Fireworks, my desk, and scooters

It's Ghost Month in Taiwan (see my previous post) and fireworks are part of the celebration. Fireworks seems to part of most celebrations in Taiwan. Tonight I got a free display outside my apartment. This picture was taken from my balcony. As you can see they're not lighting off bottle rockets. Noise does not seem to bother the Taiwanese. Last Sunday, in my apartment building, they were drilling into masonry with a hammer drill at 9 PM. They might as well been drilling in my apartment. Remodeling classrooms during school, of course...more hammer drills clacking on masonry. There's nothing like shouting a lesson over the obnoxious noise of a hammer drill. I would pause and wait for a break before starting the lesson again. As soon as I would start to speak...clack, clack, clack, clack. I swear the workers were out to get me. The students just laughed and I smiled with them. Sometimes you just gotta let go, relax, and go with the flow. You gotta have a good sense of humor or teaching will drain you to the bone.
This is my desk at school. All the essentials, as you can see. Textbooks and papers, laptop, water bottle, coffee mug, juice, a poster picture of an old Vail advertisement, and a picture of the family under the glass. The plastic bag under the desk has my basketball clothes. I'm not a very good shot, but I can pass and I'm not too bad on the boards. Considering that I haven't played basketball in over twenty years I feel like I can hold my own.


This is a street in Taichung. Where's my scooter?