bo and Josh) all got to the subway without any problems.
It was at the subway that I had an epiphany. I didn't want to be there, all I wanted to do was go back to my dorm room, and go back to sleep. So why on earth was I there? All I could think of was that if I left, it would be a hell of a trip to try to get back. So, I did what I never would have done pre-hoffman: I left. I told the teacher that I had changed my mind, and I left. Just turned around, said good bye, got right back on my bike, and biked home. And I felt awesome about it.
My story is not so interesting from there. I came back, and had to charge my phone, and had a lazy afternoon, just how I liked it. Actually, as a small confession, I watched Hook (the 1991 movie with Robin Williams) and there were some parts that I cried in. Being in touch with my emotions is a double edged sword.
I can tell you parts of what I did for dinner, but according a certain pact made, it never happened. But lets start off, shall we? I was waiting outside of the 7 Eleven (it is turning into quite the meeting spot, isn't it? You probably all think I am turning into the sketchy person that hangs out outside of the 7 Eleven now) when some Chinese girls approached me. One started talking (in rather good English) and telling me that she was working on a project that involved interviewing foreigners, and she wanted to quickly interview me while her friend taped it. I was happy to oblige.
We stood outside of the 7 Eleven, and she asked me questions about why I was in Taiwan, and why I was studying Chinese, and how long I was going to be in Taiwan for. Those sort of questions. There were a few that were rather poorly worded (with the result that I had no idea what she had actually asked me) so I just made something up. Hopefully it sounded philosophical and wise. Of course.
Three minutes later, we were done, and I gave her my name so she could friend me on Facebook. Then I met up with Jan, and we were off on the adventure to find dinner. Except that we walked about 100 meters before we realized that neither of us was actually hungry, and that we would rather go somewhere. So then we had to decide where to go. We settled on the Taipei 101 building, which is the tallest building in Taipei. It's supposed to have a really good night life scene around it, and that is supposedly where all of the good clubs are (not that either of us were dressed for clubbing. Flip flops are not normally looked upon fondly at those kind of places.)
We got off at what we thought was the right stop (the Taipei Main Station) and after a couple of wrong turns in the massive subway station, we got outside, and looked around to see where the building was. We spotted it pretty quickly, and then began walking. And then stopped, and looked at the building a little more closely. For a 101 story building, it looked rather small. Jan simply said that it was a 15 minute walk. Until we realized that we had gotten off at the wrong subway stop. That was easily fixed.
As it turns out, we were 6 subway stops away from the 101 building, which is decidedly more than a 15 minute walk. But who's counting? Once we got to the right subway stop, it was smooth sailing from there. We got out, and started walking, with Jan pointing out all of the good places to go, both bars, lounges, and food courts. Hunger hit us like a wrecking ball around 9, and we were both on the lookout for some food.
After walking around for a while, and still not being able to find anything, we decided to head back to the food court at the subway station, and either get some food or head back to campus. Unfortunately, we didn't get to the food court until 9:55, and all of the shops closed at 10. So we had to make a hard decision: Coldstone ice cream, or dinner. Which would you have picked? For me, it was a no brainer: ice cream all the way. I basically got German Chocolate Cake in ice cream form, and it was so worth it. In hindsight, Jan and I should have done some better team work, with one of us going to get dinner, one of us getting dessert. But what are you going to do.
We got ice cream, and headed back to campus. I can neither confirm nor deny the rumors that there was a McDonalds stop. And that was my night. It was interesting, to say the least. But the ice cream was worth all of it.
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