Sunday, Sept. 05, 2004 - 3:32 p.m.

Yippie! I have my first official banner exchange online. Its with one of fav Taiwan sites, Forumosa.com!

Forumosa.com

From the sound of it I had referred enough people over there, and they emailed me a few times about putting a banner up. The first time (about a month ago) I emailed them back saying I have no idea how to make a banner. No reply. This time when I replied the same way, the guy offered to make one for me! So, I sent him a funny pic and the site address, and poof! I didnt even ask for him to have the same color scheme of the website...but he did! Here it is

Me In Taiwan's Forumosa Banner

Its been awhile since I wrote something cute and different about Taiwan, so here goes. Its another bathroom subject, but much, um, cleaner than the other ones. haha.

I like finding out the tiny things that people do in the countries that I go to. Whats the right way to signal for someone to walk in front of you, call you, and in this case, go away cause the toilet stall is occupied. You read that right.

When busy in a stall I have noticed that people knock to see if theres someone in there. So far its the same. By habit I tried different replies like "Just a minute." and "yes (rising tone." But I realized that these were in English, and started to wonder what the locals say or do.

So I asked one of my co-teachers at school. She said that you knock back. Its that simple.

Only a few days after she told me this I heard a knock at the door. I was so excited to try out my new knowledge I almost fell over (it was a squat toilet, and I have yet to be able to use em without holding onto the wall!). It proved challenging to switch wall hands and knock back in time before they started tugging on the door handle, but I did it. After a few days of this, I was a pro. I started to use my non-facing-the-door hand as my perch hand automatically, as to avoid any falling over fiascos. (You can just imagine what I could have fallen into! eeeeeeewwwwwwwww!)