Typhoon Soulik

Last night, the widely anticipated typhoon struck the island of Taiwan.

 

Yesterday, after getting checked into our rooms at Sitou, we all made a mad dash to the convenience store not too far from where we were staying. We pretty much ransacked the store, stocking up on chips, cookies, pudding, and instant noodles. It seemed like we were preparing for the worst (if we ran out of food). Some of the guys came to the cashier with a whole basket full of food, which probably would only last them a day knowing them.

(our room's snack stash)

 

 So this morning, we woke up to a large amount of rain, and some strong wind outside our window. Breakfast was served at 8 am, but we quickly realized that the power was out! The food is served in the basement, so we ate in the dark, with limited sight from the couple of mini flashlights people brought. We were pretty much on lockdown; no one was allowed to go outside until the storm passed (which was late at night).  At breakfast Jack informed us of the situation, which is a huge tree fell last night, which crushed the electricity pole. This tree is also blocking the road out of here: no one in, no one out. We were told that we were actually the only ‘tourists’ that were in the Sitou Park, but at breakfast there was a huge group of people eating at the other tables… it turns out that these people are actually stuck here!

The rest of the day, we pretty much had free time because we we’re supposed to be outside the whole day, exploring the forests.  So we had some very intense game of cards (bridge and Egyptian ratslap) for a couple of hours, along with some karaoke echoing through the empty halls. (People here really really like karaoke).  Jimmy was especially into the ratslap game because he was quick, and his huge hands gave him a definite advantage! Even a mini game of baseball was played in the small hallway. It felt pretty much like what we would be doing in a snow storm back home. People were certainly stir crazy; the first time our group was confined to a small area... no big open mountain to view.

After our lunch, we had to get into our groups to discuss possible topics we would like to research. My super awesome group consists of Jimmy, Kim, Jiling, and Richard. We actually had a lot good ideas floating around, and going into project proposal time (consulting the professors) we had narrowed it down to 6 different possible research projects. We finally decided on studying the wind resistance of various plant species.  After 3 hours of debating and brainstorming, we all had a very very long nap haha. It turned out that everyone eventually left, except me and Richard, so we both woke up around 5:30/6, just in time for dinner haha. My first typhoon experience was definitely memorable, full of weirdness and off the wall games. Now the storm has passed, and we are ready to start our experiment!

 

(making a human sushi roll with the blankets)

(just goofing around, wasting time, sorry Ben for waking you up)