Biking to Taichung Air Show Practice

7-18-14

I took a 1 1/2 hour bike ride to the end of the Tan-Zih Sugarcane bike path to my 

favorite spot near the three W.W. II tanks in Shalu near Taichung Airport. I wasn’t sitting on the shady platform more than a few minutes when I heard the roar of jets and saw five Mirages flying in formation overhead. Unbeknownst to me, the Taiwanese air force was practicing maneuvers over Ching Chuan Kang Air Base in Greater Taichung during a rehearsal for the base’s opening to the public tomorrow. I took a lot of videos 

with my cell phone but missed the most exciting. I could barely read The Way of All

Flesh or the newspaper I brought for the constant sonic disturbance. The practice went on for over an hour. I felt lucky to have been at the right place at the right time. I 

decided to ride to Shalu because of the shady flat bike path through Tan-Zih. The path starts at Bei-Tun Road (called Zhongshan Road at that point) just up from Ya-tan Road 

intersection. I have to take Tanxing Road turning left at the Han-Xi River bike path and follow the streets through Guangyang and Ren-ai Road across the grade level train 

crossing to get there. Once I was on the path, it was an easy cool ride. Up past the HSR overpass, a crew was laying down new asphalt and painting lines on the path but I just went around them. It seems like they’re always fixing that path; they should use better material. 

      After an hour of maneuvers the commercial jets started flying in to the civilian part of the air force space. I wondered what the passengers waiting in other cities must have thought when their flights to Taichung were delayed for almost two hours; the airlines probably weren't even told about the delay nor did they tell them about the delays they’ll experience tomorrow, the morning of the air show.

Nothing but a Hardy Book

7-5-14 6:50am Sat. (1)

     I'm sitting outside on the patio with Latte having a coffee and English muffin. The first week in July without American Eagle classes ended well with a scooter ride with leona to the Westside. We had lunch in Ding Tai Feng and then went food shopping in Top City getting all kinds of dairy and Mexican products you can't get anywhere but there, Costco, and Jasons's in Taichung, things like ricotta cheese, Emborg butter, sharp cheddar cheese, sour cream, nachos, refried beans, and salsa. Afterwards, Leona just had to go shopping in Far Eastern Dept. Store next door and left me on a couch in the basement waiting. She looked for me way after I got too bored to stay, found me coming back from a nine floor escalator trip, and took me to another boutique in the store. This boutique was at least interesting and had three or four antique English books on display as props for their clothes; a Greek New testament, volume four of a History of England, a third book, and the primo: The Collected Poems of Thomas Hardy, 1952 edition, hard bound. Beautiful! I offered to buy the book and save it from a bourgeois life as unread fodder. The salesgirl listened to Leona's request and called her boss. Her boss said 'no way.' Why? The company had bought books from a Japanese used book store. Leona bought a few blouses from them but I left disappointed. The only item in the entire department store that interested me, I couldn't buy. I wouldn’t have bought the blouses if they didn’t sell me the book, too.

Trip to Alishan and Fenchihu

6-30-14 6:07am Mon.

   

     Leona and I are going to Alishan this morning. We will take a taxi to the train (I'm not sure if it's Taiwan Railroad or HSR) and get off at the station down south to take the narrow-gauge railroad up the mountain. We will be there for three days and two nights. I won't bring this laptop but write notes freehand to write entry when we get back or find a hotel lobby computer to send myself the journal in an e-mail. 

    

7-4-14 8:06am Fri. (4)

      Leona and I had nice days in Alishan and Fenchihu but the evenings and nights weren’t so great. That was so because the first night in Alishan, the beds were so hard that we could hardly sleep. There was no though of making love or partying. The second night, the bed in Fenchihu was softer but Leona was suffering from a heat stroke she’d gotten on the second hike of the day; the first hike was in the morning in Alishan. The evenings weren’t much fun either; we didn’t go out after 8pm and there was nothing to do but watch shitty television in the hotel room. Despite the evenings and nights, the mornings and afternoons were fine. Despite the Chinese tour groups, Alishan was nice. They had built pedestrian walkways since Leona and I last visited ten years ago but the village was just as ratty as it was back then. We were only on the train for two five minute rides as the line was out from Alishan to Fenchihu. We didn’t even take the mountain train from Chiayi to Fenchihu though it was running; we were in a mini-tour bus through the severely winding road. Now that I’ve gotten Alishan out of my system, I’ll probably not go up there again except to ride to train when the last section is finished in two years; aside from the tall old cedar trees, there are better places in Taiwan to hike without running into so many tourists, crowded even though it was on weekday mornings.

      We marched around about five hours Monday and it took its toll on Leona who had painful calf muscles by Tuesday nights; we had to forego the evening firefly walk in Fenchihu. She had diarrhea and a headache Tuesday night, too. But by Wednesday, she felt good enough to take another more level Fenchihu walk around the cliff perched village. We had a lot of little snacks but no big dinners besides the hot pot the first night in Alishan. Fenchihu was great for homemade snacks and we bought many to eat there and bring home. I took a lot of photos. We got home 8pm Wednesday.