笨死了.

In recent news, I've just changed to an unexpected fourth host family! It's insanely close to my school, meaning I can walk there and back. This makes me very happy because I don't have to spend money on transportation. :) They've been good so far. My school's area is part of the ghetto in Taipei, so that's where I'm at. My new host Dad loves to talk. A lot. He can also speak English well, so he tends to use it too much. :/ Just today they started realizing that my Chinese is actually good enough that they can speak to me in that alone. Believe it or not, it's actually really annoying to have to hear them translate everything they say. My host mom brought me to the library very close to the house and got me a library card! Just in time, too. Got two months left. x] I saw Dean Koontz and immediately nabbed one of his books "The Good Guy". Started and finished it today, makes school go bye much quicker.

My first semester of the exchange I didn't so much notice how awful the education system here is. Well, I noticed, but it didn't affect me too much because we'd spend most of our time in the library or *hem*skipping class*hem* haaah. This semester, though, we spend most of our time in the main classroom. It's boring beyond belief. We do still get library periods, and on occasion go to other classes where they're so happy the foreigners are there they stop lessons for the hour, but definitely no sneaking out of scheduled class time. Stereotype in America is all Asians are smart and good at math and stuff, right? Only applies to those in America who worked hard enough to get there. I'll walk you through your typical Taiwanese student's day at my school.
5.30: Wake up to get ready for the over an hour journey to school because you couldn't test well enough to get into a school near where you live.
6.15: Leave the house to take the MRT, bus, what have you to get to school.
7.30: School starts, if it's a monday or thursday all the students gather in the courtyard to listen to the principle blabble on about the same stuff every time.
8.20: Real class begins. Teacher is awfully boring, pretty much teaching the blackboard the lesson because only 20% of the class is listening. You're either sleeping, or messing around with your friends in class. This continues on for four hours.
12.10: Lunch! You go with classmates to get in line for a lunch box or noodles then return to your classroom to chat and finish your meal.
12.40: Bell rings, nap time. You sleep or mess around with your friends.
1.20: Class back in session, goes over the same as in the morning. Maybe you have a test or two, and if you studied hard the night before, you pass. After passing, all previous knowledge is forgotten.
5.10: School's out! Now, you either go home, or head onto cram school where school continues. This Cram school, however, wouldn't be necessary if you'd actually listen to what the teacher was saying during actual school and not goof off/sleep in class.
10.00: Get home, study some more if you've got a big test the next day, and tomorrow the cycle starts again.
All true. You can't blame the students, though. The teachers are really horrible. They don't make anything they teach interesting, or interactive. There are no group activities, students don't ask the teacher questions ever. Nothing. They get hardly any homework, it's all tests. After the tests they forget everything they needed for it. Now, us exchange students do even less. Even if we wanted to take part in the lessons, they don't let us. We're not even acknowledged as real students or take part in real classes, but they expect us to conform to all the rules of the school and act like one of their own when we're not treated as so.

Just yesterday, a couple from my school attempted suicide together. They had apparently run off a week ago, but just yesterday morning they, whilst holding each other, jumped off of a 12 floor building. The boy landed on top of the girl, who landed on top of a car. Girl died, boy is in intensive care. Why they did it, I'm not exactly sure. I don't remember seeing them but my classmates often did even if they weren't close. I'm not exactly sure what the procedure is for schools in America when a student commits suicide, but nobody seems to even care here. Of course, suicide is much more popular here in Asia than in the States. Still, nothing's happened, nobody said anything except for the day it happened. I just can't believe the boy survived jumping off a 12 story building..

My situation currently is okay. I have exactly 60 days until I go home to the states and I honestly can't wait. The problem is, I know within days of my getting back I'm going to be severely depressed from missing this place. Living here for me right now feels the same as if I was living in America, just subtract my real family and good friends. I'm so used to everything here, it's all just so normal now.

This has been a really horrible blog. Eh. Things can't all be roses and sunshine. D; Lemme think.. Something happy. My third host Father is taking me with his Rotary club next month to visit beautiful Kanting and Gaoxiong. I'm very pleased. :D

When things get bad, I just remind myself why I came here. To learn Chinese, and I'm very satisfied in how I've improved here. It's not fluent, but it's decent enough. I've gotten the extra bonus of learning this culture which is often times bad, but of course is also often times good. Some times I just can't remember the good bits. ^^;