23 Months / 6 Months

Two milestones crept past us during the Chinese New Year / Break / Valentine's Day holidays, namely, Sam's 23 month birthday and six months in Taiwan (meaning I've clocked 18 months total and Emily's passed a year, if you count our last trip).

I'm feeling decidedly more settled. I think the mechanics of moving here were more daunting than I had at first expected. If I reflect on our time, here are some of the things we've done:

Packed and shipped many boxes

Crossed the world

Unpacked those boxes

Enrolled in language school

Acquired the things that made summer better (fridge and AC)

Acquired the things that made fall/winter better (dehumidifiers, heater, etc.)

Acquired all of the things we didn't know we'd need (trash cans, etc., etc.) and a lot of pesky furniture

Significantly improved Chinese language ability

Fought back mold (on-going)

Found a church (in addition to older church)

Sam in day care

Sam happily chattering in Sam-ese, English, and some Chinese

Emily understanding most everything in Mandarin, Jonathan started on Taiwanese

Emily with full draft proposal

And paper accepted at international conference

Jonathan with submitted religions chapter

Wrote lots of newsletters

Picked small fight over (future) language evaluation with some faculty

Lost gracefully but have some more clarity

Applied for and received international health insurance

Doctored up, with dentist next on the list

Bugged many people, over and over again, to figure out what we are supposed to be doing here

Shed excess responsibilities like a molting snake

Bought a bunch of other stuff to cope with the changing seasons

Started attending faculty meeting and worship

Read some fine books

Started but didn't finish too many big projects

Skyped with family

Found out where all sorts of things are (like the Wednesday pie truck, the furniture stores, the car registration center)

Bunkered for 9 days of cold rain during the New Year

Celebrated six months with a fine Korean lunch

That is my short list of what we have accomplished. Sometimes I feel like I am still waiting to settle. I think we are slowly finding our balance and figuring out how to make the most of things. Today I was extremely grateful for child care, which is sooooo expensive back home but is free (for us, for now) here, and pretty reasonable (for us) in the long term. I still have a lot of frustrations: the language barrier, being The Young Teacher, looking so different from every one around me, being on the edge of my old world. Nonetheless, these disorientations have been good for us, and I think they will be a big help in the long run.

In talking today, we decided part of what has helped is that Sam is just so chipper. Today he went to school. He happily went off with his teacher when I dropped him. He played with pebbles afterwards as I waited for Emily. He greeted his old friend, the seminary accountant, at dinner, and walked all of the way up the hill and home with us without help. He giggled with Emily, took a long bath, and went to bed quickly. He's just such a fine baby, and while I'm sure he would have made a go of it in the garden state, here is a little rock star of a toddler, and we're very glad to be in a place where lots of people love him and look out for him.

For us individually and as a couple the bigger challenge is probably to be okay with the limitations of our life, and to realize that every place, every job, every way of being is on some level unsatisfactory. I think there is a natural longing which we cannot meet ourselves. I'll probably always fight the "grass is greener" impulse, even as I live somewhere that is as green as any place I've known. It's a big world...

Rainy Days

Asleep

Dance machine

Up for New Year's

I forgot to say that on New Year's Sam actually had gone down early and then woke up before midnight, so we were able to watch some TV and hang out together. He's pretty entertaining to us. Today he said the word "dance" (or "jump," tiao) about a million times. He jumped in bed, he jumped on the couch, he jumped at a restaurant tonight. He's probably seen kids at school who can really jump, and is working towards that. Right now, he can't jump from a standing position, but it's got to be in his near future.

He's a kinetic kid, happily dancing, running, climbing around the house. Combined with a stronger will (see last post) this can get frustrating. Still, it's kind of fun to have a kid who's so mobile. Today he was also doing little sprints in the house. Emily would count to three in Chinese--he can just say the first word yi--and then he would take off, yelling "go, go, go." This must also be something learned at school.

We're still trying to puzzle out why he uses certain words in certain languages. For instance, he used to say both "fish" and "jump" in English, after a fashion. But now he tends to prefer to say these in Chinese. I don't really know why. His English vocab is bigger, including words like hot and cold and up and please. But when he thanks people he always says "xie xie," which, come to think of it, may be easier to say than the more difficult "th" sound.

I wish I could say I was feeling a bit more motivated today, but I'm still not doing great on that front. I got up with Sam early this morning, around 6, and then napped with him later. I've done some of my own reading this week, and Alexander McCall Smith novel, and the autobiography of a Taiwanese church leader, but otherwise it's been slow in terms of work. Next week I'll be into a full run as one semester of language ends and as classes at the seminary start. It should be an interesting week.

New Year

This year is the Year of the Tiger, and we're in the midst of a full week off (from language school, preschool, seminary, etc.). It's nice to have the break, although I've felt seriously unmotivated academically for several months now. It may be that without Christmas to recharge I just never really recharged. So here is hoping that our batteries will be back to full by the weekend.

For us, it is hard to get on a new schedule--to move from full speed to full stop. Sam is becoming a true toddler, and so he is starting to become insistent about things which drive us nuts. For example: not wanting to bathe, not wanting to sit in his chair for meals, wanting to watch TV when we don't want to, etc. Standard toddler stuff. But it's a bit of an adjustment for us to deal with it 14 hours a day, rather than 6 or 8. We're missing the kind, patient eyes that have been watching him for much of the day, Monday through Friday. I love nursery school.

The upside is that we are getting a lot of togetherness time. We took two long walks together on Sunday, played with the neighborhood kids today, saw a bunch of Presbyterians for New Year on Saturday and are getting a lot of time at home. Last night I read perhaps 10 books to Sam, since he was slow to fall asleep (having seriously exasperated his mother, who first tried to put him to bed). Today I gave up on him, and Emily put him to sleep at lunch time. He's now three hours into a serious nap. It's nice to be able to trade off.

There are small dashes of grace sprinkled throughout all of this forced togetherness. Last night Sam went to his bath willingly, and played for a long time with ducks, dinosaurs, scoopers, and bath books (he has a new book with animals in Chinese and English). I've also enjoyed wandering around campus with him. I think the neighbors tired him out today, which was quite fun for all of us. On days like today, Sam is my exercise equipment.

The sun is setting on this rainy Taipei day. It's jacket cold and misty, but there's the promise of more fun in the days ahead. We'd had hopes of a shopping trip tonight, but aren't quite sure whether it will work. I'll try to write another post or two this week and perhaps post more photos on-line.