Fear and Loathing in Taipei

I had exchanged contact with a young homie a while back, whose style I liked (but most of all who I liked because he was just friendly to me). He invited me to go skate with his crew in the street and I was very excited. Later, there was some halloween cultural miscommunication, which consisted of me arriving dressed in my best impression of hunter thompson that I could manage, and everyone else looking normal. I you want to get some intense looks on the MRT, try wearing short shorts (pink) and a tucked in nightmarket shirt (blue paisley). Having a shaved bald head and a skateboard probably didnt hurt, but I hid it behind a green adn white hat from a company here that sells powdered milk. milk face, get it?

mominey arrived, a little worse for the wear, and we set off to skate some ferocious street spots. I skint my knee at the first one, which is a series of cascading marble stairs with big gaps inbetween each little tile. I pride myself on skating poorly lit spots no one else will touch, but these kids beat me at my own game. One of them slammed much worse than me off the stairs, it was a real face slapper. Then we cruised up and across the river to other yuanshan spot and played some skate and skated some skating. rmj arrived and those most beautiful brilliant kids had to go home and do things like get ready for school, but mominey and rmj and I went on to jiantan, which used to be a top notch skating hotbed, but in recently has been ruined by the westerners coming through and acting like assholes and now I cant even skate the manny pads. fuck every team that ever came to taiwan and poisoned our wells. 

other than meeting new people who actually skate in the streets, the highlight of hte night was cruising the streets at the point of exhaustion with rmj, as he managed 10 tricks to every one i tried, and was probably batting at .750. we had a stoop beer and i went home. i bought three more, and the f1 race is starting soon in 45 minutes, but i m so tired i think i might not make it that long.

here's something probably noone ever said

• “The third president, Thomas Jefferson, had a vision of America. He believed that this whole new country, this giant unformed continent offered a chance to start again. The premise was very simple. That human beings acting in a sense of enlightened self interest are smart enough to do the right thing and know the truth. America could have been a fantastic monument to all the best instincts of the human race. Instead, we just moved in here and destroyed the place from coast to coast like killer snails. Everybody wants power over a country that’s had it’s day. I think we’re finished.”

in a way, it's reassuring that if this is a real quote, it's an old one. also, in a way, it's not reassuring , for the same reasons.

this is going to be my last night of the year skating in shorts. It helps that mominey thinks they were from the gay pride parade, but also it was actually cold tonight. I hope the weather doesn't change until march. 

This would have been an excellent night to spend in the streets

It rained all day and I was lazy. I stayed up to watch f1 and God's football team, but I probably would have been awake anyway. During a lull in the television sporting schedule, I went for a beer walk (I still haven't had one in the house. A minor victory for responsible drinking, then). The night was surprisingly crisp and windy, like typhoonish weather. Of course, I still had on stubbies and thongs, but it's downright cold for taiwan. I saw a woman pushing a small child in a stroller, which is unusual in most societies at 2 am, but not here. Another thing rmj pointed out last time was that the taiwanese are probably taking random photos of us on the MRT and sidewalk much in the same way that we might take photos of people doing "asian things" in the west, like squatting in a circle and smoking cigarettes in business suits, themselves taking photos of the front of a mcdonald's or of a sandwhich on a tray inside, or of them holding small children over a grate in order to urinate or deficate. Ok, not all asian nationalities indulge in all of these passtimes, but those were the first three that came to mind that I might document in my motherland. I can't imagine why they would want to take a photo of me. Never seen a double chin before?

I didn't read all of this, but you should

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/feat/archives/2002/06/14/0000140319

Skateboarding saves the day

quite literally, i mean it was a bad day, and then zw invited me to skate at bplaza and I went, even though it's pretty far from home. I pulled up at the same time as some guys I kind of recognized but also kind of wasn't sure if I recognized, and realized my day had been bad. It was a sort of snap depression and it kept me from being able to skate without feeling like my ankles had lead weights on them. maybe it's because the city is still blanketed in poison so thick that you can taste it as soon as you step outside.
when zw showed up, i gradually cheered up. it didnt hurt that a dozen other dudes did too, which is about the maximum capacity for this spot (single long long long marble ledge. the abosolute slickest in the world). my skating sucked but i got to talk to zw and new friends (he has known some of them for more than 10 years now, and he was an og back when they started skating) and I learned some new taiwanese. youngbuck got mad trying to ********* and was so furious that even though he landed it, he didn't seem to enjoy it anymore. Eventually, I called it quits after the second time of gluing my magically evaporating circas back into something like enough shoe to skate in. they've come undone in a week. maybe because they're vintage adrian lopez promodels, bought in a nightmarket for 600ntd. at any rate, the rubber visibly erodes with ever ollie. great control, must buy a new pair every 100 tricks.
I rode the mrt under the river and got off at the first station, which is a hood with a reputation for danger and lowlifes. This is of course nonsense, because it's taiwan, but I did notice that it's a beer desert, since there are no 7's for miles. there isn't even much graffitti. I guessed my directions when i left the statoin, but it was early, so even if i got lost i wasn't going to be concerned. i skated for about an hour, without sight of 101 or mitsukoshi, and not even a single hilife, much less a 7. to foreshorten the story, i skated for at least 30 min in mostly the wrong direction, which meant 30 min back, because i'm too cheap for taxis. i eventually wandered by the bridge, which felt lonely and empty and silent, and then back by my house and up to the roof for a beer, and then here, on the couch, getting bitched at because my skate clothes stink and i tried to wash them at night.

Subgame Nash Equilibrium

Laziness tried to prevent me from skating, but failed. A small crew was there, smashing monsterous tricks from the pyramid to flat and skating the box at breakneck speed. rmj and mominey came up, and we skated til lights out. The heat and the pm2.5 were unbearable. It was hanging in the air around the street lights. Well, it was hanging in the air everywhere, but visible around the street lights. Absolute filth. As we got ready to leave, me suffering from knee pain with every ollie and the homies trying to wring that last little bit out, a fight broke out across the street. This is a very unusual event in Taiwan. A visibly besotted man and a taxi driver were doing some shouting, which turned into a little pushing, and eventually became a benny hill style sprint around the block and through traffic. We tried to imagine what possible dialogue could have led to this scenario, but I can't imagine what someone could say to me that would make me chase them. The cops pulled up on scooters and I pointed them towards the hullabaloo.

We went for a street beer cruise and stopped by my roof stoop, where the air was noticably cooler and cleaner. We cruised around some more in the streets and rmj had to head home, but I stayed up with  mominey, discussing all matter of things. At rplaza, we both hit the same crack at the same moment. It probably looked pretty funny on the security footage. No skate night is complete without a little blood. I got home at 04:30.

One of Taipei's resident fine art producers left a few paintings at the bridge, one of which is now happily on my wall at home.

I lied

When I die, I'm going to haunt the streets of Taipei. Even without skating, wandering around is at once relaxing and exciting. It's best done without a phone. Observations are sharper, but the lack of notes make details a little hard to remember. I wandered down to the bridge and thestache was there with another dude. I watched them skate in the dark for about an hour. I love the effort they were giving it. They went out into the streets and I meandered back towards home. I saw a trio of skaters on the other side of hte road (by then it was about 2 am). I watched them skate in the little park there for a while, and then they sat down with me to talk. It makes my heart glad to know that even after I have to stop this lifestyle, they will carry on. Also, one of them asked me if I write a blog, and I said no. Apparently, I'm not as anonymous as I want to be.

Hippy is a Nationality

One of the best people I've ever met is leaving, which is too bad for me, but good for him, since he's going to make some money, and also since he'll be coming back to Taiwan eventually. A quartet of us gathered at the bullring in 西門 as a sort of pre-going away party skatesession. The spot is, in miminey's words, minimalist. It's a white tiled pit that used to have angle iron around it's boundaries, but that got ripped off by someone, so the only thing left to skate is a mid-calf height stage with a rough but grindable round and chunky curb down the length of it. It gets interesting when 30 people are there, because the line to skate reaches almost all around the spot. Being in 西門, it's got very heavy pedestrian traffic, and there are always dozens of people stopping to watch. This was the first time I've ever skated there alone. It was also my first long pants sessions since last winter, but I jumped the gun and suffered from the heat all night. 

We rolled over to the plaza and there were a couple of younger guys there, and a group of ten people with three skateboards, learning how to ollie. I got into a ******* and it zipped out and I fell awkwardly on my thumb, which still hurts. We talked until the MRT closed. 

A taxi pulled out in front of a scooter and I went to get a beer and see if they needed help scraping the rider off the asphalt. Within 3 minutes, a fleet of gangstertaxis had arrived to quardon off the scene and prevent anyone from taking photos of the perpetrator, but they were too late - the police had already arrived. 

rmj and I wandered back to our neighborhood. I'm happy we're still living like this. It's hard to imagine a better existence. 

Weekend in 彰化

We went to visit the family for the weekend. I found a radiostation that exclusively plays Taiwanese nu-metal. Limp biscuit sounds much the same, no matter the language. I wonder if all the taiwanese versions wear red hats. 

In Taiwan, people often do absurdly nice things for me. I tend to feel guilty about these gifts and favours, because I don't know how to repay them properly, and usually can't afford to do so anyway. I don't want to be resentful of these things, but sometimes it imposes a certain pressure on me that is unpleasant. Sometimes I don't want to be made to feel like the star of the show. It can be hard to be loved. 

We went to a crab restaurant where the crabs were the size of half deflated orange basketballs. A western charity was having an event there, something like a circle with a k in it, and they were least friendly people I have ever met in this country. I wanted to key their rows of blacked out mercedeses as we left. Who knows, maybe it's also a gangsters' money laundering operation in my homeland as well. 

Another charity club, for lions, is perhaps an even better example. The father of one of the german skaters, now returned, was a very active member in Germany, and arranged for his son to come to Taiwan on an exchange with the taipei chapter. He was kept as a sort of dangerous exotic pet by the host family, who locked him in his room every night at 8pm. Naturally, he just started staying out all night and skating. At their charity, they post a print out of who gave what amounts of money each month. They offered him cash to write them a positive review for their newsletter. What else can you expect from wage slave masters who make their fortunes from human trafficking of factory workers?

The next day was a blue sky day, maybe because a single factory was recently closed due to an array of pollution violations, which is a breathtaking development for Taiwan, no pun intended. Apparently, pm2.5 fell by 40% following its closure. 

I skated the grey curbs for hours. A very dark old man sat down and watched the entire session, alternatively telling himself jokes and laughing outloudly at them, and then suddenly snapping threats at himself like a dangerously unpredictable mafia boss in a film, about to order the execution of a subordinate who betrayed him. I suppose his behavior was no stranger than my solo session slappying the curbs. At any rate, the river of families didn't seem to treat either of us as especially more eccentric than the other. 

Just down the hill is a volley and basket ball court where some geniuses set up a collapsable diy spot. Noone came until after dark though, so I only had the  energy to skate wit hthem for about 90 minutes. Also, they lube their rails with the fastest slickest wax I have ever skated, and I was afraid of death by zipping. I took one of hteir old decks home to give to teacherc, with whom I work, who says he wants to try skateboarding. The 3 km hill back to the house gets more fun every time I skate it. 

Clashing Cultural Expectations

In America, it's considered rude to live there and no make an effort to learn and speak English, as it suggests a refusal to integrate into society. In Taiwan, it's considered rude for me to speak to Mandarin, apparently because "people have spent their lives studying English and want to practice it." While this is initially a very convenient situation in which to find myself, it's also one of the major reasons; apart from laziness, stupidity and lack of moral fiber, that I don't speak much Mandarin.

magic

The best weather on earth is the edge of a distant typhoon as it passes 2000 miles to the south. To begin, it's windy, and less hot. It rains some, but it's very isolated drops, with the effect of bugs hitting your windshield or flak hitting your bomber, although, one of those seems more severe in retrospect, having reviewed my notes on the night. Under the bridge, the wind (breeze can't capture what it does) makes the hundreds and hundreds of used up skateshoes spin on their axes as they hang from the rafters.
trash loops around in eddies like american beauty. Taiwan has way more plastic garbage, so there is a lot more beauty. you can find god on any corner.
After the bridge session, i went for a cruise through the new neighborhood; not a random walk, but a purposeful zigzag through the alleys, some old, some new.
I found a 50ft sloped pink marble curb, a block from the house. I took a pic to send to the line group, and security came out to say "you no photo, you no photo" in english. It must be a really exclusive curb. Maybe can tell I just don't have the balance to ******* the whole thing.
The wind got noticably stronger. It was so strong that it could stop me cold, rolling down a hill, or push me across flat ground for as far as I wanted to go. I ran some redlights. It might have been my record for distance traveled without putting a foot down. Typhoons are awesome. I went on an don. May the wind ever be at your back, yes, I get it now.
Typing this on my phone, the security came back out again, just to have a cig and stare me down. He is going to freak out when I confirm his worst fears and bomb the little ramp and try to **********slide his pink virgin curb.

It didn't work. The curb was sticky and he went inside before I tried it.

Later: the wind is gone. Lil wayne in the park. I pissed against and indian laurel fig with a tangled trunk, like a cat looking furtively around trying to give birth.

I tried to recreate my favorite skate photo of all time, and it kind of worked, but also didn't work.

It was from a 90s transword and it was a photo of someone pushign along a white line, like on the edge of an american road, and the caption was "straight lines don't exist in nature." I have no idea who took it, or who wrote the caption, but it was on my wall throughout highschool.

Suddenly, I was thunderstruck by an alley with little tiny colored flags waving across the top of it. The typhoon puffed through them like a sadistic lover. I flimed it for a while, and freaked out some passing sluts, who, realizing I was filming them ( I wasn't), yelped and high tailed it to the next crosswalk. They are probably writing about how they were nearly assaulted by a Tronald Dump look alike. Dear women of Taiwan, I am honestly not trying to sexually assault you.

The last note on my phone reads :

same glove twice, but I found it again half a mile away.

I'm not sure what that means.

tapdancing is superior to whatever it is that they usually do under the bridge

I couldn't manage to roust up any troops for a street session, so I went to the bridge. It was just as well, because it started raining. A tapdancer and a live drummer set up at the entrance, and played for a couple of hours. I don't have strong feelings about tapdancing, but this was so much cooler than 35 zombies blocking the skate spot by dancing in sync to beyonce or whatever that garbage is they usually play (occaisional outkast songs notwithstanding).

America has scooter kids. Taiwan has fake Bboyz. Rmj came by and we had rooftop beers.

bum of the month

foul mood. pouring rain. walked to the bridge, no umbrella. fuckit.

This was a mistake, in retrospect. It was really raining hard, and the elevated expressway that I planned to walk under was unwalkable, because it was planted with bushes. Consequently, it took thirty minutes for the griptape to dry enough to skate. I said what were probably very unfriendly hellos to the homies trying to skate the 3 m wide dry line under the bridge, and threw down right before the lights went out. I was so sore from the elbow slam the night before that I wasn't expecting anything more than an exercise/ sweat-out-the-toxins session. Considering that, it was a good session.

It stopped raining, but the humidity stayed. The stragglers left, and hipsters, drawn by the mostly crappy graffiti, sat down on the box, literally as  I approached it. I asked them to leave, and they did, after a little grumbling. I was glad when an unknown brother in arms ollied into a trick at full speed, inches away from them during the instant they were standing up. That finished convincing them, and I never saw them again. The box has light metal coping on it, and when your trucks hit it, it makes a sound like a gunshot. Some of the more cowardly hispsters jumped. Also, this unknown soldier landed his trick, in the dark, hauling ass, with only me and hipsters as witnesses. Sometimes, you share a moment that doesn't merit discussion, but is very satisfying for everyone involved. Thanks, unknown soldier.

I couldn't force myself to leave, so I skated the banks like they were a miniramp until my calves were aching and my heart was pounding. I noticed a sawty on a ubike come up, which isn't unusual, they like to check for leftover food and water and whatever detritus the skaters leave behind, like human seagulls. But seeing one on a bright yellow ubike is unusual, because you have to pay to use those. I think he must have stolen it, and his following behavior is why: he checked a can of tb and let out a rebel yell. He stood with his feet splayed wide apart, and raised that hot nasty can to the sky, and chugged the rest of it in one go, then smashed the empty can on the ground like dime bag darrell in 1986. Then he squatted down and started eating the juice and left over rice out of someone's mostly finished dinner, with his fingers. I got my beer money for the night out of my bag and asked him if he needs some money. He launched into a fullbody furious muscle clenching response, eyes wild and darting, and spoke so quickly that I could only understand a few words, but the gist was that yes, he likes money. I gave him some and he let out a warwhoop and jumped on his ubike, making motorcycle noises, and sped off into the wet dark wonderland. I hope he doesn't die because of me. I have more sympathy for taiwanese methheads than american ones.

80's sitcom ending

Under a sunset like a fabric softner commercial, I cruised north a little haphazardly through surprisingly clear sidewalks. Sipping a warm up tb, I got to 圓山 bridge from a new direction, by cruising through the park next door. I found a pair of solid alabaster paths, like huge slopped manny pads, but they are too tall for me to get up on and too long for maybe anyone to carry enough speed to go up and over. The spot is overrun by the gratefully fading pokemon phenomemon. 
A hobo had carefully folded his filthy blanket, extra clothes, and assorted cardboard and plastic bags, and stashed it all under the main bench at the bridge. I didn't have the heart to move his shit, so I just skated the bench where it was, even though it wasn't optimally placed. I really don't know who keeps moving these heavy sonsofbitches back, but we have to powerlift them as a group, and move them to make them skateable. They're like giant brown legos, made of the slickest fake plastic wood ever. 
A taiwanese skater was there, and I said what's up, but he was much younger than me and didn't respond to me greeting, maybe out of fear. I tried to ** *** across the grate for warm up, and it zipped out and I smashed down hard on my left elbow. Almost a week later, I still have a long wound, where the bone of my forearm tore the skin from the pressure of the fall. It's kind of scabbing up now, but since it isn't a scrap, it's not healing normally. I thought I broke it for a second. The impact is still reverberating across my shoulders and neck. 
As I was trying to shake it off, ja came up. He is a kind hearted manilla IT guy, from the true old school skating tradition. He has rails on his deck. Soon, miminey arrived and the session began in earnest. We skated the upper deck of the spot, which has a line of slappy curb, metal kicker, rough flatground, two stair, and then two stair high yellow round curb that's so round that it's hard to stay on top of, almost like a rail. Usually there are heaps of pebbles and dead pigeons on the upper deck area, but this time, it was only pigeon shit. rmj got there and we all set off joyfully down the bike path ... and immediately stopped at a granite cube. It had been waxed long ago, but to my knowledge, ja is the first person to actually land a trick on it. It's very rough stone, and consequently, very sticky. Miminey put in some hard work on a particularly good trick but before he could get it, I invited everyone to move on, which in retrospect was a dick card to pull. Sorry man, I appologize. 
Karma quickly got me back though at the ampitheatre, and slipped off the bank on the bank to ledge and it bit me pretty hard on my hip. Then we went to the benches and people were pokemoning all over them. A fat got girl sat on the end of the best one for hours. miminey ******ed the stairs there, which is the first time I've seen it done. 
We played the best game of skate of my life: among four people, three of them landed tricks for the first time. 
The long skate home was punctuated by a trio of tiny dogs dashing towards miminey, terrifying him with their yapping (he really doesn't like dogs, any dogs). Most dogs don't react to skateboards here, but I suppose they could sense his fear. They were so small they could have all been on his skateboard at the same time. 
We bombed the hill per tradition, and as luck would have it, a steep marble bank was open (it's usually behind the security gate). Too tired to skate it, we discussed the possibilities anyway (it has a set of stairs coming off the side). Suddenly, the gate started creaking down, comically slowly. We all looked from the gate to the inside at the same time, and saw a security guard furiously staring us down with his hand on the gate button. We all laughed, except the guard. Sorry, it's like the ending of a cheesy sitcom. It really was funny though.

Later, rmj and I beered up on the old stoop, and then I had another on my rooftop. I could see more stars than I've ever seen in Taipei, and for a moment, I thought one was moving, like a ufo. I got excited when I noticed another one through the clouds, moving in formation. Then it dawned on me that I could see orion, and it was moving, due to the apparent motion of the clouds. Orion isn't a ufo. First time I've seen it in years though. Light pollution is really bad here.

Rainy days running together

two weeks of rain. seniorec is leaving soon, so we've made a point to skate together more often. i always go home thinking about the conversations. he is a thoughtful man. we skated the bridge on a drizzly night midweek. it wasn't crowded but i felt like i had a weight vest on. i left before lights out, which is unusual for me.
i went to yakitori with a canadian, and hten to pool and darts, where we played loser-buys for the whole night. i walked home and got there just after sunrise, such as it is when it's pouring rain. taipei is a great city to walk through after far too many beers in those sorts of conditions. it isn't cold, so getting wet isn't really a problem, and most sidewalks are under the edge of the building, so you only get rained on when you're crossing a street, and homicidal scooters and taxis are at a minimum because all reasonable people are asleep. yes, there is a contradition there, but darkness of mood prevents me from rewriting.
seniorec and i were going to try the bridge again but when i got there, there were about 50 skaters and 49 dancers, as well as families playing badminton without a net. i immediately turned heel and went home to sulk. i dont hate tehm with all my heart, but syncronized dancing to beyonce has to be the least authentic form of "street dancing" ever. at least they're not sitting at home sulking on a computer.
the bad weather is gone today, but the mood isn't. time for some skate therapy. first dry day in a fortnight.

Don’t read this unless you’re bored: A trip from hell into the only civilized country on earth (ps skating is only mentioned a couple of times, at best)

I can’t remember not having known about Japan. I was pretty familiar with it from a young age because of a VHS series my grandfather had called wings over the pacific, or something like that. It was about the war, and was produced from the perspective of Americans who by forty years after the fact, had come to greatly respect their one time foes.

The first Japanese people I met were an elderly couple who my grandfather had met golfing. He discovered that they had been adversaries in a particular battle. They came over to stay at our house, and maintained a long friendship. When my grandmother died, he lost touch with them. I spoke with him on the phone before lzyk and I went to japan, but I don’t think he was totally with it, since he asked me to look them up.

I started studying Japanese around the time I met them. At the time, I thought it was the most foreign culture to my own. Later, I studied Africa politics and security, and I couldn’t imagine that anywhere in Africa was less weird than Japan. I went to Dar and Zanzibar. It is post-apocalypse there. Americans are always dreaming about when the end of times comes, and writing books about what it will be like. No need. Go to Goma. Go to Brazzaville. Go to Kigani. Times have already ended there.

Now, I can die happily, because I’ve been to Africa and Japan. Well, I haven’t lived happily, so I imagine my death won’t be very happy either; at best, not very painful and a long time from now. Anyway, I watched the world cup final on top of a skyscraper in Dar, and felt like 99.99999999% of Africa was quite literally under me. In Japan, I was at the opposite end of the ladder, so to speak. (although, I did climb up Osaka sky tower, in the midst of a domestic dispute, which sort of ruined it all, but the view was the most astounding thing I have ever seen, like a virtual reality postcard, 360 degrees, all around, buildings and lights as far as I could see).

Both japan and Tanzania as surprisingly friendly places. I was told I would be robbed and murdered in the latter, and coldly stared down in the former, and neither one was true (maybe, because Tanzania is a relatively good place, and because Osaka-shi is a relatively good place). Here is where I’ll have to leave the east African comparison aside, with the exception of one last comment: until I went to Japan, I thought Africa was as exotic and bizarre and un-understandable as any place can be (I cringe everytime I write “Africa”; it’s a bit like lumping Europe, Australia, and the Americas into one thing. It’s laziness, and because Tanzania wasn’t really going to be my first choice for the continent, but I don’t like paying for tickets, so that was the first time I went to Africa). Anyway anyway, Japan as retaken the lead as the most foreign, inexplicable, and bizarre place in the world. Also, it has melted my heart and made me fall deeply in love (sorry Taiwan. I am a westerner, so I am consecutively monogamous. Can’t help it. I was born this way. Read some dawkins).

The start of the trip was horrible. Most of the rest of it was too, but japan being japan more than made up for it. A trip with this many disasters would have been a disaster itself, in any other place. But Osaka persevered.

I should also clarify that while Dar does not represent Africa, neither does Osaka represent japan, although the question of scale is dissimilar. I went to Osaka with the impression that an anarchistic pleasure metropolis, like a scaled up and watered down version of Taipei. I left with the same impression.

Firstly, I had to write some adult homework until 6 am, the morning we left. I did, but I passed out on the couch, with my computer in my lap, depending on your point of view, either like the proverbial Spartan catching arrows in his chest to save his brothers, or like an Italian falling asleep on watch against the Americans. The following might skew your view: we missed the fucking flight. Lzyk also didn’t set an alarm, but she was horribly sick. Neither of us could be blamed, and to our credit, we didn’t do any blaming. I blame her for going to the airport anyway. She suggested that we could make it, if we got a good taxi, so we did, and wasted $1500nt and several hours on the excursion. When we went to Dar, she misread the ticket and we arrive at Taoyuan at 8 am instead of 8pm. We are improving, but it meant we lost a day in Osaka, which is a tragedy.

My tactic, in a new place, is to book a cheap room in a sleep neighborhood, then walk around. Later, I will realize what I wanted to see, but that’s for the next trip. The first time, you can’t possibly know, and if you spend your time shitting around the tourist sites, well, you might as well have just read some retarded internet blog and not have gone. I almost never end up wanting to see tourist ghettos, but Osaka sky tower was, I repeat, abosolutely astounding.

We landed in a strong cross wind, my first. I admire the pilot, it was bumpy, but we landed at such an angle, and rotated beautifully into line… other people acted relieved, and so did i. We deplaned and were suddenly outside in the sunshine. The first Japanese face I saw instantly me think of sailors on Japanese ships in “war in the pacific” or whatever it’s called. He was a large man, not at all fat, but instead fit and square jawed. He was seated, but obviously taller, and tougher than me. He wasn’t pleased to see me, but I was happy that his uniform was so perfect, and even though he wasn’t firnedly, he was immaculately polite. We solved the “first time on a train in this country” dilemma and went east. The suburbs were charming, from the speeding window. The houses are adorable and small, but not tiny. They are noticeably clean and well built, compared to England and Taiwan. Local achitechure is immediately apparent in many but not most roofs, it’s a sort of a golden ratio spiral arc across four axis. There were solar panel arrays on many of them, and while I am trying to avoid the cliché of old noting contraditions in foreign places, I can’t help but mention this one. However, maybe this roof angle isn’t old there. Maybe it’s just how they build roofs.  As we rode east, the day passed into a lazy Sunday afternoon, and in japan, well, Osaka at least, in the fall at least, this means baseball. I saw many more teams then you would see in America. Somehow, this was heartwarming, even though I never played it myself. I took it as a sign of strong communities.

I noticed that laundry is dried outside, especially in osaka’s highrise housing estates, which reminded me distinctly of middle UK, only clean and not terrifying.  On the the train, the sunshine was so shockingly bright that I had to hide my eyes. Eventually, I realized that it was because there was virtually no airpollution in japan, at least not in Osaka, and not on this day. This isn’t to say that it doesn’t exist. The city has something like 20 million people, and great Taipei has maybe half that, but difference in air quality um, astounded me. Sorry for not looking up a new word in the thesaurus, but this one keeps coming to mind. The air is crystal clear there. It smells clean. Upon returning to America, I realized it has a smell too, which is mostly a clean one. Japan’s smell isn’t as vegetably, but like America, doesn’t smell dirty. It just smells clean, like laundry. Not the same smell at all, just a smell that registers as, ‘ah, this is clean, this is good and wholesome.’ We went to dogeza neighborhood, to stay at an airbnb that lzyk picked. She hated my totally reasonable other plans, and insisted on spending six hours to pick a new place. She was furious that I watched skate videos throughout the investigation, but it turned out to be a good house, despite my inattention. I was oldschool in the 1970s US way, or maye 1960s or 1950s, I couldn’t place it. It had tatami floors and scalloped glass windows and a downstairs subteraeanean shower and bathroom, but with awesome water pressure. It had a lady outside who was meditaing loudly at 8 am and 8 pm. I didn’t go out or get home between those hours, so I think maybe she was doing it all day. Also, there was a yowling cat.

The most striking thing about Osaka wasn’t the lack of air pollution. After a minute, you don’t even notice that you breathe normally. Instead, the lack of litter, and the lack of noise and light pollution. The quality of life in Osaka is so much better than in tiawan because there are almost no scooters, spewing unregulated filthy and cacophony into people’s homes, and also because somehow, I suppose through ingenious engineering, there isn’t any light pollution to speak of, although all the roads are perfectly lit and all the sidewalks are totally safe, even late at night (and I mean by my standard of late at night, not the Japanese standard of 8:35). As a functioning society, japan has to be the best. I haven’t traveled everywhere, but I just cant imagine that anything comes close. Maybe korea. I will have to go soon. But I think I’ll come back to Osaka on the way home, because Osaka is in the triad of awesome cities (with my home, Tiapei, and Montreal).

I didn’t bring my skateboard because it would cost extra, and we had time constraints, like shopping for $8000 hair dryers, and because I’ve heard that it’s basically impossible to skate in japan. This perplexes me, because Japanese skaters’ style is generally better than anyone else on earth, but they seem to only have helmeted parks to skate in. Osaka was full of anti-skate pro-fascist nazi signs, forbidding nuisances like fireworks and kickflips. In Taipei, this argument doesn’t work, because scooters and cars are a far bigger nuisance than skateboards, but in Osaka, I have to say that skateboards would actually constitute a relative nuisance. For Japan’s ‘red light city’, Osaka was pretty damn sterile. But then, I live in japanes Tijuana.

[edited for deletion]

This has all been written with increasingly blood etoh as I finished my grownup homework at 4 am, first at home, then on the roof,then at seven, and then on the roof for a second, but it rained, so inside a new room I found up the e and then at seven again, where I thought I lost my wallet for the second time today, but whjich turned up at home.

Looking over my notes, I forgot the mention that the first night, a motorcycle gang came screaming through our hood at 4 am, reviving their motors in neutral like sawties in the hood. In silent dagewa, it ws liket angouels had scome town, or at least kahn’s horsemen. It was seriously shocking, way more than a nuisance. At first, I thought chinese soliders were invading on Harleys. And I have to say that japan is a bike culture. I immediately notived the lack of super cars compared to Taipei. In three days, I only saw a handful of them, about the same as I would see in a 2 hour session as the bridge in Taipei. Maybe this is because the Japanese are more sensible with their money. Im not sure. Maybe it’s because anyone who is addicted to the rush can buy a fucking awesome bike there. Japan is the king country of motorcycles. Nothing else can compare. I saw so amny superb bikes there, from collection crotch rockets to actual real choppers (not that American tv bullshit) and everything in between. Japan is the greatest motorcycle country. Which automatically puts it in the running for greastest country, even no considinerg the rest.

Also I forgot to say that even minor stations in a pint sized city like Osaka are as crowded as Taipei at 8 am or 5 pm. The human contact annoyed me like a nightmarket, only there was nothing fun to do, just touch other people with parts of my torso that I would prefer don’t touch other people.

We found a spray that allegedly prevents virsus from infecting you, if you spray it on your face. I happen to sort of work in the area, and I have to say that they will probably make a lot of yen from idiots when the big one comes. Japan is in that sense a deeply primitive place.

We saw a beautiful native bowing ritual outside of a store. They were dressed in western clothes, actually, much better than wersterners would have been. They left the restaurant and did this triple series of bows, lowe and lower, and said arigato gozaimasu many times. This didn’t seem soooo bizare. but we checked our gps and in this time, they walked down the block. At the other end, they repeat the ceremony, bowing many times, deeper and deepr, from many meters away, shouting arigmto gozaimasu back and forth, like animals, or aliens. I don’t mean to be insulting in anyway at all, I just mean to say that this behavior is as foreign and alien to me as giving tips to waitors probably is to more advanced socieites. It was like watchin parrots or dolphins doing something smarter than I can understand. This sounds profoundly racist, so I went to emphasis the part about which I cannot understand. I just mean to say, it was as alien as anything I have ever seen the human spoecies do, as a ritual.

Later, I saw two skaters in the canal, under the no nuisance signs. I saw two police officers the entire time I was in japan. This speaks the superiority of the society. Japan isn’t safe because theyir police are so good, they are safe because their people are so good. Fuck, I can’t say how much I love japan. I teared up when I left (this sounds like bullshit too, but it isn’t).

From my notes, I was going to start this with ‘japan is a serious place, with serious people, doing serious things.’ I don’t disagree now. The downside was the lifelessness of it all. It’s

Great to live ina sterile place, if you’re a sterile man, working til death. It’s a lot less great if you don’t fit in. and I don’t. so I was glad to come home to the best city in the world, Taipei. I had one final moment of pure transecental extasy alone at a yakitori in north Osaka, but I ll have to leave that for later, or never. It was the best neighborhood dive I’ve ever been to. If I srurvive long enough to go back to Osaka, it will be my first stop ther.e

I skated at the bridge andit was good. I worked and iddnt skate tonight. It’s been rainaing.

The Primordial Stoop

I passed out on the couch during my writing session, I think about 7 or 8 am. I had forgotten to set an alarm. So had Lzyk, who passed out upstairs a little earlier, with pneumonia. Fuck taiwan's work ethic. It isn't work ethic, it's suicide by work. I am not willing to die for this shit, but apparently, she is, so I assume that she'll be more successful than me. Doesn't matter, I'm already happier.

I've been reading some dawkins tonight, first on the the lesser stoop, outside the 7, which is a skatespot of great potential, and then since asahi was on sale (buy 2 get one free) and since I would be in Osaka right now, had lzyk or myself set an alarm this morning, I headed up to the roof stoop to continue reading until the death of my phone's battery.

It was windy and cool up there, which is an exciting thing ot feel. The entire city flashes and blinks around in almost total silence, like a digital cancer. This valley isn't going to look like this for long, geologically speaking. It feels like looking out into the ocean at night from a windy beach; into a void where noone is. However, looking out over the ocean of Taipei means looking at 11 million people (ok 3 mil in the strictest definitoin, but I prefer agglomerative definitions). I couldn't see a single person from the roof, and I could only hear a few of their taxis splashing around the rainy streets below, and the occaisional KMT's mclaren or lambo or ferrari, screaming through the empty canyons.

My phone's battery died and I was left with 1.5 beers on the King of Stoops, high above the sleeping city, and I spent the time looking out across the metaphorical ocean of darkness.

I came here so that I wouldn't have to be a wage slave, and now I'm shackled up at 4 am

I went for a beer run in the middle of writing some sciency shit on a rainy friday night slash saturday morning, and an aussie was clearly arguing (from his posture) with his taiwanese girlfriend on the phone. I only caught  him earthfully saying, "The only person I'm trying to please is you," as I walked by, which is probably the most beautiful thing I have ever heard anyone say.

car session

小t is a difficult man to find when he doesn't wanna be found. Thankfully, he hit me up for a skate session with a friend of his. Cryptically, he send a ping to a meet up spot in the hood, around which everyone knows there are no spots, and if you go there, you will uh, have difficulty finding beers at 7-11, because in the worst neighborhoods in Taipei, sometimes the 7-11 doesn't stock their shelves perfectly. I went to the bridge to perform a viking sky funeral for my birca's (started out terrible shoes, ended up great shoes, as they wore down) and then I rode the orange line north. I slammed a couple of Tb's, because I have a problem, and also because I still have Iron Legs from the miniramp. 

I rode a crowded train out, sweaty and full of tb, I stood head and shoulders above most of the train, in both directions. I usually stand on one end or the other, in case of incident, but this time, I put my trust in the lord and rode the middle of the train. I stood in the middle of hundreds of people, but it was almost perfect silence, except for the train noises. A few people stared at me like fish, but most of htem, 99%, were staring into their handphones. Robot english announced each station, we went under the river and into the hood. I was more and more excited as each station passed. 

I got off in 三重 and got some fruit and beer, which are my energy drink, and sat on a black marble ledge for 30 minutes and consumed them. Six lanes of thrashing frantic traffic broiled in front of me, and I listend to nola hiphop on my phone. 小t showed up, in the passenger seat of a fucking rapper's car. His homie was driving it, I'll call him recklessreck. reckless's truck is maybe the nicest car in which i have ridden in taiwan, and I immediately commited to the faux pax of crush his hat collection with my skateboard as I got in (it's useful to look in the back window if you are throwing yoru skateboard in, no matter how happy you ar). Anyway, we rode about 20 minutes out to the spot, which is first time I've ridden in any vehicle to get to a skate spot since about 1999. It was boring, but the spot was magic.

It was a construction site with 5 blck marble ledges of various heights. In the middle was a curved black fountain ledge. I greeted an assortment of skaters and threw down in ecstasy and .... the human terrain washed us. A dozen security guards charged us like blue faced scotsmen. At the same time, an enourmous wind came up, so strong that it made skating impossible, even rolling mean being blown out into the road. But the temperature was perfect. 

Within a few moments, I had crushed ruthlessrack's hat collection and got us kicked out of hte first spot, the latter, by skating past the security booth that everyone else knew not ot skate past. fucking idtiot, right? 

They didnt kick me to hte curb and instead we rode another 30 minutes to another spot. it turns out to be a huge park, and since it's outside of taipei, no foreign filming missions have ruined it yet. One day, foriengers will arrive, deal drugs and rape women, and we won't be albe to skate there anymore.

In the meantime, the spot was a weird brick plaza, with a six stair/ 4 stair double set, preceeded by a half inch wide, half inch deep crack. But it had planters all around, which we waxed adn skated. I think none of the dozen odd people had skated it before. there was a narrow path that was mirror smooth, with a bump and downhill landing after. At the bottom was a long ass rail barrier that got hte living shit skated out of it, by people way fucking bettter than me, and a bike holder, that they ********** jumped and *******ed through.

It was pissing rain, and we bumbled to the next spot, where it started shitting rain. ricklesswreck and 小t and i rode back into the city to drop me off (goddam, thanks for that) and we went to eat in my new hood. 

I have ot wake up in a couple of hours for work, and they filmed me doing some stupid shit. 

osaka this weekend.

skating in atlanta was done mostly in cars. i m glad i got ot skate a car session this time, just to be reminded how boring and shitty it is to ride around in cars. 

gloriously lost

seniorec is leaving the country, and I am sad about this. We went to the only miniramp in Taipei, but rollerbladers waxed everything they could, and it was almost unskateable. Those bastards vandalized the ramp, and if there's anything totally uncompatible with skateboarding, it's vandalism. Furious, we went to get some water (and new 711 cheese burrito, which they got right this time) and discovered that there is a new plaza next door. It was a couple of fountains and manny uh, benches, but most of all, it has some free floating grindable philly stairs. Also, the surface is new taipei stone, so it's slick as bacon grease on a shinned hardwood floor. Thank you, harleydavidson.

We cruised back over to the ramp to meet my favorite dutertesupporter and were pleasantly surprised to by a party of homies from the bridge. It turned into a massive ramp session, and only one person suffered bodily harm because of the rollerbladers' wax. Scum.

It was the kind of session that I would swear out loud "this is my last drop in," but 45 minutes, I was still there. I stayed to lights out, and then skated home. This took me three hours, and if anything, was even better than the ramp session. I found a 30m marble ledge under a bridge, totally virgin, with a wall ride right beside it, adn then cruised the sidewalks for miles. A new granite bank to ledge has been installed on the way, and I can't begin to count the number of kickers and metal loading ramps I blasted through on the way back. I stopped at 7 several times to beer up, and when the tiles got rough, I skated beer in hand into oncoming traffic in the newly paved asphalt. I passed hundreds of marble and granite curbs, and grinded some of them, and slammed on a couple, spilling my TB. I was mostly lost, but confident that if I kept heading west, I could find something I recognized. I did, but sporatically, and this made it much more fun.

There is no greater joy in skating than getting lost on the way home and cruising till you make it back. Taipei is the greatest skate city in the world.

civil war

we can't agree about a budget for an osaka trip, meaning, lzyk doesn't think we should worry ourselves with money, because well, if I were a successful man, then she wouldn't have to. But I spent my time skating and I spend my money and my health drinking, so a trip to Osaka is not a minor financial concern.

I went up to the New Stoop, which is definitely the roof top of my new building, for some tb meditation. After some time, I noted that my phone was dead, so I couldn't take notes. It's just a little breezy, just the right amount. There is a waist high ledge to jump up to and sit on, although I got the paranoid fear that a spider or centipede was gonig to crawl up on me from underneath the ledge and bite me through my camo pants. I stuck it out.

I was rewarded with a city in every direction. I could only see the ground in three tiny spaces, where the headlights of passing cars and scooters gave it away. I suppose those spots could have been bridges though. I also can see the vast and aggressive mountains to the north, not so far away. There are other ones to the east and south as well, but not to the west. The lights on the buildings are a wide variety, from blinking to shining to flickering to flashing to warbling to humming to growling to skipping to glowing to blaring to gloating to shimmering.

The clouds above, adn not so far above, are pink, and pass slowly, I supposed because of the street lights. At any rate, they dont change color as they pass, and give the impression of gauzy human tissue, cut apart under the skin. Above them, somewhere, is exactly the kind of black that doesn't appear in No Man's Sky, and between the cotton candy flesh clouds and the blackness of space, I saw a endless series of white ghostly V's. They changed shape and went mostly in clockwise circles, and from north to south. They were birds, flying over the most unnatural landscape on earth, tiny tribes surviving by instint alone, totally, completely unaware even in the remottest sense that they are flying over the best skating city in the cosmos.

New trucks in new taipei city

The theme of the last few months has been that I have too many observations of skating through the city to remember in one writing session, even with notes from my phone.

At the end tonight, I went back to mainstation and cruised to the bridge on the way home. I bought some tb's to drink in the dark and had a cool down session alone. An avalanche of mist came over the barrier from the bridge level high above, and I didn't think much of it, but looking back, it's probably why I spent about an hour puking my guts up on the sidewalk, because it wafted down into my open beer. I think it was zika prevention spray, but I honestly have no idea what I ingested.

Taiwan has these pink and clear plastic shopping bags that look like victoria secret bags, but they're not. One of them was full of something horrible, in front of me, while I drank my final tb on the seven stoop by my house, which is in the running for The New  Stoop, but so far, I'm not making any commitments. I don't know what was in that bag, but I'm hoping it was nothing worse than a fetus.

Most of the evening was spent in B-ville, which has the best ledge in Taiwan and features in a variety of videos. It's not hard to find, if you come here and ask anyone about the best ledge. It's pink, 100 ft long, and has perfectly smooth surface. It's also surrounded by a park, so the traffic noise is a at a minimum, and you can hear the frogs and crickets trying to convince other frogs and crickets to make more frogs and crickets. Also, since it's just outside exit 3, an catwalk of sawties parade by the entire time.

The ledge is lit by a pair of floodlights, as though the city intended for us to use it as a skatepark. If you have an infinite budget and as much marble as you could imagine into being, and you were tasked with making the best skate spot possible, you couldn't do better than this one. zewei told me it's eight years old, and the police used to cruise by every night to kick us out, but in the last few years, they can't be bothered.

The temperature is almost chilly at night, definitely down to 80 degrees, or almost. It was a blue sky day, and as the sun set around this massive marble plaza, I watched the reflection of the sky, on the sides of the new skyscrapers, fade into darkness so slowly that I couldn't notice the progression. Then some homies showed up. We skated under the neon for hours. It's about 50 stories high, all around. Every building is blinking mandarin adverts, but I can't really read them, so it feels like art instead of prostitution.

Midweek Marathon

I swore I wasn't going to skate at the skatepark anymore and I broke that oath. But this time, I won't complain about the spot, at least not much. Only a handful of people were there when I got there around 14:00. momoney showed up, and so did sethstch, who I hadn't seen in forever. momoney is a shining beckon for the german education system, and we talked about a catholic assortment of topics between runs. The surface is still slick, but as the afternoon wore on, I started to enjoy myself (we had planned to go street skating in the area, but ended up staying til dark. The lights came on, and I decided I had had enough.  I sat down to let the sweat dry before getting on the MRT, and suddenly there was a full on ambush explosion of screaming mandarin. It was a lady of the three treasures, and her target was sethstch, which is pretty funny, since I'm pretty sure he doesn't speak a ton of mandarin, but I guess she was blaming him because she thought he couldn't say anything back. A furious but silent and obviously grumpy bumbling old man was with her, and aggressively tried to take photos of us all, and also of the clock across the street, which read 5:53. Mandarin speakers rushed over to sethstsch's aid, and although I was exhausted, I rolled in just to show my support. This sent them into another conniption fit. As far as I can understand, an unauthorized person turned on the lights before 6 pm, and everyone knows the rule that the lights can't be turned on before 6:00pm, no matter that it's totally dark, because, well, that's the rule. German beurocracy annoys germans, but makes society function. Taiwanese beurocracy serves no purpose at all and makes everything worse. I skated around til the official lights on, just to stir up the hornet's nest some more. It is sad to think that  a presumably functioning human being honestly expects us to stop skating for 45 minutes until the official "lights on" moment.

After that, I went to eat by the bridge. There is a huge alley with about 50 restaurants and stalls. Naturally, I took it to the bridge to watch whatever was going on. It looked like a fun sesssion, so I chatted with friends and joined in, but mostly kept it low key. More and more people I know showed up, and then someone asked, would I like to go street skate? I said no, because I could barely walk, but a couple of hours later, I was cruising down the bus lane with a dozen others. We went to mainstation and found the bums still hadn't come back (they sleep all over the ledges and banks, but apparently got blown back across the Strait by the typhoon). Giddy from tricks and the pure joy of skating in a group, I followed them to seven, where we all beered up, and then to a park, where we skated flatground in front of a temple, and a pair of secret police in all black watched at a distance, but did nothing. They kept going, but I went home early, twelve hours after I started.

Tonight I put on some new trucks, since the baseplate of my bindy's broke. Trux is a brand I've never had, so I look forward to trying them, but I think I got them too wide for the deck. I want to go roll around, but I have to let them marinate over night. Hopefully, zewei can skate banciao tomorrow evening. I'll try them then.