Tag Archives: taipei

Help! Cuteness is everywhere.

10 Replies

I had the privilege of flying on one of Eva Airlines’ Hello Kitty planes today.

Here's a screenshot so you know what I'm talking about

 

Everywhere you turn on the plane, you see signs of Hello Kitty: from the pins on the flight attendants’ uniforms, their pink aprons, the pillow covers, to the air freshener in the lavatory.

Eva Airlines is seriously dedicated to Hello Kitty

 

I started chuckling as I stepped onto the plane. It’s cute and adorable. But soon I grew weary. [Yes, I tend to overthink. Are you even surprised?]

There are obvious social and cultural reasons that girls, and in fact, women under 50, are encouraged to be cute, to find cutesy things desirable, and also to screech in delight whenever such cutesy things are encountered: In a patriarchal, male-dominant society, men prefer women that are dependent and docile (or at least seemingly so) and find them to be more attractive.

A nation of young women marching to the drumbeat of cuteness. Some critics have even gone so far to call it the “infantilization of women”.

There is the voice that many women here speak in. High-pitched and nasal. 

The facial expressions: eyes blinking deliberately with eyelashes a-fluttering, better yet if they appear to be watery & starry. Verisimilitude of manga characters.

I imagine myself a reject from the Hello Kitty factory.

I’ve never been able to be cute – partly because I am 5’7″ and not starving myself. By Taiwan standard, I am enormous. I also cannot fake Jennifer Tilly’s voice. Just imagine Lucy Lawless feigning cuteness. That. Did you throw up in your mouth too?

That being said, I begin to lean towards + on the cuteness scale when I arrive. It’s as if when I speak in Chinese, I assume a different personality. Or maybe they’ve spiked all the food here.

I tilt my head. I blink my eyes. I smile vacuously.

I know tomorrow I will start making a bunny sign when having pictures taken.

This is like an emergency note written by a survivor before the inevitable Borg invasion.

 

 

 

 

The Instagram Diary

16 Replies

There you go…

Oversharing on the road.

p.s. Will continue until I get home and start the long winding road of unpacking and adjusting to time zone and crying myself to sleep because I don’t want to go back to work…

 

[instapress tag=”oversharingontheroad” piccount=”24″ size=”90″ effect=”fancybox” title=”1″ paging=”1″]

Going Home. Again.

24 Replies

Waiting to get on a plane that will take me to Tokyo Narita, and then onto Taipei. I am making my annual solo trip back home so I can pack 359 days of homesickness, guilt and filial piety into a 3-day visit. (I will spend 3 days traveling due to time zone change and the sheer expansiveness of the Pacific Ocean).

As my parents get older, the necessity of going home as often as I could becomes unbearable. The anxiety and sadness I feel every time I see them though becomes unbearable as well. I long to see the joy in my dad’s face as much as I dread seeing his tears. March on, little soldier. That’s what I have been telling myself since I gave the TSA agent my passport and boarding passes.

I will try not to talk about feeling like a Godzilla as soon as I land in Tokyo. But I will feel that way while stuffing my face with food that I have been missing all year.

And I will try and send in pictures to be posted here (and below if the Flickr plug-in works). Just in case you wonder what I have been up to. *Megalomaniac laugh* *Megalomaniac laugh*

Love and peace.

Please specify a Flickr ID for this gallery

Jet Lag is a Bitch

31 Replies

It’s 2:46 am here in Taipei. I have been awake since 1, lying quietly next to the exhausted boys who passed out at 8 pm, which means they’ll be up and ready to go any minute now.

Jet lag sucks ass when you are traveling with kids.

I am also typing this on my stupid iPhod with my nose hovering above the screen because genius here packed a pair of glasses with NO prescription when my eyes are so effing bad (9.80 and 10.20). Wearing contact lenses 24/7 is simply not an option for me; I’d be blinking the whole day like Sarah Palin, I mean, winking.

I still have some work to do for work, and I would have gladly been working on them except I don’t know how to work on Excel while you are effing half- blind.

Except the above loser glitch, and the fact it’s going to rain the whole week, everything is nice. It’s nice to be here with my folks. Awesome to rub the tummy of my nephew’s wife (Yes, that means I’m going to be a GREAT aunt soon… Shut up! If I’m a great aunt, you all are great aunts and uncles according to the Chinese rule of familial osmosis.). Awesome to see my 12-year-old hovering above my parents (I’m the black sheep in my family: different in every way including effing poor eyesight). Wonderful to watch my dad watching Mr. Monk eating and my oldest doing homework with a content smile.

I’m being a bad blogger. I thought I should drop you this note and let you know why it is all quiet on the WESTERN front…

Love, from Taipei

How he feels about the REAL Chinese food...

To Buy a Fat Hog

14 Replies

Dear Costco,

I don’t know how you did it. But you won.

I shop at the Costco near our house in the Chicago suburbs right before every one of my trips home and throw money at you as if money were grown on trees: vitamins, vitamins, and more vitamins. These are popular items that will sure to please everybody back home. The tiny shelves in my parents’ already cramped bedroom proudly display the vitamins and nutritional supplements that promise to improve the condition of ailments from A to Z like a mini drugstore. Don’t get me wrong: I appreciate your role in my parents’ happiness and pride as they tell their friends which one is for what and the fact they were all brought back from the USA by their wayward daughter. Something to show for.

Ever since your appearance in Taipei, you have become the new love of people here. They love you so much that there are now 3 of you. The one inside the city proper is so crowded that you need to station employees in the street, trying to entice people to drive to another Costco “8-minute drive away” with a coupon for a free drink. I rolled my eyes at the craziness of this all. It is ONLY Costco, people.

Yes, I will confess. I visit Costco every time when I am in Taipei: I go with my family so they can replenish their supplies. It is one of those regular mundane boring things I do not get to do with them. So yes I am paying my dues. When I walked in yesterday, I was at first floored by how exactly like my Costco it was. Eerie almost.

.

.

Everything looks the same at first but once I got into the thick of it, I noticed a lot of differences. Kudos really for finding the perfect formula to adapt a quintessential American warehouse shopping concept (and seriously, you really need massive pieces of land to support this concept, no?) to the small island of Taiwan. You started with smaller packages since people have not as much storage space, are accustomed to making more frequent shopping trips, and are in general more frugal. Instead of giant rolls of Bounce paper towels, the ones sold in Taiwan are half the size. I wonder whether you have heard stories of old folks washing, line drying, and reusing Bounce, driving their children in sane with a house full of sheets of Bounce in varying drying stages. Nevertheless, I was very impressed with the homework you have done and continue to do.

As I was rolling my eyes at the exuberant crowd and their shopping carts piled high with goods, I was at the same time WOWed by the unique items you have managed to source and stock in the store: Frozen, ready to heat, Chinese dishes. I believe you have single-handedly changed how Chinese women make dinners at home.

.

.

.

Whiskey Tasting in Costco. (And yes, sigh, Christmas stuff in Taiwan now too...)

I became dejected as I mentally calculated the pros and cons of smuggling some of these frozen dishes in my suitcase, esp. the “Buddha Jumping Over the Wall” which traditionally takes a lot of time and work to prepare and in no friggin’ way would I even attempt to make. But you cheered me up with tasting tables, esp. this one, that I KNOW will never be seen in my Costco.

I left with souvenirs for people back in the U.S. purchased from Costco. Don’t tell me you do not find it ironic.

Either way, I am not able to escape you. You got me in and out.

You won.

Sincerely,
A loyal Costco member

p.s. Would you ever consider REVERSE-import the Costcos in Taipei into the Chicago area?

To Market, To Market

26 Replies

It always feels kind of surreal when I am home. In fact, what I called “home” is an apartment I did not grow up in. It is home simply because my parents live here, with my nephew who, instead of my two elder brothers (long story…), takes care of them.

I am a different person when I am over here for many reasons. It is even stranger to come home by myself because I am all of a sudden the lone girl in the family who everybody wants/needs to take care of. My father keeps on asking me whether I am hungry even after I have been stuffing my face non-stop. My mother won’t stop asking me whether I am cold; she is wearing a thick jacket while I, a short-sleeved t-shirt. The night when I arrived, when I was not paying attention, she unpacked my suitcases, put away all my stuff, hung up all my clothes and even folded my underwear. My nephew and his fiancée will not let me lift a finger because, even though we are only 9 years apart, I am still his aunt. I am an elder and he has to be respectful. So the rules says. Sometimes it is simply AWESOME to be Chinese.

People often ask me what I do when I go home. Eh. Nothing exciting really. I am chaperoned around to eat, eat and eat some more. I also go to a lot of department stores because that is what my mother likes to do. Judging by the crowd and the lines outside of many popular restaurants, these are also activities enjoyed by 90% of the people in the city.

Just like every other big city around the world. Right?

.

uniqlo
bunny-in-the-glass-case
this-falls-fashion
btw-nice-legs-too
food-court
drool
matcha-ice-cream
hot-pot
sushi
there-i-fixed-it

Chicken and Egg

41 Replies

I wonder what the statute of limitations is for going on and on and on about a trip one took in the blogosphere. Bear with me here: there is an urgent whining I need to unload…

WTF ASIA?! What’s up with all the skinny bitches?

If you know me, you know that I’d be the last person on earth to reinforce/subscribe to any stereotypes knowingly. I am the self-proclaimed, kill-joy, party-pooper, stereotype police. But I have to say, I felt totally out of place when I was in that part of the world last week. Actually, I felt TOO MUCH OF ME was IN the place.

I left in 1993 and have not been living over there. Throughout the years, I have become complacent. I am 5’7″, so by all measurement, I am of medium height in the U.S.  I “carry my weight” really well and I have the advantage of living in the Midwest, to be more specific, in Chicago, the #13 Fattest City in the US in 2009. In addition, I often wonder whether being Asian automatically makes me look thinner, like, here’s my theory, people cannot believe that there are fat Asian women… When I renewed my driver’s licence last year, the man at the DMV refused to accept the number I gave him for my weight.

“You look like you weigh no more than 150 lbs!” So he put down that number. Hey. I was NOT going to argue with him…

As soon as I got on the plane from Washington D.C. to Tokyo, I felt like a giant. Not only was I taller, I needed more girth. I was in the middle seat, and both of my seat mates voluntarily surrendered the armrests to me. That is the kind of nice gestures you make for the overweight… I looked: neither of them filled up their seats. I could see the blue seat cushions. Like the “air between thighs” test, they also passed the “visible seat cushion” test.

As soon as I got off the plane in Tokyo, I had the vision of Godzilla rampaging through the City of Tokyo in my head. Was I merely imagining the worst about myself? I wish.

“You are so fat now!” My nephew said as soon as he greeted me at the airport. With affection, mind you.

“Have you gained more weight since March?” My mom asked. “Look at your arms.”

When I saw my dad at home. “Oh, ha ha ha. Look at you. You seem to be bigger than last time.”

At the restaurant where I saw my brother and my sister-in-law, because that is really all we do: we get together, we eat, we talk, and we eat some more,

“You didn’t lose any weight at all!… Never mind. Eat eat eat. Eat now. Go on a diet when you return to the U.S.”

My entire trip I vacillated between feeling obese and stuffing my face. Often simultaneously.

“You need to lose weight. Now eat some more!”

I love my family.

So here is the chicken and egg question:

Did I feel the urge to get out of there because I knew I would not fit in, in more ways than one? Or did I let myself grow to fit the space that was afforded me, physically and figuratively?

More WTF moments came when I was at various restaurants, roadside stands, shops, stalls, surrounded by skinny women stuffing their faces heartily with delicious food. So fucking unfair…

One of the best beef noodle in Taipei. There is a line outside on a Monday night...

Deep fried anything tastes yummy

Big giant tapioca balls, oh, how I love thee... So much so that I had 6 of tapioca treats in 2 days...

Dan Dan Noodle - a tradtional Taiwanese dish; I had no desire to go to fancy restaurants. I craved the roadside vendors and night markets...

At the basement of any department store worth its weight, there is a tricked out food court lined with shops offering any style of Chinese cuisine (and Japanese and Korean) one can possibly crave. As if that is not enough to mock the overweight amongst us, on the other side of the food court, there are always fancy pastry shops and bakeries, tempting us with the mouthwatering, intricately decorated, baked goods.

Temptations! Tell me this is NOT a case for "f* unfair!"

Another pastry shop. How many pastry shops does one need? Apparently many.

Another fancy pastry shop? No. Wait... This is good ol' Dunkin Donuts! Upgraded!

WTF Wednesday: Year-End Clearance

5 Replies

I have all these wonderful posts ideas for posts lined up for before the end of the year. Alas, I am in turbo-boost Catch Up mode: In less than 10 days, I had the wonderful experience of flying on 6 different airplanes. Not accustomed to being a road warrior, to rapidly adjusting to different time zones, or to packing/unpacking in quick succession, I feel like I am walking through a mist, on unstable ground. Or it could simply be I am walking through crap collected from my trips strewn on the floor in my house since I soon gave up on unpacking. Nevertheless, I do not want to miss my once-a-week WTF Wednesday feature.

(Naturally I am cheating by Backdating this post. Good thing Sarbanes–Oxley Act does not apply to blog posting…)

So here is a composition of random pictures taken at my random WTF moments:

Considering how you call yours a Chinese restaurant, I surely hope one of you are, or at least, the food is...



A question we will still be asking next year, and the next, and the next...



"The Dog and Bentley"

This picture may deserve some explanation: I was enjoying a nice bowl of frozen desert with large dark tapiocas aka “pearls” (which I am completely obsessed with and would gladly tell anybody that I had 6 bowls/cups of those in 2 days when I was in Taipei, on top of everything else I ate) at a sidewalk stand/shop. The shop owner during the day keeps his dog on the sidewalk, as you can see, with a makeshift cardboard-box doghouse. Just as I was admiring the very well-behaved dog, I saw that across the street is a Bentley dealership with a fancy showcase room. I found this an interesting juxtaposition. It says so much about Taipei.

Serisouly. How much do you want to discuss your menstrual cycle?

This is the “Menstrual Care” section at a drug store. I have not “lived” in Taiwan since 1993 and I am intrigued by the resurgence, modernization, and popularity of herbal medicinal health culinary supplement drinks dedicated to menstrual care. This belief has been around for thousands of years, that beauty (read: SLENDER FIGURE, YOUNG-LOOKING, GOOD and PALE SKIN) needs to be cultivated from inside. Not the “inner beauty” crap, y’all. You need to take the herbs. And you need to take care of your menstrual cycles. THAT is what I have been missing for living abroad. Seriously. Mine is all out of whack. Only I did not realize that until I was confronted with shelves of herbal drinks. Nowadays it seems to be OK to openly talk about the “condition”, and though I am far from being a prude, the “openness” caught me off-guard. The WTF yet heart-warming moment came when my nephew, who is only 9 years younger than I am, brought me a case of these drinks, telling me, “These are very effective! My girlfriend takes these. They taste really good, she said, and she does not suffer from menstrual cramps any more. Her skin has also improved a lot. You need to start taking these yourself!”