Well, the wrong bus took me back too quickly, so … how to kill a short evening?
Hey, go to Costco!
Three muffin packs later … (H, chocolate, included 🙂 )
Two floor store. Long escalators ‘tween em that the carts magnetically adhere to.
Some sections, you can shield your peripheral vision and be in Issaquah. Lots of identical products.
Scooters for sale. Couple thou or so, maybe. I forget.
Same food court. Polish and soda is 50NT (33HT==1USD).
Food samples.
Very crowded. Very, very crowded.
Someone behind me a moment ago said, “That must come from having children. A big night out is going to Costco.” But, hey, it *was* kinda fun.
Different subject: English teachers are not in short supply in this hostel/hotel. So, there is info on the local schooling. Talk wanders toward the kids commiting suicide the pressure is so intense. Truth is probably less pure. In Keelung I was talking with a guy who teaches English writing, etc. in corp environments. He talked about how the kids were really pressured in school and out. “The kids go to school from 8 in the morning to x in the afternoon. Then they go to extra schools like this one we are standing in front of (Hess). But, really, the kids are a lot more relaxed in extra schools than the parents might like to think.” Seeing the kids through the window, they looked like they were being kids. Not a surprise.
But again, encouragement and expectations lead to things. The kid in the bus the other day pulled out his English homework after he saw me. You could practically see the gears going ’round in his head when he did that. It was like seeing me reminded him that he had this homework to do.
‘Nuther story fragment: The little girl today was six. She could read the page of Chinese I use to practice with. Not Dick and Jane. Her mother said she was a “real bad student”. That, while the girl was running through the numbers in both Chinese and English.
There is definitely something to be said for starting at childbirth.