Weekend Fellowship: Sunday at Guanzihling Hot Springs

The day after I met up with Eric in Yuanlin I went to enjoy some hot springs in Tainan County with Grace and family. I have been to hot springs in Taiwan in Beitou and Yangmingshan in Taipei City which are Sulfuric, Jhiben in Taitung County, and Dungpu and Lushan in Nantou County. There are so many hot springs on my list!


It was about a 2 hour drive there from our place in Anping (maybe less, but with Z and Grace's 2 sons playing and yelling in the back next to me it felt longer.) Before we took a dip we walked around an old temple built during the Japanese Colonial period, walked down numerous stairs into a valley on the side of a small hill that had a large Matsu statue surrounded by lotus and we walked the grounds before checking out the temple and outdoor eatery stalls near the water/fire display. The bee man selling honey (real honey as so much if it sold here is fake, or a mix) gave us bottles of free honey water for us and the kids (Grace is a beauty).

At the temple entrance a poem that can be read up/down, or right to left

We went to Grace's favorite bath house to soak, its not the best looking place, there are some new, snazzy hotels with hot springs water pumped into your bathroom tub that are lining the main road. She took me to the original Japanese established bathhouse, which looks its age. The water was fabulous, the smell was not the strong sulfuric, hard boiled egg smell I imagined. It smelled strangely of Chinese medicine. The water was a muddy gray and Z and I had our own huge bath room to ourselves.  After about an hour we were getting restless, I could of easily dozed off. I went in intervals from a soak where I was sweating to a cooling off/rest and found a game Z could play with the differnt shapes/sizes of water buckets. The only nuisance was my door didnt lock properly and when it did lock the owner had to unlock it for us to get out.

Japanese era bath house

After we  put our clothes on, I literally felt things moving around in my gut, there was alot of activity happening. Not like gas or cramps, but something was changing inside, I never felt that after a hot springs before. The  medicinal properties are said to "treat skin disease, neuralgia, and gastrointestinal disorders, " due to the high levels of alkaline and iodine. I imagined the ph balance was changing in my organs or something, there was some kind of chemical reaction going on. I'm sure the iodine was great for my thyroid.

Grace with the kids walking around town beside the mineral waters

Grace and her husband treated us to lunch which consisted of a nutritious Chicken garlic soup (free range), mountain veggies, fresh craw fish and fried noodles. Before we drove back to Tainan we stopped at Baihe Reservoir to take a walk, there were lovely views of the water being framed by misty mountains.

Baihe Reservoir

More than one website said, " With the exception of the Sicilian hot springs and the Japanese Kagoshima hot springs , the Taiwanese Guanzihling hot springs are the only other hot springs of this kind." For a detailed listing of hot springs click here: Hot Springs Listing . For more details click: Hot Springs in Taiwan .

Fire and Water

References:
http://www.go2taiwan.net/product.php?pid_for_show=24
http://www.saunas.com/FAQ%27s/Saunas%20of%20the%20World/taiwanhotspring.aspx

Another day in paradise and misunderstandings

You know when life throws a shit pie in your face and you could let it go, some people's natural personality is to let it go and other people's personality is to throw one back and still others is to try and make some sense of it and go back point by point and try and find the truth because it all matters too much. Well that  was my Friday at SF (my workplace and Z's school). Another issue happened with A my manager at SF, and this time it has to do with Zen my daughter. Now I know why Taiwan does not have girls softball teams or girls soccer over here.

I got called into A's office because Z kicked s kid's shoe (the foot was not inside). A said Zen has a "kicking problem" and "kicking habit" (which is not true) and is a potential danger to other children. Of course I question her motive I told her I felt this was her critical spirit of fault finding and I felt we were under her magnifying glass again. Z's teachers and I have a rapport and they never mentioned anything about a kicking problem. She made some outrageous statement to me that had to be heard to be believed, my owner was there as an "objective" witness, (she was anything but objective) . My natural inclination is to defend my daughter and question A's line of reasoning and motive.

I kid you not, the principal, (my manager) wanted to know what changes in our routine interaction my daughter and I have had lately (as if that is her business). I told her I drop her off at a playmates for my Thurs night yoga class, she has been coming to my Friday night kickboxing class, and that we rough house all the time. She replied that it was maybe inappropriate to bring her to my kickbox class, and that I should not play rough house w/her. I replied that wrestling and rough-housing was a way we bonded and that my Dad and bros did it all the time and we never had any social problems at school. She replied, "well Taiwanese parents dont play that way with their kids"  " I am not Taiwanese" . Then she said vehemently, "well you are in Taiwan now so you have to start doing it our way." And then as a bonus she added, "plus Z is a girl and shouldnt be playing that way anyway." I was so livid I could of soiled my pants right then and there. This is coming from a woman who prides herself on her MA in Child Development from an American university- I mean it was blatant sexism and cultural bias (ethno-centrism) in the same breath. Obviously this was not a conversation, but I chose to be difficult and not just shake may head and agree and brush it off.

Z has had a some cultural adjustments to contend with. I think the first year and a half was hard for her, but I think she has made real progress for a toddler/preschooler. First there was the language barrier and then there was the space issue. Everywhere we go strangers come up to us, (to her) and pinch her cheek, touch her hair tell her how cute she is , give her candy, take her picture on their cell phone w/o asking me or her. She hates the extra attention, she doesnt like to be touched by strangers and she has a blood sugar sensitivity. I think some of her behavior has been a reaction to these adjustments. Now she can speak Mandarin, now she is the one who is exploring other people's space at school (she is a very physical, hyper kid, who grabs her friends and gives them big hugs when she seems them, which is NOT what Taiwanese people do.) So she has been learning how to appropriately respect people's space, not hug them or tickle them, etc. For a 4 1/2 year old I think she is absolutely fabulous.

Weekend Fellowship: Saturday in Yuanlin

This weekend I was blessed being with old and recently new friends. I knew this weekend I was going to meet up with Eric my old roommate from my Taipei days. I could have gone up to Taichung and met up with him and his old friend Andy, but I really wanted to meet his family, which were in Yuanlin.

About 9 years ago we both were squatting in an abandoned, condemned apartment building in Chuwei, just around the corner from the Kid Castle I used to work at. I sure saved some money living there. We had cable TV, internet, water, electricity. The things you do when you're young I guess. At the time he was just ending  a relationship with a woman  from Sweden and dating some Taiwanese women, one whom became one of my best friends (Alisse). He is from Santa Monica and has been to Thailand a  crazy number of times, plus India and so many other places, used to have a guru, etc. When we lived together he was always in purple Thai fisherman's pants and always was talking about karma, God and his relationships. And now after all these years we both are parents. He is married to a wonderful Taiwanese American woman named Diane and they are blessed with little Shanti, who has the cutest little voice I have ever heard. Poor doll was covered in mosquito bites and Eric was worried that it was something else.

Holding two angels

It was great seeing him waiting at the train station. Eric still looked the same just a little silver around his ears, but none the worse, now he is looking distinguished. Eric is the creator of the Happy Cow website that is an international guide to vegan and vegetarian restaurants. He was working on it back in the day and now he has people working under him and has been offered tons of money to sell his site. (He turned down the offers because he didn't believe their principles were as similar as his.)

It was a rainy day and we were kind of stuck indoors. Diane's mom had lunch prepared, which was hot and delicious. Brown fried rice, veggies, mushroom and chicken soup, fried fish and a homemade anchovy chili paste which she gave me 2 jars of. For dessert we had fresh fruit and lots of Oolong tea. We tried staying inside as long as we could. Zen was climbing the walls and it was past the girls nap times, we were all a little antsy. We decided to take a walk find a foot massage and McD's for the girls to play in the indoor playground, etc. As soon as we left the building, Shanti fell asleep so Diane took her back and Eric and I took Zen to the McD's to play as the park was out of the question in this weather. Eric commented ",you sold out!" and I did, now me a vegetarian of 17 years eating meat. "But my thyroid" I explained, my Doc told me...yadayada he didn't buy it, yet the both of us can't eat soy anymore. "Have you heard about spirulina?" he asks. Of course, I'm from Denver and it's still not enough to convince me to go back to vegetarianism, 'tho I miss being a food snob sometimes.

Zen and Shanti watching cartoons

We went walking around looking for  a massage. Diane caught up with us and we took a taxi around the corner to a row of massage houses. We ended up with a 600NT foot massage, 20 minutes foot saok with a mediocre neck massage followed by a  foot massage. Eric being a massage therapist, was unimpressed by his neck massage, but we both were in slight pain and discomfort at certain pressure points in our feet. Our two men giving us our foot massage assumed we were a couple and Diane told them in Chinese " No he is with me, she is his old friend from Tainan." And she left early and walked back to her mom's as they had their mom's cell phone and couldnt call her to tell them they would be late, and when she left she paid for my foot massage which increased my relief.

Eric and me getting a nice foot massage.

We walked back to the train station Zen throwing a fit that I wouldn't hold her, 'tho it was not much of a walk and I was tired and said, "fine, you stay here I'm walking to the station", which was mean and I regretted it later. After I bought our return ticket, Eric raced to the vegetarian place and bought us a lunch box and raced back to us on our platform minutes before our train came. Hugs good-bye and wow, it was good to see him again. If I make it to LA in March we will hang out again.

Chinese Medicine Part 3: When it hurts

We live in a toxic world, no matter how well you sleep, how loyal you are with your exercise, and diet. With work and stress it is easy to get out of balance. When Taiwanese get out of balance and become tired, with back ache, neck ache, poor sleep head ache, they quickly get some traditional treatment before making the appointment to see the Doctor. Part of a healthy regimen or as a treatment there is massage 按摩 an (4th) mo(3rd), cupping 拔罐 ba(3rd)guan(4th) , cupping with bleeding 放血  fang (4th) xie(3rd), and scraping 刮沙 sha(1st) gua(1st). If those do no work then it is off to the Doctor.

I try to get a massage twice a month. I would do more if I could afford it. The woman I have been going to does the deep tissue, Chinese acupressure massage. It is excruciating. I am making animal grunts and my face is contorting into grimaces of pain and torture, but afterward I am as loose as a goose and everything is all worked out. Occasionally she will give me some cupping therapy, occasionally I go get some cupping somewhere else. She charges 800 NT for an hour and half, I usually go during my lunch break. She doesn't speak any English and I have been going to hers for almost 2 years and it such a blessing because I hold stress in my neck and shoulders and with training so hard at the gym as well, its just wonderful.

When I lived in Korea the parents of some of my students were Traditional Chinese medicine doctors. Every Monday during lunch me and 2 co-workers would go for treatment. First she would start out with having tea with us and she was very intuitive. For their particular constitution my coworkers usually got moxibustion, and I always got cupping and blood letting along with acupuncture. The blood letting is used with the same cups (like glass jars), they suction your skin into the cup and instead of leaving you there for some minutes, after the blood rises to the top, they get a little pin and start jabbing you and all the "bad blood" is released. It feels great. They show you what the blood looks like and it isn't the nice red liquid that you would think but dark, congealed, blobs, that looks like grape jelly. When I was in London I found a set of cupping jars (plastic) and bought it. It is now in  my folks home in storage, but whenever I went home I had my my mom help me (to her utter disgust.)

Photo taken of me in Seoul, S.Korea of cupping/blood letting.

I see some of my students come to class with their necks scraped raw. They were probably coming down with something and their folks used scraping to release the "bad chi". It really works. I have seen people use the lids from their Tiger Balm for scraping and I have 2 little tools for scraping/acupressure massage, one that is wood and the other stone.

Any of the above treatments can be done at home, the Chinese Medicine Doctor or the neighborhood traditional massage place of business (not to be confused with other types of massage places).

Traditional Chinese Medicine Part 2: Menstrating in Taiwan

Every ladies favorite topic of conversation (not really) but it does come up eventually (no pun intended). Ok there are no tampons here with applicators you have to buy the little "O-b's". The ladies here do not like to insert alien objects into their bodies no matter how convenient it is and this is not  a culture of swimmers (its the rare adult who knows how to swim well), so really there is no need for tampons. Thus there is only one kind of tampon to chose from. When I lived in Taipei I literally had to draw a diagram to show my co-workers how to insert a tampon (that was not the only diagram I drew for her, haha). When I went home for Chinese New Year, I brought back a hug ziplock bag stuffed with 'heavy' applicator tampons (who needs a tampon when its a 'light' day?) There are plenty of maxi pads to choose from, from all sizes, the night time ones are like adult diapers (Depends).

Better yet, when my co-worker (who just happens to be from Denver) went back to the Mile High City I had her pick up a bag of tricks from my folks. I had my folks go to Whole Foods or Vitamin Cottage and buy me a "Diva Cup". While my poor Dad was stuck buying it for me he ran into my friend who said she would give me a box of her "Instead" a disposable kind of Diva Cup. So I went through a box of "Instead" before I tried the "Diva Cup". The insertion still takes some getting used to. I have to roll it up and stuff it in and it seems to unroll in the process and its not pleasant, but better than inserting toxic cotton used with bleach purposely to induce more bleeding for corporate profit.  And then there is the whole business of taking it out. The vagina naturally suctions th cup into place as it collects the blood, so you have to pull and tug to get it our and when you do, its like a little BOOM of an explosion. With the "Instead" you just throw it away, but with the Diva Cup you dump it in the toilet, rinse it in the sink and reinsert, lessons my carbon footprint after years of maxi pads and tampons.

Taiwanese women during their period are more concerned with internal health, keeping the belly warm by eating warming foods.  Anything red, red beans, red dates (for the immune system), red jujube are added to stews or drunk in tea with warming ginger. Of course black sesame oil has a powerful heating effect and is added to foods. There is a sesame chicken soup, Doreen told me about that I made. Heat some ginger and garlic in alot of sesame oil, add half a bottle of rice wine, half water, add chicken, boil, simmer til all alcohol gone, add a dash of some dark brown sugar and salt to taste. Taiwanese women also add some fermented long grain sticky rice to their soup. Doreen likes a spoonful on a poached egg. I bought some made of the purple rice. Anything fermented is healthy for the immune system and intestinal flora. A Taiwanese women would defiantly not eat or drink anything cold during her period. Her period, like the time after a woman gives birth is an ample opportunity to assist the body in renewing herself. So when the period is finished it is time to eat '4 things soup.'

Here the young women refer to their period as "M.C." . The medical term is 月經 yue(4ht) jing(1st). More derogatory is  your "big aunt (mother's sister)" 大 姨媽  da (4st) yi(2nd) ma(4th), speaking of which I am still amazed at how many Chinese words there are for aunt! Father sister, uncle's wife, wife of father's elder brother, wife of father's younger brother, about 8 different words for different kinds of aunts, everyone has their place in a Confucius society, and then English only has one word "aunt".

There are stories and I have seen it myself with my friend, who before giving birth were weak, not very strong, fragile or just average health and then after giving birth and having that month of having been (force) fed stews of meat with Chinese medicine, now they have radiant health, vibrant, looking better than before. I try to do a little of that every month.

Whats in a name

Hi my name for a few weeks was  貝 凯 言(Bei Kai Yan). 貝 (4th)  is a shell and a radical and pictograph for "money".  凯Kai (3rd) means "victory" and 言 Yan (2nd) is "speech, words". It sort of sounds like my real name.

My name used to be 杜 言 艷, until a friend told me it was the name of a "lady of the night'/Chinese stripper/ancient Chinese consort name so of course I had to change my Chinese name again. But then all my other Taiwanese friends said they definitely did not get that feeling from that name, so I went back to it.

Finding a Chinese name has been an interesting process and I have learned a lot about characters and how Taiwanese people find a name, their first impression when they hear it, etc.

 

In Chinese, the family name is first xìng 姓 = surname (specifically a paternal surname), followed by the given name míng 名 or míngzì 名字. Chinese also have a nickname chuòhào 绰号. When they are born their parents usually give them a 'milk name' rŭmíng 乳名 before deciding on their personal name after consulting an astrologer.


A lot of foreigners get their Chinese name based on the sounds of their western name. I have always believed the meaning of a name has the power to ordain or preordain someones destiny or identity, if they realize this or not. Chinese people think along the same lines as me and names are so important they will consult an astrologer/numerologist to come up with the most auspicious name. Also there is also the whole business of how it sounds, the number of strokes the character has, if a name is being passed down the family and like us, if it will be ridiculed by their classmates in school.


I had  a great idea for my daughter's name Zhen-Ya, but my Taiwanese friends preferred it Ya-Zhen, as it sounds better to their ear and I have to take their word for it.  Astrology and numerology aside, my daughter's was easier to come up with a Chinese name. I liked the meaning of 'treasure' 珍zhen and her given name is 雅珍 (yazhen) 'elegant treasure'. She has been using that one for sometime now and as it is quite common I am debating whether to change it or not, but it does sound nice.

For myself, I decided to go more for the meaning than something than sounded like my English name (Kathy 卡蒂  kǎ dì). My former Chinese teacher Kevin helped me with my first Chinese name. I wanted something with mountains since I come from CO, but I like forests so I picked the very common surname of  林 (Lin) which makes sense since I was born a 'wood tiger'. He made my first name sounds like (jiayu) 嘉瑜 which is the opposite of yoga which is 瑜珈 (yu jia).  Thus my my first full Chinese name was 林嘉瑜  a kind of spin off of the more traditional 林 佳 玉 .Whenever I said 林嘉瑜   it it just felt wrong, so I knew eventually I would change it.

By own research I can up with Yan Yan 言 艷 (beautiful words).

• 言 yan  words, speech; speak, say 
• 艷  yan beautiful, sexy, voluptuous

It felt like "mine" and I confirmed with Doreen my friend (and language exchange partner) and she loves it too. In fact I wanted a whole new surname to go with it and we had it it down to two: 清 Qing and Du 杜 after the Tang dynasty poet 杜甫 .  The character 肚 means belly, to me the seat/core/gut of creative energy. But after other friends' responses I also do not want to give a bad impression, so I had nix this one too.


 So my new and improved Chinese name, which I love and hope this is the "one" is:

貝 凯 言

Here are some links I found if you do not have great Taiwanese friends:
http://www.chinesetools.eu/names/

http://csymbol.com/chinese_name.html

http://www.mandarintools.com/chinesename.html

http://goodcharacters.com/names/get_a_chinese_name.html


Like always, when in doubt ask your Taiwanese friends for advice.