Musings of the Shortest Month

Happy New Year!

Welcome to the year of the Pig!

Vancouver just isn't the same as Taiwan. Children aren't running around with firecrackers here. But I did venture to Chinatown to look at the gate and to remember red envelopes and vacations to warmer places and the Nian monster and the black haired children who stole my heart and never gave it back.

To celebrate, I am going to KTV tonight with a friend who used to teach English in Taipei. I'll sing out loudly for all of my friends from the Kaohsiung days, especially the motorcycle gang girls.

Water

Stories about Vancouver are inevitably stories about rain.

I bought a pink umbrella to try cheer myself up on the rainy days. To my disappointment, everywhere I go, someone has the same umbrella. I prefer being unique.

Unfortunately, the water doesn't always stay outside.

One of the core classes at Regent is "Christian Thought and Culture". In two semesters, we go over the last two thousand years of the Christianity in regards to theology, philosophy, economics, the arts, science . . . Last November, I had settled down to write my paper on John of Damascus's Christological defense of icons, amazingly for me, a full two days before it was due. Heading to the kitchen for my supper break, I stopped short in the hallway. My foot was wet. Like I stepped in a puddle . . . um, the puddle on the carpet outside my bedroom door.

It wasn't coming from the ceiling, the dishwasher or the washing machine. The entire "dining room" was absolutely sopping. Soon all my towels were wet. Johanna and Ben brought some of theirs and Jo and I kept Ben from tearing the wall open to look at the pipes. The water seemed to be coming from under the wall, from the neighbor's apartment, and was warm. In the neighbor's apartment, the lights were on, but no one was home.

After several hours during which Steven came home and our landlord Tim came by, the building manager's turned the hot water off for our side of the building. It turned out that the neighbor's washing machine had kept filling and filling . . . I wrote my paper the next day to the sound of an industrial blowing fan in my tiny apartment. The place smelled musty for about a week.

Last week, two days before my paper was due, I was remembering (with no fondness) the events of last semester as I sat at the dining room table. I set my foot down on the floor. It was wet. Oh, the irony . ..

This time the neighbors were home, but I still wrote my paper the night before it was due.

Spring

In Saskatchewan, February (I vote to get rid of the first r) still means cold. It means that winter is long from being over. February means down jackets and mittens for a long time to come.

Here in Vancouver, it hasn't snowed for a while. And for a few days this week, the sun shone so brilliantly that it almost fooled me into believing that it could be warm outside. I opt not to wear the sandals and capri pants, but I do venture outside with my sunglasses to absorb some of that vitamin D I so desperately need.

I am ready for spring. I am ready for summer.