戀家的候鳥

We went to Baishawan Beach and Eluanbi Lighthouse in our trip to the aquarium in the southernmost of Taiwan. Our first stop was the beautiful Baishawan with a white sand beach on the way to the aquarium. We stayed there for a little while, playing with silky white sand, watching waves coming in and out, and dipping our feet in the cool ocean water. It felt great! Allie and I were chasing on the beach. 在這趟去夜宿海生館的行程中，我們順便遊覽了墾丁的白沙灣和鵝鑾鼻燈塔。一早我們就往南開了將近兩個小時，先到美麗的白沙灣玩沙，讓冰涼涼的海浪沖上腳丫子的感覺好舒服啊！～我們住的美國水牛城離海邊很遠，只有回台灣時才能享受在沙灘上追逐的樂趣！

In the southernmost province of Taiwan lies the Asia's largest museum of marine life. It is my favorite place in the world that I always look forward to visiting every year. This time it is different, however. We are actually sleeping in the aquarium tunnels surrounded by fish and marine mammals. 台灣的最南邊，有個全亞洲最大的海洋生物博物館，那是熱愛海洋生物的我，每年回台灣必去的地方。但這次不同的是，我們竟然在海生館的海底隧道裹和魚兒一起過夜喔！

Today's trip is scheduled based on a travel book that mom found. We are going to visit the Tainan Anping Tree House, and then take a boat tour through the "Taiwan mini-Amazon" at a tourist spot called Sihcao green tunnel (Sihcao Ecological & Culture Area). These two locations are only one mile apart.今天的行程是媽媽從旅遊書上看來的，我們早上先到台南的安平樹屋，下午再去坐竹筏遊有「台灣迷你型的亞馬遜河」之稱的四草綠色隧道。這兩個地點離得很近，開車五分鐘之內就到了。

An uncle and his family came to visit us today for the weekend. We took a walk to the nearby eco-park. 這個週末，舅舅一家來高雄找我們。我們在黃昏時到附近的生態園區散步。

A cousin of mine and my family visited the newly opened Kaohsiung Main Public Library. It is not just a magnificent eight-story building, but also the world's first suspended green building! It is expected to store more than one million books. It has lots of comfy, elegant and spacious reading rooms. 上午我們和表姊去參觀新開幕的高雄圖書館總館，那是棟八層樓高的雄偉建築，也是全世界第一座懸吊式綠建築，預計藏書一百萬冊以上。它有舒適、美麗又寬敞的閱讀空間。

Today daddy had an American style dinner gathering with his friends from graduate school in Pennsylvania. After the meal, Mom walked us to a nearby park where there is a pond and rocks to play with. The park was perhaps not too thrilling, but definitely more fun than listening to adult’s conversations, mostly on work and things.今天爸爸又要和朋友聚餐了，是以前和他在賓州大學唸書的好朋友們。用餐後，我們不想聽大人們聊天，所以媽媽帶我們和Allie走路到附近的公園玩耍，池塘、草皮和石頭，還比較好玩多了！

We went visit (paternal) grandpa in Tainan an hour away by car today. On the way home, we visited a place called "Taiwan creative metal arts pavilion", which is set up by a private metal machining company. A huge recycle metal work in the form of a movie “Transformer” stood by the door. Next to it were folk legend lions and bears that welcomed us to the visit. Since it is the last working day before the New Year holiday, we were happily to be the only visitors that afternoon.今天我們回台南的外公家，回程順路去參觀了「台灣金屬創意館」，那是由一家民營公屬公司設立的（志鋼金屬）。一進門就看到利用癈棄的金屬打造成的變型金鋼、箭獅和小熊等歡迎我們。因為是新年連假前的最後一個工作日，我們是當天下午唯一的遊客。

Today, I'm finally going to the long-awaited Kaohsiung City zoo! I feel that I don’t come here often enough, even though I have been here several times before. Nevertheless, this is the first time that I did homework on the zoo map and made sure of not missing any part of the zoo. 今天終於要去我期待已久的動物園了（高雄壽山動物園了）！雖然已經來過好幾次，我還是很愛這兒。這次我特別先研究了一下動物園的路線圖，不想錯過任何的動物。

Our main sightseeing spot today is the Sizihwan Bay on the west side of Kaohsiung City. The bay has a beautiful sand beach and overlooks Taiwan Straight that separates Taiwan and Mainland China. We are lucky today to have ridden in MRT (mass rapid transit) with decorative painting of my favorite theme of marine world. Aside from enjoying the beach and ocean view, we paid a visit to a nearby tourist hot spot, the Takow British Consulate. 今天走的是西子灣線，我們幸運地坐到了彩繪捷運，車廂上畫著我最愛的海洋世界。除了看海，我們還拜訪了打狗英國領事館。

Our whole family went to Daddy's elementary class reunion. They graduated from nearly four decades ago. Thanks to Facebook, the gathering was organized very effectively through social networking. The reunion took place in a restaurant of his hometown with a very rural setting. While adults were busy catching up from old time, my sister and I had an outdoors adventure, exploring an eco-pond, pumpkin field, and several different fruit trees.

左營是高雄早期的開發地，在現代高樓與街道巷弄間，仍收藏著舊城遺址、寺廟與古厝等，等著懷舊的現代人去探訪。左營舊城又稱為「鳳山縣舊城」，是除了荷蘭人蓋的幾座紅毛城外，臺灣的第一座中式城池，以當地硓𥑮石築城，也是全臺首座石城。現存東門、南門、北門及約五百公尺城牆、護城河及北門外之鎮福及拱辰井，現已列為國定古蹟。

今天阿姨當響導，帶我們來個舊城漫遊。 我們去了東門、南門和北門，但媽媽一直很納悶，不明白為什麼這個所謂的「鳳山縣舊城」不是在鳳山，而是座落在我們所居住的高雄市左營區呢？

每年冬天回台灣，總會跟到幾個阿姨和表姊參加的「毛伊社區童軍團」的活動。今年剛好遇上童軍團受邀參加龍華國小校慶的開幕進場表演。由於阿姨和往年一樣，負責造型指導，所以我和Allie 也就跟著參與了前製和當天的活動。今年的遊行要呈現的主題是「蝴蝶的一生」。我想當一隻蝴蝶，Allie 原本堅持要當毛毛蟲，但又想和我一樣有翅膀，所以她最後跟阿姨說想當「毛毛蟲蝴蝶」，這個難題，就讓阿姨去傷腦筋吧！另外，阿姨還花了好幾個晚上，做了一個150分高的蝴蝶蛋糕，要祝龍華國小35週年校慶生日快樂。…來看看我們是怎麼玩的吧！