The past 2 days have been so special and filled with such wonderful new friends and experiences that I just don’t know where to begin.
I am especially grateful to all my friends and colleagues who have shared their friends and relations’ contacts with me in Taiwan to help take me around and introduce me to Taiwanese culture, history, food and some very interesting sites.
There is so much I would like to share with you tonight as a I crawl into my bed shrouded by the inner sanctum of my mosquito net feeling like a caterpillar within a cocoon. How will I emerge tomorrow…
It is raining again, and I was just too spent to do much tonight after traveling to the end of the metro line to the south to visit Pinglin an old tea village with a delightful little tea museum. It was rather slow on a monday so we had the whole staff taking us around while we corrected their English translations.
Then finally back to Taipei to meet a new friend of a friend of a friend who invited me to join her for her 33rd year architecture class reunion. Classic architecture scene of a room full of men and just us two women. My new friend Robin said I added a special flavor to the evening. As everyone got more and more drunk around the largest Lazy Suzanne table I have ever eaten at, they kept on toasting me with their shot glasses of whiskey. I felt so welcome with this incredible group of well established Taiwanese Architects. Though they toasted to my decision to leave architecture school to become an artist.
This morning I traveled all the way to the end of the line going north to give a lecture about my work at Tamkang University. I was invited by the President of the University who was a good friend and student of my mother’s childhood friend who recently retired from teaching at Stamford. The lecture went well, though it was a challenge to collaborate with needing to be translated. Afterwards I was invited with a few faculty members to an incredibly delectable lunch. I felt like I was in a film as one dish after another just kept coming out from the kitchen to our lazy suzanne table. I had a lot of leftovers to take back to my little studio room.
Well I am about ready to drop. Still waking up at 5:30 each morning to the birds. Please enjoy the photos. I hope to elaborate on more later.
Best,
Michele
