Earthquake and Chinese names

I feel guilty for not having any pictures in this post, but the topic does not lend itself well to photos. This morning at 8:20 am 6.2 magnitude earthquake rocked southern Taiwan (not a very unusual occurrence, I've learned) and, given our proximity to that island nation (or rogue province, depending on who you ask) we were able to share in the joys of tremors. I was hanging around the house, catching up on email and drinking some terrible-tasting instant coffee (won't even go into the sacrifices in beverages I've made this year) when I realized that I should get dressed. Not five minutes later I heard a rhythmic banging sound near our front door. At first I thought someone was dragging something heavy down the stairs that lead to the roof as people often use our elevator and roof-access stairs to dry laundry. When I tried to peer through the peek-hole, I realized the banging was the door itself, rocking back and forth in its frame (it should not do this but the deadbolt is finicky and hadn't fully engaged when the kids left for school this morning). Then I felt the whole building swaying and stood there watching our Chinese New Year/year of the tiger good luck banner sway a good 8 inches in either direction. The realization set in that this was an earthquake so I grabbed the phone and called Gene--he answered with "you feel the earthquake too?" As the swaying was still going on and at least 20 or so seconds had passed, he told me to get out, by way of the stairs, of course! I was very glad that I had put decent clothing on just in time! I made it as far as one flight down when my friend called to see if I was feeling it too--she had run from her building a block away and was pacing the sidewalk. Our stairwells have large pane-less widows to the outside so I was able to watch the many passing pedestrians as we talked and none of them seemed the least bit fazed--seems that being up high really exacerbated the movements. We decided it was safe to stay inside as the shaking had stopped, but, much like the way I feel when I step off an amusement park thrill ride, I felt as though I was still swaying for 20 minutes after it had stopped! Thankfully the only "damage" we suffered was a towel falling from its rack in the bathroom and possibly a few minutes lopped off my life. I was surprised to find out later in the day, after talking to friends and reading facebook responses, that many of them didn't feel it at all. I found a really great website that documents up-to-the-minute earthquake action (earthquake.usgs.gov) and was just dorky enough to register my experience in the allocated section. Chalk up another "first" on our list of firsts for this "adventure" abroad!
Now for the funny part of the week...we finally started back with our Chinese lessons after missing several weeks for CNY, business trips and illness. As is our typical approach to the lessons, we were joking with each other during our xiou xi (don't know the spelling, but it means break) that we should really decide upon Chinese names for ourselves. Since we don't know any proper names, we had to use common words that we have learned (the list isn't terribly long or varied...). We decided that Gene's name should be "fei ji chang" (airport) since he travels so much, I was to be "da dian hua" (make a phone call), Liz gets to have "dian nao mi" (computer-crazy) and Amanda will be called "xi zao" (take a shower, which complements our favorite Mexican expression: te la banaste). Our 20-something teacher was laughing right along with us (or at us) as she usually does when we say ridiculous things to amuse ourselves. Then she says, "Chinese women who have small breasts..." uh, oh, where is this going and where did it come from?! She went on to explain that fei ji chang/airport is slang for a flat-chested woman! We were making a cruel joke without even knowing it...but the label fits my husband a bit better than it fits me. Good thing we were only joking about the names and hadn't actually told anyone to use them.