Finally... the net has come back to Tainan

It is over! The long wait for our internet service has ended and a new era of online hijinks ensue. A very special thanks to our new Taiwanese friend Angela, for her diligent work in procuring our service. I had made several attempts, throughout this last week, at finding someone within Hinet that could speak English, and had thus far come up empty. Angela had us sorted out in fifteen minutes.
Much has happened in this past week that we went unconnected to the outside world. We have moved in to our new apartment, set up our new Media Centre computer and purchased a 19 inch LCD Flatscreen monitor. I will now be embarking on a download spree unlike any previously seen in the free world. I am going to have to download all of my favorite programs and movies as the television offered here leaves much to be desired.
Karen and I are both hitting the pavement hard this week as we need to get jobs right away to avoid the expense of a visa run. Our visitor visa is only good for 60 days and it takes about a month for the paper work to be sorted out for an ARC ( Alien Resident Card) and if you run out of time you must leave the country and then re-enter Taiwan to extend our visitor visa. You don't need to leave for any set amount of time as it is the re-entry through customs that extends your visa. You can go to Okinawa Japan, which is a popular spot due to it's closeness and relative inexpense to travel there.
This Thursday marks our one month anniversary in Taiwan and we have taken care of everything but the job issue. We don't anticipate any problems on that end as there seems to be lots of opportunity here. We haven’t been able to keep up with the news from back home much, but we did learn of the unfortunate loss of Chris Pawluk, owner and operator of Incredible Edibles. He was a great guy and we spent many an evening in his company, treated to great food, drink and conversation. It has been said already, but I must repeat that downtown Dartmouth will not be the same without him.
To those of you who haven’t lost interest in us yet, we will be updating much more frequently now that we are online.
Ed