Friday 11/1/02 Bailed on a Party
Ginger and
I had planned to go to a Halloween house party when Dave from school first
brought it up about 2 weeks ago, but it was raining all day and she called and
we were both worn out from last night: “I’m kinda tired.” “Yeah me too.” So we skipped.
Saturday 11/2/02 Supervised the SAT, Got Gypped by a Vendor
Jonathan,
Niclas, Brian and I were supervising the SAT for FSE for some extra money
today. We first had lunch at
Barista Coffee, then headed over at 12:30 to TaiDa/National Taiwan
University. The others had done it
once before, and Jonathan said it was so fun because once they came in, all the
kids looked at them knowing they were the supervisors. I wasn’t sure they’d know that right
away about me, though.
First we went into the office where the woman in
charge assigned us each a proctor, who was an older NTU student and would do
the little tasks like checking IDs, assigning seats, and counting and
distributing booklets and answer sheets.
Our job was just to stand in front and read the directions from the
guidebook word for word, then sit and breathe. I hadn’t looked over the materials I was mailed at all, but
Jonathan reassured me that the proctors knew exactly what they were doing and
not to worry.
My proctor
was a pale quiet guy who didn’t speak English that well and who I quickly
deduced did NOT know exactly what he was doing. After we let the kids in the door, checking each of their
IDs, I noticed they all had calculators and asked him if they were allowed to
have them, since I don’t remember using one when I took the SAT. But that was the Stone Age so perhaps
things have changed. He looked
confused and started looking through the instruction book. When the kids saw us flipping through
and whispering, I could tell their hearts
sank; here their fate and
chances of getting into college were hanging on two proctors
who didn’t have a clue… We found
that calculators were allowed as long as they passed certain requirements, so I
announced we were going to go around and check them. I walked around inspecting, not knowing exactly what I was
looking for or what I’d say if I really found something suspicious, but kept a
confident stern look on my face, and announced they were all OK. Then I started reading the directions,
word for word like I was instructed.
They sounded so militant—started off right away by saying that cheating
was not tolerated and listed all the things considered out of bounds and what
the consequences
would be. I then got to the
paragraph that said, “Calculators will be allowed as long as they pass certain
restrictions. We will now go around checking your
calculators…Oh OK I did that already.” Oops. I continued: “If
you see any student using a calculator inappropriately or violating any of the
above regulations, please call the Educational Testing Service at 1-800…Oh wait
I’m not supposed to read that part.”
A couple people snickered and I fell into embarrassed giggles and could
barely continue.
Besides
that, the testing went smoothly and I walked around, sometimes wrote a little
bit of journal on scrap paper, but the time went by relatively quickly since
they had a new section every 30 minutes.
I was one of the first done and went next door to see Brian, who was
chatting with two students asking him for college advice. He talked to them a long time and gave
them his number. They told him
everyone had been surprised he was so nice and they felt so lucky to have him,
because they heard that some of the other supervisors were kind of mean. I asked him, “Did you read the
instructions word for word?” He
said mostly, but tried to make them sound more friendly and said his own words
sometimes and wished them good luck.
Hm, my kids must have thought I was a cold heartless biotch.
Jonathan
was the last to finish because his room had all sorts of problems. He’d had the language SAT II test and
had to give out different language cassette tapes and tests to different
students, and had problems with tape players that didn’t work. He said some had trouble with the
cassette tapes because they weren’t used to them—the kids are too
high-tech. They didn’t know which
way to stick them into the player.
We got our
payment and went to a nearby Szechuan restaurant for dinner. Brian and Niclas split and we two went shopping
around GongKuan night market. It’s
a good night market, aimed at students, with clothes, shoes, CDs, food, not the
kind of touristy trinkets at Snake Alley.
I needed a new sun umbrella because my last one broke within two weeks
(for 50NT, what can you ask). They
were all 200NT and even though I tried to bargain halfheartedly, I knew it was
useless for such a commodity, so I picked one up quickly. We came across a Sanrio store and I
dragged Jonathan in again, who makes fun of me for liking these things, and I
got a Powerpuff Girls
box for my sister. When I
opened my wallet to pay, I realized my money was gone. I had to dip into my just-earned SAT
money and wondered. I’d had a 500
and 100 bill before, and only bought the umbrella. Understanding dawned and I cursed liberally—I’d given the
umbrella woman my 500 and 100 bills, thinking they were two 100 bills! This is a common enough mistake since
all bills are different colors except the 500 and 100—they’re both red and the
same size, so people get careless with them. We headed back though I knew it was useless. Maybe though, just maybe she’d be
nice.
There was
a man there instead and I started explaining the problem, then suddenly the
woman came up. I said, “[Yes, it
was you, do you remember me? I
gave you a 500 and a 100…]” trying to make it sound like both she and I didn’t
realize it at the time, but I could barely get the words out when they all got
very defensive and said “[No no, you just gave us 200]” and one of them fiddled
under the table, then brought out a box showing us only two 100 bills
inside: “[See, you gave us two 100
bills.]” As if I was the only
customer they’d had and all they had in their box was my 200? How dumb did they think I was? They told me I must have lost the 500
myself or spent it on something, even though I insisted I didn’t, and then
started getting angry, telling me it wasn’t right to accuse them like
this. Jonathan said, “[Not
accusing, just saying it was a mistake,]” but I gave up and we walked on. If only my Chinese were better, I
would’ve told them off. Not sure
what I would say though: “I’m
telling everyone I know never to come to your little umbrella stand!” It doesn’t quite have the same effect
as it does when you tell off a restaurant or club owner.
I was
bummed and pissed and Jonathan sympathetic, but I knew it was my own stupid
fault for not being more careful.
It just takes something like this to teach me to watch my bills more
carefully from now on. I also
tried to tell myself that people selling umbrellas off the street needed the
500 more than I did.
In the
meantime, I’m going to take extra care of this 600NT umbrella.
Sunday 11/3/02 Thinking of Moving
BiauJie
and mafia JieFu called. Mom had
told them about my apartment leak problems and they said they had two
apartments in their building that were empty and unfinished right now where I
could live if I wanted. The
drawback was that it wasn’t nearly as convenient as the location I have
now—they estimated I’d have to take a bus, to Taipei Main Station, then the MRT
to school and work, total about 40-minute plus commute. I said I’d check it out, so he picked
me up and brought me over to look.
One was on
their 4th floor,
HUGE and very nice. The
other was in the next door building and was a little smaller and thought might
be better for me. But the area was
so out in suburbia and looked like there was nothing to do. Location has always been a huge factor
for me in an apartment, ever since senior year of college when I lived so far
from school, my street
got cut off at the edge of the Student Bookstore map. People in my neighborhood practically spoke with a different
Rhode Island accent.
I finally
asked the burning question about rent and they laughed; mafia JieFu said, “[How
could I charge my little sister?
OK, 1 NT per month.]” Hm,
this is a big draw.
Back in my
area we went to a Thai restaurant for dinner. Their most famous dish was an appetizer called
YueLiangXiaBing (moonlight shrimp cakes).
Another was a fried stick wrapped around a hard stick of something. I ate the whole thing and the stick
inside was so hard to bite, like tough bamboo, and not tasty at all. Then I looked around while chewing hard
and realized they all left the stick on their plates, DOH! What an idiot I am. I couldn’t spit it out discreetly, so
after debating, I swallowed it praying it wouldn’t give me mad digestive
problems. There was crispy fried
fish, curry chicken, beef, kongshintsai, corn soup, and crab (have I ever eaten
with them without eating crab?), and a really interesting fried rice with
onions, pineapple, cashews, and dried pork (RoSung). There seemed to be even more dishes than they usually order
and I kept saying “[No, can’t finish]” when they’d offer more, but still I
would eat whatever they put on my plates.
Dessert was a bowl of ice with coconut milk and tapioca and taro chunks,
and green moji like cakes.
Whew! After days on end of
biendangs (lunch boxes) and mac ‘n cheese and more Ramen noodles than I had in
college, this hit the spot exactly.
Meals with mafia JieFu are such a treat.