New Customs & More Random Musings

Why would I choose to publish my most recent post on a Monday morning in the US? Well, if the handful of you that regularly read this thing are anything like me, the first thing you do on Monday morning in the office is check the internets to make sure they are still functioning properly. And in this age of "social media", that most likely involves at least a cursory glance at Facebook. And where do I alert those of you that haven't figured out Blogger's reading list functionality? That's right, on Facebook. Here's to 5 minutes of procrastination before you begin your work day....

What is this, you might ask? Its one of two items I was greeted with around lunch time by one of my co-workers today. Apparently, new Taiwanese parents share gifts with friends/colleagues/co-workers when their newborns reach the one month mark. All the folks on our procurement team got a boxed lunch and what you see above.

The gift actually depends on the sex of the baby. So, I pose a question to you guys: what sex do you think my friend Ray's baby is? (This isn't a trick question people; but for those of you lacking intuition/imagination on this Monday morning, the answer is at the bottom of the post....)

Thanks Ray for the tasty lunch and inspiration to write this blog post!

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And once again, because I'm too lazy to put together an entire blog post on one single subject, here are a few more pictures and captions.....

A work colleague and I were headed back from lunch the other day when the subject of loose change came up. He pointed out that in the US, a penny is a pretty useless thing. As in, you can't even use one in a vending machine. Well, despite 1 NT being the rough equivalent of .03 cents, you can in fact use an NT dollar in vending machines. Gotta be honest, I think my friend has a point. Why bother minting a coin that can't even be used to buy a Coke?

OK, here's an easy question for you guys: What do you see pictured above?

If you answered a pint of Haagen-Dazs vanilla ice cream, you'd only be 50% correct. This, friends, is one ridiculously expensive pint of Haagen-daas vanilla ice cream. I dropped $330NT on this bad boy the other night. $11.40 US for a damn pint of ice cream. Talk about sticker shock. (For those of you that are into Where's Waldo?, yes, that is a bag of tortilla chips in the background. To be continued........)

Luckily, I was in a good mood, because I had seen this earlier......


...."want to touch the hiney!!!"

***Two red-dyed eggs. According to my co-workers, parent's of baby girls bring cake to work. Go figure!

It Seems They Are Following Me.....

So I'm walking along the other day minding my own business and what do I glimpse out of the corner of my eye? A damn porpoise statue! You can even see the smirk on the top one's face.....

#1 Thing I Don't Miss About Texas: The highly random and unfortunate encounters with porpoises (Porpoise Incident, or PI for short) that occur once every 100+ years and involve me and my Old Man and Jack Dog.....

I promise the next post might have something involving a complete thought and/or description of an experience I've had here recently (I was in Hong Kong this past weekend, so its not like I have a shortage of experiences to share....) Call me a cheap-post blogger, but there are at least a few of you who will see this and laugh. And JD just might have a twinge of regret that he won't get to experience the post-PI medical treatment again..... For those of you not familiar with the post-PI medical treatment, ask me to explain the whole story to you over a beer.

Eat some Tex-Mex for me.....

The Picture Post, Part I

Yes. I am lazy. But you should already know that. I have decided that a post comprised mainly of pictures would be a lot easier for me to author and a lot more entertaining to read. Besides, "a picture is worth a thousand words", right?

Presented in no particular order (and no, I won't be challenging any of you amateur/quasi-professional photographers anytime soon. Nor do I care that my pictures look like I have barely mastered the shutter button.....)

This just in: Taipei 101 is tall. The building to the right is the Hyatt, my home for two weeks, and a 20+ story building that is utterly dwarfed by what is now the 2nd tallest building in the world. Eventually, I'll get up to the observatory to snap a picture, but there was a 30 person line the one time I thought about heading up there. My patience has not improved that dramatically in two weeks...



Not exactly what comes to mind when I think of "Playboy".

I thought an Asian Zoo would have a significantly better chance of having a Tibetan Fox in captivity than its American counterparts, so I decided to check out the one in Taipei. Who was I kidding? That smug SOB would off himself before getting relegated to a zoo. I was pleasantly surprised to discover a species I didn't know existed, however.....














...the "jackass penguin". I think the folks at Anheuser-Busch sold themselves short with normal penguins in the late-nineties Bud Ice commercials.


The folks at the Taipei Zoo clearly understand the "durian" doesn't fall under the same category as normal fruit....


They didn't get the name right, but hell, who cares? They have tots here! Lozano, what say you to Corn Dog Day 2012, Taiwan style?


Cock in a tree; literally.....

So, every convenience store I've visited in Taiwan has at least two things. Hot dogs and tea-boiled eggs. The hot dogs I don't mind; the eggs (although apparently delicious according to my Taipei colleagues) have a distinct smell I don't find particularly pleasant.

This, friends, is a grilled chicken for sale in Hsinchu, a city south of Taipei. Interesting display strategy....

Apparently this bar is having a bit of an identify crisis. Buy 1, get 3 free sales are generally reserved for fireworks stands, are they not? (That's a rhetorical question: I can safely say I've spent more time and money at firework stands across America than anyone reading this blog....)

To be continued......

Sex Panther II? Not a Chance!

I cannot read this traditional mandarin sign, but whatever it says, I don't believe a single word of it. There is nothing "Special" about this "offer."

This, friends, is durian, a fruit native to Southeast Asia. It has an odor so strong it could singe the nose hairs off a skunk at more than 100 feet.

I think I'm with the folks in Singapore on this one. See below for a sign found in one of their MRT (subway) stations:

If there's one thing I would change about the Singaporean policy, it would be to add a fine to those found possessing this fruit.....At least the same as the flammable goods penalty. Fire, when handled responsibly, is a good thing. I'm not sure I can same the same thing about our friend durian.

First Impressions

...... And I thought pirate stores were only found in beach towns.

Well, I've been in Taiwan for a week now, and there is no shortage of material to write about. In order not to completely bore and/or overwhelm you, the reader, I thought I'd make some attempt at organizing my blog in a manner consistent with the timeline of my stay over here.

(Rather than allowing this to simply become a forum for the random musings, thoughts, and jokes that I tell myself on a regular basis. It must seem strange to a local Taiwanese person to see a 6'2" bald guy from Texas in ostrich skin boots laughing at seemingly nothing on a busy crosswalk in the middle of the downtown business district. If nothing else, hopefully this blog will allow you to somewhat see Taipei through my lens....)

So, with that in mind, I thought I'd start with my trip over here and provide a brief overview of the basics.....

The flight:

Son of a bitch; 13 hours is a long time to spend on a plane. I watched more movies on my flight from LA to Taipei (4 or 5; I honestly lost count....) than I have in the last two years combined. That's right, I'm so ADHD in my old age that I can't sit still for 1.5 hours more than once or twice a year. I flew EVA airlines and other than great service and lots of movies, the only other thing worth noting about the flight is the in-flight shopping. Apparently there are good deals on inter-continental flights (you don't have to pay duties on what you purchase) because my fellow travel companions bought a seemingly unnecessary amount of cologne and perfume.

The hotel:
So, upon my arrival in Taipei I was greeted at the airport by someone from the Hyatt who knew my name (or maybe he was just smart enough to presume that the only white guy walking towards the airport exit at 10:30 pm that night was a certain "Mr. Pavlic".) Either way, I was happy that he showed me to a waiting Mercedes Benz that Dell graciously paid $80 (American) to shuttle me from the airport to the hotel. My actual hotel room and the stay at the Hyatt were quite unremarkable after the ride in the Benz from the airport. About the only thing worth noting is that a good percentage of the ceilings in my room were 7 feet tall. When the ceiling is less than a foot from the top of your head, it sucks. Trust me.

The people:
I honestly can't exaggerate how friendly the Taiwanese people are; everyone goes out of their way to be polite and I'm actually surprised when people don't smile. Being a native of East Texas, I think I know a thing or two about southern hospitality and friendly folks. But, as a foreign citizen in an unfamiliar country, I was not expecting this level of hospitality from the locals. Remarkably gracious people.

The food:
Before I traveled over here, many of the Taiwanese folks I know at Dell and other places commented that Taipei has awesome food. After my brief time here, I can do nothing but agree with this sentiment. Given my inability to speak Mandarin, I'm basically relegated to pointing at pictures of food (at restaurants with no English). Even so, I've really enjoyed almost all the meals I've had here. Japanese and various forms of chinese food dominate the scene here, but there is a smattering of everything. When I find something that is particularly noteworthy (ie good Tex-mex, which let's be honest, won't happen), I'll be sure to report it.

See below for an example of how I document a particularly good dish (one of my co-workers is pointing out the menu item I had for lunch that day.)

The traffic:

Two things: lots of traffic cops with whistles and/or batons, and scooters. Suffice to say scooters will eventually get their own blog entry..... But in the interim, you can safely assume this guy won't be driving in Taipei anytime soon. I have neither the patience nor the skill to avoid injuring myself or the other motorists on the roads of Taipei.

I'll leave you with this little gem from the local Sogo department store..... Special thanks to the random lady who was kind enough to let me capture her little one in a picture......

Now you can probably understand Jack Dog's refusal of the assignment in Taiwan. His sources in Taipei obviously made him aware of the perils of city life. You might just end up being humiliated......