At last the day arrived for me to head out on my adventure to China. There have been so many things that just seemed to guide my path towards China; Peter living in Taiwan, having Chinese speaking grandchildren and so the list goes on. The final plus for my journey is that Peter came out for the weekend of the 20 August and I was able to fly back to Taiwan with him before starting my job in China. I have a confession to make! I had a glass of wine on the plane and never thought one glass could make one inebriated …. Say no more!

I remember the first time we visited Taiwan in 2006 and experiencing such a culture shock. Besides the people looking different, the number of people, the busyness, the street lights, the number of scooters were all a big shock compared to South Africa where we are so used to wide open spaces.

Taiwan used to be cheap for us 4 NTD (New Taiwanese Dollars) used to equal R1 in 2006… so we’d divide by 4 to gt the rand equivalent. A few years later we divided by 3 and now we divide by 2 .. It is now longer cheap here because of the devaluation of the rand.

Peter lives in the south of Taiwan in a town called Jiali, which translated means ‘at home’.

I haven’t seen any other white people, usually referred to as laowai (foreigners). Family is very important to the Chinese and the focus is on the good of the family and the ‘bigger group’ as opposed to the individualism of the West. Peter’s in-laws are very good to him and to me when I’m here.

On Thursday I had quite an experience taking the grandchildren by bus to the neighbouring city of Tainan. Bear in mind that very little English is spoken here and the bus signs are all in Chinese. Thank goodness for the internet. I phoned Peter who linked me up to a map so I found my way (with the help of a taxi as well who I showed where I wanted to go. We went to see a Japanese film called Koba and thank goodness it was an English version of the film. Good for me but not so good for the grand-children.

On Friday night the whole family went out for dinner. After having said that I’m not a fussy eater, the first plate of food was placed on the table. ….. chicken feet! Now that is something that I haven’t ever wanted to eat but Peter encouraged me to be adventurous and I was pleasantly surprised. However I didn’t eat the toes.

At the night market

On Thursday evening, we walked to the night market.

Saturday morning at the indoor pool and spa