TheNHBushman.com

Photos by Hui-chen and MJ Klein

UPDATE: If you think my story is bad, then check out this story from Thailand!

Awhile back Hui-chen and I attended a lunch given by the local elementary school. While I was at the lunch they asked me if I wouldn’t mind coming to an event and talking with the school kids about camping. I told them that I’m not qualified to teach and am not a teacher, but as long as it was informal, sure I could come and talk with the kids and teach them about camping.

This is the school, up in the mountains. It’s a very nice area.

The material on this wall features the Hakka language, which is spoken in this region.

“Teacher, there is a big kid at the back of the room!”

Here we see Ms. Huang asking how many students will be camping overnight at school this evening. I was surprised at how many were staying overnight.

Ms. Huang teaching the kids new vocabulary related to camping

Next, I was asked to talk with the kids. The first thing I explained to them was the meaning of the word “outdoorsman.” They were shocked to find out that I have spent up to a few weeks at a time in the forest alone. I used their newly learned vocabulary in the course of my discussion.

Here I am explaining how to select a campsite. Later some high school students were scheduled to come over and set up some tents for the little kids. I had a question/answer session and the kids asked some pretty good questions, showing that they were indeed paying attention. One kid asked how to make a place to sleep and I showed them how to build a lean-to shelter. I had brought one of my Dutch ovens and told the kids that I was going to bake them a cake over a campfire that evening. Of course they never heard of that before and were very surprised to learn that this is even possible.

Another kid asked me if I would be joining the water balloon fight they had planned for later on. “Sure” I said. “It would be fun.” Little did I know….

Believe it or not, I am exercising hard every day and losing weight, although photographs like the above are discouraging.

Next, we all went outside for some more activities. Ms. Huang had several things lined up for the kids to participate in which would show how much they had retained from the classroom experience before. I thought it was pretty cool and the kids seemed to enjoy it.

Hui-chen decided to try out some of the playground equipment. I did not dare suggest that she was too old for any of it!

Hui-chen is on the opposite end of the see-saw from me, and naturally, off the ground!

After a few kid-sized sandwiches and some green tea, the water balloon fight broke out.

The kids were going at it, hot and heavy. They decided to gang up on me. That is exactly what I would have done at their age.

I didn’t mind getting wet at all. I didn’t mind even being targeted and ganged up upon by most of the students. This is what kids do. A couple of the boys came over to my side and were on my defense team (but not the one shown here). Several students got behind me and clobbered me very well. However, I noticed that something was hitting my back, and it wasn’t balloons - it was fists.

I take aim at one of my antagonizers

A young girl was actually punching me as hard as she could! I asked her to stop doing that, but in the meantime, the other students had re-loaded (from a seemingly endless supply of water balloons) and were pelting me good! A few more water balloons popped nearby and I heard a little voice say “get the foreigner” in Chinese. Then, more fists hitting me! It seems they weren’t satisfied with balloons, it was as if they wished to do me bodily harm. I heard some kids farther down make remarks like “we’ll get the foreigner now” and when I looked up I saw them running towards me with a tub full of water. Well, I wasn’t going to just let them throw that on me so I got off the field and walked up to the class room level and was able to cut them off just as they were about to throw it. That same little girl who was previously hitting me screamed at me in Chinese “give that to me you foreigner! that isn’t yours!” referring to the tub of water I had spilled out and was holding. She then started punching me as hard as she could, screaming “you foreigner, I’ll get you foreigner!” over and over. Clearly, this situation was turning ugly and I got a very sick feeling in my stomach - the feeling that I get when I encounter racial prejudice. That girl has some serious issues and I certainly didn’t need that. I told Hui-chen that we were going home because I’d had enough. I went back into the classroom to get my belongings when 2 students came up to the door with a tub of water and were actually considering throwing it on me inside the classroom when some adults (Taiwanese) showed up.

The head of the Parent’s Union (or whatever it’s properly called) tried to talk me into staying but I told her that she wanted the kids to learn a lesson, so here’s one: no cake, no campfire, no song because the foreigner is not welcome and is now going home.

I don’t know about those kids, but I sure got my Taiwanese education today.

technorati tags:Taiwan, Hsinpu, school

Blogged with Flock

The rice is getting high in Hsinpu.  Harvest time is near!

The rice heads are hanging heavy.

I recommend that you click on this photo and then look at the large size.  This is a brand new wind farm that sprang up recently in Taichung.  I saw no less than 3 new groups of machines today.  This is just what Taiwan needs: clean renewable power.

Don’t let it throw you.  The drink was actually quite good.

technorati tags:Taiwan, Taichung, Hsinpu, rice, stupid, drink, harvest

Blogged with Flock

Photos by MJ Klein. Check out more photos on flickr.com!

For weeks, Hui-chen and I planned on going to the geocaching woodstock as previously blogged. We were going to ride up to Taipei with our friend Michael Turton and his wife, and camp out over night for the event. At the last minute the situation changed due to a family emergency and we weren’t able to camp out.

When Hui-chen and I left on Saturday morning our front left tire was almost flat. We took the car across the street to the shop where we have our car work done.

The boss patched the tire and found that it was still leaking.

There was a nail in the tire. No wonder it was going flat!

The Culprit.

With the tired fixed we met up with the Turtons and went in their car up to Yangmingshan where the event and the geocaches were.

Here we are walking to the first cache.

This is where the cache was located. The Yangmingshan mountain area is very active with lots of geothermal areas.

The smell of rotten eggs was pretty much everywhere in this place. It wasn’t too bad and gave the area a sort of ambiance.

Without giving away too much, this is the geocache after we found it.

We met fellow geocacher Jerry and his cute girlfriend Kimi at this cache. They were also hunting it and we were just a few minutes ahead of them. More shots of the geothermal area:

OK, this shot has nothing to do with the area, but its my blog and my wife is cute.

We drove up higher on the mountain to find the next cache on the list.

I was surprised to learn that some people find scenery like this to be “boring.”

Even so, we pressed onto the next destination. Here you see our intrepid group hiking toward the next geocache. Well not really as it was a very simple walk to the place where it was hidden.

This place is called “milk lake” because of this cool geological feature. We weren’t able to hike down close to it though.

We found the cache and signed the log as we did with the first one.

After these 2 caches we went to the “base” which was a private home owned by Mr. and Mrs. “X.”

We meet up with the other cachers.

We meet again!

Mr. “H”, one of the cachers, acted as our official photographer and set up this outdoor group shot (one of many).

Here we are in the parking lot of the restaurant. Mr. X and his wife took the entire group out to dinner at a local restaurant. I feel bad because I didn’t get a chance to thank Mr. and Mrs. X for their gracious hospitality.

Mr. H sets up his camera for another group shot.

Enjoying conversation about the day’s activities. Seems that just about everyone knew who Michael and I are from our previous geocaching adventures.

“How many caches did you find today Jerry?”

“Its not how many one finds, its how much fun one has doing it!”

I’m just kidding around with the photos I took. I found the geocachers to be a very nice group of people. I would like to do more activities with the geocachers in the future.

Now you know that I’m going to show some of the food, right?

Fangyi gets ready to throw down. I was right behind her, I’m telling you. The food was good. Hui-chen and I would go back to that place anytime.

Outside of the restaurant was a pretty cool antenna farm (which has nothing to do with the event of course).

Suddenly, we had to leave for some reason. I didn’t realize that we were going until we got into the car and I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to anyone. So, please accept our apologizes. Hui-chen and I wanted to hang out with all you geocachers but it was impossible.

Originally we had planned on spending the night there, participating in the Sunday morning event and then attending the grill party at noon. Disappointed, about not having attended the morning treasure hunt, and not wanting to spend more than 4 hours in the car driving up to Taipei and back on Sunday morning for the afternoon party, Hui-chen and I decided to have our own private party on the roof of our home.

Here we are under an umbrella out of the hot Hsinchu sun. The wind was blowing and it felt nice and cool. There is a bottle of Thai rum hiding behind the Coke, and we polished off the whole thing ourselves.

As usual, Hui-chen laid out a great assortment of food for our private party.

Hui-chen likes to grill as much as I do.

Uh-oh! A major problem! Our drink cups began to give out due to the strain of such heavy drinking!

We had to switch to plastic cups! Problem solved! Disaster averted!

You can see a lot of interesting things from our rooftop cabana:

A ship in the Taiwan Straight (300mm).

Beautiful trees….

Thai men on bicycles….

The little girl who lives down the street….

This is the look that I get from Hui-chen when I’ve taken too many photos of her.

After about 3 hours of drinking, the sky looked threatening.

It didn’t rain during our private party though. The storm clouds just created more wind and cooler temperatures. It was perfect.

Today couldn’t have been better, with perfect weather and the perfect woman.

I want to thank RJT for organizing the Geocaching Woodstock event, and Mr. and Mrs. “X” for their generosity in opening their home to the event. Mr. X treated everyone to dinner and I feel embarrassed because I didn’t get a chance to even say “thank you” afterward. Please accept our sincere apologizes and thanks.

technorati tags:Taiwan, Hukou, Taipei, geocaching, wookstock, Yangmingshan

Blogged with Flock