My friend Mei Yueh

Jill and Mei-Yueh

My good friend Mei-Yueh Hsu showed up at the studio today with big pieces of sugar cane from her yard. I met Mei-Yueh in South Carolina in 2005, where she was a graduate exchange student while I was a graduate student there. She is awesome, and a wonderful artist who just had a big show in Taichung County Culture Center. She showed me how to cut off the tough outside, and then we chewed up the super-sweet liquid sugar inside. Everyone in the studio loved it.



We then went out to dinner at a local food joint where we picked out 5 different meats/foods, they fry it up, and serve it to us with a glutonous rice. We also had a plum drink in a big bamboo cup. The food was great, but VERY rich with lots of fat. Something you would not eat every day if you like your heart.

spontaneous parade with mafia dude in front

Then out of nowhere, a small parade with a drum corps went marching by with a lit-up float. It is hard to see from this picture, but there were fireworks and a whole bunch of drummers. Mei-Yueh told me it was a parade for one of the local gods, and that in Taiwan they have many different local gods. I was also curious about the guy in the picture with a bunch of tatoos on his arms, mostly because I haven't seen many people with tatoos here yet. Later Shau Yu told me he was "bad guy", like a mafia guy. Yikes, I'm glad he didn't see me take his picture! Of course Shau Yu also has a great sense of humor, so who really knows...
By the way, dinner for 4 people was $340 NT, which is about $11.50 american dollars total. Crazy.

Mei Yueh also took me to a local restaurant last week, where we had octopus, clams, soup, bamboo, and a few more things. The food was lighter here, and VERY good. 

Mei-Yueh in front of her house

Tomorrow I will tell you about the night market and stinky tofu. Yowza!
Zaijian!