What About Water?!

“Enough already! What about water?! You’ve barely even written about it. I thought this was supposed to be a hydrophilic mission, not just a phil mission!!”

Nobody has said that to me - it’s just the vibe I get from myself when I pretend to be you, reading my blog. So OK! I get it, sheesh. Let me hit you up with some knowledge.

Taipei, Typhoon, and an early Thanksgiving

Three things have kept me from working as much as I’ve wanted to last week, but it was full of excitement. Finally settled in Hualien, I had no time to relax as I made a return trip to the big city, experienced the worst typhoon in four years, and celebrated my favorite holiday, Taiwanese-style.

Last weekend, I traveled back to Taipei by train to meet up with Ruth and my family to host an engagement dinner for all my relatives here who won’t make the wedding, including grandparents and my 100 year old great great aunt. It was a formal but fun gathering, and the food was very good. The only thing I wasn’t too happy about: for this one occasion, I had to bring a suit, dress shoes, and nice clothes, which took up about a third of my packing space.

The two things people do in Taipei (and do in great abundance) are eating and shopping, so you are constantly surrounded by food vendors and shops. It really wore on me, and by the end of the weekend I was eager to get out of the city. But then the typhoon struck.

The Good Fortune of Meeting Mr. Fish

I started the week without a place to live and without any reliable form of transportation, and trusted that it would somehow work out. Drifting about was somewhat exciting at first, but the charm wore off quickly. I had many people helping me with the search, but after two days of looking, it became apparent that free university housing was not an option, and very few people wanted to rent for less than 6 months; much less 6 weeks.  Then something amazing happened on Tuesday.

Week 1: A beautiful country, a new old ukulele, and a fuzzy pet algae

In this post you can read about my first week of traveling, some initial fears, my arrival at Dong Hwa University in Hualien, what I am doing related to Deep Ocean Water research, the generosity of others, and how I am currently drifting about without a home.

A big Ni Hao to everybody out there!

Taipei, Taiwan

Today is my first day in the town of Hualien (pronounced Hua-Lien, not Hu-Alien), set between mountains and ocean, on the sparsely populated Eastern part of the island (there’s less than ½ a million people on this side of the mountains, and nearly 23 million on the other) and I am happy as a clam. I will be spending most of the next two months here, but don’t yet have a place to live or a reliable mode of transportation.

Intro Part 3: To Serve and Discover

You must admit, we've really got it good in the U.S. of A. My fellow countrymen can be proud that:

• We have clean, potable water, straight out of the tap, throughout the nation. [The Water Quality Act of 1965 and the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974 ]

• We have "fishable and swimmable" bodies of water, almost completely free of pollution. [The Clean Water Act of 1972]

Impressive, no? Equally impressive, but not quite in the same way: