Here's To Some Good Luck!

Warning: The following portion of the post can best be described with the word 'venting'.
I would be lying if I said I didn't find this week to be particularly frustrating, and the heart of the issue came down to the matter of communication.  I can't imagine many people would disagree with me if I told them that communication is vital in the workplace, so why was it so faulty in my workplace this week?  For example, on Wednesday one of my co-workers called in sick, and her classes were reassigned to other teachers (not me).  At 6:30, while I was in the middle of a different class, I was called and asked to cover the private student who was scheduled to come in at 8:30 (which admittedly was not too much of a challenge  because my final class of the day ended at 7:10 so I still had over an hour of preparation time, but I could have had a whole day of it since I talked to my co-worker before noon and she had already called in sick by that time.  The frustrating thing was planing the lesson, killing some time in the office waiting for it to start, then receiving a call at 8:50 (20 minutes after the class was intended to start) informing me that the student would not be making it to class (which, in my bitter translation means 'you just wasted 2 hours planning and waiting on a private class that you will never teach, and never see any money for').  Frustrating moment number two involves the merger of two closely leveled classes, my CE18 and CE19 classes which has been in the plans for months, and I have been putting effort into for about 4 weeks (so much so that I taught and tested 24 lessons worth of content in 8 classes). On Friday I taught my 'final class' to my CE18 class, signed their books with a 'goodbye and good luck in your new class', and then, halfway through my next class, received a phone call informing me that the merger wasn't happening.  Since this obviously wasn't a spur of the moment decision, I find it very difficult to understand why no one chose to inform me of this sooner, it would have completely affected how I taught that lesson (because I had to spend the class reviewing the contents of the test rather than covering the material adequately (which leads me to the moral of the story, which is: never teach for a test, tests are not accurate measures of a student's knowledge anyway)).  The last, and (upon reflection, least) frustrating moment was being told at 8:00 that the parent presentation that was starting at that moment would not be witnessed by any parents, would not be recorded, would not have a manager present, and therefore, didn't exist (though we had just spent an hour preparing for it).  Like I said, that one isn't as bad, it was a nice release of pressure to receive the news, but it was certainly news that could have been given to me hours before that point in time.
*Whew* It's good to have that off my chest.  It really wasn't a bad week, just a bit frustrating at times.  My weekend was great.  Saturday morning I was supposed to help the school with a promotional event that was rained out, so instead I was able to go to Lukang with a few other friends.  We set-loose in a candy shop and tried all of the Taiwanese candy (which was disappointingly disgusting), toured a few temples, and visited the shops on old street, then we finished up the night at the movie theater to catch Ironman 3.  Today I spent the afternoon with my language exchange partner and we were some of the trial customers in a new restaurant near my apartment.  We helped with their customer service and sampled some of their delicious meals.  Then this evening, to celebrate the beautiful weather of Taiwan we hung out in the park talking and playing soccer and badminton.  It was a perfect use of the day.
My thoughts this week involve the Chinese zodiac (shengxiao) - the set of 12 animals, each representing a different set of personality traits, which make up  12-year cycle.  Each year, around Chinese new year, a horoscope for the year is released which predict's what will happen in each animal's life (in terms of relationships, financial situations, education, life decisions, overall luck, etc.) over the following year.  I mentioned a few months back that while it is the year of your zodiac animal, your horoscope tends to contain negative predictions in all aspects of your life.  While I would not say I believe in the Chinese zodiac, I am starting to feel like I have had a bout of bad luck in Taiwan, particularly in terms of losing my possessions, so I have started using Taiwanese methods to ask for good luck.  For starters, on Saturday I asked Matzu for luck in one of her temples in Lukang.  If you need help from one of the gods in Taiwan you can do to one of their temples and ask them for a wish.  To do this you must buy a set of incense sticks and use them to announce your presence at the temple, which is done by stating your full name, birthday (consisting of the month, date, year, and hour of birth), and where you live (as specific as you can be).  This is done because the deities of these temples are not omniscient like those of many other religions, so you must state clearly who you are and what request you are making, or they will not know who to grant the wishes to.  Once you are announced to the gods, you can make a wish on your incense sticks and place them in front of a shrine to burn.  This wish alone, however, may not have cleansed me of my bad luck, so I also threw coins until I rang the 'good luck' gong.  In a temple in Lukang there is a display of boats, each adorned with a gong, and each representing something you might wish for in life (like good grades, a promotion at work, or in my case, luck).  Ringing these gongs with your coins is similar in practice to using a wishing well.  To complete the bad-luck cleansing trifecta, I walked over a bowl of fire to burn the bad luck off of me.
Another tradition in many temples consists of asking the gods for the answers to your yes/no questions using jiaobei (moon blocks).  Moon blocks are small crescent shaped pieces of wood which consist of a rounded side called 'yin' and a flat side called 'yang' and come in sets of two.  To use the moon blocks you must first purify them by passing them three times over the incense burner, then you may kneel and announce your presence to the gods (once again using your full name, birthday, and address).  Once complete you can use the moon blocks, which is done by asking them a yes/no questions then dropping them on the ground.  The answer to your questions is read by looking at the positions of the moon blocks after they fall, and can be interpreted like this:
*shengjiao - one 'yin' and one 'yang' showing: the gods say 'yes'
*nujiao - two 'yin' showing: the gods say 'no'
*xiaojiao - two 'yang' showing: the gods are laughing (which either means an 'emphatic no' or the gods know you know the answer to the question already)
*lijiao - one or both stands on its end: the gods don't understand the question so it must be re-asked
The moon blocks are intended to be used three times in a row to ensure the deity's answer was accurate, or they can be used in conjunction with fortune sticks (Kau Cim).  Fortune sticks are a cup containing 100 flat sticks, each inscribed with a number which corresponds with a list of 100 responses from the oracle.  The sticks are either in a cup mounted on the wall or a cup which can be picked up by worshipers.  If the cup is mounted on the wall, the worshiper will use both hands to pick up all 100 sticks and drop them back into the cup, the number on last of which to leave their hand (or not land in the cup) corresponds to the oracle's answer to their question.  If the cup can be lifted, then the worshiper will kneel with the cup and it's 100 sticks, and shake it until only one stick falls out (if more than one stick falls out the results are nullified and the process must be repeated), and the number on that stick represents the oracle's answer to the question.
This batch of information doesn't mean I am converting to Buddhism/Taoism, but I have always been open to the co-existence of different religions, and I find religion to be an interesting window into understanding a culture.