Thursday, April 30, 2009

Thursday Bike Ride

Once again it was Craig's Dad's day off and the family's bicycles were put to use so that Craig could step out into the great outdoors. The first stop was the now familiar rocking duck under an expressway that Craig has seen many times before.


This time Craig decided that Craig's Dad looked too comfortable lying down on a bench and sat on his Dad before bouncing up and down!


After lunch it was off to the normally quiet little park that has one of Craig's favourite jungle gyms. On this day, construction noise from just across the street was very loud and Craig occasionally became scared and needed a hug.


While Craig climbed, Craig's Mum checked out stock prices.


There were thousands of these little red beetles running around in the park. They were such a bright colour that even Craig's Dad was smart enough to not touch them.


But while Craig's Dad took pictures of the bugs, Craig became bored on the slide.


So, another (quieter) park was sought out. It had a cute little steering wheel that Craig had a go at.






Craig's cousins Soit-Jade and Yu-chi joined him at this park and that added to the fun. Yu-chi liked the steering wheel, too.


Craig's Dad liked the jungle gym in this park because there was nowhere on it that a child could fall to the ground from a height without doing something extremely unusual.


The three kids all had fun on this slide.


Three rocking animals, three kids! What could be better?


It's no surprise that Craig sat on the blue one.


Craig's Dad cooked dinner that night, which is most unusual. Craig wasn't too fond of the pasta that he was served however, so he had an apple for dessert. He didn't have any trouble finishing it either.


Craig's Dad also had dessert, tinned assorted fruit and vanilla ice-cream.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Really Long Saturday Afternoon Walk

Saturday began quietly and not much had happened until lunchtime when Craig went down to the second floor to eat. After lunch, it was time to go for a walk. The alleys near home are quite narrow and there's no footpath (sidewalk for our North American friends.) This is the alley that leads from home to Zhongxiao E. Rd. It's not wide enough for two cars to pass and there's no space for pedestrians.


It's slightly wider when it continues on the other side of Zhongxiao E. Rd.


Eventually it leads to a park!


After occupying the top of the small plastic slide Craig became annoyed when another boy occupied the top of a bigger slide in the same park! He even put his knee into the back of the boy at one stage trying to move him along. It really was a bit rude.


Soon, he had the slide all to himself.


But, in Taiwan you're never alone for long. Craig's cousins Soit-Jade and Yu-chi plus their mum and dad came to play.


After a while they moved on to a park that was big enough to have a name, Songde Park 松德公園.


Naturally, there was a slide, and just as naturally, there was competition to use it.


Craig also had fun on a rocking horse. He especially likes the blue ones.


Soit-Jade tried to feed Craig some grass she had picked ... not really, she was just pretending.


Yu-chi went to pick some grass as well.


Not too far away in the park, a man appeared with a pet tortoise and a big bucket of lettuce.


The three children walked over to have a look but on the way Yu-chi found some water to play with in the footholds of a jungle gym. She splashed away there quite happily while her father (Craig's Uncle Guapo) and Craig's Dad both took pictures.


The man waved at Craig's Dad as if to say, "Don't take pictures" when he saw Craig's Dad's camera but the shutter finger must have slipped because there's a picture of the man with his pet right here.


The group then continued to walk around. The footpaths in this part of town are nice and wide plus some of them are blocked off to traffic making it a pleasure to walk around with the kiddies.


The little group went inside BoAi Elementary School 博愛國小 where there was a jungle gym clearly meant for bigger kids. However, Craig insisted on climbing up the rope ladder. He managed that with no trouble at all. He's becoming quite a good climber.


On the other side of the jungle gym was a chain ladder that looked even more difficult to climb but Soit-Jade did it easy.


So, Craig insisted on having a go.


He did very well.


Even if Craig's Mum wasn't game to move away and let him climb by himself.


There was more playing on yet another jungle gym inside the same school. (It's tiring just writing about it but the kids had a great time.)


There was a long jump sand pit beside this jungle gym and Craig had to sit down there and have a scratch around.


Craig's Dad tried to lie down on the slide to rest his legs a bit but Craig sooned spoiled that plan!!


Finally, it was time to troop off towards home for dinner.


After dinner there were some friendly scuffles on the bedroom floor.


Then, the two girls went to have their evening bath. Craig sat outside the bathroom door and tried to peak in through a hole in the door's vent! Craig's Mum laughed a lot at that.

Saturday, April 25, 2009

Watch Out, and In a Cupboard

Last Thursday, Craig's parents took Craig to the park nearest home where he had strange encounter with a larger boy while playing on the jungle gym. Very, very few kids in Taipei have a bad reaction to Craig despite him looking so different but this boy raised a fist at him for no apparent reason. Fortunately, Craig didn't seem worried by the event, he just came over and reminded his parents that it was nearly lunchtime by asking to "go Fridays!" Then he speaks in Chinese, saying he wants to go on an elevator because he knows that he can take an elevator up to his favourite restaurant.


Later the same day, Craig began experimenting with hiding in a cupboard.


He's never done anything like this before.


And his parents are a bit boring. They haven't played any hiding games with Craig so he had to think of this all by himself.


He's pretty clever, eh?

Sunday, April 19, 2009

The Beach (Bai Sha Wan 白沙灣) Day 2

No one woke up early after Craig's Mum had watched Wang Chien-ming's latest disaster for the New York Yankees. But, breakfast was quick and it was soon time to hit the beach again. This time the weather was not windy at all. The ban on swimming was still in place so only fun on the sand was permitted once again. Craig didn't mind.


He had a nice spot to play where Craig's Dad had dug another private swimming pool for him.


Not only was there virtually no wind the waves were also non-existant. The temperature was just above 20 degrees Celsius so it wasn't really swimming weather but it was good to be outdoors.


The only tiny drawback was that Craig seemed to enjoy throwing sand into the hole more than helping to dig and make it bigger.


Poor Craig had a tough bus ride back to Danshui and threw up his breakfast during the trip but once he was off the bus he became happy again in no time. Due to a lack of seats anywhere else, Craig's parents took the boy to McDonalds for a late lunch and were fortunate to find places to sit right beside a childrens' play area.


Craig had a good time in there. Craig's Dad really wishes he had a picture of one little boy who came down this slide and then froze, stared at Craig for what seemed like a full minute before moving away very, very carefully making sure that Craig didn't touch him. He was bigger than Craig but scared, must be the blonde hair.


Craig's Mum tried to sleep on the train on the way home.


At home Craig got into difficulties when he sat in an upside-down plastic footstool and, initially, became stuck. Not only did his cruel heartless father not help, he actually rushed to get a camera to take Craig's picture!


Poor Craig had to struggle while Craig's Dad tried to get a better angle for a second photo. Luckily, he got himself out soon without any help. Life is so difficult for the littlest person in any household.