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Ah, I have time again to do a little writing.

A really strang thing happened today. As I was walking around Taipei 101 area, I hear a girl behind be go "excuse me sir!" I turn around and there is this college aged American girl. She's like "I saw your shirt (I was wearing my Kappa Kickoff 08 t-shirt) and I go to USC and I'm a Kappa!"

Talk about a small world. She apparently has been studying in Asia for the past semester and is heading home on Tuesday. We talked for a minute, had a few mutual friends and that was that. To be honest, I was pretty dazed that I ran into someone that knows the same people and visits the same places I visit back home, so far from home.

Last week I was working at Kuolai English Wilderness. The kids were very good, but some of them were strangly "prozaic". But I know that the kids all had a great time, and I got a tan. So I reckon we can call it even.

I did catch a big ole toad on Thursday night. This thing was the size of my hand (actually a little bigger) and had a bladder to match! There are so many different types of animals and insect where I teach (not to mention big spiders that like to hang out around my bed - and sometimes on it!). But with all the insects and diversity of animals, the thing that stands out is the respect that the students (actually the Taiwanese people in general) have for all forms of life.

An example is during lunch a few weeks back, there was a BIG UGLY HAIRY spider under one of the lunchroom tables. Now in the US, what we do is we either step on the sucker or we spray it and call it a day. But one of the Taiwanese staff members went and got a dust pan, got the spider to walk into it and took the spider outside and let it go.

A similar story about a huge red wasp about a month ago was in the cafeteria. The Taiwanese staff member picked up the wasp by its wings (!) took it outside and let it go. Things like that rarely happen where I'm from.

But now it's my offweek. I've spent pretty much all of it working on stuff for Biomagine. I've been breathing marketing stuff this weekend and am pumped up about some of the ideas and the possibilities. I also have been challenged by looking at one of our competitors and seeing how amazing their product is. I love that we definitly have a good company we can benchmark off of, but also know that once we start marketing the software, we are out of the gate better off than probably 90% of the software out in the market right now. And that's awesome to think. Hopefully we can translate that into actual success!

13 days until I go to Singapore. It's looking like Thailand is also beginning to calm down a little bit (but that North Korea is picking up the slack...) so I might be able to do a little regional travel while I'm there. If not, I've been given plenty of information about things to see, visit and eat while I'm in Singapore - so I think I can keep busy for the 9 days I'll be there. Also, as a fun fact, Singapore and Hong Kong have replaced the US as the #1 most competitive economies. The US is #3 now (but even the report said the difference between 1 and 3 is so minicule that its moot) but it'll be cool to have visited both of those counties during my time here.

Well, I figured I'd just write something since I haven't in a week or so - but I do have some political leaning posts being thought up in my mind at the moment. Therefore, I'm sure I'll have something to say shortly ;)

Until next time...