In Chinese, you can make an exclamatory statement by adding le after the adjective. You can further emphasize the word by adding tai, which can be translated as too, to the beginning. For example, if something is too expensive, I can say “Tai gui le!
My trip to Korea was tai hao le! (Too good or awesome). I
had many adventures with Laura, Mollie, Grace, and mini-Grace.
Tai Educational Le!
On this trip, I learned a great deal about Korean history,
specifically about the Korean War. In school, it seems like they usually jump
from WWII to Vietnam and completely gloss over the Korean War.
On the first day, we went to the Seoul Library and we walked
around the area near the American Embassy. Both places had tributes to the
Korean war.
The second day we went to the Korean War museum. I thought
that this was a museum that was about the Korean War that was fought in the
1950s, but it was really a museum about all the wars in Korean history. It was
interesting to see the different weapons and military garb from the various
time periods.
Another interesting aspect was how culture plays into how
history is presented. On one of the plaques, it said something along the lines
of Korea was shamed when it was invaded. If this had been in an American
museum, I think that it would have something along the lines of “The dirty
rotten malicious dictator invaded us, but we endured because we are America.”
Tai Yummy Le!
(Actually in Chinese, you would probably say hen hao chi, but that does not fit
with my theme of tai…le).
One of the best things about traveling is eating food from
all over the word. While in Korea, I ate Korean, Vietnamese, Mexican, Italian,
and Indian. Not to mention that Korea loves coffee and donuts, so I had a
Starbucks coffee almost every day I was there and I ate several Dunkin’ donuts.
Not everything was quite to my liking. The calzone I got at
the Italian place had a sweet mayonnaise on it, and I bought a breakfast
sandwich at Dunkin’ Donuts with relish on it. Aside from that the food was
fabulous.
Tai Surreal Le!
Laura and I went to the DMZ. It is hardly believable that I
was able to get that close to North Korea. As we were driving along, it looked
like we were going up any other hill. We could have been in eastern Ohio or
Pennsylvania. The highways looked like any other highway except that the
highway had barbed wire and military posted. I cannot even imagine what the lives
of those who live across that boundary line must be like.
Tai interesting Le!
That night at the hostel we decided to do the hostel thing
and hang out in the common room and meet people. We hung out with two guys who
both happened to be Australian, but they had only just met each other. During
this time, I had a fascinating revelation. I had been told that when men travel
overseas, they travel to find themselves. Whereas, when women travel overseas,
they travel because they have a purpose and they know who they are. After this
trip, I think that this is true. I met and talked with three different men on
this trip and all three of them were aimless wanders who do not really have
jobs. Then it later hit me that this is why there are no single men in our
company. We don’t want aimless wanderers who are merely want adventure. We want
men who know who they are and who have a purpose.
Tai Shopping Le!
(This is in no way grammatically correct, but you get the picture).
First of all, Korea has better socks than anywhere else in
the world. I bought a pair of socks with a hippo head on the front and on the
back it had a wide-open hippo mouth. I also found angora socks for a dollar,
which seemed liked a pretty good deal to me. Their socks are just so cute and
fun.
I actually didn’t buy that much, but I did a great deal of
looking. I went to two different bookstores with English books and simply
absorbed the literary beauty of the English language (or perhaps I just simply
appreciated the fact that I could actually read and comprehend the books).
Tai Confusing Le!
We decided to be adventurous and take the ferry back from
Korea to China. It was quite an interesting trip. The ferry was in no way
catering to foreigners. Very little was in English. Some things were in Korea,
but mostly it was in Chinese.
Honestly, I had no idea what to expect, but the boat ride
was generally long and tiring. Meals were one of the most draining parts of the
trip. The dinning room was only open for about 40 minutes at a time, and all
500 or so people on the boat came into the room at once when there was only
enough seating for maybe 200 people. We tried to take our food out of the
dining room, but there was a guard at the door who would not allow us to leave
with our food.
There were four non-Asians on the boat, so we stuck out like
an sore thumb. One was a French guy whom we befriended. We tried to play Dutch
Blitz with him, but the waitress (we were at the bar/restaurant) told us no.
She did not kick us out nor did she explain why we could not play. She simply
told us no.
Tai Loud Le!
The first day on the boat was a very long day, so I
immediately went to sleep. However, we were in the room right next to the tv
room, so the tv woke me up at about 3 am, and I could not go back to sleep.
Eventually, I was able to find sleep again, but it was interrupted at 7am when
the made the announcement for breakfast. At least I believe it was the
announcement for breakfast. I was in too groggy a state to understand Chinese,
and they did not make an English announcement. Let me take this moment to say
that I do not think that Chinese value sleeping-in like Americans do.
I was able to fall back asleep, but once our neighbors
returned from breakfast, they decided that shouting and playing cards would be
an excellent activity for 8 o’clock in the morning. At this time, I wanted to
go over and shout at them tai loud le! (This is where I got the inspiration for
this blog’s title). However, even if they spoke English, I would never have had
the gumption to yell at strangers like that. Maybe if they had been teenagers,
but certainly not middle-aged women.
After listening to the many loud passengers on the boat, I
reflected that this must be what it is like when other people are around my
family.
Tai Glad to be Home
Le!
After the boat, we took a taxi, a train, and another taxi to
get food. Then one final taxi to get home. The trip was good, but there’s nothing
like a hot shower and warm bed after a several days of traveling.
