Typhoon Jangmi

There's another typhoon on our doorstep here in Taipei, and this one really is going to hit Taipei almost head on. Called Jangmi, this storm was considered a super-typhoon earlier in the day, but it's now been downgraded to a Category 4 storm, around a Level 15-16, I think, according to the system used here in Taiwan. In any event, the news stations are all advising us to prepare supplies for the next few days, and though no one's really sure when the storm will hit or where, exactly, it looks like late tomorrow/early Monday is when the full brunt of the typhoon is expected to arrive. If that's the case, I think there's a very good chance we won't have class on Monday, which is kind of a gift for me since I'm supposed to have a speaking exam on Monday, and I don't feel very prepared for it yet. Of course, I'll be stuck inside all of tomorrow, so I'll have plenty of time to practice then, but it's one of those things I'll gladly put off a day, if given the opportunity.

Lauren and I were talking just recently about how typhoons, while still massively destructive and even deadly, don't seem to generate as much of a fuss as hurricanes do in the United States. It's almost like people here are more accepting of what nature is going to throw at them, and the country as a whole seems to take stuff like this a bit more in stride. I know it seems extremely stereotypical, but I have to wonder if it's something to do with the psyche of people here in Asia. History has taken this entire region on a massive rollercoaster ride over the centuries, and it's as if endurance is embedded into the innate consciousness of society. Sometimes I think people here are just tougher, more apt to just get on with their lives in the face of hardship, rather than protest, or complain, or try to change it.

I don't know. Maybe I'm just operating on Western stereotypes of the hard-working, silently-suffering good peasant people of Asia. Obviously I'm making a huge generalization. But I remember my Chinese politics professor back at Oxy, Professor Chi, explaining that, when the United States threatens twenty-year sanctions on the mainland for human rights abuses, the Chinese barely blink an eye, because to them, twenty years is a proverbial drop in the bucket, nothing compared to enduring centuries of dynasties rising and falling. Endurance, he explained, has an entirely different meaning to them than it does to those of us used to a new president every four years.

--

A quick endnote: I watched Liverpool play Everton tonight in the Merseyside derby, and I was really happy with what I saw. A Torres double even though he wasn't really in the game much, some amazing distribution from Steven Gerrard, and a really good partnership between him and Xabi Alonso. Plus some really good defense, Arbeloa and Skrtel both very solid. Arbeloa even showed a bit of temper for getting into it with one of the Everton players. If Liverpool could play like this week in and week out, they would have a real shot at the title. The problem is, they have yet to show that they can kill off games that they should win easily, like last weekend against Stoke. If they only win big games, like Everton and Man U, it won't matter in the end, except maybe for bragging rights.