By Lucy

Some people know Taiwan as Formosa. The Portuguese called it that as they sailed merrily on by, and they had some small ports here, but they never really “colonized” the island. It means “beautiful island” and it is indeed beautiful.

Me and Jinn had made a rough plan to go to a morning market the next day, but I felt wretched from being unable to sleep. I texted him that I didn’t feel well and slept in.

I feel really tired here. It’s not just my inability to sleep. Because we technically start ‘work’ at 11, we work through what would normally be lunch. Now if I was able to sleep and get up at 6 like normal, I could have breakfast and lunch before work started, and feel pretty normal. But getting up at 8 or 9, I have time for breakfast, and then I get hungry before I finish cleaning and become hypoglycemic, seeing spots and feeling lightheaded.

I spent most of Thursday relaxing. It helped that in the afternoon, we were grazed by typhoon Mekkhala on its way to destroy Japan again, so it was too rainy to do anything.

I sat at one of the tables with my little bottle of plum wine and my shot glass for the others to try. Martin, in true German fashion, grabbed the bottle immediately and poured some into his mouth (I’ve also caught him sneaking beers upstairs to his bunk, so…) and he liked it. Marco poured a proper shot and swirled it around his mouth, commenting on the different taste notes. Annalisa poured a bit into her commercially prepared green tea and said it was alright. I drank the rest.

We had a white guest, which is rare. Most of our guests seem to be Taiwanese. When he checked in, he spoke basic Chinese but with a German accent, and I turned and yelled, “Hey Martin, we have a German guest!”

Martin did not look over. In fact, he ducked.

Weirdo.

The guest waved me away. He went and checked in, and when he came back downstairs to go hunting for dinner, he asked, “Weren’t you in Keelung yesterday?”

I swear to God I cannot make this shit up.

“Yes, yes I was.” I reply, as everyone stares.

“I thought I saw you there!”

And then he left.

I actually slept pretty good that night, which is good because I’ve become afraid of being unable to sleep after drinking. Probably the most influential thing on my drinking is that it seems to be preventing me from falling asleep, not facilitating it. But I managed to sleep 9 hours, yay.

We have a really gross guest and he was here for like 5 days. He stayed in his bunk constantly, and for whatever reason they gave him the bunk that gets a southern exposure and is always super warm. He’s a drunk (I can smell him sweating off the beer) and he always showers whenever we’re doing housekeeping, so we have to stop and wait for him so we can clean. He also doesn’t flush the toilet and will pee with the door open while we’re trying to clean the bathroom. And lastly, he grabs the water tank from the dehumidifier and dumps it into the sink when it’s full, and then just leaves it there for us to return.

On Friday, after I was done my chores and I was having a leisurely lunch in the common room, the boy came downstairs and sat next to me, also on his laptop. We got to chatting.

“Oh, I’m Edmond.” He says.

I tilt my head, “That’s a British name.”

He pauses for a moment. “No one ever knows that.”

“I read a lot.”

“Oh, you’ll get this then. My mother named me after… umm… a character… what was the English name… Oh! Monti Cristos?”

Facepalm. Your mother named you after the Count of Monte Cristo? That’s like all the parents that named their kids “Theon”…

I mean, I guess there’s something to be said for just liking a name regardless of the implications, but still.

I invited him out on a walk with me, but he declined and invited me to a museum the next day. I agreed and went out for my walk.

I walked down to the Taipei Botanical garden. It’s a nice walk. It was overcast and spit occasionally, but it never really rained. It was humid as all hell, though. I felt like I was going for a walk at the bottom of a lake.

After moseying around for a bit, I found a children’s playground with no children on it, and did a bit of a workout. I still can’t do pull-ups, but I can dead-hang for 20 seconds. I do have to start aiming towards being in working shape for when I get back.

The main problem continues to be my intercostals. Any time I work out hard enough to make a difference, I have pain in my ribs for days if not weeks, pain beyond what is normal. It’s especially frustrating as an XX person, because my over-the-shoulder-boulder-holder cuts into my ribs, and just existing is painful. I should see a doctor about it (among many things).

I noticed a place around the corner sells popcorn chicken and cheese noodles. I went over to order some when it opened. I was… disappointed. The chicken was great, ruined KFC for me forever, but the noodles were watery and did not taste cheesy. I decided to buy some cheese ramen and order the popcorn chicken by itself in the future.

I spent the next morning organizing my finances and plans. Since I know my schedule, I booked NON REFUNDABLE tickets to Sun Moon Lake and Alishan for my third week. I also made my plans for the few days I had off between when I’m done ‘working’ here and when I leave. I didn’t line them up in case I had something I wanted to do, and conveniently, the harvest festival in Hualien happens at the same time. Let’s go!

Well. I was a little less gung-ho about it when I was trying to book my last night in Taipei. Unfortunately, it is a Saturday, and apparently surge pricing is very much a thing here. The price change from Thursday to Saturday was literally triple. Not much I can do about it now.

They put INTENSE CLEANING on the schedule, since we have almost no guests. However, there’s still nothing really to do for that. I get ahold of the bottle of undiluted bleach and toss some around to try and make everything look a bit cleaner.

Cleaning here is so annoying. Unsealed concrete is virtually impossible to clean, especially in a domestic environment. Water pools in the shower and becomes moldy easily, because the concrete is washing away and leaving large pits in every surface. Half the halfway is glass, which becomes a hall of mirrors when you’re trying to wipe water spots off it. Is this spot on this side, or the other? Or a reflection? And without glass cleaner, all I have is a rag and elbow grease. The air doesn’t circulate – I don’t see any air returns – so the air in the dorms just circulates the dust.

And they let guests check in while we are cleaning. I know people are people, but I still don’t understand how someone can walk past another person cleaning the bathroom and close the door in their face, and have a shower, and make a huge mess.

Me and Annalisa have agreed that we’re so used to being the only ones on the fourth floor, whenever there is a guest there it feels like they’re intruding in our personal space. We decided between ourselves which toilets and showers we will limit ourselves to, and if there’s no guests we don’t clean the others, because we know they haven’t been touched.

Anyway, eventually I’d screwed around enough to pretended to have cleaned for 2 hours, then I went downstairs and had some lunch, and me and Edmond headed out.

We waited at Ximen station for another friend of his – he’s been going to school here from microchip manufacturing or something – which turned into the perfect microcosm of young people. Edmond is 25, which is actually older than I thought he was, and his friend is a French 18 year old. And, y’know, I’m me. It’s also funny, because I’m half German and half French… what is this?

On the train, they asked me about family. I keep waiting for lying about not having a brother to feel weird, but it doesn’t. It actually feels like a huge sigh of relief to not have to field questions about why we haven’t talked in more than 6 years. In a real, visceral way, I don’t have a family, and never did. No one to rely on, no shoulder to cry on. I keep waiting to feel sad that I’m not talking to my dad anymore either, but again, it mostly just feels like a weight off my shoulders. I don’t have to worry about waiting for the axe to fall, and let’s be honest, he was never going to visit me in Thunder Bay. Might as well rip that bandage off and be done with it.

Anyway, we got on the MRT and headed across town to the art gallery.

When we got there, we discovered a farmer’s market. Yo!

A lot of it I could do without or had no space for, but the honey booths caught my eye. They have honey we can’t get in Canada, like Longan. After sampling a few booths, I bought a packet of Longan honey that was small enough to go in my carry-on, and a baggy of these honey jello snacks that were pretty cheap.

There was also some stage set up to sell Lays?

Anyway, after losing like half an hour there, we went across the road to the art gallery and spent a couple of hours walking around. The other two, being students, got in for free. I had to pay 100 NTD (oh no).

The art gallery was alright. Only one exhibit was Taiwanese art. One of the exhibits in the basement was French surrealism from the 1920’s, which I’ve seen before. I did find an exhibit about an European festival called the Bear festival, which I want to know more about.

It was more fun interacting with the other two. Since I speak both German and French, and those two don’t speak anything but their respective languages and English, I kept switching back and forth. But the French girl definitely seemed immature compared to me and Edmond. I asked him if he was into her and he said she was interested in someone else, which isn’t a no.

Around 4, we’d seen the whole art gallery and hit the road. They were going to a volleyball game and I was going to Canada day.

Yes, the Canadian companies that do business in Taiwan spring for a Canada day celebration. It was just a BBQ in a park, but then, it is Canada day, not “Look How Big Our Nuts Are” Independence Day (the scientific side of that joke is that animals who have more control over their partners IE silverback gorillas, actually have small nuts. Males that have to compete for partners have large nuts. So saying you have giant balls is basically calling yourself a cuck, but then since when was logic part of it?).

Anyway, while I was on the MRT, we got more rain. I arrived in the park to discover it was submerged and everyone was hiding wherever there was shelter. Yay.

I walked around the displays for a bit and bought a disappointing poutine for dinner. Then I left.

Sunday morning I had a meeting with Gabe. It went… fine. It got derailed when we discovered Gabe had accidentally only downloaded and read the first 81 pages of my manuscript. I’m down with just chalking it up to machine error, although I am a bit annoyed with Gabe for not double checking when he got to the end and it wasn’t a complete novel after I said it was. That let the air out of the meeting, because obviously he has to read the other 140 odd pages now. I was gratified, though, because he liked a lot of what he had read, and I think with his help I can really polish it.

Bleh, Sunday. Everything good closes Sunday. There’s a bento box spot on the corner that has really boring offerings but is open on Sunday. Do you want plain chicken or 2 lonely meatballs with your white rice and cabbage?

As we were all hanging out, it occurred to me that there’s an Italian in the building and I should get a pair of Italian eyeballs on the dialogue in my novel, just as due diligence. I grabbed Marco and he agreed.

“Ah, you are published! How many books have you written?” Annalisa exclaims.

“I’m not published.” I correct her.

“What kind of books are they? Young adult?”

“Nononono, I don’t write books for kids.” I mean, I can imagine teenagers reading my book, but it’s not intended for them.

As I indicate the Italian parts that I want him to proofread, his eyes notice my Italian cheat sheet, which features a lot of colourful, distinctly Venetian curses. He starts laughing out loud, and Annalisa snatches it from me. Her eyes pop out of her head.

“No, this book is not for kids. Why does your character talk like this? He’s so rude.”

Marco saves me, interrupting his fit of hysterical laughter, “No no, it’s perfect. Venetians are always swearing, it’s an art for them. This is accurate.”

Sounds good to me!

He did slightly correct some of my grammar, but overall he didn’t have many complaints about the quality, so yay!

Edmond invited me out to a ceramics market, but I declined. I’m slowly catching up on my sleep, but I know I should stay focused on resting. We chatted a little bit and he mentioned he saw the Backrooms movie and wanted to see the Odyssey.

I want to play the Backrooms game before watching the movie. In my opinion, you can watch a movie that’s been spoiled and enjoy it, but it’s much more difficult to enjoy a game if you know what to expect (outside of an intentional replay, of course). I’m also undecided on the Odyssey. I’ve read the novel/play/doorstopper, and I’m skeptical you could fit it into even a 3 hour movie. Of course, mindful cutting can do a lot for it, and some indications are that the movie focuses on the spirit and not substance, which I appreciate, like ignoring that most translations says “servants” and having “slaves” instead like what Greek society actually had at the time. I also had a chuckle over the Greek movie not having any Greek actors. I’m ok with it being multiracial and Lupita Nyong’o being Helen of Troy, especially after being in the Philippines; who says the most beautiful woman in the world can’t be black? But, like, no Greek actors? It’s becoming the new racism, especially considering how many movies mine Greek legends for stories and then have no Greek actors. Like, why is Matt Damon Odysseus?

(Charlize Theron as Calypso is the role she was born to play, though)

Every article about provocative action by China feels super dangerous now.

On Monday, I didn’t do much. Me and Annalisa got to talking about things we wanted to do, and decided the next day we were gonna hike up Elephant Mountain, near Taipei 101. As she got up to head out and buy dinner, Ash, the front desk guy du jour, stopped her.

“Are you guys going out for dinner?”

I raised a questioning eyebrow. I knew this guy was a flirt…

“Would you and the other volunteers be interested in going to a local place?”

Annalisa turned back to me. I shrugged.

“Sure, why not.”

Around 6:30, it was me, Marco, Annalisa and Ash. Martin declined.

The place was close by, but Ash took us on a circuitous route to get there. Showing us the city, I guess? When we got there, we grabbed a table for 4. This place was fairly busy. Ash grabbed an English menu that was a white board – you write down how many of what you want, then you return it to the front and pay for your meal.

Ash ordered some noodles and some “standard” small plates; fried pigs blood, century egg with tofu. I ordered something that was simply labelled “Taiwan assorted soup”.

“Ai, there’s no drinks.” Annalisa noted.

“No, they don’t serve drinks here.” Ash said. “You bring your own.”

“Could we get a beer from 7-Eleven? I haven’t tried one yet.”

Ash froze for a minute, thinking. “They’ve kicked me out for bringing beer before.” He said quietly.

“What?” I exclaimed.

We put in our order for food. I guess it came to 4-500 in total, we all threw a 100 in the pot, and some change.

“Who wants a drink?” Ash asked.

Annalisa and Marco followed him. I stayed put.

The food was pretty good. I enjoyed the fried pigs blood here more than the one I’d had at the night market. I also surprised myself by enjoying the century egg with the tofu. I noted on the menu most things only cost 40 NTD; you can get a filling meal there for 80 NTD. So I was wrong about not finding a meal for less than 100 NTD, but it takes a bit to figure out. The soup was decent but the noodles looked better.

After we’d left, Ash admitted he was just gambling that they wouldn’t kick us out for having beers because we were white. I mean, he was correct, but I’m uncomfortable with breaking the rules just because I’m white, even if I’m the only one who didn’t have a beer.

Once we left, Ash took us on another looping track back to the hostel. I mean, I knew the way back, but whatever, it’s fun. We went through the heart of Ximen district, all the lights flashing. We passed a conga line of food vendors trying to cook hot things while dragging their carts behind them. Ash explained they were moving to hide from the cops.

I must admit, the claw machines are getting pretty tempting. I’ve seen a few with prizes I’d like, like a stuffed T-rex head. But I don’t have space in my luggage, and I hate gambling. I’d rather just buy it outright.

Marco stopped to buy a bubble waffle with ice cream. I bought one of the new hotness, a “crispy milk donut”. It’s basically just a regular donut, but with milk powder instead of powdered sugar on the top. I like it.

When we got back to the hostel, we hung around the lobby for a bit, chatting. I excused myself first, I’m tired. Ash admitted that he’s 27, this is his only job, and he has no intention of getting another job or getting a full time job. He just sponges off his mom. He also stayed another hour and then took the bus home because he’d had a beer, which I find interesting. Surely after 2 hours and the meal, the beer was out of his system, and I doubt he was ever too drunk to drive, but I applaud the thought.

Tuesday was pretty boring until it came time to head out with Annalisa. We do not agree on a lot.

Edmond headed out on Tuesday as well, back to Germany.

The gross man finally checked out as well, thank goodness!

It had been drizzly all day, so Annalisa was worried it would be too rainy to see anything, but I used skycam to convince her that the rain would clear up the haze and give us a clearer view.

Around 4, we hopped on the MRT to head down. We watched an attendant arrive to escort a blind man off the train, which seemed really interesting. How does the attendant know where the blind man will be and that he needs help? Still, I love the accomadations here.

We got to the park and walked over to where the trail is, marked by a metal elephant. There’s a Buddhist temple nearby with a water bottle filler and a stack of plastic cups, which is thoughtful.

Then we started climbing.

Lord I hate stairs. Some people prefer hikes with stairs, but the problem with them is that they set the pace. These stairs had been designed for Asians a good 6 inches shorter than us, and were too short. We were taking them two at a time, some of the time.

Halfway up, we found a spirit house.

“Oh, what is this?” Annalisa asked, stepping off the path.

“I think you’re supposed to take your shoes off…” I said, but as I did, her foot touched the worship area and the bugs singing rose into a scream, like a spirit was raging at us. She beat a hasty retreat back to the stairs.

“Why didn’t you say that faster? I think we made them angry.”

The bugs kept screaming until we’d walked another 100 meters.

After 15 minutes, we reached the first lookout. We snapped a few photos. I lamented that anyone is allowed to make tall buildings around Taipei 101 – it ruins the effect.

Then we kept walking to the next lookout.

So, Annalisa has seen on social media people posing on this rock that makes it look like you’re taller than the building, which is located at the second lookout. However, despite there being climbing points clearly worn into the rock, there’s also several signs warning you not to climb the rocks for photos. Annalisa went back and forth on it. I told her I wasn’t climbing the rocks but I can’t tell her what to do. She ultimately decided not to.

Snapped some more photos.

While we were up there – not alone, I should add – we noticed a man strip naked, neatly pack his clothes into a plastic bag, and wander off with a camera streaming in his hand. When we asked the people nearby about it, they shrugged and said Taipei is full of weirdos.

Then we headed down, we were both hungry.

So, there’s this alley nearby that’s famous for offering a postcard-perfect view of Taipei 101 all lit up at night. There’s even a Japanese noodle bar in the alley. However, Annalisa had apparently promised Marco we’d go with him, and refused to eat there. There wasn’t many food options around and we eventually settled for a disappointing dinner at 7-Eleven. Marco later told her we could have eaten there and not hurt his feelings.

After that, we climbed the mountain again. For pictures of the city lights!

It was much busier now, but the timing was mint. Everyone who had climbed up to film the sunset was heading down, so by the time we reached the top it was mostly empty. At one point, when I stopped to catch my breath, I noticed a rope bridge over top of the path and some creature crossing it. I didn’t manage to catch a photo, but it looked like an opossum. It stopped to hiss at me before disappearing into the darkness.

Then we headed back to the hostel.

I couldn’t sleep that night, every muscle in my legs was screaming at me and the inflammation was lighting me up like a bonfire.

The next day, I didn’t do much. I decided to try and order a pizza on Ubereats. I found this pizza on sale, 2 for 1, and it seemed decent. There might have been a slight discrepancy between what I ordered and what I got, though.

In the evening, I walked to the same place Ash had taken us for dinner, and ordered some. Yum! Then I walked down to where maps said the river flowed by, but there was just a giant concrete wall. Presumably there’s a way around it to the park, but I shouldn’t push myself.

In the evening I got a text asking if I would work tomorrow. Someone messed up the schedule and only Annalisa was scheduled. I agreed and got Saturday instead, which means me and Annalisa have the same day off for once.

So, me and Annalisa hadn’t planned a lot together because we never had the same days off, by design. They prefer having a female volunteer clean the female floor, for obvious reasons, so we were always scheduled opposite each other. Since we both had Saturday, we made some vague plans to go to Yilan together.

Thursday I did even less, besides my job. I was still tired and I wanted to power through the revisions me and Gabe had discussed. Once I’m done at this hostel, it’ll be go go go for a while.

At one point, I was taking a brain break and watching some Youtube, when the front desk lady – Meg – came over and asked what I was watching. Well, funnily enough, I was watching the Try Guys episode where Eugene made donuts that looked like breasts (it makes sense in context). So I of course immediately slammed the laptop shut, blushing.

It also turned out she had scheduled me for Monday Tuesday next week, which means I could no longer use my non-refundable tickets! I panicked and a few anxious texts to Mei later, got swapped with Martin. Crisis averted!

Friday I woke up with lockjaw. Not literal lockjaw, just my muscles wound so tight from grinding my teeth in my sleep, that I had a splitting headache and I couldn’t get my muscles to relax so I could open my mouth. I eventually managed to massage them open, and after breakfast I ran across to Watsons to get some acetaminophen. After a few days of catching up, sleep is starting to escape me again.

“I think my brain just wants to be back in Canada so bad, it’s on Canada time without me.” I tell Paul.

“It doesn’t surprise me that your mind has wandered off and left your body behind.”

Soroptimists emails me. They want me to make content from the Korea conference. Considering I haven’t heard from them in more than 6 weeks and they actually never followed up to tell me what happened with the content I made them, I’m a little sour about it. I know I should play nice because I’ll probably need them for my leadership run in a few years, but blah.

In the afternoon, I made myself go for a walk around downtown. Stretch my legs, fresh air.

I’m so burned out. It’s hard to believe I’ve been gone for so long and I’m almost home. It feels like just yesterday I was arriving in Bangkok. Where did the time go?

I spent most of the week on my laptop, aware that I should be out exploring but unable to summon the energy to.

I just want to go home.

Annalisa spent most of the day in Jiufen with a guided tour. She came back late – like 9:30 – and then wanted to discuss our plans for Yilan the next day. Having spent several hours solidifying my plans for Korea, next week, when I get back to Canada, I was not in the mood, especially since I hate making plans late at night. I was sleep deprived, tired, and in a bad mood. She kept shooting down my suggestions as well. I agreed to whatever she suggested and decided I’d get up and hit the road before she got up tomorrow.

That was the last time I talked to her.