Arrival

Hello everyone. I am creating this blog as a way for my family and friends to see what I'm up to in Taiwan as well as anyone else who thinks it might be helpful and also as a kind of journal to keep of track of what's going on. The title is fashioned after my nickname given to me by my hometown friends Chris Pasquale, Carl Gurshenson and Sam Conver, "Sloppy J".
I got to my hostel about 1030 pm local time and when I got settled I was hanging out with the people that work here...very nice and cool, good time. I then went out to the night market to get some food. UPDATE: people at the night market DO NOT speak English...I am beginning to learn Chinese and FAST. The owners of the hostel speak excellent English and so do some people you run into so it does seem like I'll be able to get around. I went to a sushi place and had a grand ol' time trying to order...I learned the word for rice but apparently they don't know what Maki is here or what Unagi don is. Luckily I met some gents using my one phrase of Chinese that I know "do you speak English?". They helped me order after I botched the first one. I got Salmon sashimi and what is equivalent to something like a rainbow roll and it was PHENOMENAL...I dipped in teryaki instead of soy sauce...it was like a revolution in my mouth. I think it cost something like 10 dollars...I don't really remember, I have to start keeping a log..it was cheap though, cheaper than American sushi for sure, and better tasting. I got a couple of beers too at the store and you can get Kirin Ichiban for 1 dollar a can (win)...or six for a six pack (obviously) which would be like 15 probably in the states. Here's a shot of the night market...I will have many more photos to come.

So that was last night, I only slept like 3 hours cause of jet lag then I got up to go on a breakfast adventure. I ended up with some rice gruel with potatoes and other fruit like things on top. It was pretty tasty and it was like 2 dollars for a big bowl. She told me the name which means "everyday Taiwanese" or something like that, I of course promptly forgot what to call it. A few fun facts:

-You can't flush the toilet paper here.
-The quality of the tap water is questionable.


Anyway, I'm going out at 930 for the health check, I'll keep you all posted and upload many more photos.