Traitors (Chinese History Lesson)

Hello Friends-

Sorry I haven't written anything lately. The company moved me to the Republic of China (Taiwan). In the process, I got busy.

I live on a tropical island full of traitors to the mainland. So far, I haven't been blown up by the communists, but invasion is probably imminent. Think about it, if Hawaii seceded from the US, would we let China recognize them as the "Republic of America" in the UN or would we surround them with aircraft carriers and do a lot of "missile tests".

History lesson: Chiang Kai Shek lost the civil war against Mao Tse Tung in China. Chiang fled to Taiwan. Mao proceeded to freak out and royally screw up China. Chiang was no Nelson Mandela but eventually Taiwan opened up to the west. Taiwan is now modern, China is not. Plus, in a major face on Mao, Chiang Kai Shek stole all of the coolest artifacts from China when he was on the run so now Taiwan has basically every major piece of Chinese history in a huge museum in Taipei. I can't imagine how pissed the communists are about that one. I can just picture the fury in the eyes of the admiral who launches the sneak attack on Taipei.

People in America keep asking me how I like it in Taiwan. It's like this; It's a tropical island. There are green birds flying around, I eat fresh seafood and fresh fruit almost every day, I can see the ocean from my apartment and people laugh a lot. However, it's no Shanghai. I mean I lived downtown in one of the most exciting cities in the world. But girls dancing on bars at 9:30 in the morning is no way to live (long), so it's really quite nice be in a Chinese version of the tropics.

The upside (at least for excitement) is that I am now a licensed driver in Taiwan. At first I thought they were crazy to let a foriegner who can't read the traffic signs get behind the wheel. But after cruising for a week or two, I started to realize that while people around here drive aggressively, they are pretty crappy drivers; hey it's just like home! Except every car, scooter and bicycle has scrapes and dents all over it. I saw a young business woman go down on her scooter last night. She was probably bleeding, but got up and kept moving so as not to be crushed by a dump truck. Anyway, it's a bit sketchy because I can’t read anything and I don’t know what the rules are. Besides that I have scooters on all sides, dogs wandering in the road and old ladies on bicycles that just pop of alleys like a flipping magic show. I should have brought my ski helmet to wear when I drive. But the good news is that the car is pretty big and the scooters are pretty small. I'll make sure to write from Taiwanese prison when I run over a scooter.

So there you have a history lesson with a little lifestyle of a foreigner thrown in. I'll write more later. I will also get the camera going. It's really quite nice here (palm trees). Even the mainlanders told me that this is the real China. Taiwan didn't get totally hosed by Mao and the Cultural Revolution so they were able to retain the original culture. It's going to be really disappointing when China freaks out and decides to carpet bomb this place. That's a joke, it's not that bad. Probably.

That's all for now.