26th to 1st
February
Referring
back to last week’s posting when I was mentioning myself and Paul’s family were
coincidentally all sick the following day, we seem to pinpoint the culprit to
the oysters we ate.
I found
this out when I went to the school on Tuesday to finish off some work and Paul
was mentioning this too me. I’m now
almost too afraid to eat seafood, but of course that’s a foolish response. I
began feeling nausea around Sunday noon with a headache and it just progressed
from there. All through the night I was
sick and then in bed all day Monday.
Tuesday
Today is
the first day of feeling almost back to my normal self after being in bed since
early evening Sunday. It really is not
fun being sick.
Well what I
am about to say has never happened to me here.
On my way home from school I stopped off at my favourite small Thai
eatery to get a Thai Milk Tea. The owner now simply puts up 1 finger or 2
fingers and I reply with the number I want…haha
Anyway as
I’m standing there waiting for him to prepare the tea, I noticed this one guy
who got up from one of the tables and walked over to where an older woman was
preparing onion pancake. He brought back
to the table quite a substantial amount of these pancakes and handed one
package over to the owner as he was preparing my tea then he turned to me (his
face maybe 12 inches away) and with his open smile (mouth/gums/lips/teeth
completely red and disgusting looking) spoke in broken English, “here for you,
very tasty.”
Let me
first say the reason his mouth area looked like that is because he was chewing
on these types of palm nuts that the men like to chew on (similar to chewing
tobacco) and they excrete a reddish colour when chewed. And secondly, I was somewhat taken back that
a total stranger offered me some item he just purchased AND he spoke English to
me. I politely declined his offer but it
was still quite remarkable to experience.
Not to sound rude but it would have been a great photo of his face so
you could see what a startling look it was up close especially when you were
not expecting this.
It’s the
end of the day and my headache has returned with the feeling of not being
hungry. This (what I’m sure of) food
poisoning I think is still lingering.
Wednesday to Sunday
I am taking
some online courses for the TESL certification, so in my now ‘free’ time, I am
being a student. These are 2 five-week
courses and I’m just finishing up week 3 of the first course. I need to somewhat get ahead as in a couple
weeks my sister arrives and that week I will be traveling almost exclusively
with no use of a computer near me.
Other than
this I continue riding the scooter to the Oceanside everyday just to feel the
breeze, smell the different scent of air and to relax with a latte. I usually stay maybe half hour then I ride
back to the apartment and continue on with what I left off with.
Continue to
frequent the breakfast eatery, which is just steps from the apartment and I
hand over the change and voila…my breakfast arrives within minutes. I always order the same so it’s not difficult
for them to know what I want..haha
This past
week Lee and I went to two new eateries that we hadn’t been to before and both
very close to the apartment and each of them will be receiving more than one visit
from me in the future. The best wonton
soup I’ve ever tasted at the one and the best dim sum I’ve tasted at the other
and both of these eateries are simply small places just off the side of the
street.
At one
place we went, we were just being served some dim sum and then suddenly next to
the eatery, a police siren goes off and then within seconds we hear more and
more sirens then a rush of police cars converging at the intersection and all
following one another down one of the streets.
I counted 6 police cars in total but there could have been more. There was a lot of excitement in and around
the eatery as people were watching in a daze and bewilderment as all this was
unfolding. There were also two police
officers standing at the intersection directing/stopping traffic in all
directions. Lee said it was probably
some sort of police exercise in training for an emergency. Whatever it was it sure scared the crap out
of many bystanders nearby, including me.
Weather has
been quite nice during the day with temperature hovering around 21/22C with
morning temperatures around 16/17C. I
guess I better not get too use to this ideal weather as it will be changing for
the hotter in the next month or so.
In about
one week now my sister and her husband will be arriving here so it will be two
non-stop hectic weeks I’m sure. Speaking
of arrival, Nicholas will be arriving back here on 2nd February so I
will catch up with him after he has adjusted to his sleep pattern. I have some planned items I want to take care
of before my sister arrives and Nicholas will assist me with these small tasks.
The one
main task is to take the scooter back to where it was purchased and find out
why this guard came off and to have them replace it. Nicholas was the actual contact person a year
ago when Michelle and Mario purchased the scooter and the shop owners/mechanics
know Nicholas.
Sunday Night
Just
returned from having a great Vietnamese dinner.
It was planned to have Thai but the Thai eatery was closed so we went
for Vietnamese. Great food, so not a big
deal in having that as a second choice.
After
dinner I wanted to go across the street to see a department style store. This is a store that has everything, similar
to our dollar stores.
Well, I
picked up a plastic bucket of sorts that I want to use for the recyclable items
and after walking around and around, I chose what I thought was the best bet
but still wasn’t happy with what I got but oh well, it’s better than nothing.
As we
exited the store, I noticed exactly what I wanted on a shelf outside. Not sure why I didn't’ notice them upon
entering but I think it’s because I only decided while in the store that I
wanted this.
Lee took
the one piece that we previously purchased along with the one we wanted to
exchange it for. I’m waiting just
outside and then Lee returns with the new pail that I wanted plus some some
thing that I had no idea what it was and he said it’s some sort of candy but he
had to buy it. I asked why would he have
to buy it and it’s because the store will not give a refund in currency if
there is a difference in price. The
original pail I got was $60NTD and the one we exchanged it for was $50 but the
store clerk would not give back the $10NTD but instead had to purchase
something worth $10NTD…hahaha
I thought
that was quite funny.
Bottom line
is that I have my recycle pail.
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