I am back

I haven't been able to access my Blogger for 2 years now because I have been in mainland China since early 2011. While I have still been writing posts and trying to keep my blogs going it has not been easy, since so many of the sites are blocked and the back-doors that are opened for offline writer programs like Windows live Writer are one by one being closed due to the ever tightening internet censorship in China. Anyway, nearly two years have passed since I moved to China and I am realizing more and more that there things I miss about living in Taiwan, and how I am actually starting to develop culture shock and homesickness. I'll start with the things that I miss about Taiwan first since that's where this blog was born. First I miss the clear blue skies of Taiwan, well Taichung at least. I know that everyday was not blue, and that there is pollution in the skies of Taiwan...you'll be hard pressed to find a place in the world that doesn't have pollution these days. However, compared to living in China the skies were azure blue everyday. There is nothing like being able to look up into the deep azure blue skies in the summer, seeing fluffy white clouds floating lazily through the sky, with a gentle warm breeze flowing over you while hearing the birds singing in the mountains behind your house, or watching the waves crash over the beach as fishing ships throw their nets to catch the bountiful harvest below them. The splendid beauty of Taiwan is so hard to describe that it can only be understood in person. The second thing that I miss, and actually should be the first but recently blue skies have been very high on my list of want to see things, is riding my scooter/motorcycle. I had a wonderful super tuned Kymco Racing, and Suszuki SV650-SF, my scooter was my daily truck and a great work horse that took me around town and even out into the mountains. My Suzuki was great for those long haul island trekking trips where I might not be home for a few days or a week. Most of my good memories were on the back of a good bike. When the weather was not on my side I had access to a friends Mitsubishi Virage i0 that was sleek pavement eating, asphalt melting, pink slip stealing machine. This car was tuned for the Le Mans series and styled to take grandma to the doctors. When you needed to get somewhere in a hurry and it was too cold to or to wet to be out on a bike this was the car do it in, airport runs, drop offs at the High speed rail station, weekend trips to the beach, this car could do it all. The final thing that I miss the most about Taiwan are the people. Taiwanese people have always shown me the ultimate in kindness. I know that internationally Americans have a reputation for being jerks but really at home we are fairly friendly and I had always found people to help me when I asked for it, however, Taiwanese were always the ones to offer help when it wasn't asked. They could see a situation and if they think they can help they will offer. For example my bike choked up because of water in the fuel line from riding too long in the rain the day before(this is why you should not take your bike out in a typhoon) and I was pushing it up a small hill to my friend's house to have him help me flush the lines and dry out the engine when out of the dark came a guy and girl on the bike and asked if I needed help, I was fine so I waved them on, but 5 minutes later an old man on a 4 wheeled scooter thing came rolling up next to me and asked if he could help push me along to my friends house. Again I didn't accept because it was just another 300-400 feet or so, but the idea that a man whose most likely sole method of transit is that 4 wheeled scooter offered to help me was touching. Another example was when I got lost in the mountains, I had a family take me in and offer me a meal while I was waiting for my friends to show up with gas for my motorbike, or maybe the time when an aboriginal couple in Hualian invited me over to eat wild mountain boar barbecue with them. I didn't know them, never said hello to them before that day, and they offered me food and drink just because I was walking by. I am not sure I have experienced this kind of behavior before I was living in Taiwan or not. So I will always be thankful and grateful to my Taiwanese friends, will always miss my home in Taiwan. My homesickness is not so much about actually missing my home, which I do, but its about the things that were so easy before, or that were expected. I lived in Taiwan for 6 years basically, and I never really felt homesick. That might be because I started to feel that Taiwan was my home, or because I would annually go back to the US once or twice when I had the free time, or maybe because I could find a lot of the creature comforts of the US in Taiwan. Whereas here in China I can't find them and if I can they are massively expensive or just in too short of supply, or just not quite the same as at home. The top three things that make me homesick from just this week alone, are food, medicine, and heating. Haha. I last year I lived in Guangzhou which is in the south of China so the weather is hot almost all year, and when it is cold I could get by with just a light jacket and some gloves and maybe a hat. However, now I am living in Xi'an which is in the north of China (about the same latitude as South Carolina but land locked) and the cold is getting really cold. For example this morning when I woke up it was only 2 degrees Celsius (about 36 degrees Fahrenheit) and when I got to work it was up to 4 degrees (39F) and at lunch it was up to 15 degrees (59F) but as I am writing this section it is down again to 4 degrees. So I am really really missing our homes and the fact that when it gets to like 60 public places start to turn the heating systems on, and when it is 4 they most certainly have heating systems running full blast. But not in China. Medicine is a multi-part story as to why it makes me homesick, but for the sake of not causing people (if anyone reads this) to yell at me, is because the ease of buying medicine specific for your illness and doctors who will tell you what you are taking even if you can't understand it. That way when you go home you can google the hell out of it and know ever molecule that went into making the medicine and all of the clinical data that was associated with it, if your into that kind of thing. In China however the medicine is usually given through and IV drip with your name and some unintelligible doctor scribblings and a number on the bottle. If your not taking that kind of medicine then you are mixing a bag of unknown powdered ground dried who knows what herbs into hot water to drink with various levels of usefulness in them. This comes from my own person experiences, and from seeing the inner workings of a Hong Kong Chinese medicine shop, being sold Chinese medicine for colds in Guangzhou and taking what should be antihistamines for my allergies here in Xi'an and from this week having to take medicine for a flu and end up taking medicine for a misdiagnosed stomach illness. Anyway this Chububobcat and this has been my random thought for the day. Have a good holiday season where ever you are, and be thankful for the things that you have... even if they are not what you are use to having.