The Big Sleep

Tuesday, May 29, 2007--Taipei (Continued)

I had a problem trying to publish my writing to my blog yesterday. I opened Blogger and typed my very long entry. Then the buttons wouldn't work for me to post what I had written. I was afraid I would lose it all, but Blogger has a new backup system that saves what is typed as a draft. That's an improvement, because I have never been able to copy what I have written from Blogger to another program to save it in case of problems; when I try to copy, it just will not work. I could see that the draft had been saved, so I gave up trying to publish it to the Blog and just closed the computer.

I had to clean up and put on the same clothes I had been wearing for days of travel. But I wanted to get out and explore the city some. I am living near Taipei 101, presently the tallest building in the world. I walked to there and went into the shopping mall attached. It reminded me very much of the Discovery Center in Bangkok. I bet it is owned by the same company, since the food court was almost exactly the same. I was thinking of eating at the food court, since it was recommended by my guidebook. But then it was noon and thousands of people from the offices above arrived to eat. I could tell by the long lines which were the better choices of places, but I didn't want to deal with the lines and my not being able to speak Mandarin. People behind me would have been in a hurry and likely would have been frustrated by my problems. So I left the center and continued walking the area.

A few blocks away, I found a dumpling outdoor take-away place on the corner. I bought two large pork dumplings which were put in a plastic bag. The lady showed me which condiments were the best ones for it (a spicy red mixture with beans and soy sauce), so I put some inside and was off to walk and eat. It was a bit messy eating it with my fingers, but it sure did taste good!

I was tired. I stopped at a neighborhood park I passed and sat for a while. I began nodding off. So I decided it must push myself more. I walked to the City Hall and toured the Teipei Discovery Museum there. It has exhibits about the history of the city and was recommended by my guidebook as a good place to start a tour of the city. I watched a nice film there showing a day in the life of the city. It was on a 360 degree screen and the floor kept turning continuously during the showing so that different images could be seen in progression. It was fun and interesting.

I was so tired that I walked back to my apartment. I got here at 16:00 and decided to rest a little. I kept thinking that I needed to avoid falling asleep until evening, but I couldn't help it. I started to hear some noise outside and thought it was morning traffic, so I put my ear plugs in and was trying to go back to sleep when I heard tapping at the door. It was my apartment mate, Mark, telling me there was a phone call. The call was from the manager telling me that a taxi was downstairs with my suitcase. I grabbed on my clothes and rushed downstairs to get it.
When I got back up, I checked my watch. It was only 23:00. I was afraid I would not be able to sleep again. I talked to Mark for quite a while. He's a nice young man from Canada--27 years old and uncertain about what he wants to do in life. He has been teaching English here for 3 years and working on learning to speak Mandarin. I took advantage of his knowledge to ask a few questions. One was about the computer problem of not being able to post. He said that the Explorer program on this computer is old and hasn't been updated and suggested that I try Firefox. I did before going to bed and was able to post. Great!!

Wednesday, May 30, 2007--Taipei

At 1:00, I went back to bed wondering if I would sleep. At Mark's urging, I had changed to a different room. The old room had the view of Taipei 101, but the air conditioner wasn't working well and it was noisy from the street traffic. The a/c in the new room was wonderful, and it was quiet. Soon I was asleep again. As the night progressed, I wondered what time it was. When I finally checked, it was 9:00! I had slept a total of 15 hours on each side of the break I took to get my luggage and talk to Mark. I feel much better today than I did yesterday!!

Now I will get dressed and try to have a longer day out seeing parts of the city. It feels so good to be rested.