August 18

Cathy left today and I spent the entire day cleaning and organizing the apartment. I was sad to see her go. She has been a great friend and I will miss all of her wonderful stories. At the same time though, I was really excited to make the apartment my own. I went to a little shop down the street and bought placemats for the table, a rug, and some other decorations. Cathy left quite a bit behind so I only needed to make a few minor touches. At first I wanted to completely rearrange everything, so that it would feel like a new apartment, but the place is small and it turns out that things were in the best possible places. So I spent an entire two hours vacuuming and moving furniture around only to place everything back exactly where it was. At least I know the apartment is dust free and I kind of liked it the way it was anyways.

My biggest project was creating a kitchen for myself. The apartment is only a one room studio with an enclosed balcony that is supposed to serve as a kitchen. Well this “kitchen” consists of a sink, shelf of dried food, gas tank for hot water, and a single gas burner. The brick floor is stained and cracking so badly that Cathy covered it with a purple yoga mat. Cathy never cooked so the gas burner was buried under a pile of dusty pots and pans on the floor. I moved some things around and found a nice place for it on a tiny metal cart. I also washed the pots and pans for future use. It felt good to know I had a place to cook for myself. I don’t see myself doing too much real cooking since food is typically less expensive to buy already made from street venders or even most restaurants and the apartment is also equipped with a microwave. But there is something about having a gas burner that makes the place feel more like a home.

After I finished all of my cleaning and organizing, I took the scooter for a drive and found a Blockbuster. Yes, that’s right, an actual Blockbuster in Chiayi, Taiwan. All they needed was my address, telephone number, and passport to give me a membership card. The card looked just like the one I had at home except that the writing on the back is in Chinese. I left Blockbuster as a new member, with an American new release film, hoping that the girl was right when she said it was in English and Chinese. On the way home I stopped by a plant shop and bought a beautiful purple orchid. It is now sitting on my coffee table and my apartment is finally complete.