Well, it's been 3 months... I hope you guys didn't think I was dead or anything or think, "He isn't going to be on an exchange anymore. That butt!!!" Since it's May, I had my last Rotary Conference, it was a melting pot of emotions, but it was fun!
So, I figured out that I'll be hosted by the Chi-Shan Rotary Club in Taiwan District 3520... But I can't find the club in the internet so I don't really have more information on that... I get my guarantee forms on Monday, since the head honcho said he sent them out on Thursday, so I'm pretty excited to learn more about where I'm going to be headed (school, house, first host family ect.)! Umm.
Oh, so I have decided to sever A LOT of friends when I go to Taiwan. Now the sever might seem drastic, but it's true. There will be a vast majority of people I won't talk to over the next year. I think there will only be 3 people I will talk to every 2 or 3 weeks, heck maybe every month? Yeah, that would involve a conversation during the weekend on Skype, but that's about it. (And by friends, I mean like people in the US. I'm pretty sure I'll still communicate with the other outbounds in my district.) I'll probably send out emails and have an update every so often when I either talk to somebody, or if it's urgent or something like that. I would be trying to update this blog every week, even if it's little information that's going on, or hell just some pictures of cool stuff I found hahaha. But yeah, there will be 3 people that I will keep in touch with while I'm in Taiwan... I should tell you why only 3... Well, I don't want to be in Taiwan, and America at the same time. I simply won't give a flying rat's butt about your friend's finger being broken or your stupid boyfriend/girlfriend. It's stuff I don't need to know about! I'll be going through some crazy crap while I'm in Taiwan, I'm going to have my own stuff on my plate to try and eat, I'll be in a different culture and will want to learn about it more and more over the little time I have over there. It's a year, and there is only so much I can do there for crying out loud. I don't need to listen to your problems. It's harsh but it's true. I don't want a foot in Eagle, Idaho USA and a foot in Taiwan. I want both feet in Taiwan, and a finger in Eagle, Idaho USA. But like I said, I won't care about your boyfriend/girlfriend.
Friday was a bit slow for the beginning(This was the Rotary conference). So I wake up at 7:30 and I leave the house at 8, and we get to Sun Valley at 11:30. We meet up with everybody and chat it up for about 15 minutes, then we went to go and eat lunch. And oh my good god, this lunch was amazing. It was like a 3 course meal, first was this salad thing, then we had salmon and rice, and we had red velvet cake. All good. Then after lunch, the inbounds/outbounds went our separate ways and we gave our speeches. Mine, was bad... I think I could of done a better job, but heck they still want me to go to Taiwan, so I'm studying my butt off hahaha. So that's what I'll be doing for the next 3 months... After that, we had some talks with the coordinators, and went to go eat. We had some soft shell tacos, and I got to make guacamole with an Ecuadorian and a Finnish girl xP that's something you don't get to do every day... Also, new verb: " guacin' ".
Second day was hectic, we wake up at 7 am, we go eat at 8, we hang around our lodges till 10:30, then we go to the inn, and we do the flag ceremony. We do a bunch of Rotary stuff, and I stood for what felt like 2 hours, in a hot room, and I'm trying not to lock my knees so I don't pass out hahaha. So after that, we have another delicious lunch, but... We only got salad. When they were handing out the cake, (it was strawberry shortcake, and oh my good god, it looked delicious) they announce, "All the outbound Rotary young adults need to go follow Mr. Dave Shaw." I was heart broken. I wanted to flip a table, that shortcake looked SOOOOO GOOD. Then I saw an outbound girl eating some, and I was like "What the flux capacitor? I want some freaking cake." Well, I didn't get any. Oh well. After my heart break, we had a few hour talk, and we said our good byes and headed home. There was also some other stuff in between all the other main parts, but that's for my thoughts :).
I think that was about it. Ummm, I will put another blog post on Monday, to talk about my first host family and all that jazz.
-Benjamin Michael Thomas
(Eagle, Idaho USA -> Taiwan 3520 Chi-Shan Rotary Club)
