As some of you may or may not know, Kaohsiung is hosting the 2009 World Games next July.  I might not have included this in previous posts because I hear it SO MANY times every day, that it seems like common knowledge.  Well let’s just say the entire city is pretty intense about getting ready for this event.  Its like an unveiling of the cleaner and more attractive Kaohsiung to the world, so they have every right to be pumped about it.  The city has even adopted a slogan that reveals their attitude towards the event: Kaohsiung 2009 World Games, WE ARE READY!!  With that said, there was a city-wide event/contest that was held today in anticipation of the World Games.  It was basically a theatre competition held between the different boroughs of the city (ie. bureau of education, police bureau, etc.).  Each bureau was represented by a team who had to write and produce a 10 minute ENGLISH play showing how Kaohsiung and their organization was ready for the World Games.  Most of the plays consisted of friendly Taiwanese people showing foreigners the city sights and the hospitality of locals.  

Our team

My co-teacher and a few 8 other teachers from around the area represented the bureau of education in this contest and I was asked to be their secret weapon! A native speaker who could help make sure the grammar was correct and that their pronunciation was as native-like as possible (although you try explaining how to make the ‘th’ sound in they and the or the motor skills involved in pronouncing all.  Not easy.  I thank my linguistic background for at least the method with which I ATTEMPTED to explain). Their play was phenomenal.  Fancina (my co-teacher) wrote the script and the cast was all women.  Let me try to capture the spirit of this piece of art: think Jack and Rose from the Titanic, skydiving, cheerleaders, a rap about Boules (some French sport?), and “Hey Mickey You’re so Fine”.  How could this not be awesome?  I have some clips from this and eventually I hope to get the whole thing online so it can truly be appreciated.

The other plays were of varying quality.  Overall they all kinda said the same thing: look at Kaohsiung’s wonderful subway system!  The people are so friendly! Look at the local delicacies!  There was one other group that stood out, namely the police bureau.  Their play was called CSI Fairy Tale.  It was the story of Snow White (with curly electric blonde hair and played by a man).  So everything is going according to the traditional fairy tale–Snow White’s mom dies, her dad gets remarried to a rather unpleasant but beautiful woman (in this play named Sweety), the new queen consults her mirror, finds out she’s ugly compared to Snow White, plans to kill her…right. We got it. Same ol’ same ol’.  That’s what I thought too.  UNTIL Sweety (evil Queen) comes to Snow White’s room (that’s right…no dwarves in this tale) and offers her a poison apple.  Snow White responds, “Why of course! I love apples.  Apples are delicious! An apple a day keeps the doctor away!”  and just when SW is about to dig into this delicious but poisonous apple, Sweety comes up from behind her and BEATS HER WITH A BASEBALL BAT! And it gets better! After SW is unconscious, Sweety SMOTHERS her with a pillow! Then plants a suicide note along with the poisoned apples! What a wench! SW’s dad is pretty upset so he calls 119, the friendly Kaohsiung police department.  The detectives arrive at the scene with their CSI gear, gather clues, and then conclude that SW could not have committed suicide because 1. the handwriting on the note did not match her own 2. She suffered from blunt-force wounds to the head 3. There was no poison found in her system.  There was also a cigarette butt with Sweety’s DNA all over it found at the scene of the crime, as well as a bottle of poison left in the queen’s chambers.  Sounds like a cut and dry case to me! So they bagged the wench and hauled her off to jail.  And the detective (named Conan) warned us all that he would hunt down any monsters to keep the streets of Kaohsiung city safe.  Wow.  Amazing.

Unfortunately the police borough didn’t win, although they were arguably the most entertaining.  FORTUNATELY, Fancina’s team did win! and they want to take me out for a celebratory dinner, even though I feel like my 2 hours of work with them was trivial compared to the month and a half of preparation they put into it.  But hey! Free dinner!