Yesterday Ying came to visit, and in showing her around Yilan I realized again how small it is - we walked around most of it in an afternoon, while also taking Todao the puppy for a romp by the river. I was also reminded that one of the best things about living here is the opportunity for random encounters. In the short walk from the train station to our apartments we passed people dancing (mostly hip-hop) in the park and a huge line in front of a temple - apparently waiting to record prayers on the tape-players that everyone had brought with them. We've stumbled upon Buddhist cooking classes and puppeteers practicing their maneuvers inside gigantic general costumes. What makes these encounters special is that we are frequently invited to participate. The other day on my way home, I saw the gardener carrying a flat of seedlings and asked if I could help him plant. He readily agreed, and we proceeded to put dozens of chrysanthemums in the patch of ground behind our apartments. It turns out that anyone living here can plant there, so I can start a vegetable garden soon! More snippets of the past few months...
As a sidenote, this is what I'll be doing next year. At the end of February I visited the program to interview, and had a really good time. On my last day we went canoeing on Lake Washington (here you can see some of my house-and-boat-mates, I was paddling in the front of the first boat). It was beautiful; can't wait to go back!
(photo credit: Shivani Patel)
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