T.I.D.D. (Tone It Down..Doris)

Lately this has been the mantra of of John and I's relationship. I truly believe that I have naturally a happy person for the most part because I love to complain. Complaining is my way of getting all the "bad" stuff off my chest and usually the minute I finish complaining I feel great and I move on to the next thing I can complain about.

Lately, I think the heat added on with certain obstacles we are facing dealing with the bureaucracy of the Taiwanese government has gotten me complaining more than normal, to which, John's response has been..."TID...D"

But, dear readers, you be the judge of the following ridiculousness and tell me...would you not complain too if you were surrounded by such absurdity on a daily basis.

Blatant acts of thievery. Here is an Asian-wanna-be Steve Jobs fully in black turtleneck, jeans and ugly running shoes waving a pad (much like the iPad) but, instead, called the Action Pad. I mean do they know who they are dealing with? I am Apple's number one cheerleader. I get upset when someone says to me "I think the Android is better than the iPhone" I mean to lie so openly about the greatest product in the world is just blasphemy to my ears. So you can imagine my disgust and anger when I walked by an electronics store and saw this impostor in a Steve-Jobs trademarked black turtleneck.

ALLOTTED T.I.D.D TIME: 7 minutes

After finishing a not-so-delicious lunch of plain hot noodles on a 108 degree day I was walking back to my office and ran into this girl. Now, a little background on cross-streets in Taiwan is that when it is so hot outside most people tend to stay under the store awnings to not be in the sun. As I was standing there jammed next to what seemed like hundreds of people next to and behind me the one girl in front of me decided to pick her wedgie. Also, major cross streets in Taiwan also has an average of light times of 60-90 seconds. This particular cross street had a 60 second wait in which (I know, I know, I timed her) she started picking at about 48 seconds and continued down to 0. which means folks....she straight up dug all the way up in there for approximately 48 seconds of my life. She picked for so long I was able to find my phone in my HUGE purse. Type in my passcode to unlock my phone, open my Camera+ app, take 3 photos (best one shown here), and then upload it to FB. Now this may be a comment on how long she picked or it can be a comment on how fast I am on my iPhone...I'll let you decide. Either way, I wanted to throw up a little in my mouth.

ALLOTTED T.I.D.D. TIME:  5 minutes

Fourth of July. Since we moved to Taiwan in January John has been prepping me for how we would spend the Fourth of July....We would visit Taipei's ONLY Hooters and spend it eating buffalo chicken wings, drinking beers and watching some good old American baseball on TV. What I didn't expect was that upon arriving to Taipei's only Hooters we would also get a show. Apparently, in Taiwan the Hooters girls are trained in the art of hula hooping so instead of watching Sports, John and I spent the night with some friends watching a handful of not-so-endowed girls hula hoop their way around the restaurant.

ALLOTTED T.I.D.D. TIME: 10 minutes

Finally, my all time favorite for multiple, multiple reasons. The bathroom situation in Taiwan. The fact that these signs are listed almost everywhere is beyond my imagination. It is not uncommon for me to walk into any bathroom and see footprints on the toilet seat along with traces of splatter that obviously did not make it into the toilet bowl. It's super frustrating because my office doesn't provide toilet paper in the stalls so each company has to provide their own toilet paper to their employees and I usually grab a handful before I go to the bathroom and I still haven't learned to grab more than what is environmentally acceptable. then I get down there and realize that I have to use my meager amount of toilet paper to wipe the seat and then I'm left with only one option...walk back to the office for more toilet paper. I just wish people would sit on the seat and go like the seats were designed to do, and if they want to squat for whatever reason to then put the toilet seat up and squat on the inner bowl. Another thing about Taiwan bathrooms is the fact that everyone is AFRAID to throw dirty toilet paper into the toilet and instead throw toilet paper away in these little bins next to the toilet...you know what this means don't you? That means that in the dead of summer when 80% of public/private bathrooms are not air-conditioned and I work in a 12 Floor building with hundreds of offices that within a couple hours the bathrooms are filled with the smell of hot urine combined with poopy toilet paper. It's to the point that an article just came out pleading for citizens to start flushing their toilet paper rather than throwing them in garbage cans to help the city manage waste. SEE HERE. Those that know me well know that I have a very sensitive gag reflex and since moving here my gag reflex has gotten 100 times worse due to the fact that every time I have to use a public bathroom the heat and the smell combined makes me literally (not figuratively) throw up in my mouth. 

ALLOTTED T.I.D.D. TIME: 1 hour a day for the rest of our time here or until the Taiwanese government can get people to start flushing their toilet paper and start putting AC in bathrooms

But readers, as I said, I like to complain and let it all go...so let me leave you with a happy and pleasant thought. We recently had a good friend come and visit us in Taiwan on his way home from Shanghai to NY and we wanted to take him out to our favorite 快抄 restaurant. This place is always crowded and hard to get reservations but John managed to get us in. When we showed up the place was packed and they said the wait would be hours unless we were willing to sit outside. This was about four weeks ago before the heatwave hit and it was only about 89 degrees outside so we agreed. What we didn't realize was that they were going to set up a table next door to the restaurant inside a temple. And when I say inside the temple I mean you can literally see someone praying behind John. So, myself, the three boys and Liza sat and drank inside the temple while people prayed around us and had one of the better meals ever in Taipei. I doubt anywhere in the states would a restaurant get away with setting up shop in a church and letting people eat, drink and be merry for about 3 hours...no I don't think they would!

Too Wanderlusted to Post

Dear Readers, let me start off by saying "my bad" totally haven't been posting like I should on the tales of Doris the Exploris this last month. But that doesn't mean we haven't been busy. Thanks to global warming and the daily average temperature being over 100  degrees John and I have spent most week nights indoors staying cool and I've even managed to get John to start watching season 8 of Grey's Anatomy and I have never seen my husband of 12 years laugh and cry and laugh again in less than 45 minutes (the length of the show)

However, the weekend warriors in us have been hiking in PingLing (平林)

And also spending a day at the beach in BaiShaWan (白沙灣) which has been quite nice.

I will say that all this "outdoor" activity time has not gotten John or myself any tanner or any closer to winning "you've had a great summer" award. We are as pale as ever mostly due to our fear that this close to the equator will get us so burned that we end up wearing SPF 2,042 every time we do anything outdoorsy.

We've also been babysitting our friends cat while he is back stateside and although I have never owned a pet I will say that I've fed Tripod and Datou twice and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be...however, I will admit I have yet to clean the kitty litter. John has been but in charge of poop duty.

Aus(some)tralia Part Deux

Part two is going to be heavy on all the eating/drinking/fun we had on this trip.

Victoria Room. One of the best meals ever. John and I sat in a little corner table that had a victorian lamp and chairs. We shared a beet salad, pork belly, barramundi, mushrooms and had wine. 

And by sharing wine I mean I had wine and John drank beer :)

I typically am not a huge dessert person. I've always preferred salty foods over sweet foods but I have never in my 34 years tasted a molten chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream as decadent and flawless as this one. I think in the 12 years I've known John this may be the only time I have eaten more than my 1/2 of the dessert. Typically, I take a bite and leave the rest to my better half but with this dessert I think I conquered 3/4 of it without even blinking.

 Needless to say, John felt like a pimp daddy for 1. picking out such a dope restaurant and 2. ordering such a pimp meal.


We were also in Australia during Cinqo de Mayo so we spent the afternoon at this amazing little pub called Harts Pub where we got paddles of beers for 10 Australian Dollars which was such a deal.

Although I think the bartender was a little frightened by John's pants.

 We also took this walking tour through Sydney. It was actually really fun and informative and we met some great people along the way...

 After the 3 hour tour we actually went to a bar down the street and had a couple beers with this 60+ year old Irish couple, this 30 year old Portuguese couple, this Chilean boy, and a Welsh med student. It was funny hearing why everyone was in Sydney and where they were headed to next. My favorite part of the conversation was when the Portuguese couple said they had just finished a 3 month stint through Asia and had flown here from China and I asked them how it was...
PG: Portuguese Girl
PB: Portuguese Boy
ME: Me

ME: "how did you like China"
PG: "It was good. I mean we were there for a month and uh, it was ok. and uh well there were a lot of people. We were uh there for uh long time..."
PB: (cuts her off and says) "she hated it. she is being polite"
PG: (all awkward) "well no I didn't hate it, it was very very different...and uh...."
ME: "don't worry I hated living there too. I'm from Taiwan"
PG: "oh, ok. Yes, yes, I hated it."

amazing conversation.

This was a pig donated and put in front of Sydney's first hospital (which coincidentally was built by three liquor salesmen) the story goes you throw your coin in the pig fountain and rub the snout for good luck...but as you can see by the photo people apparently were rubbing something other than the snout. Then the money is collected at the end of the year and donated to the hospital.

Here's John and I trying to take a photo of ourselves at the Botanical Gardens. Didn't work out so great. Plus we had to run out of there shortly after this picture was taken as the sun was going down and the park suddenly filled with very loud cries from very large birds that we did not recognize. (yes we are very wimpy for two adventurers)

I still can't get over how beautiful the Sydney Harbor is. The bridge, the opera house. it is all just amazing. I could spend hours just sitting by the Harbor people watching.

Here we are again taking every photo-op to capture the Sydney Harbor. I think at some point John wished I wasn't Asian and fitting the stereotype of taking way too many photos. But I couldn't help it, it was just so beautiful.

I mean seriously...this is a postcard. Not something I saw with my own eyes. On a different note. During our tour we learned an interesting fact about the Opera House. The Danish architect Utzon won the global competition to design the opera house and his design was so grand that the projected 4 years it was scheduled to build the opera house ended up taking from 1957 - 1973. But sometime in 1966 the Australian government stopped paying Utzon as the project was still not complete so Utzon had to take his family and leave Australia. Eventually the opera house was built and Utzon died in 2008 never having laid eyes on his final masterpiece. Kinda sad but what a great way to be remembered.

Me at Darling Harbor. Didn't like Darling Harbor (too touristy) as much as Circular Quay but since it had such a darling little name I had to have my picture taking by it.

Another amazing meal in Sydney. This time at The Almond. A Syrian restaurant serving creamy hummus with almonds, toasted, roasted, spiced and dressed in multiple ways.

A miniature replica of the entire city under glass and we got to walk over it seeing the entire city in miniature size.


Last but not least a shout out to my new husbs. After an exhausting day we came home and he said to get ready for bed as he had a surprise for me. As I laid down in bed he turned on the TV right when The Notebook was starting. Le Sigh. Great Hotel room, RG on TV, and hubbies next to me. A girl couldn't ask for much more.

Aus(some)tralia

John and I recently returned from Australia. It was a work trip that we also turned into a belated honeymoon. I had to say that I had no idea how much I would love Australia until I spent a day there. Sydney and Melbourne are vastly different but yet similar. John and I had a fun time debating back and forth as to which we liked better. In the end, Sydney won my heart over Melbourne (although only by the teeny tiniest amount) and Melbourne won John's heart. Here is a quick recap of our trip.

Day one. Breakfast in Darlinghurst. Cute cafe called Fountain Cafe. Had a delicious ham and cheese croissant with a long black (their version of black coffee). It was a gorgeous sunny day.

Afterwards I took a walk through the Botanical Gardens in Sydney and didn't know that I would stumble onto an overlook that gave me this view of the Sydney opera house. Literally felt like a story book picture. Blue skies, clear water and the opera house looking like an enormous sailboat across the harbor.

I also happened to stumble upon a little sailboat called Oscar. I had to take a photo and upload it since my darling girl Megs is an avid reader and her little boy is named Oscar. it was so nice having a little piece of home with me even as far away as I was in Sydney.

That night we decided to have dinner around our neighborhood so we took a long 2 hour walk to check out all the places that looked interested and when it was settled between 2 John gave me the final say. I decided on The Owl House. It was quiet, quaint and quite adorable. we sat down and there were only 3 people working
1. The Maitre D
2. The Sommelier
3. The Chef
Our server/sommelier was a super friendly man who asked us where we were from. Now this has got to be the smallest world ever as he is from New York, lived in Williamsburg and worked at 49th and 6th (My first job in NY was on 49th and 6th) Either way, after he learned where we were from we were showered with amuse bouche and dessert and dessert wine all one the house. It was seriously fantastic.

 The Rock is a neighborhood in Sydney that is one of the oldest. It was built literally on top of a rock so many of the buildings and passageways are all used from the rock. After a few years when it was built a long long time ago people living on the rock were getting super frustrated that they had to climb an enormous rock just to get to the other side that they ended up blasting through the rock and creating a bridge/tunnel.

Photo of the tunnel it was gorgeous. We walked through during sunset and it was so weird to get to the other side of the tunnel and see this....

Yes, a beautiful Maple tree turning colors but in May....ha ha ha our first evidence that Australia truly is completely opposite of the Northern Hemisphere.

 While at the Rock we also saw The Hero of Waterloo. One of Sydney's oldest bars and the best was the story that came with it. Men used to come in here and get pissed drunk and they would always offer one free pint for every pint that was bought so men loved it. Rumor has it that those that passed out at the bar would wake up in the basement and find themselves sold to a ship leaving and became workers on that ship. Good thing I stopped John after 3 beers.

These birds were everywhere throughout Sydney. They are like NYC pigeons but 20X larger! Below are a few of the city shots we took. Sydney was truly a beautiful city with amazing architecture...enjoy.