It was a good first day.

I went and got breakfast with several other Americans, and one Taiwanese student. It was a little restaurant down the street from the university. The food joints here (for the most part) are either a street vendor or have an open front. I had an omlette sort of thing with vegetables and black tea, so nothing too different. Then we wandered a bit. I went in to a grocery store to get a few essentials, and was later told I paid WAY too much. Ah well- part of the experience.

When I got back to my room Vicki was awake, so she took me on her motorbike to a market area. First off: the motorbikes are SO MUCH FUN. They’re everywhere, and the driving is a bit chaotic, but I’m pretty sure there’s more of a system that I just haven’t caught on to yet.

We went in to a bunch of stores. (Tori would be in paradise. Lots of cute clothes for very cheap. I am especially a big fan of all the shoes.) It was strange to see that girls here carry umbrellas so they won’t get tanned in the sun. They want to have fair skin. It’s an odd comparison to the sun worshipers in the West.

We later had lunch; noodles with some sorts of vegetables that I’m not familiar with, and some type of broth soup. We had pearl milk tea to drink, which is a bit odd. It’s like a very sweet earl grey with lots of milk in it, but then the bottom is filled with tons of little balls of dough. Sort of like over sized pieces of tapioca.

When we got back to the school Vicki had to go to work, so I headed down the hall and spent the afternoon getting to know some of the other students.

I passed out around 6pm; the jetlag was kicking my butt. Then the entire group of TUSA students got together at dinner time and went to the night market. It was alleys of tightly packed shops of a little bit of everything, filled with people and motorbikes crowding their way through, and the streets of Taiwan flash at night from the lights of brightly colored neon signs.

A bunch of us had turkey and rice for dinner, then shaved ice for dessert. The ice is shaved so finely it’s like eating ice cream, and it has cream poured over the top and your pick of a topping. Honestly, most of the toppings were completely foreign to me, and even after I tried them I still have no idea what to compare them to. For my shaved ice I topped it with big chunks of mango, and it was awesome.

Then we all went to this great big arcade. I got a little aggressive playing air hockey, but for the most part we all just took it easy, played all sorts of odd video games, and then went back to the school.

Tomorrow is the opening ceremony and placement exams. I’m headed for bed.