Get Together!

I'm still packing. I mean, it's all planned but still packing. It's the make-myself-very-tired plan. In a weird way, it works.

I'm so excited but I already miss my Taiwanese family. I got so attached to the Mania Spa girls that they became my family as much as I love them!

Last night they all came to my house to a little get together party. We had fun! Among wine and cheeses we spent a great time together, took lots of pictures and played with Mei-Hua's girls!

Thanks girls! Thank you for friendship, for your love, for your caress and thank you so much for taking care of my health with such attention!

I love you all! See you guys in August!

Mei-Hua and Ci!
Thanks Ci for massaging me every week for 1 year!

Cheers! Let's celebrate!

My beautiful Mania's girls!

Let's get together when I get back!
There is KTV on my building!

I taped this video from the Taipei bridge when the last 2 boats started rowing! I have no idea how to talk about row/rowers properly. I never used those terms, even in Portuguese. Sorry!

It was very windy but I guess you can see how it works.

I loved the drum's sound. It gives power and motivation to the rowers! It is the heartbeat of the dragon boat and it is mandatory during racing events!

Dragon Boat Festival

Last night I went to a Disco to celebrate Ciara's birthday, my dearest friend. I didn't stay long because I had fever. I couldn't believe it! I tried to dance it out, but it didn't work out unfortunately.
Well, since my fever didn't go away and I was the only one dancing I decided to drive back home to watch Barcelona versus Manchester match! Yes, Barça won!

So, I woke up much better today after taking a medicine and sleeping heavily for 11 hours uninterruptedly and since today is a holiday in Taiwan I decided to drive to Taipei to enjoy one of the most popular festivals here, the Dragon Boat Festival!

It happened at Dajia Riverside Park with teams from Malaysia, Philippines, Japan, China, South Africa and Taiwan of course. Even though the day was dark, the people and the dragon boats brighted and colored the day in a wonderful way.

Families were having picnic and riding bikes, guys where playing baseball and/or basketball all along the park and besides watching the race, people where enjoying performance by local artists, and amusing themselves greatly with the many activities settled by the local government.

The Dragon Boat Festival is celebrated on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month and is among one of the major holidays in Taiwan. The festival is an effort to ward off diseases and evil spirits. This is a very colorful tradition that has kept itself stronger year after year, going through centuries to the present day.

During this time of the year, people use to make an especial meal that became a very popular snack here in Taiwan. It's called "tzung tzu". It is said that after the poet-statesman Chu Yuan ended his life by drowning, people began throwing balls of sweet rice wrapped in bamboo leaves into the Miluo River to keep the fish from eating the patriot's body.

It was a lovely day in a very busy week.

Once again...

What a lovely day!
I had fever all day long, then I had a small car accident, then I came home and another earthquake hit Taiwan again! And I'm not being redundant. here!

I will never get used to earthquake. Never! Taiwaneses keep saying to me that it is normal, but I really can't take it. I get scared, very scared indeed, every single time I feel the floor under my feet shaking. I feel really terrified when I see the chandelier swinging. I feel extremelly uncomfortable when I see my desk moving by itself.

When Taiwan shakes I shake also. It has a terrible impact on me. I really, really can't take this constant shakings.

A delightful lunch!

Yesterday the sun decided to shine making me the happiest woman ever alive. Oh God, I did miss the feeling of sunshine on my shoulders making me happy! Thanks John Denver!

I spent a lot of time outside, trying to get every single ray of light to light my day up. I was in deep need of it. Bright blue sky brings hope to my heart, brings warmness to my life and it makes me feel alive. I may not be a vegetable, but I do need sunlight to feel vigorous and vibrant. As someone once said, the sun always shines and I'm so happy for that.

I'm feeling like a child opening a Christmas's gift, as excited I'm feeling with the blue sky that just appeared on my window yesterday and today. It was/is so blue, so beautiful to look at.

To enjoy my day to the fullest as it were a holiday, I decided to go to a local fish market to have lunch. By the way, Taiwan is a island, and island is any piece of land that is surrounded by water, right? In Taiwan's case it is surrounded by the China Sea - Pacific Ocean!

Even though Taiwan is surrounded by water, it has no beach culture. If I drive for like 10 minutes I'll get to the sea, but not to the beach. Well, there is beach... if you think on a portion of sand where we can see some waves dancing...yes there is beach. But then you look around and you see just industrial port that releases all its trash directly to the sea. It really breaks my heart.

When I moved to here I was so excited about going to the beach like daily. I do love everything about beaches. I lived in a island before, in Brasil and it was amazing. I lived in Florianópolis for 2 years. I just love that city so so much.
When I was moving to here I just had a good "déjà vu" in my life. Living in a island again, what a paradise! Beautiful and clean beaches of Florianópolis were on my mind and I couldn't stop thinking about how great it would be to live in a island-country because living in a island-city, having 42 astonish beaches to choose was absolutely wonderful.

It was a great frustration to see that people don't go to the beaches here. I don't know if they don't go because the beaches are very pollution or if the beaches are very polluted because people don't go to it. I guess if Taiwan had a beach culture the government would care about it.

Well, this post is not about the pollution in Taiwan, it's about having fun under sunlight!

As I was saying, I drove to the fish market to have lunch and it was adorable.

The fresh sea-food was so delicious, the huge shrimps made me extremely satisfied, the fish barbecue was delightful. Oh God, it was melting in my mouth! It was deliciously well grilled to my total pleasure. And the small lobsters was divine. What a meal!
The fried rice is something. I do love fried rice and the way Taiwanese cook the vegetables is very delicious and I'm not exaggerating here right Bluefish!?

After lunch I walked a little near to get to know the place better. The fish market is well built and has a nice square facing the China sea where you can sit and get lost on your own thoughts. The day was very windy and I was very thankful I chose trousers instead of a summer dress. It could be a disaster!

I love when a nothing day becomes a especial day without apparent reason.

Going to the Fish Market, Taipei International airport road

A picturesque welcome to the market!

I love the blue color of the fish boats!

Kids having fun!

I have no idea what the guy was talking,
but everybody was laughing good!

Sea Food! All kinds, shapes, sizes!

Very fresh fishes!

I love how they display the fishes!

The giant shrimps! So delicious!

The small lobsters! Amazing!

Fish barbecue! I want to eat this daily!

Very windy day!

China Sea, and no beaches!

Stuck Energy

As I do twice or three times a week, for about a year now, I went to Mania SPA today to have my painful, but relaxing lymphatic drainage massage to help my legs to be less swollen and my arms "computorache" free.

I do love to go there. Mania Spa is my home away from home. The girls are so sweet and before I take a steam bath and a shower, I do need to hug each one of them. Those girls make my life much much easier over here not just because they are extremely competent, but mainly because their hearts overflow love and caress, and care. I do love each one of those girls very much.

Mei-hua is the owner of the SPA and the sweetest thing you can ever image. God is so good to me that He gave me a Taiwanese sister. She is always very worried about my well being and even when we are out in a café having fun, she pulls my leg over her lap and starts massaging it. She is simply adorable! She is always studying and trying to find new techniques that could improve my health. She is really the best! Vivian, thank you so much for getting me an appointment with her.

So, today I arrived at the SPA around 11AM and Ciara, my personal massagist, was waiting for me. By the way, God really blessed me with those girls. Ciara is very competent and sweet and funny. We chat a lot or until I sleep like a bear. Her hands are so magical that just few minutes after she starts massaging me, I sleep deeply. I'm not kidding, that's for real! And as my body retains a lot of water due to the thyroid and kidney problem, I swear that sometimes I feel her soft and precise hands gently pressing my body as they were sharp needles on fire just getting slowly into my water lumps. Oh God, that is sooooo painful and even so I'm able to sleep.

Anyway, Ciara was massaging me and I could heard Mei-hua's chuckle and I smelled coffee being made by one of the girls also. My nose got so excited with that strong sweet smell that was coming out of the kitchen directly into my nostrils. I slept a little more knowing I was going to have a hot cup of coffee and good chat with my girls after my relaxation/suffering time.

About 1 hour later, sweet Ciara finished my massage and we got together around the coffee table to chat as we usually do. This was when I noticed some light hematomas on Mei-hua's neck. I started joking saying it was love bites and she said it was stuck energy marks because she used a piece of very smooth wood made in Japan to brush/scrap/rub the blocked energy out of her body.

What is especial about Mania Spa is that it's also a holistic SPA and it's all about balancing the energy centers within the body called chakras. I just love how I became calmer, focused, centered after I started frequenting this place. As I do trust Mei-hua I asked her to check if I had some blocked energy myself. Of course I was very sure about it! So, she explained to me that the tool she uses leaves marks only where the energy is stuck.

She started on my neck and she got amazed how my energy flows on it because it left no bruises. Then she came to my back and you can see on the pics bellow what happened!! It didn’t hurt, but I got scared of how red my back became. She didn't put much pressure on it. We call Mei-hua "dinosaur" because she got strong hands and arms, but she was very soft on me this time.

I was anxious to know what was going to happen to me after that session, and I got very surprised. I felt very energetic. It’s unbelievable how the Asian people hold some secrets on the way to care and treat body’s tiredness and weakness. To them, energy needs to flow freely into our organs to keep them in good shape and working properly.And I couldn't agree more!

What I know about it, it’s that I really feel a huge improvement on my health and on my life style after moving to Asia. Even though Asian people rush crazily on almost everything, they do take time to care and to take care of their health in an alternative way. Well, alternative way for me, westerner.

To them, going to SPA to have massage is part of their days and it’s taken as a serious activity and not just a way to indulge the ladies as we westerns use to think sometimes. It’s incorporate on their life style, male and female, and I did incorporate it on mine!

I wonder, how long those bruises will stay on my back!

I swear, it didn't hurt!

Another Earthquake in Taiwan

Another earthquake just hit Taiwan and it seems that people are so used to it that they just don't care, or don't care anymore.

For sure I'm the only one literally in panic, crying without stop. This time the magnitude of the earthquake was 5.5! In Italy, last week, was 6.3!

I'm still in panic! Thank God everything is fine now...I guess, I hope!

Pollution of Taiwan

Back of one of my book shelves!

This is mould! A huge culture of mold that has grown on my furniture and on my life since I got back from Nigeria and Brasil. Luck me that I'd spent almost 2 months out because believe me, it could be much worse to my lungs.

For more than 2 months, north of Taiwan doesn't have a day without rain or gray sky! I'm so tired of this!
I'm very dependable of a good weather to be in a good mood and I can tell that it hasn't being easy to cope with such situation.
Everything is moulded, everything smells badly. Doesn't matter how many times I change the anti-humid and nice aroma saches of my wardrobe and drawers, it always smells terrible.

It is a hard work to keep the house and the furniture mould free. I have lost how many times I have scrubbed the back of the furniture to take this crazy field of mould out and after 1 week it is back again and stronger.

I guess I'm allergic to it, or as I have asthma it gets worse with the smell that insists in living in my home. I keep the windows always opened but it doesn't help.

Taiwan's weather is not a funny thing at all and besides it the air is extremely polluted due the careless of the industries and government about it! Taiwan is an island but without clean beaches. All of them, in the north of the country, are extremely dirty and pollued by the industries that use the ocean as trash can! It's a pitty!

My respiratory system claims for pure air.

Back of my printer table!

An Evening in Taipei

Taipei Symphony Orchestra at Zhongshan Hall

This week I drove to Taipei to watch a concert . It was performed by the Taipei Symphony Orchestra at Zhongshan Hall, with the especial participation of the pianist Li-Chun Su, known as "Taiwanese Glory", even though she was raised and lives in Germany, due to her phenomenal national and international career. It was amazing!

I couldn't hold few tears while the symphonic played Rosenkavalier Suite by Strauss! It was really wonderful. I could feel the notes bringing the new spring season to the theater. Amazing performance.

The concert had 3 acts and the last 2 was performed by the pianist herself in beautiful solo presentation. The tears I got in the first act, was substituted by a crazy involuntary or voluntary will I had to laugh my lungs out.

I'll explain: Even thought the program was all set to Strauss, the pianist played Hungarian Rhapsody No 2 by Liszt as well. It was a great surprise because I love this melody so much! If you don't know or remember it, it's the melody that was "immortalized" by Tom & Jerry in the famous "The Cat Concerto" made in 1946. I won won an Oscar that year.

Every single time I watch this cartoon and I watch it a lot, it cracks me up! I just can't stop laughing!

So, when the pianist started it, immediately the image of Tom bothering Jerry's sleep came to my mind and I guarantee that it was a humongous sacrifice to not laugh good. Oh gosh! Internally I was laughing good for sure!

The theater ambient was austere, people were really paying attention and enjoying the concert. I keep asking myself what would happen if I couldn't hold my laugh. I guess I would be deported as a hideous criminal.

Oh Gosh, why she did that to me? Why did she change the program without previous notice! For sure I wouldn't go or I would go prepared if I knew I was going to appreciate Hungarian Rhapsody No 2!

I loved classic music, especially in concerts. The last time I went to a concert was in Warsaw, at the Teatr Narodowy, the National Theater! It was one of the best nights of my life, cultural event speaking! I had a wonderful time in Poland. I miss traveling in Europe...

After the concert, I went to Ali Baba's. It's a Pakistani/Indian restaurant and the food there is absolutely delicious. I just love it.
There I met this cute little girl named Bhanu. I guess she is daughter of the owner but I'm not sure. She was on my lap for long time and I really enjoyed playing with her.

She really likes mango lassi

Bhanu got her own style to do the famous "peace" gesture

present in every single pic by Asian teenager

He lied to me!

He lied to me!

I can't believe I was that naive after so long... I trusted his words with my life and I prepared to live on happily after all.

He promised that my dark days were gone and from now on I'd have only bright days as fresh spring mornings. And I believed on him. I did believe on every single word he said and wrote. That was really a punch on my face. I do have faith on the power of words. I used to believe that words have lives on their own, and what was once said...it's said forever. When you write something down, it doubles the power of it, making a agreement that can't be broken easily.

Well, he just threw beautiful hopeful word on the wind. He did! As soon as the first morning coming I realized that I was betrayed. Those beautiful promises that brought back joy to my heart again were meaningless!

I'm lost, I don't know what to do anymore. But I'm so very sure of one thing: I will not look or even believe in any single word Yahoo says about weather anymore. I can't live waiting and hoping that sun is going to shine tomorrow and get frustrated as soon as I wake up with the unchanging reality!

Yahoo lied to me! He lied to me!! Yahoo promised me 5 days in a row of sunshine light and all I get is rain,rain and more rain...

Cultural Shock in the Gym

Photo by Spencer Tunick!
18,000 people, Zocalo square, Mexico City

I just felt as I were in the middle of those 18.000 people today.

I'll explain:
Last month I got a huge urge to join a gym and start some fitness program again. I used to do it, and I was missing it a lot.
So, I found a very good one near my home. Just like less than 10 minutes driving it the transit were cooperative. Yes driving! Even thought Taiwan is a tiny country nobody uses to walk here because it's almost impossible to cross a street if not in normal walking areas. And this gym is at Taimall, a huge mall in Nankan.

Nankan is another citied just glued on the one I'm living now, Taoyuan. So walk to there is really impossible because there is a road separating the two cities.

Anyway...I got my gym bag and I happily drove to Extreme Fitness Center, hoping to get a relaxing sauna after the sweating session!

Well, before I got into the above picture, I must remember you that I'm from Brasil. That almost all year long sunshine days, with beautiful beaches and very tiny bikinis.

What it has to do with the gym and the pics?

As soon as I got at the gym, I went to change and as soon as I open the door of the female changing/restroom I got into a huge cultural shock. Every single woman over there were naked, completely naked. They were even blowing their hairs naked. Talking friendly to each other naked. Some of them were stretching just like in the picture above, naked.

Oh God, I really really got scared. I never saw such a scene in my life. If would be better if you don't try to imagine it, trust me!

Yes, I'm from Brasil and over there we use a very tiny bikini. That's true and I must admit I just buy really tiny bikinis even for Brazilian standards.
However I never went to a sauna in Brasil where 100% of the women were naked, talking as they were in a cafe. I never went to a changing room and see towels on the floor and women talking naked as they were in their living room. I never in my life saw so many women naked. It was around 50. I'm not kidding!

I guess I never changed my clothes so fast. I tried to find a corner where I could find an empty locker to put my bag and my clothes in and as soon I found it, it started getting crowed of naked women. Oh gosh, it was really embarrassing to me and I know for sure it would be embarrassing to every single Brazilian woman I know.

I sat on a bench to unzippering my boot and when I lifted my face it almost reached a naked ass. Firstly one woman bent over to put a shoes on! Then many follow her. It was also the first time I saw someone starting dressing from bottom to top, from shoes to T-shirt!. It isn't funny, I swear to God.

You may wondering how a Brazilian woman who walks on the beach wearing a tiny bikini can be shocked with such a scene! Well, it is simple. We do have a small bikini but we do wear one, and our bikinis are tiny but they cover what must/should be covered. And when we, Brazilian women, are in public changing room we do wrap ourselves with a towel.

Brasil is a catholic country and catholics usually think that naked body is offensive, or immoral, or even indecorous! We learn from early age that we can't be naked in front of people, especially those who are not close family!

And then on the other side of the world, I go to an innocent gym and a whole new world is out there, literally out there. I may sound prudish, but I am not, really!

Well, what I know is that I will from now on leave home wearing my gym clothes. I really didn't feel comfortable around so many naked asses!

I'm moulded!

It's almost 4:30 AM and the window in my bedroom looks...wet! It seems that even the window is crying asking for a few hours of sunshine day!

The humidity here is extremely high. Today it reached 92% and I can't take this anymore. Really! I'm cleaning up the mould every single week and it comes back stronger. Even some clothes got moulded. I'm moulded for sure as well.

I live in the 12th floor of a 13th floor high building and all this wetness in the interior of my bedroom's window is the consequence of months without sun light. I was preparing to sleep and I needed to try to dry it because the water was coming to the floor already!

It's too much rain, too much!

The interior of my bedroom's window!

Really, it's the interior not exterior!
It's raining through the glass and metal parts of the window!

A lake is forming in my bedroom!

The mould starts and grows daily!

Glacial weather of Taiwan

Yesterday I had no power to take my pajamas off, I just did that to take a shower and then back in my flannel starts pajamas again.
It's freezing here in Taiwan. It doesn't stop raining for ages. I don't remember a sunny day this year. The humidity is super high and this makes the 15 degrees Celsius looks like glacial weather.

Really, +15 here is much colder than -15 in Switzerland. Firstly there is no heat and the wind is crazy. I feel the cold into my bones. Oh gosh, I'm really in a process of being frozen.

With all this, of course that my body couldn't take without getting sick. I got a strong cold and I'm feeling miserable. I was trying to study, but the book seems too have for my weak arms.

I just want to sleep, sleep for days and nights and just wake up and get out of my cozy warm bed when someone tells the weather man that he has sent enough rain and that we need sunny bright days from now on.

Back to sleep...

Chinese Torture

When Brasil was facing a dictatorship, the term "Chinese torture" became well known among those who were considering enemies of the state or labeled as subversive.

It was very well spread and for mere morbid curiosity I read about this sophisticate and highly well developed psychological tortures that the Chinese created to be as painful as the human body can resist! It is based on the almost infinite repetition of single move, sound, word, and even laugh!

Unfortunately I don't have a better word to call what is happening in my home since 7:30AM than Chinese torture.

So far I'm being torture for more than 8 hours uninterruptedly and it is really driving me crazy already. I really don't know how people resist to that for weeks!
I already called the front desk of the building asking them to stop that music and noise and the answer I got was that the noise for more than 8 hours uninterrupted is necessary to fix the speakers.

Speakers? Yes, speakers! I have no idea why there is a speaker inside each apartment as you can see in the pic bellow. This speaker "speaks" extremely loud and usually very early in the morning making me very scared. Every single time I'm awake by this noisy noise or I'm surprised in the middle of the afternoon by someone talking inside my home, that by the way is a very silence place, I feel I'm into 1984. 1984 is a novel by George Orwell where the population is observed by the government 24/7 and from where the term "big brother" came out.

I'm not complaing in vain, I'm really not. It's one of the most annoying sensations I ever tried in my life. I really don't like it and worse, it really scares me to death!

So, for almsot 9 hours now I'm being "distracted" by Taiwanese music and/or someone speaking without stopping in my living room. The music didn't stop for one second and sometimes someone speaks over it. I already closed the door of my office, put an earphone and nothing can make this noise to at least disturb less.

I'm trying to finish writing a proposal, but it seems impossible. And I also got a headache along with it and there is no Advil that can help me out.

I'm just wondering what they want me to confess...and to be honest, I can confess anything to stop that Chinese torture over my mind!

The living room and the speaker, above on right corner!

The speaker!