Day 2 - Register

Today’s Programme
Morning	Register
Afternoon	Group recreational activities
Evening	To organize into group
Hotel	Taoyuan Training Center, TaoYuan

In the morning we gathered into groups. They took each group to the Auditorium (but, to me, it looked like a small gym). We had to register and take pictures for our ID cards. They called a group at a time to register as the ID were sorted by groups and there were 4 of them. The first one was of course Dui 1 (=group 1). The process of registration started with checking our profiles, then signing to accept their rules and ended with taking pictures for the ID cards. The rest of us, including mine, had to wait until the whole first group was done. While we were waiting, we were told to design Group’s Flag, name, slogan, and dancing moves. We named our group “Xiao Gou” which means ‘little dog’ as this year is the year of dog. Our slogan was “OK ma?” which means ‘are you okay?’ (It has no special meaning). There was also a cheering song that got along well with our group name. We used the Chinese barking sound—‘Wang Wang’ as part of the cheering. At the end, we noticed that our flag was the most beautiful!

As it was my turn to register, I went onto the check-in table and checked my profile. I got a pack of documents. There were the ID card with our Chinese name and our Thai name in English without picture, Questionnaires, the Rules Paper to sign, a pen, Map of Taiwan, and Program’s Handbook that had a tentative schedule of our trip. Then, I had to take pictures. We were allowed to take only two pictures each. We could do any actions we want. They said we can pick the good one. I thought I could pick the picture I like the most but they picked it for me. Unlucky again, they didn’t pick the one I want -_-‘’

I didn’t know what the afternoon plan was, but Dui Zhang (Group leaders) wanted to go shopping. They talked to FDY and asked them to take us to the shopping area. The nearest shopping area is a small town called Chong Li which is about 40 minutes away from the Taoyuan training center. During the way to Chong Li, we saw something like a glass room stall. There was a sexy woman wearing tiny piece of cloths in a room. I was curious to know who they are. I was told later that they are called “Bing Lan Su” (=The girl that sells betel) or “La Mei” (=hot chick). Those women work as betel seller. The FDY told us that they sell everything in their shop (everything is really everything. Imagine things they have since they were born….)
We arrived at Chong Li after spending some time on the bus but it was worth it. The shopping area is much bigger than Siam Square, the shopping center in Bangkok.

This city is full of Thai workers. We saw the sign in Thai since we were at the car park. The small noodle shop I had dinner had Thai waitress, but she didn’t really want to talk. I guess she’s perhaps an illegal worker there. And there we bought the cheapest & the best International phone card in Taiwan. The seller was Thai too. While we were talking to the seller, a Thai man came to the stall to buy a phone card. I thought I was in Bangkok :))

I walked to the Chong Li train station and checked out the subway beside the station. I got into the subway because I was curios. There’s no train in the subway but it’s the way to the road behind the subway. Another side of the town (behind the subway) is full of motels. It didn’t look like it was a place we could visit during the night time. Of course, I decided not to go further but walked back to the subway. I bought very cheap stuff from an old man. I tried to ask him to lower down the price but he kept refusing. Well, it’s me who was too stingy :-P the stuff was already cheap, cheapest in Taiwan.

Finished with the shopping, I went to meet the people of our group. Dui2 was the best. All of us were at the meeting point on time while the other groups still missed someone. The bus didn’t wait for the missing people (They already warned us that no bus is going to wait for people who arrive late). The missing people were lucky ‘cos my bus had a delay because there was another bus in front of us and our bus couldn’t move. The guys that arrived late had to catch our bus with embarrassment.

We had a meeting when we got back to the prison. The meeting topic was about the show for the ending ceremony but no one made any good suggestion, so we ended the meeting without any result :-(