台北

I could already see my teacher saying "I told you so" when I first stepped foot into the Taoyuan airport in Taiwan. The hostel we were supposed to stay at was quite far from the airport. My friend and I had a choice to either:

1. Get into a taxi cab, show him the address in Chinese, and pay him 1000 NTD to take us there, OR
2. Pay about a total of 150 NTD by taking the shuttle into 台北车站, then taking the subway to Guting Station, near the hostel.

Money wasn't an issue, but I wanted to challenge myself. At first I was on a roll. Before getting off the airplane, I had chatted with the cute stewardess on Eva Air while the plane was landing. The conversation went something like this:

我：小姐，你知道在哪里可以买SIM卡吗？
小姐：以前7-eleven有，但是现在我觉得不能。不过，手机店肯定有。
我：好！谢谢！
小姐：先生，你从哪里来？
我：美国！我住在洛杉矶。而且，我在美国出生。
小姐：你来过台湾吗？
我：没去过。我去过中国，但是台湾是第一次。
小姐：是吗？我觉得你的国语不错。你多久学习国语？
我：一年左右。我用电脑学习。我的老师住在北京。我们用Skype上课？
小姐：只有一年？我觉得学过一年会那么好，你很厉害！
我：不是，不是！
小姐：很好！你治到你要去哪里吗？你来台北工作还是旅行？
我：当然旅行！现在我不知道，可是现在我有一个朋友住在台北学习中文。我们等他介绍。
小姐：阿，很好。我希望你的旅行很好玩！

I only remember snip bits of the conversation, but this was essentially our conversation before we landed in Taoyuan airport. After landing, we exchanged some money and went over to a phone booth to call my friend we had arrived. Then we went over to the bus station and I attempted to buy two tickets. My friend didn't speak any Chinese whatsoever. I went to the first lady at one of the counters and said "我们要买票去台北车站。" She looked at me all confused and then pointed me to the next counter over. It was obvious I couldn't read much.

My teacher, Mona, had always warned me about it. She said I needed to spend more time reading short stories and articles to improve my reading skills. My mom kept telling me the same also. They both knew I could not read well. In fact, my reading and writing skills are much weaker compared to what I could do in high school, but my speaking skills have improved dramatically.

So right when I stepped foot into Taiwan, the problem was already apparent. What's worse, I could not read many of the menu items in the restaurants I went to. Usually, if i heard it pronounced, I could tell what it likely was, but since I couldn't read at one of the restaurants, I simply asked for 排骨饭, because those three characters were the only ones I recognized. My two other friends, who couldn't speak or read in Mandarin, ended up eating 排骨饭 as well.