AWOL Geordie - Steve’s global adventure

I am going to the Philippines next. There has just been an attempted coup in some posh Manila hotel. A government APC was sent crashing through the front doors to end the crisis - wow! How come I always seem to narrowly miss these events? I missed the Thai coup last year by days and the recent Myanmar trouble by weeks. I have missed floods in Malaysia, massive earthquakes and volcanic eruptions in Indonesia, horrific typhoons in Vietnam and even the Khmer Rouge trials in Cambodia. There was a small earthquake in Taiwan again on Wednesday but I felt nowt. I am wondering if my luck is running out or am I invincible??

This time last year I was leaving Hong Kong and headed for the Philippines. I like to read back through my diary and see what I was doing exactly 1 year ago.

I have found a voluteering project in Mae Sot on the Thai side of the Thai/Burma border. This project provides carbon-neutral energy supplies to the Karen tribal villages and refugee camps. My MSc in “Renewable Energy Engineering” from Newcastle Uni seems very appropriate for this kind of work. I can be an engineer again - woohoo! There is no pay but I think it would be a good thing to be involved with. See www.bget.org for details. I might turn up there next year and see if they’ll have me. I think they want more engineers so it should be OK.

There are many stray dogs in Taiwan but I have no idea where they go during typhoons???

Teaching English is stretching my neurons to the limit. I acknowledge there is shitloads of grammar I am unaware of - I am OK with this. It is the level of class material that is driving me mental since the kids are very young. Could you teach “What do you like? - I like swimming” for 1 hour? I am allowed to use a few permutations on this e.g. I like riding a pony, playing, milk etc. However, I am essentially trying to teach baby English to crazy won’t shutup/can’t sit still/have to tell them a thousand times little cuties. I am questioning the value of engineering degrees when all you are required to do is enquire: “What is your name? How old are you? Do you like milk?” etc. Not exactly brain surgery eh? The biggest challenge is getting them to shut the f*ck up - truly headache inducing.

All is well in paradise. It makes me smile when I review this blog about my initial enthusiasm for Taiwan when I first arrived. I then proceed to read through the more recent entries as they gradually become more and more jaded - hehe. It all starts off so rosy, then small cracks appear and then the dam appears to burst and everything is crap - haha. That is me I suppose - always needing change.

Ni neng zuo shenme? - What can you do?

Lan zi, huang zi, hong zi, bai zi - blue, yellow, red, white

toutong - headache

One last question: Do you know why we say “I like dogs” as opposed to “I like dog”? A 16yo asked me this yesterday and I thought about it for a while and realised I didn’t have a clue what the technical answer is. I just said because “I like dog” sounds stupid - hehe! I told them: “If you say that, it sounds like you want to eat a dog”.

Also, I asked a train station bloke in Chinese: “Where is the ticket machine? piao ji zai nali?”. I actually said: “Where can I find a prostitute?”. Similarly, a kid asked me for his yellow book back. I said “Ni yao nide huang zi shu? You want your yellow book back?”. This means: “Do you want your porn mag back?”. I’m telling you - it’s like walking a tight rope out here!

 Print This Post

This entry was posted on Friday, November 30th, 2007 at 8:01 am and is filed under 1. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.