Haňule z Kyjova

Friday was the time to cut! I have started with my hair. Shortenned it a little. I was kucky as yuZhwn was befoew a hairdewssee in Taipei for many years, so she cut my hair at home for free. She is really lovely.

And in the aftetnoon it was the time to cut the rice! We started at 3pm and finished three fields in 3 hours. Then girls from the university came and also GongGong with children. It was getting dark at 6pm so everyone took a headlight and was cutting the rice in light of it:D really funny to see few people going around the field, working but you could see only the lights:D it was very demanding, we were working till 10pm. my back hurt for two days after that, but who can say that they tried to cut rice!!

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Saturday I went for a trip with one teacher from school Mass. He likes birdwatching do he took me to some places in Taroko andDwe saw about 10 different kinds of birds and also some huge spiders and wonderful butterflies.
Sunday I went to the farm of GongGong and spent theEqhole day there notTinly playing with her children.I was also helping her all day. We plowed the field and planted some grain. The work was very demanding as the field is on terraces. But the view there is beautiful. When I was planting the train I saw some people stopped and started taking pictures of.me. This was really weird so I came to them ad with my poor Chinese asked them to send me the at least the photos. Hope they will.
In the evening I went to Hualien with the family as I wanted to walk around Taroko on Monday. The weather was good, not too warm or cold and no rain so I enjoyed the walk. Unfortunately because if the typhoon last week most of the trails were closed. However I met an interesting dutch girl which is traveling the world now and the travel will take her 10 months total. I think she is very brave and wish her good luck on her travels. We spent the whole day together and walked 3 trails ( although two of them only half way).
Taroko is very beautiful, you can get a ticket for 250NTD in Hualien bus station and this will let you use the hop-on hop-off bus all day. Really worth visit, but better first check if they have some info online about the trails and their condition.
Now is Tuesday and I was again working on the farm today. We visited the school and I played basketball with children after school and we had dinner together. Children are soooo great. They don’t care if you understand or not, they keep talking and they just like you because you play with them a little. Its so wonderful to spend time with them.
I am a bit lazy to write as it is also difficult in my cellphone and I do not have Wi-Fi all the time. So sorry for all the mistakes…

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A-chen and Alice left me in the aboriginal village Sinshe on Thursday evening.
A doctor YuXiang and his wife GongGong are mostly taking care of me now. They have two wonderful children, a boy GongYu and girl SheiYuan. II stay at their friends house YangCong 2 km far from the village. That’s a bit difficult as I have to either ride a bike to the village or someone has to drive.me, but the house is OK and YangCong very kind although he cannot speak any english
I was lucky as on Friday their elementary school ( where are only less then 20 children and 10 morel in kindergarten) had a kind o f celebration. I had to get up before 6 am as there was a 2kilometers run in the morning. The celebration took all.day, But i got to.meet many people from the village which usually do not stay here during week as they work in Hualien or maybe Taipei.
There were different contests and games for students and also people from the village. I tried dancing some traditional aboriginal dance, throwing a fishernet or cutting the banana “wood” to get a fibre from which they make clothes, hats and so on.
The day was tiring, very hot but fun. The old people invited me to have some food with them, they were really very nice although I could just say that I cannot really understand. In the eveningGwe went to the only restaurant here for dinner which was really delicious. The whole organisational team assembled there and they were drinking a lot and toasting all the time. I met with the owner of the restaurant A-Zhen who is a sister of YuXiang. She is very nice person who offered ne her own bathroom that I had warm water. She also offered to cut my hair as she was before a hairdresser in Taipei.

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Today I packed my things and I am off to the east coast to meet with Alice and a- Chen. I will stay one night in jilin and tomorrow Alice will introduce me in the aboriginal village where I am going to work in a seafood restaurant. I a bit nervous and a bit excited. The aborigines might not speak very well English if they do at all. I will need to use my poorchinese. But it’s gonna be an adventure.
I am looking forward to see achen and Alice an calls the jilin Prince a-chiang again! Drink tea and talk. A-Chen.has a girlfriend so I am interested to see at least get picture as she work in Taipei.

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This week started nice for the students , as they had two days vacation. But I was so anxious to go to school. On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday I had bout 10 lessons with students in different classes. It was fun although I feel more old same of the students call me this year only “ teacher” and not buy name.

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We had a dinner with the principal on Wednesday. I was a bit afraid as she can it speak very much in English, but she invited some other teachers as slain, Irene, Jonas and my dear calligraphy teacher Yicai. They talked a lot in Chinese so I could relax. However still I could talk a little with yicai and I was really glad for that as he is extremely nice person.
On the weekend I went for a trip with Elaine and her husband. We visited a temple Qing Shui Z.. S.. Miao this one issue 200 years old and the works carvings and all decorations are very delicate. The colours are not.so.Bright and gaudy probably because it is old temple.

Then we went to another famous spot in Tahitian the White Chicken mountain. There is another temple but more new. A lot of volunteers work here and pray.also the can cleans your body and soul with a prayer and an insent
There is a trail that you can walk and go above the temple to a little forest. I have taken here this photo.I like it as it looks as the Chinese paintings, the nature but there the little teacher walk I g up the path. Actually they stepped into the photo but I like it more this way.

Afterwards we met with Rosemary and her husband in an American style restaurant. She was energetic as always although she had some health problems. She urged that she wants to take me somewhere to see the stars at night. We went to one mountain above taoyuan. From This spot you could see the sea and the airport. But No.stars at all ))).

In the morning I went with Daisy to see the Asian Pacific deaf games in takewondo.. I did not know that Taiwanese at these official events have to use a different name Chinese Taipei and cannot use their national.flag as the chi.we would protest against it.
But at least one good thing, the female champion from Taiwan won the gold medal!

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Hello,

long time no post:)

I have decided to travel again, and as I’ve so badly missed Taiwan, it was my first choice. So on 21st September I said my goodbyes to everyone in Europe and took the plane to Taipei.

The travel was long as I could not sleep on the plane and I was not in the mood to watch movies. However one of my neighbors from Dubai to Taipei was quite interesting. He was a TV producer from Chile traveling to Taiwan to do some business. We talked for a while and I taught him some Chinese

The travel went smoothly (however it started badly already in Brno where I missed the bus to Vienna :D) and after 19 hours I set my feet on Taiwanese ground again.

Elaine was there to pick me up from the airport. It was soooo good to see her again and we both shed a tear or two. I was so happy as I though probably I would never come to Taiwan again. We had a dinner together with Rosemary and Peter and Irene and then went to a school to meet Sarah. I will be staying in her appartement for two weeks.

As I am writing this after a week here I do not want to go to details. I had a wonderful time since I arrived, I’ve met teachers from school and also my friends, students that graduated from school already. I will give some lessons to students in these two weeks and then head to Hualien to meet with Alice and A-Chen.

There was a typhoon on Monday, my first in my life. It was not one of the most severe they had here however two people died. They say every time some people die during typhoon. But we stayed only at home and did nothing, just slept and ate. There was a typhoon holiday on Tuesday as a part of Taoyuan was without power for the whole day. I was very sad as I could not go to school and give lessons, and also as I should have had few hours of art class with YiCai.

Here are some pictures that we took with my friends, students that I know from last time…

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