Street Pedicure!

When Terry and I visited Taipei about 5 years ago, I recall touring with my mother-in-law and watching ladies on the side of one street sit on plastic stools underneath colorful umbrellas waiting to be ‘threaded’. Threading is an alternative to facial waxing. It involves taking an ordinary piece of thread and dividing it into 3 parts. Each hand holds one part, and one part stays in the mouth. Somehow the threads cross, creating a scissor-like effect, scraping across the skin and pulling out the hair by the follicle.

Curious as to why the clients’ faces were white, I realized that skillful older ladies would put talcum powder on their customers’ faces to determine which parts of the face had yet to be threaded. Each customer would have her hair pulled back in a hair-band and a generous portion of talcum powder would then be applied to her (or his…yes, the men here are REALLY into their hair and facial care!!) face.

Along side of each of these ladies were various other vendors hawking anything from manicures/pedicures to holistic massage (which looks a lot like beating-up their customers as I’ve seen one too many leave bruised). The site was a very curious one; however, I realized that the Taiwanese must be onto something when I saw threading become available in Stoneridge Mall back in Pleasanton in the year 2009 or so.

Since my arrival, it has been a treat to have someone paint my toes. Services in Taipei are typically about 30% less expensive than in the USA; however, most licensed pedicure/manicure women I’ve seen are priced comparable to the USA. Always on the hunt for a bargain, I’ve always watched the people on the street; however, I’ve never had the courage to try out the street vendors, as I’ve been a bit nervous about sanitation (think staff infection!!!!!).

One Saturday night, I had a gift of being alone for a whole evening. Both girls were at an all-day play date, and Terry had to leave early for a Chinese New Year party (yup…work parties I’m finding do NOT include spouses…bizaare to me, but typical). Knowing that the paint from my 2-month-old pedicure was slowly eroding, I decided to try my luck at the street vendors. I took the necessary precautions and ensured that my legs were NOT recently shaved and I had no open wounds, so as to hopefully keep any ‘can’t see ‘ums’ at bay :).

Not being able to read enough to figure out who was a threader and who provided pedicure/manicure services, I sought out anyone who had a bowl of water and a basket of nail polish. My methodology paid off and I found a vendor who was in between clients. Of course, trying to communicate what I wanted was a bit tricky, but before he left, Terry gave me the words for ‘paint nails’, and with the help of body language, she knew what I wanted and told me the price. We were all set to begin!

She used a plastic bowl, which she first scraped with some sort of steel wool and hot water as I sat down. Once cleaned, she had 2 thermos’ of hot water which she placed into the bowl, about ½ way full. She asked me to put my feet in, but not my whole feet…just the tips of my feet. While my feet were soaking, she took out her bag of instruments and proceeded to use some cotton balls soaked with some sort of rubbing alcohol (or nail polish remover…I couldn’t figure out which) to clean them off. Either way, it smelled strong enough to kill whatever ‘can’t see ‘ums’ which may have been hiding in her instruments.

After a bit of a soak, she performed all the standard pedicure grooming steps (cutting my cuticles, shaping my nails…even taking care of a bit of an in-grown toe nail which had been bothering me for weeks!). While I confess that her selection of colors and brands left MUCH to be desired, I settled on a color which was ‘good enough’ (which sums up most everything here in Taipei). After only about 20-30 minutes, my toes were freshly manicured and painted. All of this for a whopping $8USD equivalent!!! Granted, there was no foot massage or any fancy trimmings, but all I was really after was some grooming and a fresh coat of paint.

The most amazing thing to me was that there on the street, this woman had everything she needed. She strategically placed herself by a grate so as to effectively dump out the water after each customer. She had the appropriate cleaning materials needed to ensure a somewhat clean/sterile environment for her customers. She had large plastic chairs for customers to sit upon and small plastic chairs for their feet. There were about 3-4 thermos’ which had enough hot water to make things comfortable. On a hip pack, she had a change purse. In a nice, clean case she carried a large assortment of pedicure grooming instruments which, as I mentioned above, she expertly cleaned in front of each client (well done on her part to provide comfort to her customers that her station is kept tidy and clean).

While this process is definitely different and has an intimidating appearance, she provided exactly what I wanted for a great price. To me, this is a great entrepreneurial experience. Funny enough…some of the women have such a distinct appearance that I am POSITIVE that a few of them are the very same ones I saw when we came here 5 years ago.

I have not yet tried threading as I fear that once my whole face is threaded, the maintenance becomes much more demanding and I know I don’t want to take THAT much time! Still, there is quite a market for it as it is not uncommon for 2-3 customers to wait at one station for their favorite threader. There is one station which doesn’t seem to get nearly as much traffic….that’s the holistic massage guy. Who wants to PAY to get beat up??!!! All in all, an experience worth sharing to be sure!

Celebrating Chinese New Year

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you think of it), we were gone on the BIGGEST holiday in Taiwan…Chinese New Year. We left for Cambodia on New Year’s Eve and didn’t return until the week after. However, that being said, the weeks leading up to the New Year were still filled with lots of fun.

New Year in Taiwan is honestly like Christmas in the USA. The stores are teeming with candy, red signs, gifts, and FOOD! Boy, there was so much food EVERYWHERE! Much of the food seemed odd to me, and I cannot imagine giving it as a gift…unless I wanted to scare my host; however, I suppose it would be different if I grew up with it :). I can successfully sing 3 New Year songs…not because I learned them in a class, but because the same songs are played in EVERY STORE you walk by. It was really cute at first, but trust me when I say it gets old.

Just walking around the streets of Taipei the week prior to New Year was also fun. I could feel the excitement oozing from people as they roamed the streets. I knew something must be up on the Thursday prior to New Year (which was on a Sunday) as I went to the traditional market at my usual 8:15am time expecting it to be sleepy and quiet as usual. You can imagine how shocked I was when I discovered that not only were all the stands open, but it was packed with people! Much like Christmas Eve’s eve is a huge grocery shopping day, so is New Year’s Eve’s eve!

Elaine made a great sign for our door which is the Chinese symbol for Spring…which is deliberately hung upside down to symbolize ‘Spring is Coming’. Brianna also made a large red banner for our living/family room which says ‘Happy New Year’ in Chinese…I have to say that her calligraphy is not bad!

The girls’ school had a Chinese New Year celebration the day before the New Year break. All of the kids were invited to wear traditional Chinese clothing (a qi pao for girls) or to simply wear red if they did not have anything else. Keeping with Chinese New Year tradition, the girls each received a new dress for the New Year, which you can see here. Ok, yes, I AM that mom and I make my girls wear matching dresses. I realize as Brianna is now 9 (OMG is she REALLY that big??!!), I won’t be able to do this for that much longer, so I better milk it as long as I can!

The celebration was very simple. Elaine’s class had a Chinese feast with traditional dishes. Each dish had an explanation of its significance (e.g. noodles to represent long life). Of course, the kids pretty much ignored it all and went for the New Year candy, but hey…the adults appreciated it!

Brianna’s class did not have a feast; however, the school did invite a local acrobat troop to come and entertain the kids. I was able to catch a glimpse of a bit of it…quite entertaining. The kids were performing martial arts, including walking on egg shells (and not breaking them). One adult even jumped on the eggs…without breaking them!!!

One aspect that most people think of during the New Year season is fireworks! This is another great thing about Taiwan…the fireworks are not only really cheap, but they are WAYYYY better than the ‘Pete’s Piccolo’ that I grew up with! We snagged a few bottle rockets, some flying bee-type things, firecrackers, and a real Roman candle one night. We then invited our neighbors to meet us on a random Thursday night to light off a few. You can see here that Terry wasn’t quite sure about some of them! The kids (and adults) had a GREAT time…all for about $8 :). Gotta love Taiwan!

When we came back from Cambodia, we were so excited about New Year that we wound up buying MORE fireworks. This time, feeling a bit cocky from our last fireworks extravaganza, we bought some SERIOUS fireworks. We bought larger bottle rockets, some cool sparklers, more of the flying bee-type things….and a secret box!

Man, it was like 4th of July! Sooooooo cool! I will NEVER view the 4th of July in the same way again. Lighting off your own fireworks (by the safety of the water in the river in a humid environment, of course!) is the ONLY way to go. Man, that box lit up the sky! Next time I think we’ll go for the BIG box :).

While we missed out on much of the New Year hoopla, I’m excited with what little I was able to experience. There was am overwhelming sense of closeness with family and friends which reminds me again that Taipei is not that much different than California. While our traditions may be a bit different, the underlying sentiment that sharing fellowship among friends and family is the reason for the season is the same. I’m looking forward to staying here next year for New Year!

Cambodia (part 1)

February presented the first opportunity to leave the country. We had to stay in Taiwan for 4 months in order to be eligible for health insurance. So, up until now, we’ve limited ourselves to exploring Taiwan (and trust me, we’ve not seen nearly as much as we would like to!!!). However, knowing that Southeast Asia is in our backyard, and the cost not only of the flights, but of the destinations themselves, is quite reasonable…we’ve been itching to explore some place exotic!

Now the hard part… WHERE TO GO??? The world is such a large place! Many people in Taiwan go to Thailand as a vacation destination, so I thought I’d start there; however, there were so many choices in Thailand! Do we go to the beach-part of Thailand, or the more outdoorsy part of Thailand? Where do we stay? Should I book a tour or try to go it alone? The choices were so intimidating and I was so afraid to mess things up (trust me, the role of vacation planner is not glamorous and can be quite stressful!) that I decided to go to a country with limited choices in terms of what to see and where to go….Cambodia!

We had heard that the temples of Cambodia were quite the sight to see, after all it WAS a 7th wonder of the world before the most recent votes came out (which, btw…don’t ask locals about…they’re still upset over the whole thing!). With a few recommendations on touring companies from some experienced world-travellers, I had a tour package which fit our budget and seemed an appropriate vacation to take as a family. Terry was excited that he’d REALLY have a chance to hone his skills in his new hobby, photography, and the girls were very excited that our itinerary included riding an elephant. I was just excited to visit some place COMPLETELY out of the ordinary for us. I think this is the most exotic place I could think of for our family to visit.

Getting out of Taipei would prove to be no easy task. About 5 days prior to our departure, both Terry and I started asking around to others about how early we should leave our apartment to catch a 9am flight. People who’ve lived here for quite some time all said the same thing…4 ½ to 5 hours prior…YIKES! 4:30 or 5am?? Are you KIDDING?!! Knowing that this would NOT be a great way to start our vacation, I booked us one night at a brand-new hotel right at the Taipei airport called ‘Novotel’. Our neighbors had told us about it and the rates were quite reasonable…when I say brand-new, I mean that the hotel opened in November! So, yup, we stayed in a hotel that was 4 months old. Brianna will tell you that this hotel has been her favorite so far. The décor was quite modern, and the amenities in the rooms were cute. The staff were quite friendly and the kid’s corner (which had a Wii to play with as well as a number of board games for the kids) was located QUITE conveniently next to the bar (THAT was some smart planning I tell you!! The architect/planner obviously must have kids!). It was the perfect way to start our vacation.

Personally, while I was feeling really excited, I was also a bit scared and nervous. I had reviewed the itinerary and was comfortable with the recommendations; however, I have to admit that I was scared! The few facts that I knew of Cambodia was that (1) it is a 3rd world country where the living conditions can be severe; (2) it is the home of Angkor Watt and some other temples; and (3) it is supposed to be VERY hot.

With the weight of worrying about the happiness of my family’s vacation resting on my shoulders, I tried to sleep. Thankfully for me, it had been an exhausting week, so I was coming into the night already tired. As I said, the hotel was brand new, so the accommodations were pretty comfy. With a solid 7 hours of sleep behind me, I woke up the kids and Terry and headed off for the unknown!!!

(I'll try to update the rest of the trip soon; however, there seems to be SOOOO much to catch up on that it may take some time!)