Man, I Already Miss Taiwan

It is about two weeks for me to move back to the United States; and I l already miss Taiwan very much.

I miss what I usually eat in the breakfast in Taiwan. I miss mantou 饅頭, or まんじゅう in Japanese. This is a steamed lofty-like bread made of flour and yeast. Its low density texture made it very easy to chew, and digest. It is usually eaten in combination of regular milk or soy milk. I also miss yakult, 養樂多 or ヤクルト in Japanese, a kind of drink that made of much good bacteria to help food digestion.

I miss the variety of fruit available on plates every meal when I was in Taiwan. Of course, there were regular fruit such as apples, pears and oranges. But, there are quite a few fruit such as fire-dragon fruit 火龍果, four-season fruit 四季果 which most American even had not heard of the names.

I miss the morning and evening Taiwanese exercise enthusiast crowds in the park or school campuses from Qi-Kong to Tai-Chi, to dance. Americans only drive kids to the park after school for soccer or baseball games. On weekends, occasionally, American families may play baseball together in the park.

I miss the crowds of the dusk-market in every Taiwan cities. There, not only you shop for the bargain, you also had opportunities to chat with friends.

I miss the year of no car and no driving. I could walk to my office in 5 minutes when I was in Taiwan. At noon, I could also walk back and took siesta in my residence. The public transportation in Taiwan is so convenient that I can rely on bus, and trains to go most of the places I like to go.

I miss the health care system in Taiwan. I could walk to a doctor's office in the evening while most American doctor's office will close after 4:30 PM. The doctors in Taiwan are competent. Some of the Chinese-Medicine trained doctor offer patients alternative treatment in which US patients had no such luck.

Of course, there are few things I don't miss in Taiwan. I don't miss rude motorcyclists roaming everywhere even on the pedestrian paths. I don't miss and heat and the humidity of Taiwan summer.

Overall, I still like Taiwan, the place where I came from; the name of Taiwan, someday will become the name of a nation.

I Have Gone Through The Worst So I Understand How To Be Thankful

This is my story on how I had temporary gone through excursive pain and agony in my body and mind. Such experiences have reinforced my faith that we have to be thankful everyday when we can just be ourselves to do everyday chore such as working, play, and rest. Because when you realize those that you and I had taken for granted can be lost one day they are very good reasons that we must be thankful and enjoy the life we have.

The story started when I arrived U.S. from Taiwan trip and visited my doctor for a complete medical check up and some follow-up discussions. The medical report card turns out to be clean. I then discussed my two major complaints with my doctor--indigestion and insomania. Doctor suggested to tackle the insomania problem first.

I have been on temazepine medication for years. This medication belongs to a benzodiazepine drug category which acts to enhance inhibitory effect of a neurotransmitter (GABA). The medication is primarily used to treat insomania patient and is considered to be very safe. However, a patient using such a medication for a long period of time can develop tolerance and the medication would become less effective for the medication.

My doctor suggested me to give my body a temazepine-free two week holiday then come back to this safe drug. During this period of time, my doctor asked me to try few non-benzodiazepine medications. Two medications were used. One of them is the ambien, a medication of the imidiazopyridines chemistry. The other was mesyrel which was actually prescribed by a Taiwanese doctor.

I had developed serious side effects on both non-benzodiazepine drugs. When these side effects came, it looks almost the end of the world at all. I had numbness in both arms and legs. I had chest pain and cold sweet. My throat was always dry no matter how much water I had drunk. My body was sensitive to both hot and cold. My head was heavy, drowsy, and occasionally losing orientation. I lost interest in activities which I usually enjoyed such as playing recorders. I was unsociable and was afraid of meeting people. This was the worst experiences I had ever had. It looked like I was at the end of the world.

My doctor was on vacation when I had side-effect problems and was not available for consulting. I made a decision on my own to stop taking non-benzodiapepine drugs and to go back to temazepine with lower dosage but at the same time supplemented with valerian, a sleeping-aid herb which can be bought from a regular health-food store.

After doing that, I returned back to my sense-of-well-being. Now, I am a regular me who had everything which I usually took for granted. This experience has taught me that everything we have taken for granted can be lost. For that reason while we are enjoying what we are, we must be thankful and live the best of all.

Qi-Kong Alone In The US

I learned about Qi-Kong while I was sabbatical in Taiwan. Coming back to US, I was ready to give it a try: Practice Qi-Kong alone at Dr. Chen's porch with a winter cap.

Unlike Taiwanese who would spontaneously gather together in the park, or school campus in the morning to do various morning exercises which included Qi-Kong, Tai-Chi, Dance, and many others, Americans in the neighborhood do not spontaneously gather to do exercise. Americans prefer pay exercise club membership fee and to do cardiovascular and weight exercises in the club. Since there are no single Qi-Kong group in the club, it means that Dr. Chen has to do this alone at the garden porch.

Taiwanese summer is hot. Even in the morning, the temperature can be as high as 28 C (or 82 F). Wisconsin summer is quite cool. The temperature in the morning is typical 15 C (or 60 F). You need extra clothes besides T-shirt to feel comfortable in the outside.

Attached please find a photo which shows Dr. Chen is practicing Qi-Kong at his Wisconsin home.

Sand Castles

I heard one version of the 'sand castle' stories from one of Pastor Chuck's children sermon in the Memorial Presbyterian Church in Appleton, WI.

Here, I write about my version of the 'Sand Castle' story. Here it goes:

Jenny does not remember how many sand castles she has built over the last 25 years. She is young enough to remember the details of the castles she has built either on her own or with friends or even with parent. She is also old enough to understand the philosophy of building sand castles.

Jenny's first castle was at the shore of San Diego (CA) when she was only 6 years old. Her parent took her over there for vacation. Actually the castle was built mostly by her dad and mom; but Jenny did help from the side using her arms and legs to shore up the sand. The first castle they built was quite elaborate: it is equipped with molt that surrounded outside of the castle, and two cannon battery site. There even sand soldiers either standing or walking to guard the castle. Just about this beautiful castle to finish, a wave coming over high enough to swallow the castle and completely destroyed the castle they had built.

When the family is back to the shore of Lake Michigan of Wisconsin, Jenny began to build castle on her own. The second castlt was completely built on her own. It was only a simple pile of sands with the sands inside the wall carved away to give it a look of sand castle. Later, other friends join in continuing to add features here and there and their castles were becoming more elaborate. But no matter how many castles they had builts, all of them eventually were swallowed and destroyed by the wave.

Jenny now has her own child of 3 years old. This year, Jenny and her husband Mark took the 3 years old baby to the sea shore to introducing sand castle lesson to their child.

Their castle finally finished after 3 hours of hard work. A big wave rushing over from the ocean swallowed and destroyed their castles; just like it swallowed and destroyed other sand castles.

The baby cried sadly. Jenny said to her child not to worry, because everything we had today is only a fleating experience and it will eventually vanish. However, the process of building the castle will make you a better castle builder and also allows you to make friends with other friends. Most importantly, you will have fun of building the castle, and that fun counts all.

My Dear Tennis Friend--Larry Passed Away in February, 2009

Bad Things happen to good people; they had happened to my good friend, Larry.

Last year, I ran a short story about Larry in my other blog--Taiwan Sabbatical--http://chentaiwansabbatical.blogspot.com/

Larry was my tennis buddy in Wisconsin. We have been playing tennis together for Monday morning tennis drill for several years. This was the drill on Monday morning, 6:00 AM to 7:30 AM and it takes great determination to get up in the very early cold and dark morning in the winter days of Wisconsin. Larry also organized Saturday's men's double league on Saturday morning. I also play in that league for many years.

Larry was in the 40's. A physician himself, he ate right and exercised everyday. He was cheerful and no one had expected something bad would happen to him. One day he had a routine physical examination and asked his doctor to check on one of the strange spots on his skin.
Larry's fate suddenly changed when the doctor told him that the strange spot on his skin was actually a malignant form of skin cancer. A follow-up check revealed even a worse news: the cancer has metastasized to his lymph system. Without treatment, he was expected to live for another 6 months. and there were no effective treatments available guaranteed to cure his illness.

Larry told this bad news in one of our gathering. We promised to be his support behind his struggle against his illness. One of the tennis fellow, Robert, also a physician himself, gave him a big hug. Larry's tears ran out of his eyes. So did we.

Larry terminated his physician pracice to get full attention on his cancer treatment. This was a sign of his professionalism because a person fighting for the illness cannot simply gives 100% attention to his patient. He went into his struggle against his cancer. If he could, he always showed up at our tennis gathering to give us update on his treatment.

Larry was diagnosed in April, 2007. His doctor gave him 6 months to live. When I left US for my sabbatical in Taiwan in July, I saw him and promised him to pray for him. We said to each other, "We will fight the odds."

Larry did. He outlived his doctor's fate prediction by nearly 6 more months.


When I came back to US, the first thing I asked was how Larry was doing. My other tennis friend, Mike, told me that Larry passed away in February.

Bad thing did happen to good people. Larry, we miss you.