Martial Arts and Chilling with the Natives

Well this weekend was pretty interesting.  As a group, we visited the cities of Yilan and Hualien.  At Yilan, we stayed on a farm that was "so nature."  This place was subsidized by the government to establish an area where students had an obligation to learn about the environment.  We did these DIY projects which I personally felt were geared more towards someone who may be about 17 years younger then I am right now.  While the sky lanterns were kind of cool, it didn't help the fact that all the other people making the lanterns were these families with extremely young children.  I felt they were somewhat a waste of time, and would have preferred to just go out in the area and explore on our own. However, the one redeeming factor in all of this was the martial arts demonstration.

I was first told by the New Zealander on the farm, Jerry, about this demonstration that evening.  I was really excited since this would be the first instance of seeing martial arts since I have been in Taiwan.  The martial arts demonstration was more traditional compared to what I do, which is more contemporary.  I volunteered to go up to kick a bag and managed to send the bag flying with an extremely fast jumping kick.  I am actually kind of sad that no one got a picture of it, because they said I kicked way too fast.  After the whole demonstration, Dr Liu insisted that I perform a short demonstration as well.  I obliged since why not? I have done this for 11 years, have taught my martial art for some years now and can basically perform it on a whim.  I introduced myself all in Chinese, which really seemed to make a lot of people in the crowd very happy, probably because they did not expect it.  I performed an improvised 長拳和南拳 routine and everyone was apparently really into it.  I was really in the zone when I was performing and paid very little attention to my surroundings save for making sure I didn't hit anything in my general vicinity.  According to everyone afterwards, the other martial arts students were gawking at me and their master was yelling along with my form.  What I was most impressed was that the Master was very into me performing.  Traditionally, I know many martial arts masters do not approve of foreigners learning the Chinese martial arts, especially crashing a performance their school is conducting.  I thought that whole experience was very cool and have no regrets performing their.

In Hualien, the biggest stop on our itinerary was going to see an aboriginal performance.  I had very mixed feelings about it.  On one hand, I wanted to learn more about the indigenous culture of the island.  On the other hand, I felt the performance was not a very accurate representation.  Similar to Native Americans in the United States, their culture has become commercialized in an attempt to simply make money.  I am not sure if I learned anything that was honestly the truth.  Although it was fun to participate in the show twice and I did get to practice my Chinese with the performers.

I am very sick and tired of the sheer large amount of seafood that I have engorged myself on since I have been to Taiwan.  If there is anything I miss about the United States is the diversity of food that I can experience.  I will get an extremely large steak when I get back and douse myself in greasy goodness like a good American.

I am entering my last week in Taiwan.  There is so much I still want to do but I don't know if I can.  My biggest concern is that I will never be able to experience the Taiwanese night life.  I really want to go to a bar/ club, mingle with the locals more and have more downtime to explore.  I find it completely ridiculous that our dorm locks its doors at 11:30pm.  I am 21, a grown man and am fully capable of taking care of myself and others if need be.  I have learned over the years that binge drinking is a terrible idea and I really just want to go out late at night to compare it to my experiences in the United States.  Are young people here just as belligerent and irresponsible like in the United States, or are they more responsible and reserved?  There are so many things I want to know about people my age here that is being stifled.  There is a large chunk of Taiwan that I am unable to experience due to the rigid schedule and due the fact that the place we are staying at keeps a tight leash on us as if we are pre-teens with daddy issues.  If anything, this may force me to come back on my own time so I can experience the part of Taiwan that is systematically being denied to me.

That being said, in the coming days I will try to experience all I can so that I can get as much out of this trip as possible.  These three weeks were just a small taste of all that I can experience if I were to come back in the future.  And knowing me, I will most definitely come back.