Our First Day in Taiwan

Our bus driver, "Uncle" Bob, picked us up at the airport around 7:10 A.M. The welcome sign was a little ridiculous.

We went outside to wait for him to bring the bus around.

When he pulled up, we realized quickly that the seats in this bus were meant for little kids. It made for an awkward ride on my part. Craig sat in the front for the trip to the school.

 This blurry picture of a seat is where I started out the drive to the school. It was super uncomfortable and the bottom pad slid off the frame. It was a little ridiculous. Craig and I were cracking up!!

"Uncle" Bob speaks almost no English, so it was a fairly silent ride as Craig and I were exhausted and didn't really feel the need to speak. "Uncle" Bob stopped to get us coffee and we had no idea how to tell him that we don't drink coffee. He was in the store before we even knew what was happening.

7-11's are very popular here. You can usually find one every couple of blocks. We've bought hot dogs for dinner there a couple of times since being in Taiwan. It's one of the only places we can get to on foot before we buy bikes. Apparently you can do a lot more at the 7-11's here than in the US.  You can bank, pay bills, send mail, and purchase cell phone minutes from 7-11 here. It's kind of crazy.

We arrived at the school about 1 1/2 hours after leaving the airport. Before we even got out of the bus, we were driven to our apartment down the street from the school. I'll post about that later. We were allowed to have 30 minutes to unload and to "rest" before we were taken back to the school to be shown around and to sign our contracts etc.

Following the business aspect, we were taken to RT Mart, kind of like Target or a Super Walmart, where we did some shopping and had McDonald's.

We didn't get back to our apartment until around 2 P.M. local time, which is about 10 P.M. in the US. At this point we'd been going for almost 24 hours with no real sleep. Add to that culture shock and jet lag and we were done.

After checking in with my family, I fell asleep at 3:45 P.M. and woke up at 4:45 A.M. I slept for 13 hours and it felt amazing! So, so, good.

Day 1 complete, only a year and a half left to go!