Goodbye for Now....

Dear readers,

Taiwan :)

I can't believe that I am writing this last blog. (Unless I feel motivated to write about my travels after I return home). Can you believe that the time has already come and that I have already been in Asia for a year?! Don't you feel like it was yesterday, when I first started explain to you, through these wonderful blogs ;) the crazy experiences I had been having in Taiwan? It just feels like yesterday, when I was sitting at home with my parents debating whether or not I should take the offered teaching position here in Taiwan and come pursue my goal of studying Chinese. I feel very fortunate that I have the strength and courage as well as amazing motivating parents which all helped me take that leap of faith and fly halfway across the world to a country I barely knew anything about! Although, this past year has been one filled up great highs and low lows, I wouldn't change anything, because I have grown so much as a person, mentally and spiritually.

I thought that I would just write about some of the things that I am going to miss after being back in the United States. I can't say that I would want to live here any longer than a year, but there are some things that you just will not find anywhere back home.

For example, I will miss how there is ALWAYS something, somewhere happening in Taipei. You can go to any street, ally, any MRT station and find a bustling market, street performances, art fairs, food fairs and just people selling things everywhere. You can never be bored here. Along with these, I will miss the night markets, which are so crazy and filled with anything you could possibly think of, but are so convenient and very interesting to just go and people watch. If you are sick of all of the people, you can just head to a nearby park and enjoy the wonderful outdoors and sit in the shade or take a walk. This along with running by the river nearby my house was probably my favorite thing to do in Taiwan (well, after I found the park a couple months ago). Spending time outdoors, when it isn't scorching hot, is so wonderful and Taiwan has beautiful parks that are very well maintained. When I would need time to myself to just think and get away from everything, the park near my housing and running by the river made me feel like I wasn't in Taiwan anymore without all noisy cars and scooters and with all of the open space. I will miss that.  

In addition to this, I will miss being able to speak Chinese to just about anyone and YES, I think I may even miss the random people always staring at me and saying random things to me like, "can I be your friend," or "wow, you're really tall," or "pretty woman, walking down the street," (yes a man really sang that to me) or "can I have a picture with you?" At first its very strange and you don't know what to do, but after a while you just smile and laugh and they end up laughing along with you. I definitely won't get that back home as I will just blend right in, of course. I won't be, that tall, yellow haired girl, amongst all of the jet black haired, short Taiwanese people anymore.

Furthermore, I am really really going to miss the sense of safety and security here in Asia. Not because I am bigger than most people, haha, but because everyone is so truthful and wouldn't dare to cause any harm or damage to another person or their things. It didn't matter where I went, at what time or who I was with, I always felt safe, even if I was taking a cab home at 3 am, after a while I always knew I would make it home with any difficulty. The Taiwanese truly are honest, nice people.

Finally, I will miss all of the wonderful people that I had the chance to meet and become friends with. Thats the thing about traveling, there are always going to be "goodbyes." But, these people have made a great impact on me and my adventure here in Taiwan and am thankful that I met everyone who I worked with, went to school with and just hung out with on the weekends.

Well thats all I can really think of for now, but I am sure there is a lot more that I will realize I miss once I am back at home. But, let the countdown begin as I leave Taiwan in about 2 weeks and head off to Southeast Asia to do some more traveling. I am very excited as I will be heading to Hong Kong, Vietnam and Thailand! There are going to be so many more awesome experiences and this is definitely not the last time I will be in Asia.

I hope you all have thoroughly enjoyed my life/blog throughout this past year and thank you all SO very much for reading and sharing my stories with others. I hope that you have all learned a lot about Taiwan and Asia and that you one day will come see what it is really like here! You'll be in for a great surprise.

Goodbye for now,  Olivia xx