Yesterday night (our second night in Taipei) was great - mama H and babydaddy and the bambina and I hit the night market for a peripatetic dinner - and then Buddha answered the request I made at the temple, which was for both me and baby to sleep the whole way through the night. Yeehoo!
Then today we hit the National Palace Museum before heading back on the bullet train to Kaohsiung.
Wild brother-in-law and I were discussing yesterday that there is a Buddhist relinquishing-of-self element to being a non-Chinese-speaking in-law on this kind of family vacation, because not only do you renounce all control as to what happens to you during the day (i.e. someone else is deciding the agenda) but you don't even know what is coming (you don't understand the conversation in which the agenda is being discussed, and there's no point in anyone translating the discussion for you, since you don't have agenda-decision-making power anyway). You therefore have the ability to predict maybe fifteen seconds into your own future, but beyond those fifteen seconds, it could be anything: dinner at an aunt's house, going to look at panda bears, buying dried squid parts, getting into the car - could be anything, you have no idea. A similar thing on a smaller scale happens when you go to the night market with babydaddy and wild mama H. for dinner: you are walking along minding your own business when all of a sudden something totally delicious and/or strange is shoved into your mouth and hey! look! I'm eating fish balls/Chinese churros/mochi rolled in sesame/papaya chunks! Disconcerting but lots of fun. It has been particularly enjoyable to watch babydaddy in food-rediscovery mode: he will see a particular yummy thing he hasn't had since he was very little and get very excited and have to have some RIGHT NOW and make me taste some as well RIGHT NOW and it's really, really sweet.
I totally love the whole night market thing: apart from the food, most of what is being sold is complete schlock (if you need HelloKitty thigh high stockings or a rhinestone I-pod case, it's the place for you) but I can forgive the schlock because the food aspect is so fantastic. It makes me very happy that it is so completely different from the U.S. (can you tell I am still traumatized from the McDonald's/getting-lost-in-a-shopping-mall experience?) There are few things more disheartening than travelling to the other side of the world and having it look just like where you came from, but by the same token, there are few things more fun/exciting than travelling across the world and seeing stuff that it is totally different, and I love that there are places where you can buy pigs' feet and wasabi and noodles (btw "pasta" in Mandarin is "Italy mien" hee.) out of a gigantic cauldron on the street.
Ennyways. This morning we packed up and taxi'ed to the National Palace Museum, which I just realized I am too sleepy to describe but was nice (my favourite I think either the miniature walnut shell carvings or the great big bronze happy Buddha or the ivory carved lunch pail or the big long scroll painting of the epic love story of some guy and a river nymph or the big painting of a dog by the Italian monk who ended up being a Chinese court painter) then lunch then train back to Kaohsiung then crazy fun/crowded/colorful night market for New Years' goodies then back to bed ok starting to ramble really really really tired. Babydaddy is doing his loud not-quite-snory breathing next to me, so will have to do some judicious and tactful poking to get him to roll over without actually waking him up. Wish me luck.
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