Kids - Experts At Misplacement

He is not one of my students, but this astute young fellow sums it up perfectly.

Kids are like electrons - you may you know what they are, what they do and where you can find them. But true to the comparison, controlling them is wikked hard. I've tried a few different things: rewards, punishments, pepper spray, embarrassment, apathy and water boarding. Some work, some don't and each new day is full of surprises.

A recent development - kids are the foremost experts at misplacing things. Anything, big or small, they will put it somewhere where it will remain forever. At Giraffe school, we use audio CDs to supplement written material in their work books. Here is a specific incident of superb misplacement - the student, I'm calling Mario, needed to borrow my copy of the CD to finish a page out of his book. Great, I say, one less person to watch over - here is a CD, here is a CD player, have a ball. Mario has good English, here is the gist of the conversation when he came back without my copy...

"Thanks for finishing, where is my CD?"
"Um, I don't know."
"You were just using it."
"It's over there."
"I don't see it, can you show me."
"I don't know."
"You were just using it! Is it in your bag? The CD player? Your hand? Your mouth?"
"No, I don't have it. I don't know."

Is this the son of Harry Houdini? Are you using some kind of Taiwanese magic the teachers haven't warned me about? Of course, I went bananas looking around the area for this lost piece of educational goodness. Before I started lifting the linoleum and crawling around in the air ducts, I gave up. Of course I didn't punish or get mad at Mario, I was too amazed at that. Either I'm working in an Asian Bermuda Triangle or children are truly on their game of getting rid of crap they don't need. Other freak occurrences include losing pencils that were in their hand, erasers that imploding after placing it on the desk for a split-second and everybody's favorite, the "my homework vanished into thin air" ploy. So much talent, squandered on something so petty. Maybe the guy who whacked Jimmy Hoffa said to his child, "here hold this bag for a second, Daddy's gotta grab the car."

But kids have carte blanche on these kind of situations. If I could have held on to that kind of immunity, I'd have more money, friends and health. Recently Brendan and I were discussing our Resident Visa paperwork and what we needed to get done. Lets compare...

B - "Hey man, what did you do with that visa application?"
A - "I don't know."
B - "You're an idiot, find it."

Harsh, maybe but I did find it. It was in my hand the whole time. Does that make me a kid, dumb, or a dumb kid? Wompwompwomp.

Happy Birthday Taiwan - The Most Dangerous Parade

October 10 marked the latest and greatest holiday celebration of Taiwan, the National Celebration Day! That day in 1911 began the Xinhai Revolution, eventually culminating in the decline of the Qing Dynasty and the establishment of the Republic of China. We all loved and remember the great times we had during the Qing Dynasty, like that killer party house you lived in during college, but as time goes on you realize that you'd like to wake up in a bed not surrounded by empty Schlitz cans or iron-fisted Chinese commanders. Enough is enough, turn the page and start fresh.

Fast forward one hundred years. That wasn't so bad, was it? Modern society demands observation of such significant events, bad and good. The only reason I heard about it was through my friendly Starbucks barista, Mike, who simply described it as "Taiwan birthday! So good!". Armed with that English, he quickly became my culture attache of sorts alarming me of any impending events I should take notice of. By the way, his title is coffee master, it says so on his name tag - Starbucks, where do you get the nerve. If you think you could just conquer the world, pay your suppliers next to nothing, overcharge me for a supremo super blah...damn Mike this is one kick ass drink. See you tomorrow!

Back to the event - Brendan and I leave the apartment to play some frisbee in the park on a seemingly uneventful Sunday. However, like every other day, there is no such thing as uneventful. We hear a faint bass rhythm, pounding over and over, unwavering and unyielding. This is not some Honda POS cruising the boulevard for babes - interested we walk towards the source. Across the park, the origin of said noise is the beginning of a parade in our neighborhood. The group is lining up to march and the drummer kids standing behind massive kettle drums being towed by a Jeep are warming up. Pretty normal so far, that is about to change.

The parade is lining up to start, therefore we rush ahead to get a view of the group. And this is where it gets crazy. Typically, to avoid injury or confusion or certain death, a town or neighborhood might close the roads completely to accommodate the celebrators. Nope. Not here, that would inconvenience everybody else, how rude! Buses, taxis, cars and mopeds have the same right of way as kids dressed up like dragons. Share the road you imbeciles! And then it gets better. What better way to announce the upcoming parade than to shoot off a bucket full of fireworks a couple feet from the front of the beginning. People, I'm not talking sparklers either. These are weapons grade, US Army explosives making noises loud enough to loosen your bowels. These are rockets being shot into the air that terrorists are looking to use. I love heavy, heavy metal and have been to many shows without earplugs. But these noisemakers were loud enough to make me cover my gentle, baby ears. Wah. Even more entertaining, these are used at the crossing of every block - I don't see much Taiwanese who drink when they want to party but they sure like to blow shit up.

After watching floats with drummers, men carrying homages to their founding fathers, buses passing the other way full of commuters, women dressed in traditional garb and many more confusing arrangements, time for some serious fireworks. By a river that passes through the west side of the city, there was a MASSIVE, professional fireworks display. Not any of that amateur nonsense close to people's faces thankfully but a full-on American Fourth of July style show that lasted 45 minutes. Everybody and anybody was out to kick it Taiwanese style and it was a great end to a very interesting day. Learnings of the Day - if you leave your apartment, expect to be surprised.

"Right about here is where we expect the bus full of Korean tourists to collide with the Taipei City Elementary School float. After that, we will drop M80s a block back on the Senior Tai Chi Association to distract everybody. Yeah."

- Some Asian Man

**I don't speak Chinese perfectly but I'm pretty sure that is what he said.