In my opinion, intense perspiring should only happen when you are seeking it out, like in a sauna for instance...and not when you are simply walking down the street, or pausing to read a map, or looking in a window.... and your heart rate is at a mere 63 beats per second!!!  Here in Hsinchu you just sweat your brains out whether you like it or not.

After a day of travelling by foot, we both felt it would be advantageous to buy bicycles in this city with little to no public transit. We briefly toyed with the idea of buying a scooter.  That's how the majority of people get around here.  Although Ivan is a skilled motorcyclist, I felt uneasy at the thought of sitting behind him on one (with my eyes closed) as we joined the vast numbers of scooters performing their daily daredevil stunts.  I'm not a motorcycle person at the best of times. We now have bicycles and it's a lot easier than walking everywhere. Sidewalks are an extreme rarity so we share the roads with pedestrians, cars, and thousands of scooters that fly past in rough formations like great flocks of birds!!! When skycars eventually hit the market I'll bet that people here will be first in line to buy them.

"The Rainbow Lizard" (left) 

This amazing lizard flickered up the bench on which
I was sitting and then went inside my knapsack for
an exploratory visit. I could hardly believe my eyes.

 "Temple Tomb" (left)

This is one of the buildings around a temple courtyard in our neighbourhood.  It could be a crypt.  I'll probably find out eventually. I sat under a tree to do this painting and every so often a gust of wind would come and give relief from the unrelenting heat. It's so very beautiful at this temple...it's an oasis.  Jungle rises up the hill from the courtyard and birds call to each other from the trees.  I think I'm going to spend a lot of time up here.

"Path at Eighteen Peaks Park" (right)

Yesterday I took my bicycle to a park called Eighteen Peaks Mountain. It was hotter than blazes though I managed to surrender to the heat for the most part.  Going there in the middle of the day had it's advantages, mainly that although the traffic was heavy, it wasn't rush hour traffic.  (Ivan and I walked to the park in the evening a couple of nights ago when the city was in the throes of rush hour and we honestly felt our lives were in danger as we made our way up the street with no sidewalks. The insane drivers constantly attempting to gain on each other by any means possible which meant that often it was only inches between us and hurling metal. On the way home we couldn't cross one street at all because of the neverending stream of scooters and cars....we had to double back a ways until we found a less hectic crossing area.)

As I rode my bike towards the entrance way of the park, the noise of the city  began subsiding. I could hear more birds and insects. By the time I was in the park itself I felt that I was in another world entirely! I had just walked into the jungle.  It wasn't exactly what one would call complete wilderness, with paved paths and staircases winding up the hills, but, compared to the city I had just left it was lush and untamed!  Trees stretched up and over the paths.  Tropical plants and vines covered the ground underneath in crazy profusion. The air was heavy with fragrances from flowering plants unknown to me. The sound of cicadas seemed to meld with the humid air creating a song liquid that I could walk through. I felt hypotized.       

Walking back down one of the hills towards the exit I began musing about the wildlife one might find in a park of this size. Were there only birds and insects? Or, would there be other animals, too?  I stopped to examine a bed of flowers and nearly jumped out of my skin when, at my feet, a 4ft long yellowish green snake made a dash for the undergrowth!  Well, now I know a little more about the types of fauna this park contains!

"The Kissing Trees" (right) 

These two trees with
the table underneath
are in the temple
courtyard. The trees
are full of small
green birds...
it's as though
the leaves
are singing.

"Neighbourhood Bridge"
(left)

I stood in the shade of a tree to do the pencil part of this
piece and then I painted it when I returned to our
apartment. Even though I had been standing in the
shade I was so extremely hot that I thought I'd pass out
before I could even get home!

In our end of the city these bridges are a regular feature
spanning the concrete riverbeds numerous times.
 

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