I am really sick of those Nazi re-enactment kids

There is a reason this was OK but the high school students' Nazi re-enactment was not
From here

...and yet here I am writing about them. 

Make no mistake, however, I am sick of them. I just don't want to hear about it anymore, and I won't write about them again.

I'm not going to get into the "but their freedom of speech!" retort because it's intellectually shallow. These kids have freedom of speech - they have not faced and will not face criminal charges for this. Freedom of speech never gave anyone the right to freedom from criticism or backlash from the public regarding what they've expressed.

I'm also not going to get into "why is it so taboo?" It's not taboo. Movies and even war re-enactors re-enact painful scenes from history, including the horrors of Nazism, fairly frequently. If the subject matter is handled sensitively then there's generally not a problem with it. The issue here is that it did not meet that standard. This is true for historical re-enactments of all sorts for a variety of purposes.

Remember how we all watched a re-enactment of executions under the White Terror during President Tsai's inauguration? Remember how, while people remarked on it, there wasn't this kind of critical backlash? Because the re-enactment had value: learning value, historical value, emotional value. Nobody (well, nobody with any sense) thinks that such re-enactments should be forbidden or are all in bad taste, no matter what. It's how the events are handled when acted out, and why the re-enactment is staged in the first place, that matters. (Edited to add: not everyone thinks that the re-enactments in the inaugural play were handled well - I too have some criticism of them, but overall do feel they had historical value if, perhaps, it was not portrayed as accurately as it could be).

Also on the trash heap: "well they don't know that much about WWII. The evils of Nazism haven't been ingrained in them the way they have in us". Sure, but there's no excuse for that. Just as we Westerners could stand a more comprehensive approach to Asian history - from the horrors of Mao to the White Terror to Pol Pot, Japanese imperialism and beyond - this should be better taught in Asian schools. In fact, even in Asia these subjects don't always seem to be fully understood: why is it that Chiang Kai-shek and Chairman Mao bobblehead toys can be purchased in half the gift shops of Taiwan? What is the purpose of making two brutal dictators adorable?

And yet another one for the dumptruck: "people do lots of worse things, Americans can be just as insensitive!" Yup. Thinking of all the idealistic young Westerners a generation ago who wore Mao suits to be "cool" (or worse, because they actually bought what Mao was selling) or make tasteless jokes about some of the more awful events and people of Asian history also makes me shake my head. But "they do it too" is not an excuse.

What bothers me, really, then, is the complete lack of value - historical, pedagogical, emotional - in this particular re-enactment.

The dramatically staged executions during the inauguration performance had historical value and emotional weight. Through them, we can be reminded of the horrors of the past - it pushes us to remember the history of agonies Taiwan has battled through and in some way pushes Taiwan to come to terms with its own history (something that is avoided more than it should be). Through the re-enactment, the horror of what took place in that era is laid bare, and it provides a useful lens through which to examine Taiwan's progress, current status and future. It was not a perfect dramatic performance, and there are reasons to criticize it - and the depiction of Han settlers driving out the original aboriginal inhabitants of the land - but nobody would say that no re-actment should have taken place. If it made you upset, good. It should.

There is similar value in films dealing with history, whether fictional, semi-fictional and documentary, and value in historical societies re-enacting battles and other scenes from potent events from the past: through them we can understand what it was like for the people involved, in some small way, and hopefully learn from it.

This, though? This was a group of teenagers choosing a decidedly un-fun subject and having, well, fun with it. It was not handled sensitively and, as a teacher, I fail to see what learning outcomes this might better bring about. What exactly did these students learn about Nazism by putting on snazzy uniforms and marching around? What of the weight and pain of history did this impart? What greater understanding did they gain? How did they learn to examine the issue critically, look at various sources and discuss the ideas within, or apply the lessons to the timeline of history, the world as it is today and the future?

There are certainly ways to teach Nazism in schools in Taiwan and elsewhere. The subject is not taboo - or should not be - and there may even be room for historical re-enactments if they serve a purpose.

However, one of the first things I learned in my teacher training is that every activity included in one's lesson should be carefully and critically evaluated for how well it will enable the class to meet its aims: how it will enable the learners to learn what you want them to come away with. Not only are we asked to look at each activity and decide if it is the best possible choice to propel the class toward successful learning, or if another choice might be more targeted, more efficient, more engaging or more relevant, but also if each activity is properly scaffolded and ordered to bring the class, in stages, through to a greater understanding of the subject (whatever level of understanding you have specified in your aims).

I am not a perfect teacher. Sometimes I get lazy - I try not to do it often - and perhaps I grab an activity because I'm short on time when another, more involved one might have been more fruitful. Sometimes I reflect on a class and think "that wasn't scaffolded as well as it could have been, I shouldn't have had to give such a long explanation of this or that issue". Sometimes I think "well, we met our aims, but I'm not sure that the level of understanding is as deep as I'd like it to be." I think all responsible, professional teachers think this way.

Certainly, syllabuses and curriculums are littered with pointless school projects that amount to wheel-spinning or extra whiz-bang showiness but do little, or nothing, to actually promote absorption of and understanding of the subject matter. Certainly - and not only in Taiwan - is critical thinking training often sacrificed for these surface-level school projects that are usually money and time sucks (or they are sacrificed at the altar of 'this is on the big exam so memorize what's in your book, we don't have time to think too deeply about it, you just need to answer some questions').

I can honestly say if I were tasked with teaching Nazism to a history class, this sort of re-enactment would have no place in it. Not because it is tasteless, though it is that, but because it lacks value. If, however, in some lesson a re-enactment, handled appropriately, did have value I would incorporate it.

I could give you a very long list of things that might be better included: from debates to class experiments (such as the brown eye/blue eye experiment) to readings (not only textbook readings but books such as The Wave, The Book Thief and perhaps even Stargirl which is seemingly unrelated but in fact carries that us-against-them mentality so intrinsic to the Nazis into the modern world in a different way). I am not afraid to face slightly unnerving lesson plans - if you are not unnerved by Nazism then you didn't learn it properly - and would not even be opposed to a class experiment where some children had to hide, others had to find them, and the hiders were punished if they were found whereas the finders were greatly rewarded - and to see if the finders were willing to capture the hiders for their reward, knowing the hiders would be punished. Then to bring them all back and talk about how that felt and why, and how it might manifest in the world today.

I might include something like the lesson told in a Facebook post that's going around:

When I was in 7th grade, our teacher put on a video and told us to take notes. Ten minutes in, she threw the lights on and shouted at Steven [Lastname], telling him he wasn't taking notes and he should have been. But the thing was, Steve was taking notes. I saw it. We all saw it. The teacher asked if anyone wanted to stand up for Steve. A few of us choked out some words of defense but were immediately squashed. Quickly, we were all very silent. Steve was sent to the principal's office. The teacher came back in the room and said something like "See how easy that was?" We were reading "Anne Frank."


But this? What does marching around really teach? Does mere imitation really have any value? Thea answer is no, and that goes for any re-enactment. Was the Wushe Incident re-enactment of any greater pedagogical value? I'd say no. Had the students chosen to re-enact events in a different way, with teacher guidance leading them to better understand those events through the resulting play, would that have been more valuable? Certainly.

It's tasteless, yes. It shows a deep and painful lack of understanding of important events in world history, yes. It also shows a lack of understanding of why the backlash was what it was - last I heard, the principle of the school was resigning but the students themselves did not really seem to understand what they'd done wrong or why they were being criticized so heavily.

All of that is true, but it's the complete lack of educational utility of the whole thing that really gets me.

All that said, I really am sick of this story and I'm going to stop talking about it now, or writing about it in the future.

One of those stupid year-in-review posts (#8 will shock you!)

I mean, I generally don't like these and I am not sure I have ever done one. But I feel like doing one for 2016 because the general consensus seems to be that it was a shit year and we're thankful it's over. And on a societal level, that's true.

However, there's something I really can't deny - in fact, on a personal level, I had a pretty good 2016. I did! My shit year was Dec 2014-Dec 2015, for reasons you know if you know me.

So, this isn't to gloat, it's to point out that a bad year on a sociocultural level doesn't necessarily equate to a bad year in total. I am sure good and bad things happened to us all despite the fact that the world is in a political shambles and we're probably all going to die.

A look back:

1.) Taiwan elected its first female president and, for the first time in its history, is not controlled by the (awful) KMT (not that I particularly love the DPP) - I know this isn't personal but it's worth mentioning. A few of these are not personal, but I think good enough to include

2.) My cousin spent several months in Taiwan

3.) I published my first ever journal article

4.) I passed the final module for, and received the full diploma for, the Cambridge Delta

5.) I was accepted into grad school

6.) I visited the US twice

7.) American women had the chance to vote for the first ever female presidential candidate (no, she was not a perfect candidate, and yeah, that turned out kinda bad, but I refuse to give up on that milestone in political history)

8.) I accomplished what I feel is my greatest achievement to date

9.) The Taiwanese legislature got the wheels rolling on marriage equality

10.) Hong Kong elected a slate of pro-democracy, pro-localization candidates (that, again, didn't turn out well thanks to Stupid China, but it still meant something)

11.) I made a fair number of interesting new friends

12.) I went to the Grand Pasta'ai

13.) I went to Vietnam for the first time (post forthcoming) and Indonesia for the second

14.) I traveled a fair bit around Taiwan, visiting Tainan three times, Kaohsiung, Yunlin, Xinpu (again, post forthcoming), and probably more that I can't recall exactly as I try to leave Taipei frequently to keep in touch with the rest of the country

15.) My closest and oldest friend in Taiwan got married

16.) I went to Hong Kong for the first time in five years (again, post forthcoming)

17.) Taiwan actually made the international news (kind of a mixed blessing though)

18.) I was invited to observe a session of the Legislative Yuan - watch my video here!

I would call that a pretty good 2016, wouldn't you? At least, it offers a chance to see the good parts, or find a few gems among the burnt rubble of the political and social sphere. Don't get me wrong, things were bad. The whole world with the possible exception of Taiwan is trending towards reactionary politics and fascism. The climate is, well, getting worse and it will probably be a massive problem very soon. A horrific mass murder and total destruction of a once-great city took place very close to my ancestral home, and the West did nothing. We elected quite literally the worst person in the world to be the leader of the "free world", a thing (I don't mean the event, I mean the "person") I can never accept as my president. As a result, I no longer consider myself American in anything but name and have no loyalty whatsoever to the USA. There is no forgiveness for this.

So yeah, things are bad globally. But personally, I have a few gems.

Let's Get Physical

That guy in Tainan? He gets me. 

Every once in awhile a constellation of events helps throw an issue one has been mulling over in foggier terms into sharp relief.

On Wednesday, a friend says to me in a message: "You can occupy Donald Trump's office" when discussing occupations in Taiwan.

Something about that bothers me, but I can't put my finger on what. I am not afraid of physical protest or confrontation. I am not naturally an occupier, but it is not outside the realm of possibility. It also strikes me that in the US such an occupation would be unlikely, and not only for security reasons.

On Saturday morning, I get into a taxi in Tainan and as the HSR station employee, or the taxi company employee - it's hard to tell - shuts the door for me after a brief chat, he says "You're the New Taiwanese" (his actual words are "妳是台灣的第二代").

I am touched.
On Monday, I am out looking for a book I'd seen for sale in Tainan but didn't want to cart back to Taipei. I am chatting with someone who asks me "when are you moving back to America?"

I normally don't think too hard about such micro-aggressions - I have better things to do with my time - but it is such a stark contrast to what the person in Tainan said that it bothers me. Why would she assume I am ever moving back?

I live here. My body is here. Why would my mind and heart be elsewhere?

On Wednesday, I am having lunch with a friend (not the same friend I was chatting with on the previous Wednesday). She asks me if China were to invade, would America send planes to evacuate citizens, and would I be able to escape? (Don't ask me how we got onto that topic).

I am reminded of Facebook conversations about how people like me who claim to love Taiwan so much are just full of so much wind, because if everything really went to hell, we wouldn't stay and fight. We'd get the hell out, like plenty of Taiwanese would be trying to do.

And it is like jumping into an ice cold pool.

Would I stay and fight, or would I get on that plane?

My friend's comment about occupying the White House bothers me because I don't feel any loyalty to the US. It's almost like a foreign affair, something foreigners do, those weird Americans with their big lawns and houses with white siding. Why would I occupy a government office of a country I no longer call home? If I am going to occupy something - though I am not likely to - it will be in Taiwan, because Taiwan is my home. Why would he assume the change I want to fight for is in America, where I do not live?

The man in Tainan seems to accept my reality, though he has missed a crucial point: I can't be New Taiwanese because I am not a citizen and may never be. However, he shows more willingness to take at face value the idea that Taiwan is my home. In contrast, the woman in Taipei sees my face and makes an assumption about where I belong. She does not accept my reality. She sees me as a temporary fixture, a visitor who will eventually go "home". Taiwan cannot be my home, or the thing I call home. I don't look the part.

In fact, she goes on to ask me where my home is.
"Taiwan."
But where is your family?
"Taiwan." (This is true: both my husband and sister live here).
But where are you from?
The USA, but why does it matter?

Is Taiwan my home? Would I stay and fight? Is it okay if I say no, because I know many Taiwanese won't either (and those that do will have to - those that don't have to are more likely to run)? Does their turning tail not take away their Taiwaneseness (obviously, it does not, that's a rhetorical question), but mine does? Is there anything wrong with choosing to survive?

Could I even stay and fight - should I - when I am not a citizen? Is it not completely insane to dig in and put my physical body, rather than just the amorphous feelings of my mind and heart, on the line, for a country that won't even give me citizenship under reasonable conditions? Do I need to show loyalty for a country whose own government assumes I will eventually go "home", not that I am already home?

I come from fighters. Despite being generally a lazy, unpatriotic, establishment-loathing couch-hogger who hates fighting and is terrified of death, it is not inconceivable that, if everything truly went down the tubes, that something would break inside me and I'd dig in to do the right thing and put my physical self on the line for Taiwan (that said, it is not entirely conceivable that I would do this either).

I was going to share a bad-ass picture of my great grandfather posing with an Ottoman moustache and a gun, but instead you can look at how deeply I have always loved couches. 

I can't say either way whether I would stay and fight or swoosh away on an evacuation plane, but it feels somehow important to ask myself this rhetorical question of a country I have invested in, which won't invest in me. I like to think that if I were a citizen, I'd stay. In 1915 my great grandfather saw what was happening to his people - the Armenians in Turkey - grabbed his gun and fought. I would hope, anyway, that a tiny spark of that exists in me, somewhere, under my personal agenda and general enjoyment of not dying (for what it's worth, he didn't die fighting).

In any case, that leads me straight back to last Wednesday. My lack of loyalty to the US, or the fact that White House security would never allow an occupation, is not what strikes me as I consider how much of my physical self I am willing to put on the line for the country I call home, as compared to the country that is no longer my home.

I think at first that Americans aren't very physical in their resistance. Then I consider that I may be wrong, and the truth is that Americans in my demographic (white, well-off on a global scale if not on every scale) are the ones who are not very physical. I consider Wisconsin's Capitol occupation in 2011, Black Lives Matter and Standing Rock (agree or disagree, it is a physical resistance). However, I can't shake the feeling that we Americans just don't throw ourselves into civic action very much, or at least not anymore.

You would think we would be more physically resistant, what with our guns and our bar fights and the general lack of safety of women on the street, but we're not. We didn't occupy Wall Street, we occupied a park near it. We have a few marches - I went to a tepid one against the World Bank when I was in college (wasn't that into it, wouldn't you know), and marched with a bunch of other idealistic but otherwise dishwater demonstrators against the 2nd Iraq War in New York. They were about as effective as those DPP or Citizen 1984-organized protests in the Ma era.

I have a great deal of respect for the exceptions, but they feel like exceptions: good, but not enough to stem the general impression in my lifetime that we like to write thinkpieces and generally grouse about the state of things, but we don't seem to show up physically all that often. Those that do have more to lose, the rest of us can go back to our little boxes on the hillside made of ticky-tacky. We join Facebook groups, act supportive, use it as a place to vent or post motivational memes or share our personal stories - not really useful themselves, either, I've come to think - and then watch those groups get monetized. We focus on no concrete action, no policy change, no taking down the patriarchy. We do not take to the streets, or at least not often and not angrily enough. We do not effectively occupy. We could, perhaps, learn a lot from how the Taiwanese do it.

I don't think the White House will ever be occupied, because I don't think Americans are necessarily occupiers at this moment in our history. I have to hope a robust civil movement will grow to counter the tragedy that is a Trump "Presidency", but I haven't really seen it yet.

In my time in Taiwan, though, and looking back through Taiwanese history, it feels as though there is more of a tradition of physical resistance. From fighting the incoming Japanese to 228 to the Kaohsiung Incident to Nylon Cheng, the White Lilies and up through the Sunflowers and now marriage equality, people have had specific things to fight for, and have gone out and done it. With their bodies, not just angry words. Perhaps it's because it was the only option in a brutal dictatorship, perhaps it is a part of the national character. I am, however, continually impressed by the willingness of Taiwanese to physically show up and sit their bodies in the street or in a building to fight for something. There seems to be a physicality about social movements that, at least in my lifetime, feels sorely lacking in much of the US.

I love this. I don't want to share stories in lieu of action, although I realize that I began this post by doing exactly that. There is only so much action I can take in Taiwan (I'm not a citizen, I can't organize, and I speak Chinese but not perfectly enough to be as involved as I'd like to be). At least, I want to be a part of a country where the citizens take action rather than, I dunno, post pictures of flowers with insipid feel-good self-improvement quotes or whatever, or turn everything into a PR stunt.

It's what gives me hope for Taiwan, though I am not quite sure why.

It also may be a part of why, against all logic, despite the fact that I am stronger with words than physical actions, I have so much respect for being willing to fight for what one believes in with more than just words, but with deeds and with one's own body.

What does that have to do with Taiwan being my home, other than the fact that I am physically here? It means - and this is where the icy water comes in - a good hard think about the possibility of the unthinkable happening, and about what that means for me.

In any case, today someone asks me if I am going home for Christmas.

"I am already home for Christmas," I reply.

A time to break down

I've been working for awhile on a story-like version of this topic: true events told in a narrative about my time away from Taiwan in 2014 and 2015 and subsequent return. But recently two people I know (a friend and a friend-of-a-friend) have taken or will take similar flights, so I felt like writing something more essay-like about it now. Look for the story in a month or two.

Most recently, I returned to the US for one week in order to attend a family reunion, as well as pack up my entire childhood. The reunion and other family visits were especially important as I have two living grandparents, both of which are near 90 and neither of which is in good health. It is a painful fact that every visit I make home could be the last time I see either or both of them.

In 2012, a few years before my mom passed away, she had expressed an interest in the various old and attractive, but not particularly valuable, antique decorative items I'd purchased for my apartment in Taiwan: mostly old carved wooden panels used to decorate the tops of walls and under eaves in houses and temples. So, I bought her a similar panel with carved peaches (symbols of long life) and a stylized 'long life' (壽) character, as we were returning to the US for Christmas that year. It turned out to be our final family holiday together before she passed away in 2014. The irony of this does not escape me.

This past week, after learning that our dad planned to rent out our family home and the house I grew up in for at least a year, and potentially sell it after that time, I asked if I could have the panel rather than see it go into storage. It was an easy request as I'd purchased it to begin with.

With too much in the suitcase, including books, large photo albums and other items, the fragile wood of this panel just couldn't take the pressure. As I was closing the back, I heard a crack. The cut was not a complete severance and could be repaired, but I didn't want it in that suitcase. I put it in my carry-on as gingerly as possible, only for the breakage to complete itself as that bag, too, was overstuffed.

When I took it out of its (inadequate) padding back in Taipei, only to see it completely severed, I was reminded of a favorite song of my mother's which my uncle sang at her memorial service:

A time to build up, a time to break down
A time to dance, a time to mourn
A time to cast away stones
A time to gather stones together
I couldn't help but draw some weird symbolic analogies to my long-term expat life - literally as far away as it is possible to go from my hometown - and that antique wooden panel. Bought in Taiwan, gifted to my mother in the US, only for its hope of long life to be dashed in a few remaining years and to crack on the way back to Taiwan, as I leave the home I grew up in quite possibly for the last time.

As you know if you read this blog even semi-regularly, my flight home in 2014 was sudden: I'd planned on leaving for up to a year, maybe two, but wasn't scheduled to depart on the day I did. I knew as I left for the airport with a few hours' notice that whatever happened would not be good: I didn't know if I'd have a few hours, a few days, a few months or a few years with my mom, but no matter how long I did have, I knew I was flying back to the US to say goodbye. As it turned out, within two days, maman est morte. 

Less than a year later, just before I was set to return to help my father after his heart surgery, I lost my grandmother somewhat suddenly (we'd known it wouldn't be long but we didn't know it would be quite so soon).

What I've become more aware of in the intervening year and a half is that I am not nearly the only expat or immigrant who has experienced that situation. Many of us who live abroad long-term and likely some of us who don't stay for that long in the grand scheme of things take that same flight. They're lucky in a sense if they do: not everyone can. I could return for my mother but there was no way for me to have done the same for my grandmother, as much as I wanted to.

It's a part of expat life that few talk about: if you choose to live far away long term, there is a chance the next time you see your loved ones 'back home' might be the last time, that you might have to take an unplanned 12-hour flight to say goodbye, or that there is a chance you could be half a planet away knowing there is nothing you can do.

What is even less discussed is the feeling of breakage that comes from this time away. Many of you know I no longer consider the US to be my home. I haven't for awhile but haven't been able to articulate it until recently. We may not stay in Taiwan forever - let's see if this country can get its act together on immigration and labor reform - but if we leave it will be to go forward, to somewhere new. I am married to a Canadian citizen after all. But if you plan to go forward that necessarily means you won't be going 'back', though it feels cruel to put it that way. If you don't go back, a crack forms between your life before and your life ahead. Given time, and despite one's best efforts, the crack will eventually turn into a break. Even if you keep in close touch with people back home, the number of times you will see them again in your life is reduced by your living so far away, and the amount of time you will spend with them before they, too, leave either your life or this world is necessarily less.

Does that 'goodbye' flight make up for such a trade-off? You must go forward, or at least, I must. The answer is not to stay behind, but you must also be aware of the consequences. You do not know when your 'goodbye' flight will come, or if you will be able to take it. You don't know when the crack will form, or when it will turn into a severance. You can pack as carefully as possible, pad yourself against all manner of unfortunate events, but they will find you. None of us living abroad are exempt from the 'goodbye' flight. None of us are exempt from the breakage.

It is easy, while living a relatively charmed existence in Taiwan, where my salary (as much as I complain about it, with reason I think) affords a comfortable lifestyle of downtown living, further education and travel, to pretend that every time is a time to dance. To pretend that I am a 21st century Meursault - that we are all little dancing Meursaults staring at the sky or the sun or whatever - that nothing between humans matters as much as the immediacy of life and nature, that only the constant forward-moving pace of the universe makes sense and nothing else can be explained rationally.

But, whether or not there is truth in such absurdity, human relationships do matter. You make new ones abroad: it's fairly common to write about this positive side of expat life. You meet all sorts of interesting people, not least among them local residents of your new country. And we all know that our relationships back home may cool due to this distance. But we like to pretend that there is no permanent consequence to this moving forward, that good relationships can always renew themselves. Generally, they can, but only if the people you leave behind are still alive when you come back.

This is an acute feeling while you are actually home. Living in the US in 2015 was like functioning with my arm chopped off (left or right, depending on the day). I was still alive, in a great deal of pain but able to get through the day and even keep other peoples' lives together as I planned my mom's memorial service, but something was just missing. I wasn't able to function normally due to this missing thing, this absence where there should be presence. Living in Taiwan, it's easy to forget that it happened at all. Any given day now in Taiwan is no different from any given day before late 2014 when I might not have talked to my parents (we talked frequently, but not on a daily basis).

It would be easy to pick right back up as though life was as before. It's almost eerie how nothing in Taiwan has changed even as I know rationally there is no reason for it to have. That's the other side of the expat life coin: after a monumental change or loss where you come from, the only change you see when you return to your country of residence is in you.

Back 'home', things have changed quite a bit. Others feel your loss, or rather, that loss is also felt by others. Their possessions are still around, in many cases. Whatever they built in their life still is, too. People offer memories or sympathy. The place where they lived, where you come from, has changed, even if just a tiny bit. Return to your new home, and that loss is not felt by most others (in my case, my sister - also in Taiwan - and husband were mourning, too). They can't miss someone they never knew, and a place that person never set foot in obviously wouldn't change because they are gone.

It's tempting and easy to try and avoid returning to a place where you feel your arm has been cut off by staying in a place where you can be whole-bodied if you want to be. To pretend that the breakage you've suffered, the human relationship you've lost, doesn't have as big an impact because it doesn't impact the immediacy of life and sensation in your new home.

I can't do that though. I don't regret moving abroad (it would also be easy, but futile, to wallow in regret). It is natural to move forward. To seek your fortune, in whatever form it takes, wherever it can be found. Go East, young woman. 

In order to atone for all of the time I didn't spend where I grew up, that I didn't see my mother or grandmother, all of the times I wasn't there rolled up into one goodbye flight I could take and one I couldn't, and to acknowledge that the same circumstances will present themselves again at some point in the not-too-distant future, it sometimes helps to spend some meditative time with my arm, figuratively speaking, behind my back.

So, today I broke out my arts and crafts tools, including the appropriate type of glue to repair wooden items, and set about gluing that antique wooden panel back together so I can hang it in my apartment here in Taipei.

The break will always be noticeable: it's my own fault for trying to carry it to the US and back in the first place. But then if I hadn't gone abroad I wouldn't have bought the panel at all. My mom knew that my move abroad was my own move forward and, as hard as it was, supported it.

Officially Unofficial: A Review

I thought I was a little late to this party, but a quick look online shows that no, the only other person I can find who has actually reviewed Officially Unofficial (and not on Amazon) is my husband. Seems odd, I would have expected it to have been widely read and commented on in expat circles though not necessarily much outside Taiwan, but okay.

Brief recap - this is a memoir about moving to Taiwan, working one's way to national and international recognition as a journalist, coming to care deeply about Taiwan, and about Cole's time at the Taipei Times and his not-so-amicable split from them, as well as his own observations of the political and military goings-on from the perspective of a journalist with access to the key players.

First, what I liked about it. I can't find the specific reference but it seems that Cole arrived in Taiwan about one year before I did, and is older than me, but not by a huge amount. Which is to say, we experienced Taiwan at about the same time and at not terribly disparate ages, so it was fascinating to look back at the experiences someone else with a very different trajectory had during a time I was also in Taiwan and also learning how things worked. At many points, reading this filled in the gaps of news events and other important issues I was either too new to know much about or too busy with my own life trajectory to pay sufficient attention to (I wasn't that interested in Taiwanese politics until I had already been here several years - my interest bloomed just as I was starting to realize this could be a long-term home for me).  I appreciated this quite a bit.

A few examples: I had been in Taiwan one month when the Red Shirts marched. I went and observed but didn't participate and didn't know much about it (nevertheless, being more knowledgeable now, I am glad to have seen it with my own eyes), so reading about how businesses at times paid employees to participate or donate was of some interest - especially as I went from a green organization (a large chain of language schools) to a blue one (a singularly awful 'management consulting firm' with great clients and terrible management) back to an apolitical-but-greenish-leaning one. I did notice that the blue one was a far worse place to work than the green or greenish ones, though.

I was also a Taipei Times reader when the quality started to suffer and I have to say, that one line in the book about how "readers noticed"...yes, we did. I did. I was one of them. I used to contribute the occasional reader editorial, but don't now.

Huaguang, Losheng sanatorium, Dapu, Want Want's Next Media acquisition? I was there for all of that too although, again, too busy with my own career path to pay as much attention as I should have. Reading this book filled in a lot of very useful blanks.

My mother was a journalist, so it was equally fascinating to me to read about how other journalists got to where they were and how they worked, as well. Although I have a lot of respect for (most) (good) journalists, the kind who really live up to the industry's standards of professionalism, it cemented my choice way back in the day not to pursue that career path. That is not meant as a jab at Cole, the profession, or any other journalists - it's just not for me. The low pay, long hours, poor treatment and lack of freedom and free time to pursue other interests? As a young arrival to Taiwan I was only willing to put up with perhaps one of the above, and now that I'm older I'm not willing to put up with any for any appreciable amount of time. The idea of only having 7 days off per year indefinitely, for example? Not acceptable.

In Cole's shoes I would have flamed out at the Times far earlier than he did simply because I'm not willing to do work towards an item for publication that will make someone else money on my day off, and not willing to put up with much bullshit. I also probably have a shorter temper. If that's what you have to do to break into journalism, then it's not for me and I'm quite happy I realized that early on (when I considered, and ultimately rejected, the idea of double majoring in journalism back in college).

It also helped me better articulate, oddly enough, how and why I chose teaching as an actual career and not something one does for a few years before moving on. It is a career - a profession. One would never call a math, science, history or literature teacher someone who "does it for a few years then moves on" (though some do) - they train to become professionals, and they are. So, when Cole subtly disparaged the teaching profession a few times in this book, as though it were somehow beneath him, it caused me to realize that no - I worked hard for my degree and my job is no less respectable than that of a journalist. It reminded me that I chose this and I trained for it in lieu of pursuing other careers (I used to work in finance, and have been offered non-teaching jobs which I have turned down) and no detractor can take that away. It is not 'beneath' anyone unless they don't know what being a professional educator actually means.

It reminded me, while reading about events that happened while I was busting my butt doing a Delta that, hey, it's okay that maybe I let my political observation slide a bit - I was busting my butt doing a Delta! It is absolutely fine that rather than go down and see the Huaguang protests for myself, that I was reading a book on discourse analysis. That rather than read every article on the Next Media acquisition that I was improving my knowledge of language systems. That it was perfectly logical for me to have been honing my knowledge of training practice and theory, language testing and assessment and various pedagogical approaches as well as doing data gathering on a group of real students rather than watching political events during the lead-up to the Sunflower occupation. I did it for my career, and now it's time to go back and fill in what I missed (you may have noticed that there were a few quiet years on this blog as well - now you know why.)

It was engaging, informative reading providing angles and backgrounds to things I either didn't know much about or missed due to my own studies.

In short, there was quite a lot to like.

Let's talk about the things I didn't like.

I noted there were a few inaccuracies in his portrayal of the ELT industry. Most importantly, that in his time drafting articles for an English teaching magazine, rather than realize that the reason it wasn't fulfilling was because he didn't know what he was doing, he just immediately reverted to the idea that it was "beneath him". Sure, it's easy to think that way if you have no background in second language acquisition, materials or curriculum development, scaffolding, early childhood education (for the articles aimed at kindergarteners), text-based language extraction pedagogy etc., it's easy to think any idiot could do a perfectly good job and smirk at such work. That's why so many such publications (and schools) in Taiwan are sub-par. For a real professional, such work would present a chance to grow and develop text-creation and other curriculum development and pedagogical skills. Simply put, he thought the job was beneath him because he was a hack at that particular job, and the crappy company he worked for doesn't do the profession any favors, either.

Moral of the story? Get your facts right before you write about a profession you know nothing about.

And finally, okay, look. This author didn't care for the book being in the third person, which creates not only wonky referencing but a sense of pomposity that just doesn't need to be there. It was a poor narrative choice that detracted - and distracted - from the otherwise very interesting story, she said. But, beyond that...how does she say this?

When a fairly large section, and several passages interspersed later through the narrative, reference how much one has  read in such a way as to come off as bragging about how well-read one is rather than telling a good story about a journalist's life in Taiwan which is all I really want to read about, one comes off as...well...also a bit pompous if not outright sybaritic. I didn't think those paragraphs added much to the overall story. He's a good journalist and well-read, we get it. If he had interwoven observations and references based on his wide and diverse reading it may have come off a little better. As it was I was not terribly interested in paragraphs about all the stuff he's read. Great. I've read a lot of it too. Do you want a gold star?

That, and his disparaging of English teachers (discussed above) and bloggers (discussed below) were the book's greatest weaknesses. I would not go so far as to say it caused me to dislike Cole. I have respected and will continue to respect his excellent work, and having never met him, it is not fair for me to make any such judgments. But, you could say it put me off a bit. I can see why Ben Goren called him "alienating", although I have no such personal story to corroborate that. That said, we have a rather large number of mutual friends, people I respect immensely, so perhaps he is more likable than he at times comes across in this book.

As for the bloggers, because I seem determined to make this review as long and messy as possible, I find a lot to disagree with. There are plenty of idiots, but there are also plenty of excellent Taiwan bloggers. I won't go so far as to group myself in with them - at the end of the day I'm a loud woman with opinions and a platform and that's about all, and I write Lao Ren Cha for personal pleasure rather than to try and get readers - but it is quite unfair to imply that excellent personal blogs that comment on politics, such as The View from Taiwan, Letters from Taiwan and Frozen Garlic are amateurish or beneath Cole's own work (I do not imagine that my blog was in any way considered as an instigator of those comments, simply because I assume Cole doesn't read it, nor, given my proclivity for sailor-mouthed vulgarity, should he necessarily do so!) What really bothered me was his assertion that such people, who don't have the access he does, "shouldn't" have a voice. To quote my ever-oratorically-appropriate cousin, you can fuck right off with that.

Nobody gets to decide who "should" and "shouldn't" have a voice. That's for a bygone era. Now, everyone with a computer and rudimentary writing skills has a platform, but that does not necessarily mean they have a voice. You can get a free blog and write what you want, but if what you write is crap, nobody is going to read you (or at least not anyone in any great enough numbers to matter). The readers decide who has a voice or not with their clicks and eyeballs. The downside of that is not that unqualified people comment, but that qualified people feel reduced to creating clickbait headlines and going after angles that will hook readers rather than the story people actually need to know. That's why Taiwan is so often shoehorned into stories about China. In the end, though, good people do tend to stand out and get readers, and incompetent ones don't get read and don't get link-backs. The readership tends to sort the wheat from the chaff pretty accurately I'd say.

I'd also like to note that towards the end of the book he writes about how mainstream media is failing and alternative media is increasingly becoming the place to turn to. Wouldn't that also include personal blogs?

Such comments, again, only serve to put readers off Cole's larger narrative by dint of making him seem like a less likable, more priggish person than perhaps he is.

I'm also curious who these bloggers who "revile" him and other journalists are. Seems to me most decent bloggers are big fans of Cole's work, myself included. He seems to group them in with the "white wise men" he so often references, but I honestly don't have a clue, blogger-wise, who he is talking about unless there are a ton of blogs I haven't noticed. For now, though, I feel like he's describing a world at odds with my observations.

A few quibbles before I finish this.

I was happy to see in the Afterword that he changes his previous "the KMT is not so bad, they are a modernized political party functioning in a democracy" into something more realistic. I may strongly dislike the KMT as a whole, but I do realize that individuals within it are not all necessarily evil, corrupt, chauvinistic or incompetent. I also appreciate that not everything reported as done by the "evil underhanded KMT" went off exactly as it was reported by pan-green publications and that not all pan-green politicians are great people or good leaders.

However, the idea that the past is the past and now they're a perfectly normal political party? No, again, you can fuck right off with that. A normal political party doesn't withhold transitional justice or try to ignore-away its past the way the KMT has. They don't keep records from the Martial Law era sealed to a large degree and hold the line that victims and their families - many of whom still don't know what happened to their ancestors - should just forget it and move on. As the descendant of genocide survivors who are also being told to "just forget it" by the Turkish government, in my gut I feel that that is simply not acceptable and is proof that the KMT is not, and likely never will be, a normal and modernized political party.

Furthermore, this idea that these "white wise men" Cole references parroted the DPP party line for years, which was both self-serving and self-defeating, and that they called the youth and their critics "brainwashed" by the KMT. Certainly a few did do that, but what I saw during the Ma years was those "white wise men" (who all seem to think they're freakin' Confucius) towing the KMT, not the DPP, party line! It was all about how ECFA was good (it wasn't), the economy was bad under Chen but good under Ma (not true), that closer ties with China was invariably and in every situation a good thing (wrong again), the DPP were "troublemakers" (nope) and pro-independence "agitators" were the "brainwashed" ones, and the students impetuous and naive. All that nonsense. Maybe it was because I stopped reading the Taipei Times soon after its quality dropped, but unless I'm living on a different planet, the commentary he heard and the commentary I heard was quite different indeed. Any given Economist article on Taiwan from that time period will show you what I mean.

I have a few things to say about noting that a journalist was "female" without that adjective being necessary, the ridiculous Taiwan/Israel comparison (don't get me started on that) and the unnamed-but-we-know-who-it-is reference to Ralph Jennings (the short of it is that my reasons for disliking Jennings have nothing to do with his wife, whom I hadn't known and don't care is Chinese). I'll save all that for another time, maybe.

I'll end with this: despite its flaws, it was an engaging book and quite fascinating to read about someone else's experiences in Taiwan just as I was having my own, very different, experiences. I enjoyed some but not all of the autobiographical elements, overall wanting to know more about Taiwan. So, in the end, I have to say it has whet my appetite for Cole's next book, Black Island, which I have the feeling I will enjoy even more.

Has Taiwan made me more feminine?

Before you start thinking of Betteridge's Law here, I actually think the answer to this one might be a qualified 'yes', or I wouldn't be writing it. It is a bit navel-gazey, so if you're not into that sort of thing you might want to sit this one out. I even post lots of pictures of myself like the narcissist I not-so-secretly am!

Some of you know me in real life. You know I am not, and have never been, particularly feminine. Although I identify and present as a straight cisgender woman, I have gone through periods of questioning not my gender identity so much, but how much I wanted to have anything to do with the whole concept: there are people who don't desire to be either or any gender, and I briefly considered whether that, rather than 'not very feminine but otherwise female', was a better fit for who I was. The Jenna who landed in Taipei 10 years ago wouldn't have started a blog that, at times, focuses on women's issues - it was only several years later that I did so, after what I now feel was a fairly major personality upheaval, though I can't point to what exactly changed.

That Jenna also didn't cut, style or wear her hair down, and mostly wore jeans, khakis, cargo pants, Tevas or sneakers and plain solid-color t-shirts. She certainly didn't wear makeup and she rarely wore accessories. When she did they were small, often single charms on leather chains. Her favorite clothing color appeared to be some variation on brown. She tended to just look at the camera and smile without worrying too much if she looked good.

Does the person I describe - the person I very much was - resemble this?



Other than the no-makeup thing of course. I still don't wear makeup because, as a wise woman once said, "ain't nobody got time for that".*

Because that's what I look like as of this month, at least when my hair is cooperating, which it does more often now that I put effort into it. Effort pre-Taiwan Jenna would not have even considered putting into it long enough to reject the notion. She also would not have worn that necklace, nor would she have taken a selfie let alone posed in quite that way for it. She was a bit thinner (when you get married and hit your thirties you gain some weight, I refuse to feel bad about it although I am working to live a healthier lifestyle overall) but overall 2016 Jenna tries harder, looks a bit more feminine, and it shows. (This photo was cleaned up for color, and I removed a zit, but is otherwise accurate - Other Jenna would not have bothered to clean up the photo at all).

That other Jenna? She looked more like this:


Brendan and I weren't dating yet in this photo from our trip to Beijing, but you wouldn't know it

Or this:


That's not blush or rouge - I'm just sunburned

Or, if she wore her hair down, this, which I'm mostly showing you for the amusement factor:


This is not the outfit or pose of someone who gives a damn about how she looks - also, cheese
(I swear I am not stoned in this photo, but I would forgive you for thinking otherwise)

Note that it's not just the clothing, accessories and hair that have changed, it's the manner of how I relate to the camera, smile and pose. This is not reflected in every character trait I have: some things have not changed - I'm still not ashamed of burping in public if I have to, I've started drinking stronger alcohol (Other Jenna probably would have gone for wine or a sweet cocktail, whereas Jenna Today keeps a bottle of Laphroaig in her home office), I still swear like a particularly surly sea captain, I'm still a bit loud and I laugh like the megaviral Chewbacca mask woman (to the point where a friend pointed out that our laughs are eerily similar and I can't disagree). I still don't wear high heels.

But some things, honestly, have. I own more than two hair products, a round brush and a hair dryer which I actually use sometimes. Other Jenna seriously did not have a hair dryer - what's wrong with regular air? Air works. Those hair products come from Aveda, where Other Jenna would never have shopped. I have a bottle of Chanel No. 5 (it was my mom's, she would have wanted me to use it - waste not want not and all) that I actually wear, I have a bag of high-end makeup that I still don't wear, but break out for special occasions (Other Jenna didn't even wear makeup to weddings or job interviews). I've switched to big jewelry, lots of scarves and bright colors, and actually wear skirts. I own a sundress! Other Jenna never owned a sundress. I do not own a pair of khakis or a pair of cargo pants, which Other Jenna would have found incomprehensible. I used to wear men's jeans but don't anymore. I even buy women's sneakers in more typically feminine colors (not pink - ugh no - but purple, fuchsia and teal are fine. Other Jenna wore gray, navy or black sneakers). I own a pair of heels! They are not very high, and they're boring and black and from Clark's, but I can hear other Jenna screaming. Heels!

There's no proof that this has anything to do with living in Taiwan - people change naturally all the time, but I can't help but think that Taiwan has had some sort of influence.

As much as I write about how Taiwan is a pretty good place for women, how, despite it not being a gender-equal paradise by any means it's the best you'll find in Asia and many of the problems found here are also found in Western countries, I have to say that there is a greater societal expectation of women looking and acting more feminine, and my "Get Out of Jail Free" card because I'm a foreigner doesn't work very well to let me out of it. I've never quite been asked the question I was once asked in China - excuse me, would you mind telling me if you're male or female? in the most polite Chinese the person could muster - but I did have a student once blurt out, after I pointed out that they were teaching me Taiwanese swear words that they admitted they wouldn't say in front of a woman, "you are a man!"

He meant "you don't come across as particularly feminine so I am comfortable treating you like one of the guys", but...heh.

For every makeup-free fortysomething on the MRT and every obasan who will cut you if she doesn't get her way, I sometimes feel bombarded with far more oblique references to expectations that I, and every other woman, should make certain efforts to look and act like stereotypical women. From the office workers at my old job pointedly complimenting me the one day I did wear makeup, to much more open comments about my looks - I know I'm no stunner and I'm not sure I ever cared, but thanks for that - and what I am, vs. what I should be, wearing to students and acquaintances openly discussing how women liked to shop and look pretty, and being genuinely surprised when I said I wasn't a huge fan of either, it's just more out in the open here. All your ideas that Asia is a place where people don't say what they mean and communication is indirect, between-the-lines, high-context culture etc. etc.? Yeah, no. Not when it comes to commenting on looks or gender roles. Not at all.

In terms of looks, it seemed to start fairly soon after arriving. About a year or so in, I went to a wedding back in the US and wore makeup for the first time in years, and a dress which is just nuts:



Then I started to cut and even sort of style my hair, though I didn't keep up with dying it:


It's Margarita O'Clock at the long-closed Yuma!

Then I started paying more attention to my overall dress, hair and looks:



...and then one day I woke up and I was using premium hair products, wearing skirts and statement necklaces and thinking about how I smelled beyond "not like anything which is better than how humid Taiwan weather makes a lot of people smell". And then I took the picture at the top of this post.

Would I have changed as much without the influence of Taiwan - that is, does Taiwan have nothing to do with what would have been a natural evolution of my personality regardless of where I lived? Maybe. But somehow, I don't think so. I just don't see how I would have started to give a shit without the fairly common, open comments on how I and other women look and the constant, always-there, sometimes-tacit-sometimes-not expectations here how how women present themselves. Granted, the US has those too, but I do feel they're not shoved in your face quite as much. People don't openly comment on your skin, eyes, lack of makeup etc. there, at least not as often.

I can honestly say, as well, that I care far less how I look when I go back to the US for a visit. When I moved to Taiwan I couldn't imagine bringing the one fancy pair of shoes I owned - knee high black leather boots, which I still have 'cause they're quality - I couldn't imagine needing or wanting to wear them. Fancy shoes were for the US, I thought. Now I have them here and wouldn't dream of packing them for a trip to the US, because sneakers are fine, who cares? Naw, it's fine, I know I'm in PJ bottoms but I'll run to the store, it doesn't matter, nobody cares, it's just upstate New York.

(To be fair one time when I really don't give a damn in Taiwan is when I'm going to Wellcome or 7-11, because no matter how shabbily I'm dressed someone is always wearing something more jacked up than me and the clerks couldn't give any less of a damn).

It could be that I've gone from a twentysomething cube monkey in a crap office job in the US and no disposable income to a thirtysomething professional with a reasonable amount of disposable income. It could be that I take my job and therefore how I present myself for it more seriously.

And I can say that while I've started putting more effort into my appearance, my core personality hasn't changed much. If anything, I swear more than I used to and am far more frank and, at times, caustic than I used to be (I'm still learning when to shut my trap). I just don't care as much what people think of who I am inside - if they don't like Meanie McSwearalot that's their fuckin' problem - as much as perhaps I do care how I present myself on the surface. So some things haven't changed, or at least, some parts of me have not become more feminine.

But some, most certainly, have. Even personality wise - Other Jenna wouldn't have cared that she doesn't really have a 'BFF' nearby (and it's true, I don't have a bestie in Taiwan, lots of friends, even very close friends, but not another woman I can talk about periods&vaginas&boys&hair-in-weird-places&stuff with). That's not a bad thing, but I do wonder sometimes what is up with the statement necklaces.

Taipei: The New Old Berlin

So I was reading this article about how Berlin has changed and, as I read it, something about the old, pre-cool Berlin that the writer describes felt familiar.

I can't point to any one quote that captured this for me, just an overall feeling - a modern, capitalist, free city (well, half-free) that was not particularly inviting to outsiders, was off the beaten track, and was full of grubby neighborhoods that you could live in if you wanted cheap rent. If you were there it was because you wanted to be there, and not anywhere else, but anyone who wanted to be anywhere else generally did not give Berlin a second look. The "beautiful people" were in other cities (London, Paris, Milan).

And I realized, it reminded me of Taipei now. Taipei is not particularly cool. It doesn't have the cachet with Westerners that Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong or Tokyo (or more recently, Seoul) do, or even Bangkok or Singapore. Tourists from other parts of Asia come here but it is not a global tourist hotspot by any standard, and wasn't a tourist hotspot at all until Chinese tourism opened up. You are here because you want to be here - at least I am here for that reason - and not anywhere else. It's very local, and looming just across the straight is a massive Communist threat. I highly doubt Chinese missiles are going to rain down on my head anytime soon, but some days you can't help but wonder and be reminded of that during the occasional air raid drills. The beautiful people are in those other cities, and with them their beautiful overpriced nightspots and commercialized bar and restaurant scenes.

It can be nice and shiny and new - look at Xinyi (or don't - I kind of prefer not to). But entire neighborhoods are a bit grubby, and you have to look more deeply to find their charms (which they do have). It's so cool because it's not cool at all.

And, like that older version of Berlin, you have to work to understand it, and you might not always like it at first. You may remember that I did not really like Taipei when I first arrived. It was hard - foreigners generally make friends with coworkers when they first land but I didn't care for most of mine (the ones I liked I still didn't feel that close to, and they have pretty much all since left Taiwan). I cried on my birthday, after eating dinner alone at a terrible Indian restaurant, two weeks after arriving, on the Muzha line MRT because I could look down through rain-streaked windows at people on the street all going somewhere they belonged and probably seeing people who cared about them in lives that were anchored in some way, and I had none of those things.  It took another year or so before I felt like Taipei was alright, and probably another year after that before I began to really feel it, and Taiwan, was someplace special.

As an aside, so far I can count on one hand the number of people who know why this blog is called Lao Ren Cha. There is no special reason why I don't publish the reason publicly other than I never really felt like it. The people who know I felt, for whatever reasons I had at the time, deserved to know. Some still do! But, it's not a big deep secret, and perhaps someday I will write about that. What I'll say now is that it was very much intentional - not just a pretty name - and is very much directly related to my experiencing Taipei first in a muddy, dark, monochromatic sepia and only later a stunning, clear azure blue. It took more time than you would ever think such a thing would require.

And I'm not alone - when my cousin visited recently and stayed for a semester, he took time to adjust too. At first absorbing everything, then feeling a bit down due to the unrelentingly bad weather, then finally realizing one day that he had a solid group of friends and that Taipei was a super cool city to be in. The Taipei effect is not immediate.

I do wonder, as Taipei gets cooler - maybe not Seoul-level cooler but cooler nonetheless, with its plethora of perfect little cafes and increasing number of tour buses, increasing rents and gentrifying neighborhoods if it will start to become a victim of its own coolness. Part of me hopes it will bypass the Brooklyn effect, as it feels like it's already become too expensive to truly be a hip haven - and all the cool kids are already taking advantage of the better weather and cheaper rents in Tainan.

I wonder, I guess, if in 10 years (assuming I am still here, which I may be), what was an off-the-beaten track choice for building a life in Asia will start to be THE place to be and it will start to lose some of its street-level vibrancy and slightly grubby charm. Will I feel like that disaffected old expat in 10 years, complaining about all the new kids and how "this city isn't what it used to be"?

Yes, I do realize expats before me have already said that, but I wasn't here then so LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU.

Part of me wants Taipei to get that international recognition. Part of me wants it to stay the way it is.

Ways Taipei Has Ruined Every Other City

Honestly, I feel like I've written something like this before, but after a bit of a search I couldn't find it. I've written about how a lot of people overlook all the stuff Taipei has gotten right, and it's street-level vibrancy and convenience actually, surprisingly, mirrors what I would call good urban planning. But that's not quite what I'm trying to say here.

There are just so many things that I've grown accustomed to, to the point of insisting on them, or taking them as a given, that it is now hard to imagine living in another city. I just don't see how another city could provide everything Taipei does. Let's have a look:

1.) The MRT

Me in another city:
"What do you mean there are no public restrooms?"
"What do you mean I can't have a free umbrella that someone left behind?"
"What do you mean the metro is closed because it's on fire?"
"I honestly do not understand why it took any more than 2 hours, let alone 2 years, to fix this escalator"
"Is that a mouse? Seriously WTF"
"Wait wait wait, you want me to either pay sky-high rent or live over a mile away from the nearest metro station? Why? Why would I do that?"
"You expect me to walk more than ten minutes to get to the MRT?"

Seriously, I live a bit closer to one MRT station on a less convenient line - maybe a 5-minute walk if you book it - and a little farther from one at a transfer station - maybe a 10-minute walk. I often moan to myself about taking the station a bit farther away because I so readily expect a 5-minute walk that a 10-minute walk feels like a real hassle. What am I, Walkie McWalkerson? The MRT should come to my door!

Now think about how I'd do in any major Western city!

2.) Breakfast and Coffee

I like to patronize those super unhealthy breakfast shops because I am too lazy to make my own breakfast more often than I'd like to admit. I like that if I'm in a rush they even have sandwiches waiting.

There are two of them within a 30-second walk of my front door.

But I believe in compromise. It's clearly too much to ask that any city have a place for me to live where a breakfast joint is 30 seconds away on foot. I'm willing to double that and make it a minute because I'm generous. The idea that if I want breakfast I have to walk for more than one minute, though? Blasphemy.
If you can't give me breakfast in one minute or less, your city is bad and you should feel bad.

The same is good for coffee. If there is a neighborhood where you can't get coffee within a short walk of your apartment, I don't want to hear about it.

3.) Other Food

A lot has been said about Taipei's culinary scene, I'll leave that be. Here's what I want to know about cities back in Western countries - what the hell is wrong with you that you think it's OK to charge that much for food? Don't you know I can get 10 potstickers for, like, a dollar fifty in a real city? And while I know Western goods are more expensive here, I have to laugh at prices back in the West for basic produce. Fresh cilantro, spinach, peppers etc. cost what now? Are you mad? 

4.) Cheap rent

Growing up I always thought that if you wanted to live downtown you could, you'd just be in an apartment, and if you wanted a house you could spend the same amount and move to the suburbs. But outside any city I'd want to live in in the US (hint: I don't want a lifestyle based around driving, so that's, like, two cities, maybe three if I'm generous, the rest are not even on my radar because who even drives? Seriously), it feels like you can either rent an apartment in the suburbs, buy a house in the far exurbs and enjoy your 2-hour-each-way commute, or just not live in the city at all because who the fuck can afford that? What I would call reasonable downtown rent is now the rent expected in the 'burbs or outer boroughs, and the rent in cities themselves just isn't even a thing in this universe it's so unreal.

In Taipei I get 30 ping right downtown for less than $1000USD a month, and I have a doorwoman and elevator. Suck it, The West!

5.) Urban Driving

Already covered this. I know how to drive, I even have a license, but I don't do driving really. Not my thing. I put my money where my values are and take public transit. Most American cities require you to have your own vehicle - pretty much any city outside of New York, Washington DC (where you still actually do need a car if you want to get anywhere with any modicum of convenience), Boston and maybe Chicago, and all but one of those cities is still inconvenient without a car. I do not understand this because the whole point of being "urban" to me is that it, to some degree, equals "don't have to drive". Why would you build a city you have to drive in? What twisted or just plain stupid minds would ever think that's a good idea?

I mean if I had a job in DC like the one I do in Taipei there's no way I'd be able to get between clients without a car, and DC is considered to have "good" (ahem) public transit. I'm not sure why.

Does not make sense. I've got some subterranean homesick alien stuff going on with that.

6.) "I can't socialize, I'm broke!" 

Wait, can't we just get some tai-pi and hang out in 7-11 then? Or I can take the MRT to your place 'cause that's a thing you can do in a real city? Wait, your city doesn't have that? You can't just hang in 7-11 and places require gas and a car to drive to? How do people socialize if they don't have money? They don't? WTF? How is that even a thing?

7.) 7-11 generally

To prove my point, I suggest that you go to a 7-11 in the US, in your buy a beer and some snacks in your pajamas (points if you try to do this at 3am and complain loudly when you realize the 7-11, which clearly needs to be open 24 hours, is not in fact open because there is no God), and sit in that 7-11 drinking your beer and eating your snacks, still in your pajamas. Maybe take a nap. See how long it takes for them to call the police.

In Taipei this is so common that I call it 'street soda' (beer on the street) and my sister calls it Bar 7.

You see? Taipei is better.

8.) Really, I am pretty sure those guys are trained for the zombie apocalypse

When the zombie apocalypse comes in the US, where you gonna go, chump?

I know where I'm gonna go. 7-11! Sure they have breakable windows but I am also fairly convinced that when the zombies attack the 7-11 superstar clerks will take out their 7-11 issued crossbows with cute little cartoons on them and just...take out the zombies. All part of the job. Then we'll drink beer and hang out in the 7 together. My treat, because I can afford it.

9.) The really pleasant lack of street rapists

No, seriously, when a single woman walks down the street after a certain hour (or not even after a certain hour!) in most Western cities, she's all "hey so where my rapists at? Because I know they're here". The threat of assault really is that bad in a lot of places, and there are quite a few you just don't go to alone at night if you are female. Certain areas where you do not walk. You definitely take great care in taxis, too.

I can't think of even one place in all of Taipei where I would not feel perfectly comfortable walking alone at any time of day or night, even down at the riverside park, even in the less-savory parts of town. I'm not saying rape doesn't happen - it does - but your chances of getting assaulted on the street are basically zero.

10.) When I am sick I can afford to see the doctor and I don't have to wait 

This applies more to Americans (but plenty of other Westerners have to wait far too long for their health care). But what else is there to say? In the US even with health insurance I couldn't afford to see a doctor when I needed to. I was barely scraping by even on a salaried office job, so even though I had only a co-pay, I couldn't afford it. It was my bus fare for the next two weeks! Now if I'm sick I see the doctor.

This is related to living in a city because I can usually walk to any clinic I need. Even if I have to take transit it's not particularly far which is a big deal when your problem is immediate and serious, like bronchitis and every second you have to be out and walking around is like agony.

WOW! It's like the FIRST world! UNLIKE my home country!

11.) The speed of telecommunications

Putting this under 'city life' too because perhaps in smaller towns in Taiwan it's not quite the same. I love how in Taipei when I want to go online I just go online and things happen instantly. Slow wifi is a death sentence for a cafe, and slow wifi at home simply doesn't happen, because Taipei (at least) has taken the effort to upgrade all of its cables. None of this "well fiber optic cable runs to your building but inside your building you have copper wire from the 1920s so...enjoy your slow wifi bub". That's nonsense. We live in the first world. The FIRST world. America should try it sometime...

12.) When I want to leave...

...I can take a bullet train and be on the other end of the country* in 90 minutes

HAVE FUN ON AMTRAK SUCKERS

~*~zoom~*~
*none of this "island" nonsense, it's a country

Something Old, Something New

One of the things I love about living in Taiwan - though I suppose this is true for expat life in just about any country - is that I can see something that looks as though it will be the same as something I've seen in the past, but discover something completely new within it.

For example, I happened upon a temple parade in my neighborhood a few weeks ago. It is fairly rare to find one there; they usually take place in the older part of the city, not the most densely populated part of Da'an! I enjoyed it in part because, being more of a neighborhood thing, it didn't draw the massive crowds that the more well-known festivals draw. I was able to get solid close-ups of the temple cohorts and performers, including some more unique or characterful shots that are hard to get when you are pressed in by a massive crowd at, say, Qingshan Wang, Baosheng Culture Festival, the Matsu pilgrimage or others.

The other thing I liked about this festival was that I saw something I'd never seen before, despite having thought I'd "seen it all" as far as temple parades go.

And that is the offering of beer to bajiajiang, or the 8 generals!



This was really interesting to watch - a tiny temple, more like a shrine, in the lanes around Rui'an Street, coming out with a tray of Bar Beer and offering it to the performers. The performers accepted it formally and drank it quickly.

I didn't know this was something you could do, in fact, I wasn't aware they could be seen drinking, talking or using technology (though I have definitely seen bajiajiang chatting, smoking or on cell phones when they shouldn't be.



Another thing I didn't expect was the "temple parade enthusiast" (which I joked might be me in about 30 years) - I had seen spirit medium type parade followers who became possessed during parades but never one who was clearly not possessed but simply wanted to also be a part of the procession. She even had the right outfit, and was allowed to join by the rest of the temple troupes.



I was quite sad to see a truck with poles for sexy temple dancers being used for Three Princes (santaizi) instead, and none of them were dancing on the poles. A pole-dancing child god would be a wonderful photo! 



Otherwise it was a fairly normal neighborhood parade, with small crowds coming out to watch, not unlike, say, a Firemen's Day parade in the US but more colorful and interesting, at least to me. There were two bajiajiang troupes, the second fiercer than the first. These guys were legit scary: 










And the usual cohort of dragon dancers, lion dancers and tall god costumes.







What bothers me, and I feel like writing about here, are complaints about traditional temple activities and how they should be curtailed or banned. Not just temple parades but ghost money, Mid-Autumn Festival barbecue and Chinese New Year firecrackers.

People complain that they are noisy, they are dangerous, they pollute, they annoy neighbors. I have very little patience for this (maybe for the ghost money but honestly the most polluted days to me are not the ones on which it is being burned). People who think the occasional temple parade causes "pollution" don't seem overly concerned about the actual biggest source of noise and air pollution in Taipei - scooters. Or how they are far more dangerous than a few fireworks from a parade.

They say Mid-Autumn Festival BBQ annoys neighbors, without even thinking about how noise trucks, those stupid loudspeakers outside of stores, or community events (Fireman's Day is a big one in my community, and there are quite a few concerts and children's events too) that are just as noisy and maybe just as annoying to some of us. But no, a few days of barbecue is somehow more polluting than Taipei's traffic, and somehow noisier and more annoying than all the other events in the city.

Give me a damn break. I just can't take seriously the idea that temple parades are somehow worse than scooters for traffic snarls, noise, air pollution or general danger and public annoyance, that Mid-Autumn BBQ is worse than a political noise truck or more polluting than the imprint of a large, air-conditioned, concrete department store, that Chinese New Year fireworks are more annoying than the Musical China Douchemobile. That ghost money smoke creates more pollution than factory or traffic exhaust (again, the worst pollution days to me - someone with a weak respiratory system - are actually not ghost money days).

So stupid. So wrongheaded. 



I'm usually not one go to in for conspiracy theories, but I can't help but wonder in whose interest it is to slowly let the air out of the cultural street life of Taipei (and Taiwan in general, but this seems to mostly be a Taipei problem). Whom does it benefit to see temple parades become smaller, quieter and more rare until they disappear altogether? Whom does it benefit to squash autumn barbecues? Whom does it benefit to allow noise trucks and civic events but not firecrackers? Whom does it benefit to ban or discourage election posters so Taipei looks less like a democracy going through an election as you drive around?



Because it seems to me that while temple parades may have originated in China, they aren't really done much in China anymore (one year in China and I saw exactly one lion dancer, hired for the grand opening of a supermarket), and a lot of the quintessentially "Taiwanese" practices, such as bajiajiang, have their origins in a few temples in Fujian and aren't really pan-Chinese in any real sense of the word. I didn't see much ghost money burning in China either although it originated there and I am sure is still practiced to some extent. The others, such as barbecue (which originated in Taiwan with a barbecue sauce ad, but I still love it and anyone who doesn't can shove off) and, well, democracy, are not Chinese in origin at all. Night markets may be a thing in some parts of China - I went to an okay one in Yantai - but most people associate them with Taiwan...and a lot of neighborhoods have become recently and mysteriously interested in closing down night markets in their vicinity where no such animosity existed before.

Is it an attempt, consciously or not, to make Taiwan look more like China?

I don't know, and I realize I'm baiting conspiracy theory by even asking, but that's sure how it feels. 



Some people, for sure, probably aren't even thinking along those lines and think these are the things keeping Taipei from being a truly modern city - quiet, clean and upscale.

Which is of course utter nonsense.

These things are what make Taipei Taipei, rather than, I dunno, some crappy box-building city in China with streaky luxury apartment complexes rotting out by the 80th ring road, or Beijing which is even worse than that despite the cultural heritage because you literally can't breath and they are slowly razing anything of interest (rather like the cultural razing of temple parades and other items of cultural interest in Taipei in favor of luxury apartments, boring civic celebrations and department stores?), or Duluth or Peoria or Des Moines or some other city I wouldn't want to live in that feels like a stand-in for a boring, poorly-planned metropolis more known for suburbs than actual urban vibrancy. 



I mean, if I wanted to live in Duluth I would have moved to Duluth. If I wanted to live in 屁眼, China, I would have moved there.

I live in Taipei because I want to be in Taipei, and a part of that is the street life, the overall street-level liveliness, and the cultural aspects of living here. I'll put up with a traffic jam because a ten-foot god is walking down the road for that. 



Some people do say it's because so many temple events are connected with gangsters, because gangs, temples, businessmen and politicians are in many ways just an inbred group of cronies in Taiwan.

Sure, that's true.

But who cares?



Honestly, of all the things gangs in Taiwan are involved in, this is by a very wide margin the least problematic. Stopping temple parades isn't going to make gangs go away, and even if there is gang activity inherent in them, it's fairly harmless as gang activity goes.

I mean, imagine if the best pasta joint in town were run by the local mafia (which in New York might very well be the case, though not always). Would you want to stop the gang from doing anything illegal or truly problematic? Sure.

Does that mean the pasta restaurant is the problem, and you shouldn't enjoy delicious pasta there? I don't think so. It just doesn't seem like a very strong reason to me. You want to crack down on gangs, crack down on scammers, prostitution rings/pimps/brothels, drug cartels and a scary large percentage of politicians and big business.

The temple parades are not the problem.

Anyway, rant over, enjoy a few more photos: