Money for the Dead and the Pollution that it Brings

Joss Paper being burned

Normally when people think of Asian traditions, what comes to mind might be taking off your shoes when coming inside someones house, bowing, and respecting the elderly. This tradition involves the supernatural and is harmful to people, even though they might not realize it.

A block of Joss Paper that costs about a dollar... but worth a lot more in the afterlife. 

What is Joss paper?

Originally Joss paper was made from bamboo paper or rice paper. Nowadays that really isn't the case. It is made of regular paper and also has gold squares on it that represent wealth and the back of the paper is white representing mourning for love ones.

The burning of Joss paper, or ghost paper, comes from religious beliefs derived primarily from Toaism but also it comes from local traditions. It is believed to be a currency that is used in the afterlife that is transferred from this world to the next by burning it.  People also believe that when you die and if you have any debt remaining you still need to pay off that debt in the afterlife.  Burning the paper will allow their relatives to pay off their debt. It doesn't only allow the dead to pay off debt, but people also think that the spirits in the afterlife need currency to get what they need in the afterlife.  You can also can burn cardboard objects the dead might need in the afterlife like fake iPhones or rice cookers. 

The Jade Emperor

People not only burn Joss paper for dead relatives but they also burn it for the Taoist God called the Jade Emperor (the God of money). If you burn ghost paper specifically for him the belief is he will help you out and in turn you will become wealthier.

Furnaces that are sold everywhere

This paper is also burned in a specific way. Is not just thrown into the furnace. It is delicately placed onto the fire one by one. There's also specific ways you can fold the paper before burning it.

People burning Joss paper in front of our work.

Traditionally the paper is burned by a regular person every 15 days according to the lunar calendar. But people will also will burn it on holidays like Tomb Sweeping Day which we just had little while ago here in Taiwan, or at funerals. 

Behind the local Kindergarten

Below our apartment

Recently I read an article in the English newspaper Taipei Times about the air quality in Taiwan. When the wind is not blowing the air quality becomes almost dangerous here in my area in Taoyuan city or Taipei. I was surprised to hear that they give people the option to send Joss money to special incinerators that produce less emissions than burning traditionally at a temple or outside their homes. 

I hope one day that people might have these incinerators close by their homes so they can burn it in a nondestructive way. There are people outside of our apartment that burn the Joss paper and smoke goes into our apartment. Also by our school there's a kindergarten and the temple right next door that always seems to have paper burning and the kindergarten is overtaken by smoke from burning this currency. Researching online I've learned that some ghost paper uses mercury and lead in the ink. So, it's far from healthy to be breathing in these toxins.

Normally, I love to learn about and respect local traditions in every culture I come across, but when it's harmful to the general population I think people need to rethink the way they do things. If that takes new technology that will burn this paper with less emissions I think it should be looked into as soon as possible. But for now people will have to be on the lookout for clean air in Taiwan, because on most days it's very hard to find.

What it's like Running a 100 Mile Road Race in Taiwan

On April 3rd I completed my 102 mile race in under 30 hours. The race that I completed was called "The Race Across Taiwan." Some of the runners started in Taichung city on the western side of the island and were running all the way to Hualien on the eastern side. These runners would be up for close to three days without sleep and would run a whopping 246 kilometers. I contemplated entering this group but with work and other time constraints I decided not to. Instead I signed up for the 164 kilometer (102 mile) race that started in Puli and skipped over some of the more congested areas then would finish in Hualien. Since, I am all finished I can say it was not quite what I expected but everything went as well as it could have went. The weather was okay, I didn't get horribly sick, and I didn't get really lost.

There were a lot of unexpected challenges leading up to the race. The biggest challenge was dealing with our boss. Over the last couple of weeks our boss at our school has become more hostile and less friendly than ever. As a result, working at the school has become a very stressful. Conflicts would arise all the time and the interactions between us became one of the most unpleasant experiences that I've had in a long time. With this thought of running a hundred miles on busy roads sounded more and more appealing as long as I got away from my job.     

On Friday evening we got a taxi from work to the train station. Then we took a high speed train to Taichung and from there got a bus to Puli. Once we got to Puli the taxi drivers didn't want to take us to the guesthouse from the bus station. So we ended up having to walk there with our bags. It wasn't an ideal since I was trying to rest before the race but I guess I shouldn’t complain about walking a couple extra miles. As we got to the guest house I the both of us were exhausted and my throat felt raw from the long week at work. 

I slept pretty good that night but woke up feeling under the weather and tired the next day. We were planning on taking a taxi to the starting line but the owner of the guest house was nowhere to be seen. So, we ended up walking again with our bags down the grimy, busy street to the start of the race.

At the starting line there were about 30 runners in my category which was the 164 km race. There were some speeches in Chinese and lots of pictures being taken. Then we all lining up at the starting line and the (fake) guns were fired. I started off at a slow pace and followed the crowd of runners going up the road.

Right away it was getting hot and humid. I’ve gotten fairly sick before running in the heat and I didn't want to have to have this happen during the race so I wet my shirt down then at every faucet, waterfall, or creek that I could find. While doing this I also got  my phone saturated with water.   As a result it would only work some of the time and it was a little inconvenient because I was using my phone for navigation.  I was lucky enough to see other runners ahead of me and was able to make out the general direction of the course. The first 20  miles or so there was a lot of very steep climbing and I think a couple of the runners dropped right away. It was hard to go more than 2 miles an hour for a long way and everyone slowed to a walk going up the hill. 

Adrien took a bus that was going to follow me along course and help me out. She found out the bus that she was on was more concerned about picking up the runners that dropped out from the 246 group. I ended up being pretty far ahead of her and didn't get to see here until 21 miles into the race but it was a real treat to see her. She had some food ready for me from 7-Eleven and there was a place to cool down. After my brief visit I left and was lucky enough to have a nice section of the course. There was lots of shade and a turquoise lake to look at as I trotted down the road. 

Just when I started to enjoy myself we got to a new intersection and we turned on a really busy highway.  As we continued it got steeper and more difficult. There was no shoulder and the traffic was getting overwhelming. There was lots of dust, exhaust, and pollution. This made my throat feel like it was on fire. Going up the busy highway I passed mock European villages and other semi ridiculous tourist attractions.  It was strange passing all these families walking to their hotels. I couldn't stop to think about what their day might have been like. Maybe they slept in and got a late breakfast, took some pictures and now their going to get dinner. As I was thinking about this my legs where tiring and my feet were starting to hurt and I was questioning my decision to do this race.  


As I continued on the sun started to dip behind the horizon and I wasn't even at the 64 kilometer (40 miles) mark yet and I still had a lot of climbing ahead of me. The road that I was running on is called the Central Cross-Island Highway and it is the highest paved road in the country. The race started in the bustling streets of Puli Township at a little over 1000 feet with the feeling of humid jungle mountains. I was dipping up and down canyons and mountains,  and even into a pine forest. My final ascent up Mount Hehuan was the highest point  of this road,  at 11,227 feet. As I continued down the road I got to the next big aid station where I met Adrien again.

I was around 6:30 pm when I got to the aid station and Adrien had all my gear ready for me.  I quickly changed my shoes since I was drenching myself at every opportunity everything was pretty wet including my feet. I got some food and with my dry shoes and socks I headed up the road into the night to do the final climb to the top of the mountain.  By around 10 o'clock I was above 10,000 feet and the air was very cold and crisp.

I was pacing myself as I started to get waves of nausea from the elevation. The snow on the side of the road  and stars in the sky made me feel a little better. It was nice to be finally breathing cleaner air.  I managed to get up to the top of the mountain and start coming down and was able to run at a good pace again. 

The race directors warned everybody how cold it would be up on the top of the mountain but it wasn't extremely cold. As I continued to go down the air seemed to get thicker and in no time I was approaching the 55 mile mark and getting to the next aid station. When I arrived Adrien told me that there were some runners that had gotten hypothermic and had to get on the bus. Also by this point a lot of runners were dropping out and experiencing acute altitude sickness and throwing up so it wasn't very pleasant for her to be on the pungent bus. She was there to help me get some warmer clothes and get some hot food in me. The race director walked up to me and asked if I was going to keep going. I guess this was a common thing with all the runners. It seemed a bit strange for him to be so discouraging. It seemed like in America everyone has a can-do attitude and will push you to go on and try. But here in Taiwan they were doing their best to make runners quit. It seemed at times that the directors would almost harass the runners, especially the runners going uphill.   

Before long I was off again going down and entering Taroko Gorge and  I was required to wear my helmet which was required for the next 40 miles. I was not looking forward to this but I didn't want to get disqualified. After throwing on my helmet I ran as fast as I could down the mountain hoping to get as far as I could before the traffic started again. 

 I saw the sun come up while entering Taroko Gorge and it was beautiful seeing the sunrise while running through these magnificent tunnels and marble canyons. There  were many waterfalls and 2000 foot high sheer cliffs with trees growing out of the sides of them. It was really amazing to see.

Even though I felt like I was moving at a good pace I was a little bit behind schedule. I found out that I was near the cut off point. I was just making it to  the cut off points for certain aid stations and as I went on there was a lot of confusion about when the aid stations closed.

A very important aid station was at mile 90 and according to the schedule it closed at 11 AM. As I went on many of the runners told me that they extended the time to 12:30 or 1pm. This made sense because if you made it by 11 am and then you had 5 hours to run 10 miles since the absolute cut off point was at 4pm. 

I was about four miles away from the mile 90 aid station when one of the race directors jumped out of a bus told me that the time was up. He told me to get on the bus, but I said no I want to continue running anyway.

 I only really had about 15 miles to the finish line and I figured I should just keep running even if my finish was not official. Since he told me that I wouldn't be able to qualify for the actual race I left my helmet by the roadside for somebody else. I figured someone would pick it up soon enough. Also it was getting very hard to run with the heavy helmet on. It made my shoulders and back strain a lot. I was hoping that Adrien would still be at the aid station even though it would be closed. 

When I got there Adrien talked to the race directors and convinced them to let me continue the race officially but  they said I had to have a helmet . So, Adrien quickly went to the bus where all the runners that quit  were and asked everyone if they had a spare helmet. Not to long after, she got me a bicycle helmet to wear. Then she got me a snack from 7-Eleven and told me to get going. 

I was tired of all the mind games of the race directors so I ran hard. As I went on I met other runners and we motivated each other to run faster. Mostly because we thought the finish line was sooner than it really was. 
By this time I was with six other Taiwanese people and we were approaching an intersection. One way went to a temple that we all saw on the race pamphlet and the other was continued down the busy highway. We all thought the temple was the finish line so we all went that direction, looking around and getting excited. There were nothing but tourists. We knew we made a mistake and finally saw in the distance other runners running across the bridge far off and we decided to catch up with them. 

So after wasting about  a half an hour and a lot of energy and we made it back to the main road and kept on trying to guess where the finish line might be. As time went on we came to a town and I kept on having to stop and try to look and decide which way was correct. Finally some photographers pointed me in the right direction and ran up the road towards a rundown looking town. Off to the side was the finish line. It took me a little over 29 hours to get there but I made it. As a reward the race directors gave me a printed certificate and a paperweight. The whole experience was strange and a bit stressful but was worth getting away and doing something different. But I don't think I'll be doing another road race for a while. 

Final Preparation Before My 100 mile Road Race

I was out on a run on the road behind my house and this guy stopped me to take a picture. It came in handy because I used it to send to the race director for the pamphlet. 

Only person from the US that signed up for the race. 

My hundred mile race is only a couple days away and I'm making my final preparations. There has been a lot of planning and preparing that has gone into getting ready for the 164K (100 mile) Race Across Taiwan. The best part was the training. Getting out and seeing new places and taking pictures along the way has been a real treat and much needed time to clear my head of all the difficulties that we have been facing at work. The most challenging thing has been signing up and figuring out bit by bit what I might expect. Unfortunately the race organizers have only given a small amount of information, most of it involving strange requirements like a mandatory helmet after 58 miles.... Other than this I have a map of the course that will hopefully work on my phone for navigation during the event.

The first thing I did was study the map, translate the aid stations names and write down when the aid stations close. These are a couple screen shots of the course and the elevation gain and loss on the course. 

I'm not sure if this is right but 8,703 meters translates to 28,553.15 feet of gain and 9,117 translates to 29,911.42 of elevation loss. To put this into perspective Everest is 29,029 feet.

#1 Puli Start

#2 卓社隧道前道 Zhuo former club Tunnel Road 12K (7.4 miles) Close 1153am 

#3 武界水庫隧道後高地平台 After Wu Jie Tunnel Reservoir 23k 14.2 miles) Close 147pm 

#4親愛國小Dear small country 35k (21.7 miles) Close 351pm 

#5 台14-投71叉路口 Taiwan 14- 71 47K (29.2 miles) Close 555pm 

#6 哪嚕灣民宿 Bay Bed and Breakfast 58.5k (36 miles) Get Jacket Close 8pm 

#7鳶峰 Kite peak 71K (44.1 miles)Close 1024pm 

#8 昆陽 Kunyang 77K (47 miles) Close 1136pm

#9 小風口 Small air 84K (52 miles) Close 1am 

#10 觀原 View original 93.5K (58 miles) Close 253am 

#11 碧綠 Dark green 102.5K (63.3 miles) Close 456am 

#12 慈恩 Mercy 110k (68 miles) Close 527am  

#13 新白楊 New Topol 119K (73 miles) Close 7am

 #14 洛韶 Luo Shao 128K (79 miles) Close 837am 

#15 西寶 Westwood 138K (85 miles) Close 948am

#16 天祥 Intertek146k (90 miles) Close 11am 

#17 布洛灣 Bullock Bay 156K(96 miles) Close 137pm

#18 Finish 106.5K (102 miles) 

The second part of the preparation process was getting everything ready. The strange part about this race is they're requiring the participants to have a helmet after a certain point. They didn't mention how long we have to wear it, but it might be for forty miles. I don't know exactly why it is required but you might be disqualified if you don't have one. 

Runners are also have to wear a real reflective vest. I ended up using some bungees on my regular running hydration vest to keep everything simple.

At a certain point they are requiring a warmer jacket. This weekend I went out and bought a cheap Taiwanese down jackets that way if it gets lost it's not a big deal. After looking at the weather it seems like I might just be carrying it around most of the time in the back of my vest.

Other gear that I will be carrying

-sunglasses
-headlamp
-extra battery
-gloves
-bottle
-money
-phone
-ipod
-Tailwind (electrolyte drink mix) 
-soap
-first aid kit

Everything else is going to be with Adrien. She is going to be taking a bus along the course and I will hopefully be able to see her and drop off or get anything that I need. Some of these things are...

-extra clothes

-medical supplies

-extra shoes 

-warm clothes/rain gear  
-medication for altitude sickness 

This is a rough summary of what I'm bringing and what I'm doing in preparation for this race. I'm not a seasoned ultra runner and I don't quite know what to expect but I have done one other race. I hope that I have learned a little from that and will help me be more prepared. In reality there are always and lot of unknowns with any event like this. There is probably a few more. Since I'm in Taiwan and there is a real communication barrier between me and the race directors it always makes things more interesting. No matter what I'm really looking forward to the opportunity to get away from my boss and seeing some new places!

Quitting our Jobs and Leaving the Country

"I'm quitting in pursuit of not working here"- Unkown

We have made the decision to give our two months’ notice at American Eagle Institute here in Yangmei, Taiwan. 

We are also going to return to the USA in May and with our time running up at the school we work at I decided to write in more detail about what it has been like working at American Eagle Institute in Yangmei, Taiwan. With that said this blog is also a cautionary tale to anybody is coming to this school for employment.

Monica Behind the desk

The Management

 Adrien and I combined have worked at many private schools in Korea, Russia, and France.

We both agree that the directors at our school are unlike any other managers or directors we have worked with in the past.   

The English names of the management at our school are Monica, Co Co and Sean. One of the most frustrating things about working here is they have very poor communication skills. That doesn't mean they don't speak English but rather you can't really understand what they're saying sometimes. More specifically Monica and Co Co really don’t have the ability to communicate clearly to us.

The stinginess

Another thing that we've dealt with at the school is a level of stinginess. During winter camp we were given materials teach and a lot of the materials detailed activities that required some arts and crafts supplies. When we asked to get some supplies that are bosses told us that the parents don't know what’s in the manual so don't do these activities.  We had a lot of time and a lot of activities that would have made the experience much better for the kids but we had to skip over these because they were not willing to buy some glue and color pencils. Adrien did end up buying colored pencils for her kids.

During this was a camp and we were expected to do a lot of physical activities but when we asked for any equipment such as balls or ropes and they didn't give us any. We ended up looking all around the school ourselves to see what we could come up with which wasn't much. At other schools if they're doing any type of classes with physical activities such as PE or Winter camps normally they would provide a lot of mats, balls, and many other things that we can use for those activities but not here.

Even before the camp we asked for was a board markers and erasers because all the erasers were falling apart and stained with board marker ink and the markers were out of ink. We asked for these things that were pretty necessarily for daily lessons and it took those about two months to get these to us. The only reason they did give us these things was because they thought they were giving us some type of reward for teaching  beyond expectations.

Also during the winter, and Winter Camp especially, the classrooms and office were unbearably cold. Nothing below freezing, but with the humid cold air and the lack of any heating, it certainly felt close to freezing. The management had a heater for themselves that they turned off when we came back into the office. Nothing for the kids.

Never knowing what will happen next

Working at the school you never know what's going to happen. Here the teachers are the last people to know if we're going to have a class for an extra activity. We specifically asked to be notified about these things so we can prepare but they've never changed and let us know about these things most of the time we have to find out from the students at the school if we have to teach an extra class.

Desk warming

Our working hours schedule would be from 12:00 PM to 9:00 PM. Sometimes we have a lot of work to do and sometimes we don’t but we always had to be desk warming no matter what. I'm pretty sure this was just to show the parents that they had foreign teacher’s present but I also think it was more of a cultural hierarchy that is present in the workplace in Taiwan. The management wants to know that they're in control and that you're following their orders. This is the types of things that make them happy but is not so pleasant being submissive all the time.

Extreme Disciplinary Standards

Another thing that we found out after we came to the school is the amount replacement teachers that they went through. We were informed by another teacher that they had 12 different teachers that came and left in three months. We even experience one Canadian teacher walking out because of the very extreme disciplinary punishment that they use at the school. This happened more when we first started working here. If a kid didn't bring their homework or their folder that they needed they would get hit on the hand with a roll of paper repeatedly or a something that looks like a whip for a horse.

One day a Canadian teacher witnessed this two weeks after we arrived and he ended up telling them right then and there that it's not right and he couldn't work at a school. He walked out of the building and never came back. This made us feel very uneasy and we don't really promote or really respect these people much after this happened. It seemed very cruel and old-fashioned to us but we thought it was a cultural thing.

  

Giving Our Notice

Breaking any employer the news that you're going to quit is not always the easiest thing but as with any job that happens and we tried our best to be responsible and tell her how her bosses that we are quitting before we actually leave. In the world of ESL teaching it's very common to do something that's called a mid-night run. Basically this is when you work and you go home, pack up, and leave that night and don't tell anybody that you are leaving. This more often than not gives foreigners a bad reputation.

We decided to give them two months’ notice mainly because we thought we were doing the right thing. Everything was going pretty well but we were talking about how we would help try to find replacements and we got information that our recruiter found some replacements and we might not be able to fill those two months which are pretty important to us since we already have plane tickets back to America and we need all the money we can gets to pay for plane tickets and college loans etc. So again there is more tension between us and our bosses. If anything happens there are legal services in Taiwan for foreigners and if you give notice the employer doesn't have the right to change the contract so we are just waiting to see what happens. There are a lot of unknowns in the school but just a warning to everybody that wants to work at American Eagle in Yangmei, it's been strange time working at this place and wouldn't necessarily recommend it to any foreign workers that are coming to Taiwan. 

Yehliu Geopark

For my birthday Adrien and I went to “Yehliu Geopark.” Located in the northeastern park of Taiwan there is a small sliver of land that goes out to a point to the ocean. It is definitely a unique area for many reasons. Rock formations that resemble anything from a queen’s head to a dragon's head.

The name Yehliu comes from the Pinpu language and when it is translated into “devil’s cape.” My guess is the natives would go out to this point and see all these crazy looking rocks then think they were demonic.

Another theory of the origin of the name comes from a story where traders would come to shore with bags of rice and the native people would use sharpened bamboo sticks to cut small holes into their bags. After that they would pick up the rice that fell out. In Taiwanese Yeh means savage and lui means steal. Hence the second theory meaning savages steal.  

So is it worth the trip? It is but there are crowds and if you want to take a picture of the famous queen’s head you have to wait in a line and watch countless people take selfie after selfie. Then you feel awkward standing in front of the rock without a person in front of it.

In my opinion the best rock formation was the dragon’s head. The best thing about it is there were not many people waiting to take pictures of it. Another intriguing thing was all the fossilized sand dollars imbedded in the rocks. This is the first time I have ever seen this and as far as I could tell the Taiwanese people were paying little to no attention to them.

  

7 11

“I know enough of the world now to have almost lost the capacity of being much surprised by anything” 

-Charles Dickens

7-Eleven is a place where you get Slurpee's, junk food, and scratcher tickets in the US. Here in Taiwan things are a little different. Here they are a multi-functional stop for most of your needs. First of all they have many different types of drinks, sushi rolls, hot soups, freshly made lattes and even boiled soy sauce eggs. Every 7-Eleven varies on what type of food you can get exactly but it's good stop when you need something quick to eat.

I recently I was having trouble paying for my upcoming running event so I emailed the director of the race many times and finally figured out how to pay. But he told me to do is bring a number to 7-Eleven pay for the race there. Lo and behold I went to the 7- Eleven and put a number that the race director gave me into a machine after that the machine printed out a receipt where I paid the full amount for the race at the cash register.

This is not the only thing you can pay for at 7-Eleven. You can also pay your water, electricity, and any other utility bills that you may have. Unfortunately I found out a couple weeks ago that you could even pay your traffic fines at 7- Eleven. While riding the scooter coming back from a run I did not know there were speed sensor cameras on some of the roads and as a result I got a speeding ticket through the mail. I brought the ticket into the store and in two minutes I was all paid up.

There is also a mailing pick up service at there but I believe it's for only the domestic packages. As far as I could see most people use it for ordering things online and picking them up. I have also heard that you can bring your dry cleaning to 7-Eleven but I have never met anybody that does that yet.

In a nutshell there are many things you can do at 7-Eleven across Taiwan. One extra tip whenever you walk into a 7-Eleven or any other store more often than not the person at the counter will say, “good morning.” At least that's what I thought they were saying when I first came to Taiwan. I used to always reply to this by saying good morning back but what they are actually saying is “Ying Guanglin” which means welcome in mandarin. I have yet to find out what the correct responsiveness is. Normally I normally I just say Ni Hao to them or just nod my head.