Arrival

I made it! After being hurried off by my grandma and parents on Friday night, I took off in a taxi to the airport where I sat and drank too much wine to pass all the time I had. The flight was 13 hours and stopped in Korea. I don’t think I slept much because I was exhausted when we arrived.

It was 2:30am in Korea which was totally unfortunate because everything was closed. It was like walking into an abandoned airport – not pleasant – and I was stranded there for the next six hours. Luckily I ran into a young fellow named Ryan. He was on his way to Manila from Toronto to visit family. We managed to pass the time fairly quickly chatting and watching online TV and then when things started to come alive at 7:00am we went up to try some Korean food. It was really good – similar to Chinese I thought with miso soup, kimchi, and pork. Ryan and I started to have so much fun talking that he almost missed his plane making it to the gate just a few minutes before take-off! Lucky they let him on.

I left shortly after and it was a short 2 hour ride to Taipei where I was met by Henry – one of the mangers at AIESEC, the organization that helped me get my work permit and VISA from the Taiwanese government. Christina met me also. She is the only other North American working at Brickcom and I met her last time I was here. She has been here for nine months already and will be finished this January (to her extreme excitement). She’s been waiting for me to come over for months so she can have someone to get into trouble with. Luckily we like each other.

About two hours after landing the initial excitement of arriving in Taiwan started to wane as Christina made me lug my heavy suitcase (with broken wheels) along the busy streets of Hsinchu in a wind storm just as my jet lag was really starting to hit. It got worse when we arrived at the bedding store to find that the lady didn’t speak any English. I was not in the mood for miming and my patience was running thin, but I managed to find some sweet leopard print covers that match nicely with my snuggy – much better than that lovely pink hello kitty crap I chose last time.

When we got back to the dorm I was shown my room – it’s on the top floor with my own bathroom, balcony and beautiful view of the city and China Sea. I am quite happy with it. The building is like a hollowed out square with a big garden in the middle. We have vending machines and badminton courts on my floor and I am steps away from the building I work in – super convenient. There are basketball courts outside and I have the option of joining photography or fishing classes…not too shabby for living in the heart of an industrial park.

This morning after waking up from a 12 hour sleep (that started at 6pm) I went to the main office building to work out in the gym…It was empty, not a soul around and all the lights were off so I ended up skulking around in the dark in this massive office building feeling very much like a secret agent but trying not to do anything suspicious as they probably had cameras all over me. I finally found the gym – again, empty. Christina says no one gets up in the morning here because most work until really late at night and savour the extra few hours they get in the morning (it’s nice because we don’t have to start until 1:00pm if we don’t want, as long as we work 8.5 hours Monday-Thursday and 8 hours on Friday). Apparently most people use the gym at night for the yoga classes to wind them down from their hard work day. I’ll try that this week too.

Coming back to my residence to get ready for my first day of work was nice. I’ve never had a place to myself and I liked it (ask me again in a few weeks). I met Christina and she brought me to the office and saw me off like a mom would do on her child’s first day of school – cute. She left me in a training room with eight other new recruits (all Taiwanese) and I’ve been listening to power point presentations and going over company procedures for the past four hours…all in Chinese. I’ll have to learn the language now. Now they are all about to take a test in Chinese which I am exempt from. Then they are going over documents (diplomas, health checks etc.) that I do not have so I will probably be exempt from that too.

Lunch was pretty typical – stir fry veggies and tofu. It is nice because they have a few little places with different options to choose from. There is a buffet style area set up, a kitchen that has daily specials (soups, noodles, dumplings etc.), and then a café that has western-style sandwiches, subs and drinks. We get a monthly budget for food and a card to swipe for convenience. I don’t see myself going to any of the local restaurants very often; a) because I want to save $; and b) because unlike in Taipei where many restaurants have English menus for foreigners, Hsinchu is totally Chinese which would make every order a gamble. I feel like I did sufficient experimentation during my last stay in Taiwan.

It’s almost the end of the day now and I have been stationed in a temporary office close to the product line manager who will be in charge of me for the next little while as I learn the ins and outs of the products. I haven’t been assigned anything yet and probably won’t be until tomorrow - probably for the best. Jet lag has struck again and I’m feeling dizzy watching everyone pace around the room. One of the female employees across the way just stood up with a big red “we’re number one” foam hand that she acquired while studying at Iowa state university. She’s jumping up and down trying to catch my attention to say hi. I think it’s time for a rest.