Rebecca and I started a list of things I have to do before I leave the country. And today we made plans to do one of those things. They wanted to take me to Tom’s World. Becca and Michelle were very excited. But we had a few mishaps.
First, the one close to us is no longer a Tom’s World. (Oh, Tom’s World is an arcade with games, like Nickel Cade.) So we decide to ride the bus into the nearest city (Fongshan), but find out we had missed the bus by 20 minutes and the next one was in 2 hours. Bummer! The girls had a solution – go back to my apartment to eat cereal and watch TV. I think I’ll be going through a lot more cereal now that they know I’m willing to share. They’ve said they are content to just eat cereal all day. It makes me chuckle.
It worked out nicely. We made 2 stops at stores to stock up on supplies then had a little cereal and Oreo party while watching the end of Twister. We made sure to head to the bus stop early :) And we didn’t have any problems. We (well the girls) did have to field questions about me. The worker at Family Mart asked Michelle if I was her mother or a teacher. Her mother?! I don’t look that old! Strange. Then some old man walked up and starting asking questions about me. I just laugh – it is becoming normal.
We had no problems once we got on the bus. I was a bit apprehensive since Michelle tends to get lost when using the public bus system. Okay, she only did it one time. But still I made Becca check that it was taking us to the right place. The bus dropped us off and we backtracked to Tom’s World. (Orchestra music, please) It was fun. I spent $200 NT on tokens and I am the king of air hockey. I beat Michelle, then Becca, and then Michelle another 3 or 4 times. She didn’t catch on to putting the puck flat on the table before hitting it. It went flying off so many times. Once it got me square in the forehead. It was hilarious, but a bit painful.
I hit the jackpot on one game without realizing it. I just knew that tickets kept coming out of the machine! And the first 2 games I tried had issues. The bowling one didn’t give me any tickets although I earned them. And the baseball game didn’t spit out the balls properly. We also drove race cars; and one of the racing games had chairs that moved and vibrated. That was weird. Again they answered more questions about me. And Michelle said I had 2 male workers hooked. Whatever! I didn’t ask, nor do I want that to happen.
Our next stop was A+1. A store sort of like Wal-Mart in that it has nearly everything. So nice to know they have those! Up til now I thought you had to go to a bunch of small shops to get all you need. And I guess I still do since this shop is a 20-min. bus ride away. Bummer. We were goofing off and laughing when suddenly Becca mentioned the bus. We realized we hadn’t checked the schedule for a bus going back home. Uh oh! We rushed Michelle through the checkout and ran to the bus stop. We were worried it was only every 2 hours. It was 5:15 already and I was almost certain we had missed the bus and would have to wait until 7:15.
Luckily, we saw the bus when we were running up. But both Becca and I stopped running. We didn’t want to go home yet! Missing the bus was a great reason to get home later :) So we “missed” that bus. But it wasn’t a huge deal – they had buses going every 20 minutes. Back to shopping.
And we did plenty of that! I found some cute black flats. We visited a candy store (another thing on our list) and ended up back at A+1. This time I did some shopping. Michelle did more too. Becca, the queen of shopping, didn’t bring any money because she knew she wouldn’t be able to resist. Good thing Michelle was willing to give her ‘play’ money at Tom’s World. Oh, we also stopped in at McDonald’s. I had some French fries. And gave some to Becca. She ruins them by dipping them in a yucky mixture – 4 packets of pepper and 1 packet of ketchup. I tried one and it was gross.
We just had a bunch of fun and time slipped away from us. Suddenly it was 6:50 and we needed to be heading home! Michelle told me they eat dinner at 7:05 (which I think was inaccurate information). So now we were going to be late, and not because of the bus! We made our purchases and headed back to the bus stop where we purchased tickets for the 7:15 bus. KFC was conveniently located next door and they had a dessert I was told I had to try. So we stopped in and I got one. As we sat down and started talking about grabbing dinner at Pizza Hut, the bus pulled up. Luckily Michelle noticed it. We ended up running for the bus after all :) But we made it on in one piece, and began to stew about what awaited us at home.
Becca called her mom and we discovered she was angry. Very angry. Becca has never heard her yell like that. Great! We went out and had an awesome adventure but upset a very important person – the mother. She was mostly mad because we went off to Fongshan without telling her. She thought we were at the arcade near our homes. Uh oh. Becca was quite worried and our trip home was marred as she continually asked, “What are we going to do?”
I’m happy to report things turned out all right. They were greeted by Dad not Mom when they returned home (I’m sure they breathed an internal sigh of relief). He gave them a slight punishment but was happy to hear we had a good time. Oops! We have learned our lesson. Always tell mom where you are going!
It really was a great day. I feel bad about keeping them for 6 hours. Becca said she has never spent that much time on an outing unless she was on a trip. Woo hoo. There is always a time for “firsts”. And now I am tired and shall retire for the night. Michelle made me wake up at 5:15 this morning and play b-ball with her. Yes it was fun, but it was early. And I’ve agreed to go again tomorrow. I’m tired just thinking about it.
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