Childhood street food vendors

Every morning my mom would take me to the back of the ally for breakfast, and the meal of choice was noodles. This vendor was known for noodles with peanut sauce and soup with fish balls. Their fish balls are very bouncy, Taiwanese term is very " Q ", and there is some meat inside with a touch of meat juice. When the guy ended his business years later, it was a very sad day for the whole neighborhood.

There were other breakfast places that served traditional meal like deep fried "oil stick" and soy milk, but the noodle place was the best!

At night all the street vendors came out, and my childhood favorite were two stands. One is the Oyster noodle soup/pork ball soup/deep fried meat pocket/deep fried taro root cake, and the stand is still there this day but operated by the original owners' son. When I went home for the first time after 14 years, that was one of the place I went. The verdict: I still miss it because things did taste better in your memory.

The other stand sold fish cake soup in the winter and ice cream in the summer. The guy was always very nice to me. I can get similar ice cream now in Tamshui night market as the Old Time ice cream. The fish cake soup usually served dry first with hot and sweet sauce on top and cilantro, when you finish all the pieces, then he pour some hot soup into the bowl. The remaining sauce and the soup cooked with fish cakes all day in were just great! Once I sat there asking for refilled of the soup over and over again and the guy just smile and gave it to me, because the soup is free I justified. My mom said he asked about me often after I came to USA and she would tell that story about her son scammed this poor vendor for bowls after bowls of soup. One day he just disappeared, my mom thinks he had some kind of illness.

My favorite favorite food however, is the oyster omelet.






The best place was this stand in the night market in front of Long-Shan temple. The oyster omelet was Q and the little touch was grounded peanut powder on top of the sauce. That is another one that stands out in my memory. The whole night market was tore down and so went the awesome oyster omelet.

I am sure you know I love food just by looking at me, but hey, don't call me fat, I am just a foodie. :)

Golf: The ride

My exposure to golf was actually started in college years. My friend Steve wanted me to go hit some balls in the driving range. He even lend me his new irons. We were out at the old Storm on Bluemound Rd. and it was a busy afternoon there. I swing and mis-connect a lot and then the club flew out of my hands, went further than the grounder I just hit and stuck straight up in the middle of the range. Of course I had to do the walk of shame while ducking a few aimed drives and even more damaging insults.

You would be surprised if I would even pick up another club after traumatic experience like that. At Bill's urging, I decided to take up golf and went golfing with him. I picked up my K-Mart special set of golf clubs: a deeply discounted Fuzzy Zoeller set after he made his infamous watermelon remarks to Tiger Woods. I AM A GOLFER!

Learning to play was pretty interesting with Bill. He was a much better golfer, and he can actually get his score under 100. I would be lucky if I can get it under 120. The point was actually to get out and be one with the course. With all the frustration, just one good swing can take away all that. Even though Bill and I spent a lot of time out of bound looking for balls, and could never figure out how to play on the fairway when we accidentally hit one straight and land one there, golf was a very good aerobic workout.

Then came Golf: The ride. We were out early at our favorite course Kettle Marine, and the grass was quite wet yet. We drove the cart up down this hill and the cart lost all traction and was did a 360 as we slided down the hill. That was the beginning of all our trouble with golf cart.

At this par 3 at Edgewood by the water fountain/bubblier, I took a drink and grabbed my iron and walked up to the tee box. Bill would sit in the passenger side and reached over and drove the cart. Somehow that day the ground was slippery or something, he lost control and drove right into the woods. I turned around after I hear the crash. The roof of the cart was crushed under a tree and the bumper came off the cart. Of course the game was going down hill after that. We tried to fix up the cart as much as we can, but without heavy tool we can only get the roof back about 3 quarter of the way, and we threw the bumper to the rear basket. At the clubhouse, Bill, being Bill, went to the attendant hat in hand to explain. The attendant took a look, waved him off. " OH, THIS HAPPENS ALL THE TIME! "

Another golf story was the time Bill took a swim: We were at this Par 4 at Kettle Marine, we had to drive past a water hazard and go Dog leg right since there is another water hazard on the left. Bill took out the Big Dog and hit it straight to the left, I actually sliced to the right and stayed dry. We went up to the swamp area and Bill asked me where his ball landed. I pointed straight ahead, so he took a step and sunk into the ground, but he was in motion for the next step and he was half way in the swamp. To add salt to the wound, I looked to my left, his ball was right next to me on the dry ground. I did not know how Bill finish the 18 in wet pants but he did. When he told this story, usually with dagger eyes and " MY BUDDY GEORGE!"

Bill and I had some very special memories on the course, we played 18 in pouring rain, putted the green with 2 inches of water; we also saw some very beautiful scenes: cranes in the morning sun, greens shimmering in the sun with morning dew, Swallows circling the green in large groups, but those are for me to treasure forever.

I stopped playing golf few years later to Bill's dismay, I chipped a bone on my thumb due to hitting the ground too hard. The real reason which I did not tell him was more financial at that time. I just never did go back after that. I know he was very disappointed.

I made a promise to him that after he passed away, I would take him out there once more. Even though my game was pretty terrible as usual that morning, I knew he was out there with me as I spread his ashes from hole to hole. There were this big crane standing in the middle of the fairway, I said, DON'T WORRY, CRANE. and I sliced to the right into the rough as usual. I did hit it straight on the Avon Lady hole which we usually sliced to the right and onto some people's front lawn. It was an emotional morning for me and I buried the ball in the memorial I had built for him.



Sitting in the clubhouse bar by myself was just not the same. No Corona, no chili dog, no remarks to attendant's toupee. I do miss my buddy Bill dearly, but he is truly one with the course now.

Childhood street games

What did anyone do before the age of video games?! There were a lot of old school street vendor games in Taiwan. No doubt it was a form of gambling but there are these games you pay to get a small piece of paper with number on it, and you win the prize according to the number. The prize can be candy, bean cake, meat jerky, toy, gum or even cash! Some even skip the number part, you just poke through a square on a sheet of many squares and the the prize is in the box below. You can find these games on sale in night market as a novalty of the past. (No wonder Asians love to gamble, we hook them young! ha ha!)

There were two vendors at night next to the rice mill in front of the post office building. One is some form of fishing. The idea is to take the "scoop", which is a metal wire circle with thin paper stretched over it and the circle attached to a little wood stick, and scoop out goldfish in a shallow pan size of a kiddie pool. Of course the paper is quite thin and usually not able to hold the weight of the goldfish once it is wet. If you somehow able to scoop the fish out, then you win that fish. Odds of it? Not so good. You can pay extra for a scoop with thicker paper of course.

The other vendor was this old lady, she lived right behind the rice mill. She was always very quiet and her game was fishing for small water balloons. Same idea that the string was quite thin and usually break. You too can buy a hook with thicker strings. Sometime she would fill the small water balloon with Winter Mellon Tea (sweet drink), and all you need was a needle prick and you would have some nice drink too!

I remember vividly how she would sit there in the night with one lonely light shinning. Not a lot of people frequent her business but she would come out night after night. Some neighborhood kid decided to mock her and set up a similar stand until his parents put a stop to it, but she was always quiet and just sit there tending her little business.

One year she was hit by one of the truck from the rice mill as it backing out of the ally. She was nowhere to be found for a long time and then she came out again. Lonely figure in the lonely night with a lonely light.

I am sure she is long gone but she still lives in my memory. I often wonder where was her family and children. However, I am sure someone is looking at my mom's lonely figure sitting in Starbucks, wondering where is her heartless son? :(

Pet Insurance

I just signed our greyhound Bitsie up for pet insurance. She is six now and I am just full of fear with Osteosarcoma in my mind. OS was the monster that took the spirit out of Sadie's eyes.

I found this at the vet and I am not sure how well the claim service is. I did the level 2 which is more for serious illness and injury.

http://www.aspcapetinsurance.com/info

It came out to be $220 a year, and it covers 80% of your vet bill up to $8000/yr, $1500/incident after $100 yearly deductible. All injury and illness have to be healed in 180 days. There is also a $7/month rider if you want to have extra $1000 for the next year if the illness carry past 180 days.

Stay tuned, Bits get injured all the time from running crazy at the Dog Park, I will let you know how this insurance work out!

Taiwan Flood and other random thoughts

Around 8-8-09 (Father's Day in Taiwan), Typhoon Morakot finished dumping 8 feet of water on southern Taiwan. The result were 70+ bridges washed away, many roads cut off, and some entire village covered by mud slide or sudden flood. Please support the effort to help.

http://www.globalgiving.com/projects/taiwan-typhoon-relief-and-assistance-fund/

It is quite terrible when I hear some pumpkin head radio talk heads talked up about how there is no global warming, and I did remember when he talked up about how there were no recession before last October. There were just no accountability and one would say anything for a buck. The bridges in Taiwan were designed for 100 year flood mark, some older ones for 50 year flood mark. This time the rain reached the 200 year flood mark, so you can see why all the bridges failed. Taiwan had one year worth of rainfall in a day, the global weather pattern is definitely changing and I am seriously looking at where the flood line is around me. You can never be too prepared. It can't happen here? Taiwan were urging people to conserve water one day and the next day the dams were overflowing or breaking. The weather forecast were saying the storm was going to the north but all the rain went to the south. Whenever I brought this up with customers, there were always some stories about some new million dollar subdivision built over wetland and now suffer serious water problem.

When Bill had his motorcycle accident, he told me that we are constant walking on the edge, we do not think we are, because nothing happens from day to day so then we take un-needed chances, but when you fall off from the edge, then you realize you were there all these time. I will always remember this and take it to heart.


Cash for Clunker program is now over and we have this 2009 Yaris 5 door to show for. I named her " Red Velvet". I started the research about a month before the program started. I was told to only get a Prius or a Prius. I was very excited to see Toyota had 0% financing for 2009 Prius and we rushed out to find out. THERE WERE ALL DONE SINCE MAY! I did manage to find out in Madison and it was sold the same day I called.

Plan B was to trade in for either a Honda Fit, Nissan Versa, Toyota Yaris or Smart for two. I drove a Versa for rental when I went to Colorado. I like the room and where the cruise control is but there were some noise issue. We test drove the Fit and if I am younger, I might like the handling and styling more. I really wanted to like the Smart for two and it was actually very roomy inside, but I can't live with the automatic manual transmission. The Yaris was one of those cases that everything just worked out and led me to it.

We were able to get 2.5% under invoice and I actually got the same deal for Tattoo Jack for his new Tundra. Other than the $4500 rebate, we also got $200+ for junk value. Jack took the factory rebate and I took the 0%. We are very happy with Toyota and now all our cars are Toyotas. I am hoping to get 40+ MPG using cruise control as much as possible. We learned that with the Prius.

On the same topic of getting money (back) from government, we also had a tankless water heater installed. Two month into it I can tell you the electric bill went down 1/3 already. It is pretty much an on-demand water heater so you are not heating up two tanks of water all day and you will never run out. The limitation is how many bathrooms you have due to the winter here and takes a lot more to heat up ice cold ground water. I decided on a Noritz unit.

http://www.noritz.com/homeowners/



I also researched the installer and I can tell you some people are trying to get you full 30% government ( up to $1500) tax credit by charging you more. Hmmmmmm. We also get $400 energy rebate by changing from electric tank heater. Drop me a note if you like more info. Don't bother with those cheap units sold at Menard or Home Depot, you do get what you paid for!

Who knows, maybe in a few years we will have solar panels all over the house....

Confession of a (not so bright) Ramboid

I am a Rambus (NASDAQ: RMBS) LTL (Long Term Long), and I have a problem. I watch the stock price everyday, I lurk on the Investor Village Rambus board. I click on Rambus.org at least 5-10 times a day.

I had held the stock since 1997. The reason? They provided the technology to power Nintendo 64 and I saw a TV ad on CNBC. Then it came the big spike and 4 for 1 split, I was hooked. I would suggest interested readers to research this company and understand the potential, even though many Ramboids like me had to endure a lot of up and downs.

Thanks to a lot of smart people in Ramboid community, they can usually call the events way ahead of the curve.

By the way, you will have no idea how much Rambus technology you own. It is in your computer, your cell phone, your game console, and maybe even your TV. All the Ramboids just hope the justice will prevail and the inventors and investors will finally get paid for their inventions. It is a truly David vs Goliath story once all is unfold.

Do your own DD. I just blog what I know. :)

Baseball

Taiwanese had their love of baseball traced back to the Little League World Series win by a bunch of poor kids forming a team years ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_League_World_Series

There is also the home run legend Sadaharu Oh; his Chinese family name is actually the same as mine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadaharu_Oh

There are several Taiwanese players in MLB now, the most famous one is C. M. Wang of Yankees and Hu (on first) of Dodgers.

Of course when I was growing up, kids play baseball on the street and every parents wanted their son to be the next great baseball player. I remember the day my father was trying to teach me how to throw a "fastball". Well, even today I can tell you my fastball top out at 58 mph, not even fast enough for little league. My father was frustrated that I could not throw an over the shoulder fastball but a sidearm one. I guess until just recently I learned to, it was just physically not possible for me as a kid.

I did not have much of a "career" in baseball. What do you do with a kid whom can't throw, can't catch, and can't hit? My very very few moments of glory were taking a walk in a street pick up game when everyone on my team BEG me not to swing and just stand there. I did hit a double once but more like the infielder lost the infield fly ball in the sun.

These days I will just be a fan. Rachel and I had partial season tickets to Milwaukee Brewers since 1993. Just don't say the "C" word to me.

We also had Sadie the greyhound in our life thanks to baseball. We were debating on if we wanted a dog or not and we finally decided to let baseball god decide. When Craig Council tied up the game and also scored the winning run in inning 11 to lead a 1997 Florida Marlins comeback, it was decided then. When Marlins won again in 2003, I did promise Sadie a little sister, but how thing worked out was Bitsie after Sadie's passing in 2004.

I did not get a chance to throw baseball around with my father that much, but I did take him to County Stadium once and it was Brewers/Yankees. He was pretty toasty after half of a beer like I would. I threw balls around with late Bill here and there. He always tried to throw the knuckle ball but there were always some spin still. I hope he won't get mad at me for saying that and give me a "Kunkle Sandwich" (Inside joke).

Frank Thomas is my favorite player for years. I was also a White Sox fans for years because of him. I believe he should be HOF bound. We did go see him play in Spring Training one year, and that was the year Michael Jordan was trying out baseball.

If you come to the shop in the summer, you likely will hear the Brewer game on the radio in my booth, and I do appreciate the other fans talk baseball with me. Remember, that "C" word is a no-no. ;)

Childhood memories

I grew up above the family rice mill, and the workers are like my extended family. We all live in the same building so I did have many uncles and aunties. The younger guys would take me all over the city while they deliver the rice on the back of their 150cc motorcycle. Later on they would have small vans and trucks.

There were a couple of shop dogs too, but Little Black died before my time and her pup Little Won was the first dog I know. According to the shop legend that I was crying excessive one night as a baby, and that was the night some thieves broke into the mill and cracked the safe. In the process, they poisoned Little Won.

My parents worked a lot but my father did take my sister and I out when possible. Another family legend is once we were at this park with father and his friends, I do remember the green grass and it was a very sunny day, I can see my father and his friends huddle to my left talking, and my sister on my right all the sudden got up and ran out of the park. I was quite puzzled but I was just a little kid. When my father frantically asked me, all I can tell him was that my sister turned and ran out of the park!

Well, I think the story was that she thought my father left, so she ran out to find help. She did manage to find a policeman I think and I wonder til this day why she did not ask me where father was and I would just point to the left. :)

I love my sister, but I just have to give her some grieve. :)

When I was a little older, one of my young uncle brought us a mutt called Chubby. That first night was great, we played and she ran all over the living room, but the rest of her life was in a kennel. She did have a litter by the neighbor dog since Taiwanese people did not like to fix their dogs then, and we only kept the boy Jimmy. The best thing I could do for them was to get cooked pig intestine for them and I know that was Chubby's favorite, (mine too). They did continue to give her that as a treat from time to time when I came to US.

There was also a shop cat. I think he/she was black or grey, but the dust from processing rice would be all over he/her. The cat was tortured as a kitten by neighborhood kids and the tail was tied a knot, and the knot grew with the cat. Years later I asked the uncle worked in the back and he did say the name but I had since forgotten, and I know he missed the cat because he started to cry. He had since passed on as well and I hope the reunion was joyful.

There is nothing like running your hands through the rice while being processed, it was warm and very golden. I stood knee deep in them before, but also pick bugs from them too. The busy time was when the government contract came down and they would go into overtime, but years later when the contract was lost, that was the end of the rice mill as a big family.

I do still have a battle scar from the rice mill. I think it was a lazy afternoon and I was just running around, and I ran right into a dolly when one of the worker was using it to transport a big bag of rice. The edge of of the steel bottom piece cut right into my leg and I sat down in a pool of blood. For some reason my father was in the front and he grabbed me and ran me right to the doctor on the next block. I lost just a little bit of leg muscle that day, but hey, live to tell about it.

One thing about being so far away is that I am far far removed from all the people in the rice mill. I can see them in my head still but some had moved on since. I still remember, guys, I will do my best not to forget.

Molly

On my short trip to Colorado, I met little Molly at my uncle and aunt's Great Pyrenees rescue. (www.pyrescue.org) Uncle John, Aunt Linda and Kat had been giving this little girl a lot of TLC but she would get better and then get worse. She was only 4 month old at the time and had been so sick all these time. They had to pay the puppy mill just to rescue her.

She had a lot of fluid in her lungs (both) when I saw her, you can hear it from her breathing. Underneath all the fur, she was scary skinny. I was told that walking does her good so I walked her as much as I can.

Molly was a spirited girl, when she is done going toward a direction, she would just sit until I change where I am walking. She had me pretty well trained I say. Molly wanted to join rest of the rescues but because of her condition, she was staying in the special TLC room by herself. Her favorite spot was just outside of it, it was under the shade and the cool concrete felt good to her.

The day after I met her was supposed to be her day to cross but her condition did improve and for the next few days, we went on many short walks. I kept telling her that she needs to get better so she can go to a good family, and there were many people asked to adopt her when she gets well.

My time there was up and I had to say goodbye and came back to Wisconsin. I was told that she would still look for me when go on walks and was a little depressed.



On 7-10-09 I received the email from Uncle John that little Molly had gone as far as she can with her fight, on the day she became an angel. Everyone was crushed. I felt very very bad that I broke her heart when I left and she stopped eating.

On request, I am not going to be a sad blogger. I am happy to report that Uncle John granted me the request to adopt Angel Molly, so she is in a pack with me now. They all think she chose me, and it is a honor even though the precious moments are so fleeting...

I prayed to my angel pack in the traditional Buddhist way and Sadie answered me that Molly is with the pack but she likes to be in a pack on her own, and then later Aussie decided to be with her since he is fighting with Whitie. You might think I am crazy but I do feel my angel pack is very much active in their own right, and I know they are waiting for me. Like Becky used to say,
I collect angels, I collect them one at a time.

Memory

Yeah, you are hearing the song in your head right now. Perhaps I did see CATS too many times, yet I still have no clue what the musical is all about. Okay, back on track.

I remember in a movie it said that one is alive as long as someone remembers one. I often think of it since I do treasure a lot of unique memories of people and fur kids I miss dearly. I can talk about it to my customer while I tattoo, but does second hand story count as "memory?"

Some culture has the Storyteller tradition, I guess I am blessed with some (selective) memory capacity to do that. (BUT I CAN'T REMEMBER CUSTOMERS' NAME FOR THE LIFE OF ME!) When I left Taiwan at age 14.9, my memory of Taiwan was a lot more vivid because I separated that group of memories to the ones in USA. I must say that I was very disappointed when I went home years later when the food did not taste as good as remembered, and boy, did the streets look narrower. For that same reason I am hesitant to go to New Orleans. I just had too many good memories there.

These days I do take some video to put on Youtube. www.youtube.com/koolfooltattoo Even though it is still somewhat artificial and not a true slice of experience, I find it to be a great tool regardless. I wish it is more like the device in movie STRANGE DAYS that you can share memories.

When my wife's sis Becky passed away unexpectedly, we went up to U.P. to help handle her affair. Sitting in her bedroom where she passed, I was looking for her will and I came across her posting on message board and I suddenly realized that was her lifeline and support, it was honest and it reconstructed her for me in my mind. With all her stuff, you can kinda live her life from seeing the financial records, DVD selections, and you see what she love. I was very very sad when a wall of photo came down that she worked hard to put up came down, I guess that was when the reality sat in.

So I am leaving my mark in the cyberspace, perhaps someone can relate to the memories I have. Like Bill (my mentor) used to say, I hope people still remember me kindly. (by the way, this is not some cry for help or anything, I am not thinking of OFFing myself or anything, I had enough "mix-ups" to not clear this up, and that, sir, is a different story.) Bill was so loved and so many people came to his memorial, I know I will be one whom remember him kindly for sure.

Wow, second blog and I am getting sad already.

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(WHERE IS THE BEEF?) Okay, on to some memories.

My first memory is this big window. I like to say sunset with the warm orange light but I might have confused this with a Chinese book and stole the same memory. There was that big window however. metal bars on the other side. My father fixed up a storage area in my mom's family home to live, and while my sister lived upstairs with my grandma, we are in the second floor. My mother worked downstairs in the rice mill as the accounting person. I often sit in that room alone and stare at the big window. ( Things are done differently there and then so please do not judge) I know I was jealous of my sister, because I thought she had all the goodies upstairs with grandma, while my father try to prove he can make it on his own in the shadow of my mom's family, we were not rich. I know once they tried to make me wear my sister's hand me down and that is YEARS of therapy I tell you. But I guess my sister was jealous of me, because I get to live with my parents.

I remember I threw a fit one time that I thought they were hiding all the toy to give to my sister, of course that is still somewhat debatable, and I can no longer prove or disprove. ;) My parents still have most of my toy in display back in Taiwan, so I guess I did have some toy of my own contrary to my belief. I do wish they keep my comic collection but I believe that was lone gone.

The forth floor of the building was where my grandma prays, and one can clime up to the roof from there as well. Every Oct. 10th, there would be firework at night like how Fourth of July here and during the day, military plane might drop leaflets depicting Taiwan's military and some slogan about recovering mainland China. My grandpa said he would give me $10NT (2.5 cents us) for everyone I collected and with help of all the people in the rice mill, I had a lot. Let's just say once he saw how many I collected, I never did see my money! I think we were suppose to throw our teeth up to the roof instead of tooth fairy deal, I wonder if any of mine is still up there.

On that note, while I keep thinking about my grandpa (on my mother side) and how I should go up to him and say : SHOW ME THE MONEY!" I should go share this tidbit with my sister, her memory is just not good after giving birth to Lyra; I guess that is the side effect of forgetting the labor pain.

to trick or to heal

hey, i am blogging. i once had a blog before there was the word blog on my website www.koolfooltattoo.com named "by george". why all small case? because i am typing on a mini keyboard of a nokia n810.

so what do i have to say is so important for cyberspace? likely nothing but as an artist, you really don't know if you are tricking (self/others) or healing (self/others) by creating and sharing. i hope all you cyber lurker get something out of it, maybe just a smile is good enough for me.

disclaimer- typo and grammar problem will happen, this is my third language after all.... good excuse, hey?