Not All Western Women Are Sluts, Because Sluts Don't Exist

Guys, I seriously love Jocelyn Eikenburg's blog, Speaking ofChina. The comments can get a little troll-y, but that's the downside to having a very popular blog (so maybe it's a plus that I don't have "a very popular blog!"). And I usually agree with her frank, openminded inquiries and stances on love in China, although I myself never did experience it.

But as a Western woman in Asia, as a Western woman, and as a woman, I have a small problem with the first item on this list of "stereotypes about Western women in China": "Western women are sluts and like to sleep around".

Basically, she says:

It took me years to learn that some Chinese men automatically assume Western women love to sleep around or are simply easy sex for the taking.

I blame it in part on the ubiquitous Hollywood movies and TV you’ll find in China at the local DVD vendor or online, where Western women’s sex lives often turn into a revolving door of one-night stands and disposable boyfriends.

Of course, we’re not all sluts.

I kind of wanted to scream - "if a revolving door of one-night stands and disposable boyfriends is what you want, then what's wrong with that?"

Saying "not all Western women are sluts" implies that there is something wrong with women who do choose temporary companionship over relationships, and that it's okay to judge them. And why shouldn't they? Maybe they have sexual desires like almost everyone else, but don't want or aren't in the right place for a relationship? As long as they're open about that, then that's their and their partners' business. It doesn't make them "sluts". 

So no, I don't blame it on "ubiquitous Hollywood movies and TV you'll find in China", I blame it on puritanical judgmental pricks who think it's okay to dictate what every woman's choices should be.

In fact, a man who takes a woman home, sleeps with her, and then the next day says "I'm just not in a place right now where I can commit to anything serious" would be seen as a cad if he'd led her on, but if he'd been honest with her, then there would be nothing wrong with that (she might be angry, but hey, he was honest with her. She knew what she was getting into). 

That is not to say I have a problem with the blog, and I'm sure Jocelyn didn't mean for it to be taken this way, but, to say "not all Western women are sluts" sounds good on the surface: look, we're multidimensional, and not all of us are Sex in the City-style swinging single women who view sexual conquest as a game or hobby! Woo!

Just a little below that, however, lurks the idea that for this to be true, sluts must exist. And if sluts exist, then it's okay to think of a woman with a longer sexual history than you might deem acceptable as one. It still puts forward only two choices for women: be a good girl, or be a dirty skanky slut. You don't want to be a slut, do you? Nobody likes a slut! Sluts are slutty and gross! Ew! Get your slut-juice off of me! So you'd better be a good girl. That means no sex, or at least, pretending there is none (to admit you are a sexual person is to admit you are a SLLLLLUUUUUUTTTTTTTTTTT). Good girls don't have sex and they certainly don't enjoy it.

So, to say "not all Western women are sluts" implies that SOME Western women ARE sluts, and it's okay to think of them as such, which judges their behavior as wrong (again, I don't think Jocelyn herself meant to do this, but that's how the phrasing comes across). And, it's not wrong. It's just not.

And, following that, it implies that if you're an Asian guy who likes a Western woman, that the woman you like is "not a slut", which implies that in order to be acceptable, she must make a particular set of "not slutty" choices. Those choices need to be similar to the perceived choices of the local women (be they Taiwanese in Taiwan, Chinese in China, Korean in Korea etc) in order to "pass" - those same local women who don't always feel free to be open about their own histories and desires because they face the same sexist notion of what a "good girl" does, or the Western woman automatically becomes an "other". Nothing new in the stream of intercultural or gender discourse, except this time it's a group of people of color, mostly men, telling Caucasian women what choices they must make to be "acceptable". Which is not quite the same as the reverse problem - telling people of color they have to 'act white' - because being white confers privilege that being a person of color doesn't, but it sure shares some DNA with it. (Also, being male confers privilege that being a woman doesn't - as the universe giveth, the universe also taketh away). The whole thing, no matter who you are, never leads anywhere good.

Whereas the real progressive answer here isn't to refuse to stereotype all Western women (only some of them!)  as slutty slut-whores, but to acknowledge that some people make different choices, and some of those choices may be more libertine than yours (or more conservative than yours - that's okay too, as long as those same conservatives don't try to push their choices on everyone as the only morally correct option!) but there's nothing wrong with that as long as everyone's safe and legal (and even if they're not safe, that sucks, but it doesn't make them a bad person). So to me, the person who says "you're not like other Western women. You're not a slut! Now I see that Western women can make the right choices!" is still upholding only one set of choices as acceptable, and that's not good for women generally. That person doesn't get a pass from me. Either you acknowledge that women can make a variety of choices and it's not for anyone else to judge them, or you're a part of the problem.

Basically, forget "not all Western women are sluts". How about NO women are sluts? How about even if a Western woman (or an Asian woman for that matter! Or whatever woman!) makes choices you personally don't care for, that doesn't mean there's something wrong with her?

It does mean a lot to me that this be clear - perhaps if there is a stereotype that "all Western women are sluts", then I have to constantly be proving somehow that I'm not. But the only slightly less constricting "NOT ALL Western women are sluts" isn't really any better, because I STILL have to prove I'm not, only there is now room for the stereotype of a Western woman to include "makes the choices we approve of even if that's not what she'd prefer". How is that better? 

This doesn't even get a pass culturally. I am sure someone will read this and comment angrily that "if a man wants a woman who doesn't have a huge sexual past that's his right, if he wants a virgin then why can't he look for one?" There would be something to that argument if it went both ways, but those same men who claim they want a woman like this generally do not hold other men or often themselves to the same standard. He probably wouldn't judge his guy friends who slept around to be "sluts", nor is he likely to judge himself by the same standard (he may, but my point is he usually doesn't). Only the women they stick it in are sluts, not them. It's okay for men, but not for women, even though for the majority of us, it takes a man and a woman to do the hoingy-boingy dance. And that set of double standards is pretty fucked up. 

Which is really too bad as if men who felt that way about the kind of woman they would prefer to be with held themselves and other men to the same standard, then like could find like. There's nothing wrong with having your set of "traditional" values (although that's a loaded word, too), and wanting a partner with a similar worldview. The key is, you have to have those same values for yourself. If that happened, chaste men could find chaste women and libertine men could find libertine women. Okay.

Libertinism an attitude that doesn't always lead to action, by the way - I am quite libertine in my attitudes but actually very traditional, by 20 and 21st century standards, in my actual life. I don't mean that as an excuse, like, "women who sleep around aren't sluts but I'm definitely not even those women!" - but to point out that progressive thinking can exist within any chosen lifestyle. That's the whole point - we can all choose. Whether you choose monogamy, open relationships, booty calls or no relationships at all, it's all okay.

Plus, there's no cultural pass here because this "NO SLUTTY SLUTZ ALLOWED IN OUR CLUBHOUSE!" attitude is pervasive in the USA too. I'm not just speaking to Asian men, here. I'm speaking to everyone.

It's not "not all women are sluts". It's not "not all Western women are sluts". No women are sluts. No people are sluts. Sluts don't exist.

How Not Chinese is Taiwan: Rinbansyo, a teahouse review

Rinbansyo (eighty-eightea) / 輪番所
#174 Sec. 1 Zhonghua Road, Wanhua District, Taipei
台北市萬華區中華路1段174號
02-2312-0845

From here

I am so happy to finally realize my daydream of blogging while hanging out in my tatami-floored Japanese tea nook - the previous tenants of our apartment turned what was built to be a dining alcove (or, was called one when it ended up that way due to the building's overall floor plan) and furnished it with a large mirror, low table and tatami for a wonderful tea drinking and dining alternative. I'm brewing the very last of a tin of basic Alishan tea that I was given awhile ago - it's time to let that particular cannister go, brewed in an Yixing teapot, poured into a tiny celadon cup (well, faux celadon). 

Nice, yeah? It looks better now - I hung the teacup curio shelf on the wall and got an antique box to hold tea that now sits in the opposite corner.

And what an appropriate blog post to be doing this for!

This past weekend I was happy to be invited to Rinbansyo, a "Japanese style" teahouse in a traditional Japanese house redolent with hinoki wood, situated just inside the park with the Japanese shrine to the west of Ximending along Zhonghua Road (you have to go into the park area to get into the teahouse).

Here's the thing - I don't even feel I need to say "Japanese style". Sure, it was, but more importantly, it was also local style. 

What a lot of people forget about Taiwan is that, while the people are ethnically Chinese and many aspects are derived from Chinese culture (whatever that means - seems like there's more than one "Chinese culture" out there), many other aspects are not. That includes not only home-grown grassroots cultural facets that are unique to Taiwan, but also aboriginal and Japanese influences. 

In terms of tea, food and to some degree architecture and lifestyle, much of Taiwanese culture is as Japanese- as it is Chinese-influenced. So I would not say that Rinbansyo is a "Japanese teahouse in Taipei", I'd say that it is a Taiwanese teahouse in Taipei, which reflects Japanese cultural influence.

From here

Rinbansyo has two seating options: a large, tatami-mat room that you must remove your shoes to enter, where you sit at low traditional tables, or the more modern Western-style tables. Both are lovely, but I recommend the tatami room if your legs can take it (mine tend to fall asleep, and I always feel huge and cellulite-ridden among groups of locals sitting blissfully in perfect poses on tatami - one of the pitfalls of being a Western female expat - but I do it anyway). It's more atmospheric and you get more of the hinoki scent. Which, by the way, is like a combination of cedar and cleaning product, but in a good way, an organic way, like in the way tea tree oil has a bit of an antiseptic smell). 

There are no meals on offer, but there are lots of small snack options - it's a good  choice for meeting people for tea and dessert. We had a Chinese-style flaky bun with a sweet bean filling (green beans, not red), sesame nougat candies and little madeleine-like cakes with a matcha tea paste that was delicious, the perfect combination of vegetal, sweet and bitter. There are more ornate options too - little sculpted flower desserts and the like.

The tea is delicious, pricey by general standards but standard as teahouses go. I got a Sanxia bi luo chun, because I like bi luo chun teas but rarely drink them at home, as my Yixing pot is prepped for oolongs. 

With tea, you can either brew it in a leaf-filled bowl, with a ladle to serve it into cups, or they will cold brew it for you, and you get one large glass (the glasses are of especially fine white ceramic).

It's lovely and peaceful, and smells like my favorite thing in the world. And with all the tatami, matcha and Japanese screens and ceramics, it is very Taiwanese. 

Normal Women Existing

Image borrowed - please don't sue me! - from here

Yesterday I was sitting on the Taipei MRT in one of those sections where seats run along the walls rather than sticking out in pairs. Across from me there was a string of women - one dozing, one on her phone, one reading, one just sitting. They spanned several decades in (guesstimated) age and were for all intents and purposes, totally normal. Not a one of them looked much like any of these women:

 

From here, here, here and here

(I had to google "asian women haircuts" to even get a search results page not full of softcore porn, but I suppose that'd be true for any search involving photos of women - we're objectified no matter our race). 

I don't mean to say that a beautiful woman can not also be a normal woman, although I don't buy into the "everyone is (physically) beautiful" myth: everyone is beautiful in multidimensional ways, but some people do possess more physical beauty than others and most of us are just average. So those who are notably physically attractive are, in some sense, not normal. That's not a bad thing, or a good one - it just is. 

There was nothing unusual about seeing this group of average women, who ranged from ponytail-sporting student to mom-with-kids to office worker to obasan. But it got me thinking about one tendency in male expat circles to fetishize Asian women (BIG IMPORTANT NOTE: that's not the same thing at all as dating an Asian woman or loving an Asian woman. I'm talking more about the way some expat men - and men back home, too, to be honest - talk about Asian women, and not touching at all anything having to do with relationships). 

You know, the usual: they're all so beautiful, they're so cute, they're so slender, it seems like all of them are! You can't walk down the street without seeing a gaggle of Asian beauties! It's not like my home country, where most women are frumpy, fat or ugly and you only sometimes see ones who look okay. Asian women (all Asian women, apparently - this statement is never qualified) are just so lovely and slim and cute.

There's nothing wrong with seeing beauty and admiring it, but these statements, and the thoughts behind them, are pernicious in several ways.

First, there's a very strong tendency to use these statements to imply that all, or most, or a disproportionate number of women in Taiwan (or whatever country - I am talking about Taiwan because I live here) are somehow better or more beautiful than women in whatever your home country is. And I just don't think that's true. From my observation, anyway, every country has its attractive people, it's majority of average people, and its not-so-physically-attractive people, in roughly the same proportion. To insist that Taiwan has more gorgeous women is to imply a sort of fetishization or racialization: this race is better than that race. Taiwanese women are better than women in my home country...based on what? What's different, other than race? 

I don't see them as all that different. I get on the New York subway, I see a string of average women and a Dr. Zizmor ad. I get on the Seoul metro, I see a string of average women and a plastic surgery ad. I get on the Taipei MRT and I see a string of average women and an overly-photoshopped ad. 

So that attitude diminishes some women based on their race, and elevates other women based on their race, based on very little evidence. 

What that does is imply that all you see are the beautiful ones - which may be true, and in fact probably is true - while not seeing the average ones at all. As though they don't exist. Of course a country would have lots of beautiful women if all you saw - the only ones who existed to you - were beautiful women.

Which leads me to my second point - it adds a layer of invisibility on any woman who does not fall within those magical parameters, if the thing you say most often about the people in your adopted country is how beautiful the women are. It means you don't see all the women who fall in the fat belly of the bell curve. They are quite literally invisible to you; they do not exist. That is a shitty thing to do to anyone. It comes very close to saying - if it does not say outright - that women who do not meet your standards for beauty don't get to be a part of the universe. 

It means you don't notice the diversity of the society whose country you are living in - whose country took you in (perhaps grudgingly - we know how Immigration can be - but they did). It means you don't notice every grandma, every makeup-less office worker, every mom with kids, every manager in a power suit with pumps, every artsy type, every expat woman (not to mention every Taiwanese man - although that's a different post). Even when they're in your field of vision. Even when you are at the same event. 

And don't think we haven't noticed how that manifests in real life. Have you ever had to lead a seminar while your horndog co-teacher salivates over the two pretty female students (and ignores the fortysomething female manager, and the makeup-free student in a plain singlet and ponytail)? Have you ever been walked right into by men and women who buy into the beauty myth, because they either don't see you, or don't think they should have to make space for you so that you can also have space in the world? Have you ever had a shoulder bump, when you saw someone coming and swerved your shoulder, figuring that was all you had to do to make space, while the other person moved not at all and whacked into you anyway - as though you were supposed to make all of the space and they were not required to make any? Have you ever felt unwelcome at an expat meetup because the demographics of the attendees were: average expat men, some above-average attractive Asian woman, one or two average Asian women, and you? And so you and the other average-looking women talk amongst yourselves because you are completely ignored by everyone else? Have you ever read expat blogs or Facebook posts and noticed how often they talk about "Taiwanese cuties" as though they are the only women who exist in Taiwan? As though the only people who exist in Taiwan are "Taiwanese cuties", white men (them - and they are almost entirely white), and maybe their boss? No average women, certainly no expat women, average or not, no older women, and no Taiwanese men of any age? Have you ever seen an older woman - an obasan - get seriously manhandly because yet another person has tried to claim her space on the sidewalk and she's had to literally push to get it back? 

For me, it's a big fat "YEAH" on all of these. And the myth of "all the beautiful Asian ladies" perpetuates it. If it's all the beautiful Asian ladies, then the not-physically-beautiful ladies, of any race, simply don't exist.

I know I'm going to get some shitty comments like "well I think Taiwanese women are just so pretty, but that doesn't mean I ignore other women or Taiwanese men, I notice them too!". Sure. This doesn't mean that every guy who has this attitude towards women in Taiwan walks right into other people on the street - or expects them to move - or that they totally ignore any other people. Just that these attitudes run in tandem and one feeds the other.

Finally, but briefly - it perpetuates a sense of competition among women - women who have bought into the beauty myth, anyway. I don't blame them for buying into it: there are a lot of rewards to playing that game, if you win, or even if you rank. If I thought I could rank, there's a chance I'd take a hard dive into the shallow end too. If it's all the beautiful Asian ladies, then the average Asian ladies feel pressure to try harder to get into that world. Whether or not they give into that pressure, or take care with their physical appearance for their own reasons, is another blog post that I probably won't be making, because while I can talk about a woman's experience in Asia, I can only go so far in talking about Asian women. I'm not an Asian woman; I do not really have that experience. It's just not my turf.

It's what drives commentary that runs along the lines of: if you don't like how you are ignored in favor of Asian women (not a word about how other, less "cute" and "lovely" Asian women are also ignored), then try harder! Slim down, buy some cute clothes, put on makeup, try harder! Basically - don't like the game? Compete anyway! My approval must matter to you. (Fortunately, it doesn't). As though it doesn't matter if the game is valid or not - we all must play. Refusing to play is blasphemy.

It's also what commentary that assumes that everyone who mentions racial fetishization of Asian women - or the comparative non-existence of any person who is not an attractive Asian woman, feels either bitter or threatened. I would not say I'm bitter - annoyed, angry, yes, but not bitter. I do not need or want the approval of these people; but I will insist that I exist. I don't need flirty attention (not only do I not want it from them, but I get all I need at home with my husband, thanks), but I will insist that my race and my looks not demote me to someone who deserves less respect as a human being. I am not threatened: I neither need nor want these men to be attracted to me. I'm not even in the game - I'm married. I simply want to exist. 

That's why it is simply not okay. 

It's time to notice the grandmas. It's time to notice the women over thirty. It's time to notice the moms and the managers, the wrinkled and the portly, the plain-faced and bespectacled, the tired-eyed care workers, the makeupless and the (oh horror) Western. You don't have to be attracted to us, you just have to acknowledge that we exist and treat us accordingly. That means teaching a seminar rather than ogling students. That means giving us space on the sidewalk. That means listening to us without condescension. That means stopping with the whole "Asian women are all so gorgeous!" bullshit, because they're not. Some are. Some aren't. It means acknowledging that someone other than a fellow male expat or a pretty Asian woman might have something of worth to offer, and respecting that person accordingly.

"How Does One Dress to Buy Dragonfruit? True Strories of Expat Women in Asia" launches today!

Guess what!

I'm currently in Seoul - not permanently, just for a short vacation - on the way to the USA to attend my friend's wedding. After our tour of the DMZ, we took refuge from the afternoon rain in a traditional hanok (think like an old-school courtyard house of the similar type found in many East Asian countries, but this one is Korean)-turned-coffeeshop. I'd post photos, but blogging on an iPad is not easy, and I'll have to skip that for now.

And guess what else!

"How Does One Dress to Buy Dragonfruit? True Stories of Expat Women in Asia" launches today! It's available on Amazon as an e-book and paperback, through Barnes&Noble, Apple and several other outlets (check the editor's blog for more information) and coming soon to select bookstores in Hong Kong.

If you're interested in knowing more about the anthology, and my contribution to it, check out Taiwanxifu's review of the anthology focusing on my contribution, titled "Gods Rushing In". 

It's not available in paperback in Taiwan unless you want to pay preposterous shipping charges, so if any Taiwan based folks want a copy in paperback - if e-books just don't do it for you or you want to show off to your friends by having it on your bookshelf - let me know (you can leave a comment with your e-mail address here. I won't publish it, because I bet you wouldn't want your e-mail address broadcast to the world as a spammable or hackable account, but I will get back to you and can arrange a paperback copy).

I'm really excited about this - I'd known it was coming for awhile but it's something different for it to be real, for the book to be available. Even one story in an anthology is something, especially as it is the first thing - other than job reporting on local issues in a regional newspaper in high school - I'd ever really submitted for publication. I saw the call to submissions on a lark, I thought about writing something and put it off for weeks...then on the day submissions were due I sat down in a coffeeshop and hammered mine out. I didn't even proofread it - I gave it to Brendan to read, made a few adjustments as per his recommendations and sent it off...as a first draft. What the hell, right? May as well see what happens.

One always imagines writing as a career - or a side hobby, or freelance gig - as something that you have to toil at for years, submitting manuscripts, stories or pitching ideas, and facing rejection after rejection before you get one fateful acceptance. And I know that while I can write, I'm not the most talented writer ever to walk the earth - I can write, but so can millions of other people. There is nothing particularly unique about my writing ability. So, given all this, I certainly did not expect that my first draft "what the hell" submission would be accepted. I was, frankly, surprised to be proven wrong. What the hell indeed!

I may have written all of that in a post before - I can't remember - but it's what I'm thinking now.

So, I hope you'll check it out. Everyone who contributed to "How Does One Dress to Buy Dragonfruit" put a lot of work and a lot of heart into their contribution, and I do believe - after having read it myself - that it is worth your time.

Happy reading!

Keep Her on the Pole

I'm sure some of you have heard of the just-common-enough-to-be-noticeable practice of hiring dancing girls or strippers (or both) at certain functions in Taiwan: notably weddings, funerals (yes, funerals) and temple festivals.



Well, I came across some at the Baosheng Cultural Festival this weekend, and it got me thinking about an old topic that I thought I'd written about but actually haven't: is Taiwan as "conservative", or at least as sexually conservative, as people think?









There's no clear answer to this but I would put my bets on "no". Not just because of the "pole dancers for the gods" driving around Taipei on the back of retrofitted Jeeps, but for a number of reasons.

My New Life in Asia covered this awhile ago, and his post is worth reading. However, I feel it only covers one aspect of Taiwan's (lack of) sexual conservatism, at least compared to the rest of Asia. Which is good - keeping focus and all - but there's more to explore.

He focused mostly on women leveraging their sex appeal for financial gain, and businesses and marketing doing the same. And there's certainly truth to that: between booth babes, beer girls, betel nut beauties and the blatant hiring favoritism of attractive women over unattractive ones or, in some industries, over men (even attractive men), there's definitely less taboo centered around leveraging female sex appeal in Taiwan - to the point that it sometimes makes my feminist skin crawl.

And the pole dancing girls definitely fit that aspect of Taiwan's relative progressiveness, so I'll talk about them first.

I can't explain the "weddings and funerals" thing when it comes to hired dancing girls - and it doesn't happen all that often at either - but it's common enough at temple festivals that a few of my friends have come across it so far. Once at the Baosheng Cultural Festival, once at God Pig in Hsinchu - and I did see my share of scantily clad "baton girls" with marching bands at the Matsu pilgrimage kick-off.




But why? To quote one of my students: "they do that to show respect to the god. That god probably wants people to have more and more babies and this...helps. And the god should enjoy it too."

And certainly nobody seemed to disapprove - men and boys watching obviously enjoyed the show, but notably, they were doing so right in front of their mothers, wives, grandmothers, daughters and sisters, who also didn't seem to mind (some were even cheering - even grandmas). The dancing took place in front of temples and nobody thought this was declasse or inappropriate (although certainly among Taiwanese who don't commonly watch temple parades for fun, you'll find folks who do think it's declasse). The women certainly didn't think they were doing anything wrong or shameful.

That's significant - there's truth to the idea that whether you approve of it or not, the female body and its appeal does move product. Sex sells.



Until the human race evolves beyond finding sexualized marketing appealing, it's going to happen (just like any number of social ills: abortion, divorce, premarital sex etc.. There's no sense railing against it, because it's going to happen. You have to build your fight for a better world around accepting that fact). The pragmatism of just accepting that rather than wringing hands and clutching pearls, while bracing at times, can also be refreshing.

But there really is more to Taiwan's progressivism than that. So, here are a few reasons why I don't think Taiwan is as sexually conservative as people think, and is definitely not as sexually conservative as most of East Asia.

1.) Love motels -







In the USA they're seen as gross, seedy places where all sorts of nastiness goes down. And certainly Taiwan must have a few grody love motels. But ask most locals and they'll say there's nothing wrong with pay-by-the-hour "rest" establishments, that they're a social necessity in a country where people often live with parents until they marry, and often afterwards as well, or share smaller spaces with multiple generations. Maybe it's a boyfriend and girlfriend looking for somewhere to go when they both live with their parents, or a married couple who needs to get away from Grandma and the Kids, or a truck driver and a prostitute, an extramarital affair or just some kids looking to party. Who knows, who cares, it's nobody else's business and people respect that. And I love it - no moralizing, no soapboxes, no bible-thumping, just not your business, stay out of it, sex is a thing people have.

Thanks to my Christian Guilt (I was not raised Catholic but the guilt thing is very real), the first time Brendan and I (unwittingly) stayed at a love motel, I was a bit embarrassed walking outside (we'd realized it was a love motel after we checked in). It felt like I was on a reality show, looking around shifty-eyed: Who's Judging Me Now? Once I realized nobody was, it made me wonder why this wasn't how things were everywhere else in the world.

And they're openly advertised as such, in ways that could ostensibly point to both male and female desires: Secret Love Motel (advertised with huge LED signs off the main road - nothing too secret about it, ey?), Eden Exotica (home of the Batman Room!), I Need Motel etc. and pictures of hearts or, in one establishment's case in Yonghe, a man and woman making out. The woman sure seems to be into it. The fact that the signs can get that racy at all means that there's just not much of a big deal surrounding them. I could see such a place in the USA being picketed by angry evangelicals.

2 - Prostitution exists (DUH) but it's less acceptable to be a john...not because sex is wrong, but because "decent guys" do it for love.

I feel like in a lot of other countries (*cough* China *cough*), it's still a social "thing" that a man can both be a "decent guy" in the eyes of society, and be someone who visits prostitutes and playboys it up, even when he is in a relationship (assuming it's not an open relationship). It's like, the fact that that guy blatantly cheats on his partner is utterly irrelevant to whether he's a good guy - perhaps because more people think that all men do it, so there's nothing wrong with it and it's women's job to accept and forgive.

Setting aside whether it's OK to visit prostitutes (I err on the side of "no" just because of all the exploitation of women that goes on in that industry, including, if not especially, in Asia, but I'm not against a woman choosing to enter sex work if she chooses to), I feel like while Taiwan has its share of prostitutes (I wouldn't, as My New Life In Asia calls it, say "Taipei is a city of lust" though - it's about as lustful as any other city or even group of humans who live together in a society, no more and no less), that if a man wants to be seen as a "decent guy", a 君子, in society, that man can't (openly, at least) sleep around when he's in a relationship or married.

Note: I'm not including men who sleep around or visit prostitutes when single in this analysis, because that's a different discussion.

I know, I know. Some of you are going to say "doesn't that mean Taiwan is more sexually conservative, not less?" No. To me, that's a sign of progressivism, not conservatism because it includes a feminist perspective into ideas about sex. Openly breaking your romantic promises if you're a man (but not a woman!) is actually a symptom of a sexually repressive society, not an open one. A society in which sex shouldn't be enjoyed by women, and is entirely the privilege of men. That's not openness, it's the opposite! In an open society, that sort of behavior tends to decline because people are more likely to form happy, healthy relationships in which both partners are satisfied.

Oh yeah, and male escorts exist too.

3 - There's been an uptick in using male sex appeal in advertisements and media -

DONE.

OMG Takeshi.

I have heard that apparently 3G service slowed down significantly at Zhongxiao Fuxing MRT when this ad took up an entire wall, and that it was mostly due to women taking pictures of it and sending it to their friends or posting it on social media. That could be apocryphal, but I really hope it isn't. Because OMG Takeshi.

4 - Sex jokes are surprisingly acceptable, especially at weddings but even in other situations -
No really, you wanna hear about the time my friends got married and their friends stuck a banana between his legs and made her eat it? I don't really wanna talk about that time, but I can't imagine most people from a "conservative" country thinking it's OK to pull those stunts in front of someone's grandparents.

What's more, I've found that if I have had a student or group of students for a long time, and they make mistakes that sound hilariously dirty ("I asked her if she could do my English tutor", "I gave my wife a Wang Steak for Mother's Day", "My presentation is in three man parts", "Be careful or he'll knock you up" (they meant "knock you out"), "I like to take out my member to play on Friday night" (he meant he liked to go out with his team members), "My salary is too low, I think. My other friends have big packages but I have a small package", "We will have an oral contest next week to see who does the best oral" etc., I can usually just tell them why they can't say that, and it's wonderfully funny.



Plus you can buy these t-shirts and much, much more in terms of horrible things on clothing.

5 - Sex ed advertisements and pamphlets are much more "open" here than in the USA -




Some of you "enlightened topless Europeans" may disagree, but in the USA it's quite rare to see too many sex ed public service announcements, and how much of it you get in school differs by state. I know Taiwanese schools aren't great at this, but they seem to do a better job of it than any other country in Asia (correct me if I'm wrong), and I've definitely seen pamphlets like the above (nevermind the English - a workman must sharpen his tools if he is to do his work well indeed!) and TV ads on the MRT station TVs that show two cartoon lovers going to a motel, then the cartoon motel starts shaking, and there's an admonishment to wear protection.

Of course, there is a flip side to this - plenty of women don't seem to know how their anatomy even works ("if I wear a tampon, won't I lose my virginity? If I wear a tampon, won't I be unable to pee?") or think that sleeping in the same bed with a man carries a risk of pregnancy. This could definitely be improved.

6 - A majority of Taiwanese are either not opposed to, or actively support, marriage equality, family planning and reproductive freedom -

You don't really hear any objections to the use of contraception (except perhaps by in-laws who want grandchildren yesterday to carry on the Chen family name, because it's in danger of dying out or something), I've not really heard many people ever speak out against the legality of abortion (which is only covered by health insurance if done for certain reasons, but is legal) - at least, the dialogue never gets as vehement and sexist and downright hateful and shameful (on the part of certain conservatives) as it does in the USA, and recent surveys indicate widespread, even majority support for marriage equality.

I've never heard of a "conservative" society being mostly in favor of granting marriage rights to all.

Oh yeah, and support, at least in artistic form, for transgender people exists, too!

7 - There's been an uptick in PDA -

A lot of people writing about Taiwan write about how PDA just isn't done here, it's kind of rude to do that in public, whatever-whatever. I have to wonder what part of Taiwan they're in. Perhaps that's true in rural areas, but I see all sorts of PDA in Taipei - butt-touching on escalators, kissing, hugging, all that stuff. And then a few extreme examples that have attained national prominence, too, like this one, which produced some amazing viral meme material (known locally as "kuso", from a Japanese word), much of which you can find here, including the image above. Or the time a couple made the news for riding a scooter together, the woman sitting astride her boyfriend as he drove (clothes on) - can't find the link for that, but it happened.

8 - For every "using a hot girl to sell product" advertisement, there's another one either implying that their product will give you a big dong, or that guys with big dongs use that product -

I've been trying without success to find the link for some of these products - I don't exactly need them, seeing as I haven't got the organ in question, so hunting in English would be difficult enough. Can't find it at all hunting in Chinese.

But every time I take a taxi with a little TV in the back, there's this commercial where a guy in a blue shiny suit dances around happily until he goes to his girlfriend's house, and it's obvious what they're going to do. Then you see a cartoon blue bird wave at you before growing huge muscles - the product is basically some sort of male enhancement ("blue bird" is local slang for that particular appendage).

And let's not forget how readily available Chinese medicinal remedies are for men who need a little help.

9 - The Kaohsiung Sex cafe exists, yes, and even outside of it I have seen more depictions of sex organs (and underwear just dancing in the breeze, or worn outside by old guys) in Taiwan in 8 years than I saw in 24 years in the USA -



Just not sure I believe many people in a "conservative" country would hang their underwear to dry on an old placard carved with Chinese Nationalist slogans. For women's unmentionables, scroll through here. 

10 - The slang. Oh, the slang.

Taiwanese swearing, when not referencing shit ("shit face", "shock you into shitting green", "Eat shit!"), references sex acts and sex organs far more than you'd think the language, even the dirty language, of a "conservative" country does. There's a slang term for "like throwing a sausage down a hallway" (the Taiwanese translates as "a stick of bamboo in the well"), the two worst insults out there are stinky (man parts) and stinky (woman parts), and an effective way to say that one is angry is to say "My dick is full of fire!", and of course the usual slew of slurs directed at one's mother, but that's true in every culture. I just don't see a "conservative" culture translating "I'm SO ANGRY" as "my dick is full of fire", I'm sorry.

11 - Well, as I said above, pole dancing for the gods. Not only is it totally normal, but the crowds in the street cheering on the pole dancers weren't just men of all ages, but women too. 

12 - Magazines in 7-11 and Zhu Geliang movies - 

Seriously, any kid or grandma can see this at the checkout at 7-11 (sometimes they put it in the magazine rack in back, sometimes they don't, or what's at the register is far racier). 

Brendan disagrees with me about Zhu Geliang, whom I have most recently seen on an advertisement on the side of a bus for his new movie while a woman, ostensibly measuring him for inseam length, is actually measuring his man bits. In another movie, someone kicks him in said man bits and the shot cuts to two eggs cracking over a frying pan.

from here

I say that's a sign that Taiwan is not that conservative. Brendan says "well, it's really no racier than old Benny Hill movies. You know, sex jokes for our grandparents." But for me, the fact that softcore pornographic magazines are not only sold in 7-11, but are right there on the checkout counter where every child and grandma can see them, boobs out and everything, seals the deal. Every country has porn, but "conservative" ones don't put it right at the cash register.

Oh, and one of those magazines is called "Sexy Nuts", which I think is hilarious.

13 - Reproductive health and contraception are all easy to come by, and for women, everything but contraception is free (contraception should be free, but that's another post) - 

"Conservative" countries don't provide free pap smears to women after age 30, nor do they make it extremely easy to buy condoms and birth control pills with no shame attached, no stealing about, no red faces.

* * *

Of course there's more work to be done. Abortion shouldn't only be covered for certain reasons, we need better education towards gender equality, contraception of all types should be available for all at an affordable price for all (see the comments of that post for more on that topic), sex ed in schools needs to be more comprehensive, and there are still folks out there who have old-fashioned ideas about what families should look like, who can be gay ("I don't care if some stranger is gay, but NOT MY SON!" is a common sentiment, but then that's true in the USA too), and how "pure" a woman should be before marriage (again, that's also common in the USA where slut-shaming is surprisingly common).

But overall, I would not say that I find Taiwan to be terribly conservative. I would not say I find it to have rigid, old-school morals. I'd say, if anything, it's the most progressive country in Asia vis-a-vis these issues and in some areas, can compete with the USA when it comes to open-mindedness.



After all conservative societies don't have very many protesters who make signs like this, and have their message get so popular that someone makes a series of stickers based on it to pass out to the public. Which happened. I have one.

Expat women! In Asia! In an anthology! With dragonfruit! And me!

   You totally want to read about this guy.

I've mentioned a few times before on this blog that one of my stories - based on this blog post - is going to be published in an upcoming anthology of stories by expat women in Asia (woohoo!). That was all very informal, but now things are being finalized and I'm proud to announce that the book - titled How Does One Dress to Buy Dragonfruit? True Stories of Expat Women in Asia - will be on the market this June!

Yay!

You can, and should, follow the Facebook page here. A list of contributors and more information can be found on the editor's blog here. And I am going to be totally shameless in saying that you should buy a copy (don't worry, Moms & Dads, you're getting free copies. But the rest of you should buy it). You'll (hopefully) see a few reviews on some Taiwan-centric blogs, including mine, because duh.

It's pretty rare that a story from Taiwan makes it into these travel writing anthologies, and rarer still that that story is written by a female expat. I can really only think of one other that I've read - and I buy these sorts of books all the time, so I would know. They're great to bring on vacation because you can read them one story at a time. In the story I try to address the female expat experience and progressive women's issues in Taiwan, along with thoughts on being an atheist in a country that mostly practices folk religion, and what happens when those three things collide at a temple festival in Donggang.

Seriously, you should read it. I think I did pretty good. At least I tried my best to capture the atmosphere of one of these festivals outside Taipei. I haven't read the anthology yet - eventually I'll get a copy - but I'm sure the other writers wrote brilliantly as well.

Anyway, so yeah. Buy the book that has my story in June. :-P

Reaction: "Downsides of Living in Taiwan"

Taiwan Explorer (formerly My Kafkaesque Life) has an interesting and more-thoughtful-than-most post on the downsides of living in Taiwan.

My reaction to it is long enough that I think it deserves its own post here, but definitely go read his thoughts first!

1.) You will always be a 'waiguoren'

Yes and no. Yes, in that the vast, vast, vast majority of people you meet will always think of you as "NOT US", or someone different, and there's nothing you can do about that. Taiwan Explorer covered that part well.

But there are inroads you can make. While most local friends you make here will think of you as their "foreign friend" or otherwise think of you as "other" (to the point where they might exclude you from gatherings that there is no reason to exclude you from, or just forget), it is possible to make friends and connections who just treat you like a person and local vs. foreign doesn't come into it. It is definitely possible.

And you will meet people who - if you speak the language(s) and are well-integrated (or are trying to be), will say "eh, you're Taiwanese!" or "you really should have the right to be a citizen and vote here, it's not right, you're as Taiwanese as me". While some are joking or giving empty compliments, I do think some of them mean it.

Frankly, most countries have cultures were outsiders will always be outsiders - I joked once while visiting Brendan in Maine that if we were in a horrible accident the headline would read "Long-time Maine Resident and His Non-Maine Wife in Accident: Real Mainers on the Scene Recount the Tale"! So it's nothing new or surprising.

2.) You will have to live with stereotypes.

Yep. But you can also make friends who see past them. And stereotypes aren't anything new either - certainly I've heard my fair share of them growing up, even in the People's Republic of New York.

Also, I find that inward "island mentality" is only true of some people (and honestly, in the US I often encounter the opposite - being cocooned within a large country makes some people inward and ethnocentric - they're so far away from any other country or group that they start to turn in on themselves. I blame the whole hackneyed bullshit notion of "American exceptionalism" on just this phenomenon). For others I feel that the fact that Taiwan is a small island surrounded by other countries and deeply affected by them has made some people aggressively outward-looking. I've met many extraordinarily worldly people in Taipei, including many of my students. Most people are normal - somewhere in the middle. Like we all are.

Not much to say about #3 - although most people I know do know something about Taiwan - they just know the wrong things - "well I read that Chiang Kai-shek was a good man who saved Chinese culture by bringing it to Taiwan and then did great things for Taiwan like developing it" said one relative. Yeaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh noooooooooo. Same for #4 (yep) and #5 (yep - although it is possible to become highly fluent). I do have something to say about #6 but will post it below.

7.) Food

I agree about Taiwanese food. But as for good Western food, I actually think the selection is okay. Not amazing, but okay. I can get good bread (there's a place near us with great baguettes), cheese, I get goat milk delivered, and Taipei is dotted with great coffeeshops. I'm actually quite alright with the Western food situation. Whatever I can't buy I can cook myself, too.

Nothing to say about #8 and #9 - yep.

10.) Population density 

Yeah, but I see it as a positive. I like living this way, near other people, near lots of things. I like that everything is so close together, which is only possible with high population densities. I'd probably feel right at home living long-term in New York City.

I also don't think it's hard to find an affordable, spacious apartment in a quiet neighborhood. We have 30 pings - 3 bedrooms, a generous living room and a Japanese tatami tea room (albeit a very narrow back room and galley kitchen). We have a dryer, a bathtub and "wood" (high quality restaurant-grade plasti-wood) floors! Outside most of our windows is a courtyard/playground/public space. We're on a busy lane but we can't hear much, if any, traffic. Sometimes we hear our neighbors but nothing too annoying. We're right in the middle of downtown Taipei, in Da'an district, and we find our rent to be quite reasonable (maybe NT25,000/month isn't reasonable to some, but for a couple, in Da'an, near the MRT, three bedrooms, we think it's great. Everyone always asks me my rent anyway, it's not a personal question in Taiwan so I may as well spill).

And it's quiet, affordable (for us - I know not everyone considers our rent 'affordable') and central. So, hey, it is possible to do just fine with apartments. I will stay here as long as possible. You will pull me out of real estate heaven only after rigor mortis sets in, and not before.

Adding some of my own: 

11.) Taiwan seems to have multiple personalities vis-a-vis sexism and gender relations

I just don't know what to think. On one hand, a woman was nearly elected president here without much problem at all, or even commentary, regarding her gender. Truly, nobody seemed to care. The most beloved mayor in Taiwan is a woman, and while some people make fun of her hair, nobody disparages her gender the way Americans do Hillary Clinton (or Elizabeth Warren for that matter). In all of Asia, this is probably the best place for women.

It's easier for women in Taiwan to hold good jobs, have great careers and have positions of power. The whole "men don't want a female managing them" doesn't seem to be much of a problem here judging from the number of female directors, CFOs, COOs, partners, senior physicians and department heads I've met. Taiwanese women basically run finance and accounting. An average Taiwanese woman is almost certainly better off in terms of opportunities than an average woman of any other nationality in Asia.

Men in Taiwan seem to be catching up to this whole womens-equality thing faster than their counterparts in China, Japan, Korea or the rest of Asia, and this is one country where I can go wherever I want, whenever I want without fearing sexual assault. I can't say that for America.

On the other hand, there are so many ridiculous notions that I come across regarding women: that we're "more interested in fashion than politics", that we are "less adventurous" (I was really offended when someone I knew gave that as a reason why there were fewer female expats in Asia), that we always, across the board, like pink, that we do most of the housework and child-rearing because we're "good at it", or other sexist practices allowed to continue because it's "culture" (NO, IT'S JUST SEXISM).

Jump-you-in-the-street rape may be unheard of but marital rape is frighteningly common and unreported.

I've definitely come across a lot of lookist-sexism (the idea that a woman's most important feature is her looks, not anything else she might have to offer, and that pretty women are automatically worth more than any other women) and momma-sexism (the idea that of course every woman wants to have a baby, that of course they will be better at raising it because women just are, that it's unnatural to not want to have children) and marriage-sexism (the idea that all women want to get married, that all women act a certain way especially in relationships, and that they are fundamentally different from men in how they act). Also acting-sexism (men can drink and swear, women are ladies who don't drink a lot, or at all, and never swear because that's not ladylike).

There is still an entrenched 'mistress' and 'hostess bar' (and prostitute) culture, which does have tendrils in the business world, making it hard for women to rise to positions of power in some fields. I've met otherwise progressive guys refer to attractive female employees at their company by their employee numbers, like they're livestock (NOT COOL), and there are a lot of sexist beliefs among the older generation.

Add to that the current government's total lack of interest in progressing the cause of gender egalitarianism, the lack of readily available and affordable oral contraceptives to poor women, and the lack of no-fault divorce or solid legal precedent for handling child custody or domestic abuse cases fairly (or divorce petitions for that matter), and things are not entirely rosy.

So I just don't know what to think. America's pretty fucked up too in this way - most places are. And Taiwan's better than most, but still not good enough.

You could spend a day talking to young progressives who have wonderful, egalitarian, mutually respectful relationships and family units and who aren't threatened by women and think things are great. Then you could have to listen to your sexist-as-fuck boss (scratch that - former boss!) blab on about "a man's mind is an ocean and a woman's is a river" or some bullshit and think things are terrible - it's enough to give you whiplash!

Either way, if you're a woman living long-term in Taiwan, you definitely have to face this. It's not so much that it's different from the West (which is far from perfect), it's just that it's expressed along such different parameters. In the USA there were legal protections against a sexist boss, but you had to watch your back on the street. Here, you can walk freely, but your boss is just as free to be a misogynist dick.

12.) You have to get used to people being overly direct in unfamilar ways.

I actually don't agree that Taiwanese culture is generally an "indirect" one (Taiwan Explorer's #6). Communication can be indirect in ways that may be unfamiliar to Westerners - such as showing anger, disagreeing or confronting mistakes (in some ways the cultural difference here might come off as passive-aggressive to some Westerners, and yes, I still struggle with this. I actually have the same problem with West Coast Americans). But in other ways it's actually too direct! "What's wrong with your face?" if you're breaking out, "Why don't you want to have kids? You should have kids!" after you've answered a question honestly (OK, my family does that too and I hate it), "You've gained weight!", "Well even though you don't have a beautiful face you are pretty smart, maybe someone will like you" and so on.

Yeah. You just get used to it.

Fact and Fiction: on the love lives of Western women in Taiwan

Not long ago, this ended up on my Facebook page. It was an amusing use of the Batman-slapping-Robin meme, and it was definitely channeling general sentiment (and general assumption) about what it's like to be a foreign woman in Taiwan.

But it also got me thinking - how true is it really? I suppose that could be easily answered with "of course it's true, everyone says it's true, articles and blog posts focus on it, women themselves will tell you it's true", and case closed.

I thought about my female friends, though (focusing on unmarried ones), who live or have lived in Taiwan, and my conclusions were that it's...actually...not true. In fact, I could think of very few who suffered or were suffering from a dead dating and sex life.


As a married woman, I wasn’t sure what I could contribute to that conversation and I wanted to explore this more from other perspectives, so I reached out to all of my unmarried friends. I asked all of them for their input, and some kindly agreed to talk. What I found instead shows issues far more complex. I've included responses from several women (rough ages included because, while it shouldn't matter, sadly, in Taiwan it does).



First, I found that pretty much every woman has chances to date casually or to have a sex life. Of course, that might mean casual hook-ups, and not all women want that (I sure wouldn't if I were single). So in that way this picture is wrong: sex isn't the problem.

Dating - real relationships that last, especially - is the problem. Here, options are limited. We all know why so I won't delve too far into it: the classic points that "the male expats aren't men we're interested in, and anyway they aren't interested in Western women, they're here for Asian women which *can* in some cases be kinda racist/fetishist but isn't always", "Taiwanese men don't go after us” and "Taiwanese men are a possibility but the culture differences in terms of how women are supposed to act and what they are expected to do in a relationship make it harder/impossible”. I'm not a fan of any of these narratives and just don’t want to have that discussion because it's too fraught with stereotypes.



To quote a friend: "I wouldn't ever feel like it's impossible for Western women to find love and, yes, sex in Taiwan. But, I certainly believe that Taiwanese men are much more shy, hesitant, and reserved than what you might be accustomed to in the West. So, I believe if you want it, you'll have to go out and get it.”



The common refrain was "it's easy to find hookups. It's hard to find guys to date."

 Of course, dating and pursuing real relationships is a problem all over the world. This is hardly unique to foreign women in Asia! It may be a little harder here, but it's certainly not very easy in our home countries, either. I see a degree of difference, but not an insurmountable one. And if someone like me, who is not conventionally pretty (I don't think I'm straight-up ugly, just not 'candybox pretty') and not thin, can garner interest (and I do) most women can. Even in Taiwan. Even in Asia.



I found from my friends that experiences attracting interest varied wildly, from "it happens sometimes - it's not so unusual that it'd shock me" (me), to "I get hit on ALL THE TIME" to "it's rare, or I am just approached for hook-ups" to "I feel invisible". But then, isn't that true back home, as well?

Interestingly, a lot of people I know - including women -  "a lot of Western women don't like Asian men", but while they all say that this is a "thing", it's all pegged on these "other women" who "don't like Asian guys" - - but I've truly yet to meet many such women. Either women saying this are trying to disguise their own feelings, or it's an assumption that is not nearly as true as people think.



I also found that the vast majority, when they did date, stuck pretty much to Taiwanese guys. In fact, looking through my friends, I couldn't think of any who'd hooked up with or dated, let alone married, a fellow expat (ed: I've made more friends since this post came out, and that's changed.)

This might be where the stereotype comes from - a few women complain about decreased opportunities (true - but that doesn't mean no opportunities). Then foreign guys notice that they and all their buddies are dating local women, single expat women they meet aren't dating anyone they know, and they know this is an issue in other countries in Asia, and so the assumption that "foreign women can't get none” is born. Without that many foreign women in Taiwan to refute it, it becomes canon.



Add to that the assumption by many expat men - and upheld by foreign women who (as discussed above) don't actually feel that way - that Taiwanese guys aren't desireable, it's easy to see why this idea is so firmly entrenched in the expat community.


Anyway, enough from me. I'm just a boring old married lady who's never actually dated a Taiwanese guy. Instead, listen to a sample of women who have. You'll start to notice a few patterns - you may even think I hand-picked these responses to fit with my theme. Not so - I asked pretty much every Western female friend I have in Taiwan (including Taiwanese/Chinese women born and raised overseas) and these are the responses of those who wanted to contribute. Other than the fact that obviously my friends will fall into the demographic of "older than early 20s" and "people I like and get along with", they're about as close to a random sample as you could ask for.


Enjoy!


"I came to Taiwan married, and am still in Taiwan. As I believe from my first-hand experience that it's easy for western men to find sex here, I found my way to the door of divorce court. And as a newly single American woman in Taipei, I opened myself up to new possibilities.

Over the five years that I've been here, I have been approached several times by random Taiwanese men asking me if they could "be my friend." The first time I naively said yes to Mr. Yikes, thinking, I was married and friends are acceptable. I explained that I was married and living with my husband in Taiwan. This man said it was okay, he was just looking to be friends. Not so! Mr. Yikes proceeded to grow increasingly affectionate over MSN (at the time) and then he began to profess his love and longing for me. Needless to say, I was married, so I stopped using MSN all together! No more "friends" for me."


"After my separation and divorce, I ran into Mr. Handsome, the guy I'm now dating. He worked under my former company. In the beginning, I went back to his company to look for him, but he wasn't working those days. So, I chatted with his friend/boss. We became friends. He was cute and I thought there definitely could have been something more there. But, anyway, I was looking for Mr. Handsome.



Mr. Handsome was finally there one day after I had gone back several times looking for him. He, unlike Mr. Yikes, was much more shy, reserved, and tender. I was the first to make a move. He was busy acting cool or shy, not sure which is was, so I just told him directly that he was indeed Mr. Handsome! He replied in kind, and we hit it off. We exchanged numbers, went on dates, and quickly feel in love and into bed!"


- from a friend in her late 20s/early 30s, American. She, like most of us, realizes it's not necessarily as easy as back home to date, but that no, you're not totally bereft of possibility.



“Dating in your late 40s and early 50s is challenging in most situations, but doing it in another culture, let alone another country, can be either down right hilarious or one of life's greatest disappointments. 

“Take Chinese culture for example, Taiwan specifically, most men in this age group are quite set in their ways and lack the spontaneity and energy I require.  I’m not your mother, cook, maid, personal assistant or spiritual advisor.  

I was recently “spending time” with a guy in his mid-40s, divorced, a 13-year son, owned several properties.  In the beginning, it was a nice experience, easy and relaxing, but after a few months of movies and dinner, I wondered out loud why we didn’t eat near his house.  His response was that his son might see us and be upset. 

Well, you know how that went down, but wait, maybe you don’t. Turns out the kid is very jealous of the father’s time since the divorce of a few years ago. 

Things cooled a bit after this discussion, but revved back up about 3 or 4 weeks later. 

He suggested we might want to take a trip.  Yeah…this is pretty much the equivalent of a sex weekend and I don’t give free samples, but I do love creativity and imagination.  So I declined the weekend, but suggested phone sex instead. Thought he was going to faint.  Out came this little, feeble, old man response of not doing that in his culture. What’s the difference? Really, I mean foreplay is foreplay, come on, get in the game. 

It’s not that I really intended to follow through with this, but just wanted to gauge his willingness. 

I don’t need the fountain of youth, but I do need someone who can keep up with me on my 40km bike rides and is willing to jump the culture divide for some fun and play. 

I’ll keep on looking around, but remain disappointed in how constrained the duality of women’s roles remain in many societies.  You can have a job, but you’ve got to come home, cook, do the laundry, take care of the kids, maintain the house and more.  Watch out world, women are making their own money, have their own apartments and with electricity and imagination, men may become obsolete.”


- from a friend and coworker in her early 50s, American, who was previously married to a Chinese man. 



“I came to Taiwan solely for career reasons. I had lived in Thailand for a year when I was younger and dated a guy there so I certainly find men of all kinds attractive (lucky me!).

When I first got to Taiwan I lived in Hsinchu and ended up dating an international student there briefly who was from St. Lucia. Then, after I moved to Taipei, I dated another international student for a little while from Belize. I should note that, for career reasons, I only ever planned to stay in Taiwan a few years at most and that made me a little shy of getting involved with anyone, especially a Taiwanese guy (not that I saw many opportunities). Most of the time, the interactions I had with Taiwanese men were kind of bizarre and bordering on harassment, but that can be true of dating in any big city.


I met my boyfriend through mutual Taiwanese friends and he was really well-traveled and highly educated which I think did contribute, to some extent, to his open mindset. I think we had some minimal conflicts related to culture, class, and language misunderstandings (Chinese and English) but mostly it was good. He was a wonderful person and very good to me and we had an enjoyable relationship until he went to Guatemala for the Taiwan military service and I came back to the U.S. I guess we just really were able to relate well and our personalities really fit. I do not think I fit American cultural norms and I don't think he fit Taiwanese cultural norms and our personalities were more similar than any of those differences.

I still think it was more difficult to date in Taiwan and maybe I had less of a selection, but that might be "my fault" too in that I felt way more self-conscious and less relaxed in Taiwan. I found, overall, that it was much more difficult to meet people and create friendships in general so, for me, dating was just an extension of that. I also worked in an office full of white men who were terribly misogynistic so that soured some of my day to day thinking about men, lol. Overall, it wasn't that there weren't any opportunities, just that I knew I didn't want to stay permanently. Back in the U.S., I feel much more relaxed and can meet people much more easily.”

- from a friend in her 20s, American, who had an office job here for a few years and has recently moved back to the US. She's absolutely right that it's harder, you have to be more proactive, there isn't as much of a selection etc. but note that in the end she did have a Taiwanese boyfriend after dating a few international students. The pattern holds: it's harder, but not impossible, and "Western women don't like Taiwanese men" isn't nearly as true as people think it is.


“My husband is quite unique and was not the norm at all. I made a huge effort to win over my hubby at the time. There is also the fact that lots of Western women are not attracted to Asians. I was different because physically my husband is not typical in that he is broad and has body and facial hair that I find attracts me to a "guy". And, my husband's family is not traditional and does not influence him so him so he had freedom to date me.

Let's also not forget that it is easy to "hook up" and hard to seriously date. If Western women approached Taiwanese men aggressively there would be lots of success stories. All I can tell you is that if a girl is assertive and takes the lead the guys will follow. It is true that the Asian men are intimidated and probably won't make the first move.”


- from a friend in her 30s, American, who came here to study, came back to visit, and on that visit met the Taiwanese guy she'd later marry.



“I have lots to say about this. My experience is pretty different from what I hear a lot of Western women talk about. Overall, I feel like I get hit on or have guys ask me out in Taiwan on par with or maybe even more than in the U.S.

Just last night, for example, I went to a small local bar I'd never heard of because a Taiwanese female former colleague invited me there to chat. Over the course of a few hours, the Taiwanese bartender started chatting me up, we played the dice game (I'm not sure what it's called but something akin to Bullshit), he asked me if I'm married multiple times, told me I'm beautiful and otherwise flirted with me, walked me out to a cab and stopped just short of trying to kiss me. Another guy, an ABC, who we had barely chatted with, came up and quite directly asked me if I wanted to go home with him. This kind of thing doesn't happen every time I go out, but it's not terribly unusual. This isn't just in bars - I've had students aggressively hit on me in the middle of class, dudes approach me in coffee shops and someone ask me out on the MRT.


I'm not sure what to attribute this to, but I have a few ideas. I think I generally have an attitude of not really giving a fuck, that is to say, I don't put out the vibe that I'm looking for someone. I think that this is pretty attractive to some people. I'm also fairly outgoing in a social situation and will be friendly and shoot the shit with strangers, which I think can put people at ease a bit. I tend to go to more local places, as opposed to places that cater mainly to foreigners, and a lot of people I have met seem really pleased about that and tell me I must be Taiwanese at heart.


One Taiwanese guy I dated told me that a main reason he was attracted to me initially was because I am "manly" (his words). He went on to explain that I don't act super "feminine," meaning that I don't seem obsessed with my appearance, am not submissive and very different from most Taiwanese girls. (These comments could generate another very lengthy discussion entirely).

I'm certainly not the bee's knees, either. I'm 34 (with no husband or kids!), which basically makes me useless to society. I think I'm pretty charming and brilliant, but I'm not a knockout that people would trip and fall gawking at on the street. I've dated 2 Taiwanese guys in the last year and I've had guys ranging from 20's to 50's ask me out and at least 3 local girls ask to make out with me.”

- from a friend in her 30s, American, who has been here for a little over a year. Since she's been here she's dated two local guys and garnered interest from others. Her experience truly is a bit atypical in that she's had more luck than most Western women, but the pattern still holds: Western women do date Taiwanese men, they do like them more than is often assumed, and they do have opportunities. We're not all chaste nuns over here, jealous of Western men swaggering around with women hanging off their arms. In fact, we're not even dating those men for the most part. We're not interested. 


"I've observed this from afar as someone who's been attached entire time living in Taiwan, HK and Indonesia. The general quality of guys who move to Asia compared to the standard of women they believe they can get is something of a contrast. But after five years in Asia I know a few happy expat couples who met here. Yes there are a lot of horrid little men who date Asian girls and believe they must also be a serious catch for Western women. But lets not fight over them, ladies. Quality guys are few and far between. But its also very difficult to identify quality single guys aged 30 to 40 in London.

 Taiwanese men are often lovely, aren't they? Must be the aboriginal mix? Tall and handsome often. Life is a bit harder for Western women in HK.”


- from a British friend in her 30s who has since left

“I was warned before I came here, but did not take it seriously because I thought I would be an exception the rule. Maybe others experiences are different than mine, or maybe the warnings were just not specific enough and not in enough first person voices to convince me that they applied to me too. For instance, I have the impression that Western men outnumber Western women by a large margin. Off the top of my head I can think of 9 Western women I know personally here. Two are married to Westerners, one is in a relationship with a Taiwanese woman, and the rest appear to have been single a long time. Through others, I know of a couple Western women married to Taiwanese men, but not well enough to know their names. If you wanted to look at patterns, age is probably a factor in how things play out too.

Age matters. I have met impressive local men, but they were younger than me and in marriages with small children. There's a definite stigma against older women with younger men that some of the younger men who seemed interested in me could not stand up to. The other issue being the importance of having children to Asian men. So the large number of chronically single western women I know here tend to be in their late 30s and older.

There is a crop of men who become available in their 50s here, after their children have grown up. Some are divorced or some just permanently separated from wives. Many of the divorced guys are not educated, or don't have money. The separated guys I've met are sometimes quite wealthy, but are rather old school and sedate, with or have well established habits in terms of what they expect of a woman. One issue I find with retired men is that they are at a different stage of life from me.


I feel more of an affinity - and probably share more assumptions in common - with specific younger Taiwanese men than I do with older ones, men in their 20s and 30s, but I am nearing 50. "Lao niu chi qing cao," (老牛吃青草) one man in his 30s who flirted with me constantly said, indicating that he did not have the strength of character to stand up to the stigma. Moreover, he did not want to disappoint his mother, who expects grandchildren.


My advice to a young American woman who majored in Chinese and asked me if I am making my life here and what I think about her moving to Taiwan - my advice was to put a time limit on it. If you don't want to teach English and don't find a job doing something else within one or two years, then leave.”


This is from an American friend who is in her 40s (I believe - I've never asked) and hasn't had the same luck, and feels overall her love life her has been a negative experience. She's right that age does matter.


She agrees with a lot of my other friends that there are men you can hook up with, and Western women are generally more interested in dating them than one might think, but it's a lot harder. She's invited male friends over to her apartment - as friends - and had them act really weird about it, or show up and be "nervous", until she realized that they just assumed it was all about sex. It hadn't occurred to them that she had friendship in mind. One, she said, would not cross the threshold from her patio to her apartment out of "respect", and one said he was surprised she'd invited him and he had to gather the courage to come over (indicating he thought more was intended by the invitation).


She's noticed that it's different from China, in that in China men were interested in sleeping with her because they assumed American women were “easy” or out of sheer curiosity and intrigue - whereas here they're more just shy. This doesn't mean they're uninterested, just that they don't have quite as strong assumptions about American women and they don't act on their thoughts. 

In keeping with that, pretty much every Taiwanese male friend I've had has admitted that the idea of a Western girlfriend intrigues him, but he's either already in a relationship or too shy to act on that interest. As she said above, the older men aren't on her wavelength or are already married (although some become available in their 50s following divorces) and the younger one too put off by the stigma of dating an older woman.

She also noted that there seems to be a cultural space for "pink friends" - friends of the opposite sex (or that you have some attraction to if you're bi) with whom there is some chemistry, and to whom the married of the pair of friends can pour out, as to a confidante, all his (usually his) marriage misery. Sometimes those relationships turn sexual, other times not. She's not interested in them, having been through it once. 


* * * 

Looking back on these responses, all I can say is this: sure, stereotypes about Western women in Taiwan exist, mostly negative ones. We're sexless, female incels. We're not attracted to Asian men. We can't compete with 'local women' (oh man that statement is so fraught with racist/sexist stereotypes that I don't know where to begin).

But hear this: Western women in Taiwan have their own stereotypes of the typical male expat here. You know - horrid little misogynists who think they're hot shit because they can get here what they couldn't get in their native countries. Charisma Men.

These stereotypes are not always true - many of my friends are Western men who are super cool guys, whether they are single (which not many are these days, a function of age and my social circle settling down), married or dating and whether their partners are foreign or Taiwanese. But there is a basis for them, and I've met a few Charisma Men as well.

But then, I wouldn't necessarily say it's harder to meet good men here (though admittedly I haven't tried). Not because it's easy, but because it was also hard to meet them in the US. Before I married, I might have had more dates in the US, but that doesn't mean the men were any better or any more worth my romantic time. Most weren't.

I, and most foreign women here, avoid them. We live our own lives, make our own friends, hang out with the cool guys, form local friendships and in some cases relationships, and are basically normal people living normal lives.

So, expat men. If you think we're angry celibate shrews just because we're not dating you, then perhaps you just don't know enough expat women and perhaps you just don't know much about our experiences, because you haven't lived them.