Our First Date

Trina mentioned to me how tired she's feeling. It's really nice to have a vacation, but I've been trying to pack a lot into under three weeks. I understand what she means.

With the boys, we walked down to buy breakfast, then played on the playground for a little while. The weather was turning very hot, so we walked up to the community pool to see what the hours and rules are. Speedos only (fortunately, they sell some that come down to the knees), no swimming shorts, swim caps required, goggles optional. Open from 5:30am to 9:00pm, and only about $1 CDN per person. We planned to come back in the afternoon.

We walked down to the train station, then took the train to the Holiday Flower Market. When Michael saw where we were, he was not very impressed. He doesn't really enjoy shopping, and it's hard to blame him. He and Jeremy amused themselves playing in the fountains, Robert looked at bonsais, the most impressive of which are the flowering ones, and Trina bought carnations for her class to put in food colouring. Jumping ahead, when she brought them to school on Monday, her teaching assistant asked apprehensively if they were for Mother's Day. White is the colour of death, so it would have been very poor taste. Trina's not so clueless, though. The flowers were just for the kids to enjoy.

After a quiet, but hot, afternoon, we went back to the pool to swim. It was 32C out and humid, but the water was cold. Jeremy was unimpressed and stayed on Trina's lap the whole time, but Michael and I really enjoyed splashing around. A little girl was kind enough to lend Michael a flutter board, but even after she wanted it back, he was perfectly happy in the water without toys. Of course, playing jumping and spinning games with Daddy was pretty exciting.

We got back home just in time for May to babysit the boys, then we were off on our first (and only) date in Taiwan. It was such a strange feeling, not have either of the boys with us. We didn't have to worry about keeping them safe on the bus, keeping them close in the crowd or walking slow enough for Michael to keep up. In fact, Trina was walking fast enough that I had to hurry to keep up. We had dinner at a steak place called St. Paul's that seemed to be pretending to be an American buffet. But when there are tea eggs and dried tofu and hot tea, it's just very Chinese. That's not to say we didn't enjoy it, and it gave us the energy we needed for some serious shopping. We bought some souvenirs, but my favourite stop was a clothing store called Giordano. I don't shop for clothes at home, but I still have a pair of pants I bought at Giordano over four years ago in Hong Kong that I really like. In fact, their clothes fit my style fairly well, which is unusual in Taiwan, where the preference seems to be for large patterns, bright colours and unique designs. The sales people got really excited when I bought three pairs of pants and four t-shirts, plus a top for Trina. We were excited that it only cost around $100 CDN.

We had a fun time out and enjoyed being together. We came back to find the boys both asleep in their clothes, sprawled across our bed in different directions. I guess they had fun, too.