Birthday Pictures + Egg Cake!

I just stumbled upon the pictures Tin Man took of my birthday celebration, thought you might like to see what this egg cake was all about!


The infamous towering egg cake + other goodies.














Reading the sweetest cards ever...




Asking Tin Man if he'd like a birthday egg...

Ostriches + Markets

Today we took bus trip to a Hakka Museum and made stops at several small markets along the way. One of the markets had outdoor pottery wheels, which I think is AWESOME. I didn't want to get messy, so I didn't try. There were also handmade traditional Taiwanese umbrellas and fans. They were all so beautiful! The handmade pottery was absolutely amazing, I would have bought some if it wasn't all so fragile!

Another market had 3 live ostriches that we walked right up to. A few people were feeding them popcorn and were pecked. haha. The pictures convey, fairly well, how strange of creatures they really are.









































Joy Caught a fish, haha.
Recently, I have been writing numerous papers as a requirement for this trip. This blog, and all of my documentation, has helped me complete the reports for each of my 4 craft classes [glass, metal, painting + pottery], as well as a three page letter to the president of Shu-Te and even a report on Taiwan culture. There is still much much more to be written, but I'm trying to manage my time wisely here, so that I can enjoy more of my free time back home :) Free time, gosh, that sounds so great right now!

Yesterday, I started work on our final model in the wood shop with one of my group members, Dawn. We were a pretty good team! We managed to get quite a bit done in only a small amount of time. Unfortunately around noon, one of the Taiwanese students cut herself on the joiner and shop was closed down for the rest of the day. It is important that I do as much work as I can on this project all day on Monday, because Tuesday + Wednesday I will be interning in Tainan at a design firm called NDD [a requirement for another class I am taking]. Keeping in mind that our model is due Friday morning, it is not the best timing, but everything will pan out.

Tonight I began the packing process because we have to switch dorm rooms this week [the dorms are shutting down + we will be the only people on campus, as our program runs an extra week longer] So all auburn students are consolidating onto the same floor for security reasons.

9 days left. I'm sure the next week will just fly by with all of the work there is to do.

Painting Chinese Lanterns

Today in Chinese painting we tried something new + different. We were given rice paper lanterns to paint. It was so much fun! I've never tried painting on a lantern before. I have several hanging in my apartment in Auburn, and now I have a personalized one that will always remind me of Taiwan! It was our last class today, but I would really like to continue painting when I get back to the states. If I have room in my luggage, I might try to buy a painting kit to take back with me.

After lunch I had a few hours of down time that I spent sleeping in the few hours of air conditioning that we are allotted during the daytime [between 12-2pm].

Later in the evening was Chinese class. Today we learned how to tell the date and time

Tomorrow my group is going to start the building process of our model, which is due on Friday, July 3rd.

22nd Birthday!

I would first like to thank everyone for all of the wonderful birthday wishes, it really means a lot hearing from you guys while I'm so far away from home! Happy Birthday, Jen!!! :)

So, I woke up, and at first it just felt like any other day. I really wasn't even sure if anyone even knew! My Taiwanese friend Apple came into pottery class and made me the Chinese Pizza I love so much [same dish that I've mentioned in previous posts.] It was absolutely delicious! I told her she needs to teach me how to make it pronto!

After lunch was studio, we were really busy figuring out how our designs would be built, how much materials we will need to make it... etc. Usually certain people are always talkative around me, but today in particular, most were pretty quiet. I figured they had gotten little sleep and were focused on the project at hand. One of my Taiwanese friends Kimmy got me an adorable "Love Cup" mug.


Another hour of work went buy and then I heard this roar....a crowd of 50 people started singing [even the people who don't speak English sang too!] I looked up and the first thing I saw was a gigantic tower of hard boiled eggs and a plate of cupcakes. I thought everyone had forgotten! There were cameras flashing left and right, and they gave me a huge card signed by everyone with some of the sweetest messages I've ever read!

I must explain that the hard boiled egg tower is no Taiwanese tradition. Apparently, my name in Chinese "Lau Liuen," sounds just like the word for a type of egg here... haha not many people can say they've had an egg cake before!

The surprises for the day didn't end there, oh no. On my walk back to the dorm, after Mandarin class, I was bombarded by a group of 6 of my most "talkative" Taiwanese friends [Page, Lesley, Mandy, Stuff, NoNo + Iris]. So we went to hang out in the lobby of the dorm. We got to the lobby and they surprised me with Ice Cream Tiramisu + a birthday collage with our pictures together!
I finally got back to my icy cold dorm room around 8pm and Flower [one of my Taiwanese roommates] Said "Happy Birthday,Lauren!" and gave me a sweet T-shirt with Chinese writing. It's so Asian, I love it!!

Around 11pm, my last visitor of the day was little Joy, I dont know what I would do without her! I thanked her for planning the studio festivities and for the unforgettable egg cake extravaganza.. haha. Words can't say how touched I am by all of my new friends. They have only known me for 1 1/2 months and have shown me more kindness than most people ever would in a lifetime. They are truly a giving culture with love in their hearts. I will never forget these wonderful people. :)

It was a spectacular day, my first Taiwanese Birthday! I will post more pictures as I find them, most everything that happened was a surprise to me!

Typhoon Linfa + other fun adventures.

The large orange mass in the center of this picture is tropical storm Linfa. She is graciously making her way toward the coast of Taiwan [the small potato shaped Island slightly above the storm].
Rather then calling it a hurricane, in the Eastern Hemisphere it is referred to as a typhoon. Needless to say, there will be quite a bit of rain here shortly. Don't worry about me, it's just heavy rain + high winds, all the Taiwanese students claim we will be fine!

Yesterday, myself and six Taiwanese girls went to the Chinese Clinic, but this time, no cupping. Instead, they hooked me up to an electric-muscle stim machine that worked wonders. I've never been on such a great stim machine. It was making my muscles jump all around, like they had a mind of their own! Afterwards, I convinced this sweet old nurse to crack my neck and boy... it felt so great! I will indeed return to try and save on chiropractic bills back in the states.

From the clinic, the girls took me for lunch at a nearby foodstand, rice noodle soup w. pork. Recently, I've gotten used to consuming food without question if I'm really hungry. This morning in particular, I didn't eat breakfast... so I was hungry + just starting eating along with the group. Midway through the soup, I lifted a tube-like piece of "meat" out of my bowl. Looking at Joy [my Taiwanese friend who speaks awesome English] I said "Okay... Joy... what is this? And.. if it's gross, please don't tell me." All it took was for her to say "pig" and point to her stomach for me to understand that is was pig intestine! I was done with lunch at that point. ha.

After an "interesting" lunch, we took an unexpected stop at a local hair salon. As mentioned before, Taiwanese salons are known for their spectacular head massages/hair washing. For only $7/US I had my hair washed with soothing Tea Tree Shampoo, massaged and during the rinse she put warm towels around my face and neck. I tried explaining to the girls that this 2 hour experience back in the US would easily cost $100 or more. I needed this day out with them. It was so fun and relaxing!

Presenting Models + Taiwanese Card Game

This morning each group presented their respective models to the class outside, and was it ever so humid! Just before it rains here, the humidity gets just below 99.8% and stays that way for several hours before it actually rains and cools down for a bit.

When class was over, it was indeed time for a much deserved nap. I had this feeling as I was walking to the dorm, that maybe, just maybe, the air conditioning would be on just this once... for no particular reason, just because I wanted it to be on [the A/C schedule here is from 7PM to 7AM, we wake up every morning in a sweat] So, just for the heck of it, I pushed the little red A/C power button as I walked in the door, expecting nothing to happen, but to my surprise... it turned on at 12:30pm. Long story short, I got to take a luxurious 3 hour nap in the air conditioning. It was glorious.

This evening in Mandarin class we played a few games dealing with numbers in Chinese. Bingo and pick-a-number between 1-100. I won a game of bingo [Grandma Miller's luck] and will receive a traditional Taiwanese prize next class. The best part of this class was during the pick-a-number game. We got down to a number between 38-40.... so obviously... we said "san shi jou"- 39 and the lady said No. We were all completely confused and laughing in hysterics. The teacher changed it and the game proceeeded awkwardly. To make it worse... this happened again during the same game... You really had to be there...

After class, I ran into some PD [product design] students in the lobby playing cards. They asked me to join in and taught me to play the game "99" or "Jou Jou." Its hard to explain but very simple to play. But to make it a little more challenging, each person had to say the numbers in their opposing language [ie. me in Chinese, them in English]. It was a great learning experience!

Tomorrow morning I'm going with a few Taiwanese girls to the Chinese Clinic for cupping and a chiropractic adjustment. I've been sleeping poorly lately and am in desperate need of a chiro. I might even try some bitter Chinese Herbal Medicine too, to help me relax. We'll see.

Necklaces + Cardboard Models...

Today's highlight was making charms for necklaces. We were shown the hammering process and how to create forms from metal by using just a hammer and rounded steel base. The entire procedure was very simple, so decided to make three. Here's one of them [see left].


We started moving forward today in Glass. After several weeks of forming clay, we finally got to cast our designs in plaster this morning. Next week we will dig out the clay, left with just the plaster mold. Then we can finally melt glass inside the cavity. I can't wait to see how they all turn out!

Tonight, we had our first mandarin class, from now on will be 4 days a week. It will be a good help trying to decipher the language barrier.

Afterwards, I met with my group and began working on our fullscale model. We got some done, but will be spending quite a bit of time tomorrow completing it.

I need a day off, maybe one entire day committed to sleep.

Ps. Happy Birthday, John!!


Here are the other two necklaces I made today...