The happy newlyweds - Kim & Nate Mah! 

Family photo (from L to R): Aunt Jen, Uncle Hammer, Grandpa, Grandma, Mom, Amy (cousin), me and Michael (cousin).  

One of the many, many Starbucks in Taipei. 

Theme of my Hong Kong trip: shopping. 

Happy Belated Birthday to Bonnie (it was this past Sunday) - she even went wedding-dress shopping with me on her birthday!

Greetings from Seattle once again!

It was a whirlwind of wedding-planning activity in California during the past few days, but I am happy to announce the acquisition of a wedding gown. After much unnecessary hand-wringing, I dug down and made the commitment. After all, if I am to get held up in such a small detail, planning this not insignificant event shall prove to be overwhelming and impossible - especially since I will be doing it long distance. I am overflowing in gratitude and love particularly to my mom for her help in being chauffeur, consultant and coffee gopher. Mom, you are the best! Much thanks also to Mrs. Yip, Ellen, Bonnie, Joy and Christine for your time and opinions!

Also, a big congrats to the newlyweds Nate and Kim Mah! Nate had some, er, exciting (ok, more like borderline scandalous) moves on the dance floor... Tuan did too, though he was surprisingly restrained (to my disappointment.) Yi-Jen was an admittedly corny MC, but he stepped up and got the job done!

Pictures are coming soon! Stay tuned.

Just a quick post - we're departing Taipei this evening. I'll post pics next week when I return to Seattle. For those of you in Socal, I'll be home for a few days before returning to UW for the new school year. I hope to see some of you before then!

I'm reporting from the Taipei Public Library, Dao An Branch. Now this is the greatness of the Internet! From New York to Seattle, to Socal, to Hong Kong, and finally to Taipei, in a time span of less than two weeks - I can hop on to any computer, log in to this website and say, "Hello!"

I am much in favor of the slow-pace lifestyle. For example, yesterday I went to bed at around 11pm. I woke up at 10:30am this morning, leisurely strolled about the streets of our neighborhood in Taipei - drinking my nai cha (milk tea) - and hung out and read the leading English newspaper at one of the local Starbucks (ok, ok, not exactly a local institution; but it's 3-stories high and I was curious as to how closely it tracks the American version - I'll post pics once I get home). And now, I'm at a local public library. It's right next door to my grandparents' apartment.

And they've got English books too! I briefly entertained the idea of reading a few children's books (in Chinese), but figured I wanted it to be a relaxing (not brain-straining) afternoon. I then tried to catch up on some email (didn't get very far).

This evening, my grandma is taking my mom and me to see a show. I'm not entirely clear what kind of show it will be. Ah well, it's all very much go-with-the-flow!

Passport Story (cont'd.)

So we ended up cancelling our flight to Hong Kong, as well as our hotel for that evening. I called Jason (in Seattle), who went to my apartment to pick up my passport. Now for the more difficult part - how to get the passport to Socal within a day? Fedex and UPS both have next-day service, but nothing within the day. There are personal courier services, costing $300 or more, where they will pick up the item within 1.5 hours, send it on a flight, and then pick it up on the other end and deliver it to the final destination within another 1.5 hours.

Another option, which we ultimately chose, is a lesser-known cargo service called counter-to-counter. Nearly every airline has this service. We chose Alaska Airlines, because there are something like a dozen flights between Seattle and Orange County a day. Someone needs to deliver the item to the airport (or the cargo warehouse near the airport), which sends it on a flight. Then the recipient can pick it up at the destination airport, at the airline counter.

So the next day, Jason drove down to Sea-Tac airport and dropped off the passport at Alaska Air's GoldStreak cargo service for the 1:50pm flight to Orange County. My mom and I picked up the passport at John Wayne Airport at 5:00pm. Incredible. As for the cost, the service was $25. Of course, that didn't include the time, labor and gas costs of Jason, Mom or myself.

Notwithstanding this achievement, we couldn't get a flight to Hong Kong the next evening, and had to wait until the following afternoon (nearly two days later.) However, we did arrive in Hong Kong late Friday evening, and didn't have to cancel another night's stay at the hotel.

So here we are in Hong Kong - safe and sound!

Along with the key players Mom and Jason, special thanks go to Dad, Joy, my cousins Vinnie and Ivan who played critical supporting roles in our success!

Yesterday I committed one of the lamest traveller's mistakes ever.

In the afternoon, I flew home to SoCal from Seattle, fully intending to embark on a plane to Hong Kong at 1:00am, departing from LAX. I arrived in familiar, smoggy Ontario and then spent time shopping with Joy and eating dinner with family. My bags were already packed to go, and we were going to leave at around 9:30pm for the airport.

At around 9:00pm, my parents were getting ready to go. I'm sprawled out on the living room couch (so comfortable) and my dad says, "Don't forget your passport."

Time stands still. Terror had seized my heart. I swallowed hard and said, "Oh my gosh, I don't have my passport. I didn't forget it - I just didn't even think about it. It's sitting in Seattle, in my apartment."

aaaaacccckkkk!!!!

No kidding. I left my passport - of course, needed for an international travel, duh! - in Seattle. And our plane was supposed to leave in less than 4 hours! So here I am, still in Socal. The end of the story? Well, I'll have to share the conclusion in my next post - gotta run!

The summer certainly has flown by. I've returned to Seattle, and the weather is gorgeous. Upon my arrival, a sense of strangeness and familiarity greeted me. It's pretty quiet here, and the students won't arrive for another couple weeks or so. I am very happy to have nothing to do before Tuesday (other than packing and some cleaning), when I head down to SoCal and then off to Hong Kong and Taipei.

I am very excited to go to church at Mars Hill this evening!

Happy Birthday to my cousin Wai Yan! (Belated - it was yesterday.) It was great to see you in Boston, as well as briefly in New York this past weekend for dinner. Hope you had a wonderful time with friends!

Dorothy, me, Joy and Wai Yan enjoyed afternoon tea at the Four Seasons Hotel in Boston. (8/21/04) 

Facing west, outside the Cloisters in Fort Tryon Park (upper Manhattan), with the Hudson River in the background. (8/28/04)