Fast Times in Da-an

My sojourn at the Winter Palace is going very well so far. In a Jody sort of way. ie, I accidentally pulled the door off the washing machine, it's taken me 4 days to find the powder for the dishwasher, and I've eaten a lot of cheese...

The cats are alive (I'm documenting this with photos in case of a law suit) to date, and appear to enjoy my company. This feeling is mutual. I've been singing them songs (something along the lines of "Huash and Hansel ARE so cute, doo daa... doo daa". I didn't say it was good singing!) and scooping more poo than you would think possible for 2 small winkies to produce.

Highlights of the week: today in the elevator, a very stylish 3 year old with a jaunty flower on her woolen hat and a large helium balloon attached to her wrist announced that I have "cool shoes". As translated by her mother, from the original Chinese. I said "thanks very much" back to her in Chinese, and suddenly she went very shy.

Also worth a mention: as ever, my 7 year olds. If I didn't get cuddles from them, my backbone would shrivel up and I would die.

Lowlights: Those of you who know me will remember, I am sure, my distaste for the frothy tinselly crap of Christmas. Well, NZ has nothing on Taiwan. They have fully embraced the glitter, the synthesiser bells, the vile seasonal songs by 'artists' that should have a little more pride, and the stuffed animals that belt out carols when you walk by them.

My local bakery. There's a stuffed Coca Cola-esque Santa Claus, who is maniacally singing "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way..." ad nauseum. How the poor woman working in there could stand it, I don't know. I was only there for 40 seconds and I was ready to scream by the time I left.

Kojen (my school) has covered the entire building in fake snow, Christmas trees, gingham curtains, snowmen, fairy lights, pretend presents, reindeer and candy canes. But did they stop there? Nooooooooo. They are playing their only Christmas CD non-stop. It's a funky remix of the worst carols you can imagine. As interpreted by: Alvin and the Chipmunks, George Michael, and a bunch of other losers that I don't recognise. There's also a reindeer with sunglasses on playing a sax, and every time one of the shitrats squeezes its hoof, it plays "Santa Claus is coming to town". OVer and OVer.

I'm sorry to say, I had to go down there yesterday, grab the vile thing by its plush antlers, and inform the secretaries that if they didn't remove it from the children's little paws, I was going to scrape together every remaining NT in my possession, and purchase a handgun. Then I pointed at the last kids to set the thing off, and said that they would be first to die.

It got put away for a whole day.