Xie-Xie (pronounced Shay Shay)

Ni Hao!

 I can't believe I am in another country! And what a great country to be in. Taiwan is so green. The only other place that I have been that has been this green is the zoo :) We landed in Taiwan at about 6 am which is about 3 pm the previous day MST. I probably got about 5-6 hours of sleep on the plane and for the other 7 hours I read, made movies with the videos on my camera, and ate the delicious food.. We had 2 meals. Dinner was technically at 3 am MST and I ate this chicken and noodle entree which tasted like beef stew to me, a carrot coleslaw, salami and chocolate mousse dessert.  For breakfast, they served con-gi  (p.s. whenever I spell something I hear in chinese, I will most likely be spelling it phonetically) which is a rice dish with onions and other stuff  in it. (to me, it seemed more like a meal for dinner than breakfast) Both meals were really good.

We got off the plane and went to customs. I said my first Chinese phrase to the employee who helped me. It was Xie-Xie (this one is spelled correctly) which means thank you. We then went and got our bags and exchanged our money. the paper money very fancy, especially compared to our green money. It kind of makes me feel rich because their lowest bill is 100.

We then got on a bus to go to the high speed rail station and oh what a ride it was! It seems that anything goes in the middle of an intersection. At one point, another bus cut our bus off and the driver had to slam on his brakes. Another passenger told our group that that is normal :) Oh and I have to mention that there are a TON of mopeds.


Another exciting adventure was when we almost missed the train.We only had 3 minutes left to go 2 floors down and board the train. As we were getting on the elevator we realized that 2 girls from our group, Sophia and Sarah, weren't there. We looked around and saw them still going to through the ticket reader. We had to leave them and go down the elevator and were hoping that they would make it on time. We got off of the elevator and the next thing we see is this Taiwanese man running down the stairs with luggage and Sophia and Sarah running behind him. It was so funny to watch! It was also very kind of that man to help them board the train on time. the people in Taiwan are so nice.

Third adventure of the day: Out professor, Jim Kohl, asked us to change into our uniforms while on the train because we were going directly to the hospital afterwards. And of course everyone changed before they got off besides me. I thought that we still had a half hour to go, but before I knew it the train was stopping and I did not have my uniform on. We then had to hurry to get on the bus to Tainan. My only chance to change was on the bus. I sat on the backseat of the bus and Sarah held a jacket in front of me and I changed my clothes on a Taiwanese bus. Luckily the bus wasn't very full so no other people were near me except for the girls in my group.
Once we arrived in Tainan, we went to the hospital and were given a tour. We get to help out and observe in the ICU and the ER. We will probably be working with women in the community and children in the orphanage... so all of our nursing bases are covered.
After the tour of the hospital, we went and at Shwa-bing (sp?) Mmmmm... so delicious!! It is made with shaved ice, fruit (or anything else you prefer), and sweet and condensed milk. It is so simple, yet so good!

 
It is only 3:45 pm, I am a little jet-lagged, but there is so much to do... Hopefully we'll go karaoke sometime tonight! 





Additional Pictures:
In front of the Chi Mei Medical Center

Nurse riding mechanical bull in the workout room of our housing

 Tara and Katelyn acting weird in San Francisco

Selection of food in a 7-Eleven

eggs boiled in tea