Unforeseen Expenses

The alarm clocked pounded and I awoke slowly, rolling out of bed with a moan. My experiment of non-midday napping had failed miserably as, even though I was coherent for the entirety of the previous day, I was clearly paying for the lack of sleep the next morning. I realized I didn't have enough time for coffee, but a quick shower should do the trick--sort of. Down the elevator I rode to unlock my scooter and join the morning chaos the Taiwanese call "traffic." "Boy, it's sure hard to push my scooter backwards today," I think, the idea knocking lamely around in my head. A few more pushes and it started to become clear: I had a flat tire.

The last week has been scooter trial after scooter trial. I noticed that I had had a nail in the same tire and had dutifully taken it to get patched. No problem...or so I thought. This of course added to the battery I had to replace on Saturday, makes for an increasingly light wallet this month. Ack! Ever so slowly, I pushed the scooter the two and half blocks to the nearest scooter repair shop only to realize that even though traffic is crazy so early, most shops don't open until 10 am. Oops. I called some friends from the kindergarten, but they knew of no shops open so early, and I sent the message that I would be late. I figured I might as well pick up breakfast and that coffee I had missed, before I sat down to figure something out. Luckily, another teacher at the branch offered to cover my class, since the earliest I could possibly arrive was 11:15 (30 min repair time + 40 min commute), a mere 45 minutes before lunch time, and the end of my shift. I couldn't afford both the scooter repair ($750 for the new tire) and a roundtrip cabride, that would undoubtedly cost somewhere around $1000. Damn Chinese New Year and it's unpaid week of holiday bliss!

This month continues the theme of the empty wallet. Luckily, things aren't as desperate as the last week before payday...yet. I think about it this way: By now I've pretty much replaced everything on the scooter so it's almost like I've bought a brand new one! Sadly, or happily (I'm not sure which yet), I missed the kindergarten field trip to the stationery shop. I wasn't really looking forward to controlling 30 little hands grabbing in every direction, but it was a change of routine and possibly a fun one at that.