Outsourcing Our Kitchen 廚房外包

Beef Noodle Soup! (牛肉麵!)

"So, what do you cook?"

This is a question Ping gets asked all the time when the locals learn that we've moved to Beitou from the United States. As we've mentioned before, Taiwan is all about food, so people are very curious to find out what we like to eat--and, particularly, what kind of food we cook for ourselves.

Always Coming Home 回家

Imagine being awakened by a 6.6 earthquake and having to play Super Mario Cart between [stationary] Fiat-sized boulders on the road and negotiate detours around washed out bridges. Imagine standing on a windy hill at the edge of a massive thunderstorm with thunder rolling loudly all around. Imagine sampling "horse milk wine" in a yurt, and eating more mutton in two weeks than you'd eaten in the previous 20 years combined. Imagine that all of this happens in the space of a couple of weeks...

...because it did.

Repacking 重新打包

One of the things about being on the move is that you learn what you really need. When we moved to California from Oregon, we did some pretty serious downsizing, but we still had boxes and boxes.

We moved to Taiwan with two pallets and the luggage you see here. We actually could have left a few things behind, but some things we left behind really should have come along.

GuanYin Shan - A Little Help From Our Friends 觀音山

Across the Danshui River （淡水 河） from where Ping's parents live, there is a beautiful mountain named after the great goddess GuanYin （觀

音). We've often thought about what it must be like up on top of it and we knew there were trails going up there. When we decided to finally hike it, we learned again how people help each other around here. It seems like you're never really a total stranger.

It's FRUIT, Right? 吃點水果

A mystery has been solved! There is an anatomical difference between the Taiwanese and everyone else on the planet! NOW, we understand. We need to evolve accordingly. This is a really good thing.

Let us explain:

We've Been To Rivendell 魔戒的世界

This is Rivendell. Great walls rise on all sides of us. The trail weaves in and out of dense woods, one moment hidden deep in primeval forest, the next traversing a windy cliff on a narrow path cleaved from the rock where a misstep could mean certain death.

Yet the Elves did not carve these stone passageways. Neither did the Dwarves.

A Little Help From My Friends 處處遇貴人

Almost anywhere you go around here, you find massive trees. Some reach clear across the street, often with aerial roots hanging down like ragged beards. When two or three of these giants stand close together, you can't tell which branches belong to which trunk.

In many ways, these huge trees are a metaphor for life in Taiwan.