On my way...

I'm at the airport, using free internet... so far so good. I didn't even get fined for overstaying my visa (only 4 days, but still). I thought I'd have to pay $2000 NT, over $60 US. So I am going crazy in the duty free shop. No, not really.

I'll be back in Taiwan in mid-January (hopefully! if the US Passport & Taiwan visa-issuing people are on my side :) and start a new job February 9th. It's at a bilingual elementary school in the north end of Taichung. I'll be teaching 2 classes of 5th-graders.

I got to observe the teacher who's leaving which was great- she seems like a really good teacher, great classroom manangement so I got an idea of her classroom routines, so it should be a good class to take over. I also met some of my future colleagues- the other 5th-grade teachers- who all seem easy to get along with. And the 5th-graders are still cute! She seems well-regarded so I'll have big shoes to fill.

I'm pretty excited about the new job. It seems like a very well-run place. And no evenings or weekends. It's about a 20-minute scooter drive from my apartment, but they have a parking garage so I can also ride my bike. I actually did it once and it's a little under a half hour going there, about 45 minutes going home (no hills, just slight grade the whole way). It's a lot of traffic on the scooter but surprisingly peaceful on the bike- I guess because on the scooter I'm fighting all the other scooters but on the bike they just go around me. There's also a pool we can use! Maybe even showers I can use if I ride my bike during summer- I didn't ask yet, as I didn't want to seem to psycho. Time for that later.

So... I won't post much about my visit home, as I will mostly be laying on my parents' couch, catching up on a year's worth of trashy magazines, but I will catch up on some posts about the last few months in Taiwan that I just haven't added pictures to or whatever.