外國朋友

Riffing a bit on my post about friendship in Taiwan over a week ago...I was chatting with a local acquaintance about the phrase "外國朋友" (or 外國人朋友) - literally "foreign friend".

"It should be pretty good," he said. "In the past, Taiwan didn't have many foreigners, so if a Taiwanese person had a foreign friend, it was some kind of honor."

"An honor? To have a friend who is not from Taiwan? Any friend? Of any age, from any country?"

"Yes. So they are trying to be very nice when they call you 'foreign friend', it's like a friend but higher."

"Hmm. But it seems to me that to say 'foreign friend' makes it clear that that friend is different or set apart."

"Yes! It's true!"

"So to me that sounds like 'these people are my friends, and this foreigner is my foreign friend, like I'm not really a friend the way anyone else is."

"Yes. But it's an honor to that person."

"That local person or that foreigner?"

"That local person, and maybe the foreigner too."

"I guess...an honor, OK, but I don't really want to feel 'different' or 'higher' or have any special honor for being a foreigner. People are just people, you know? 人就是人. 'Higher' doesn't mean 'closer', in fact it feels like there is some distance."

"Yes, probably there is. Maybe that could be a language or culture issue."

"I guess. I know it is hard, and there are a lot of language and culture barriers. But still, I would rather be just a friend. Like people are just people. Have the chance to be closer, not higher. Not some special foreign friend. Anyway it's clear I'm a foreigner, there's no need to actually say so. Nobody will ever mistake me for Taiwanese."

"That is true!"

...

Fortunately, none of my friends say this in my presence (I have no idea, if they mention me at all, if they refer to me as a foreign friend when I'm not around, though). I have heard it, though, and heard myself referred to by others as someone's "foreign friend". I don't worry too much about that because I don't really know the people in question, so that's different from a real, actual friend. I try not to say "Taiwanese friend" unless there is some specific reason why I need to mention that they are Taiwanese (to explain something about an anecdote or joke, for example) or, as in my last post on friendship, I'm actively trying to dissect friendship norms with locals compared to those I have with other expats.

It makes me wonder, though. How much am I a friend and how much am I a foreign friend, and will that ever change? Should it? Is it even a big deal? Is there a bit of distance and maybe a bit of bragging inherent in the phrase foreign friend or am I overanalyzing it as I do everything?

Dunno. You tell me.

The Oldest House in Xindian

"Xindian's first street, those who will tear down this culture are about to become historical criminals" (or something to that effect)

We went with our friend J this past weekend to seek out an old house/shrine in Xindian, near Dapinglin. J had learned that not only did the house still exist, but that it was slated for destruction despite being a fairly important historical relic - the first house built by the first people to settle Xindian in what used to be the only part of Xindian, which is now a forgotten lane off Minsheng Road.

You can reach this area by taking Minsheng Road (which starts near Dapinglin and is not far from the river separating Xindian from Taipei, very near our house in fact) to Lane 86, which is found after driving through a patch of farmland that nobody would really expect in this part of urbanized northern Taiwan, turning in and walking to the temple at the end past some old broke-down houses (which are older than they look I might add). Just before the temple to the left is a gateway with the name of the shrine on it. Go through there and walk down to the end - you can reach the inside by going in through the open door with the room full of junk (a local assured us this was OK to do) or see the outside by heading to the right and going around.

The house was built by the Liu family, the first to settle in Xindian, and they are apparently fighting to keep it (although from the look of the place they don't have the money for proper upkeep).

Meanwhile, the government along with the MRT company is planning to focibly buy up this and all the other land around it to build an MRT depot near the green and soon-to-be-dug yellow lines. Why they can't just build the depot 100 meters to the left is beyond me.

The temple, despite having plants growing out the roof (below), has a few parts (such as the above) where it looks like some restoration work has been done.

The pillars look recently restored, as well.

The lions and door gods are brightly painted.

As the sun set, we wandered back to the more settled area and ran into Mr. Wei, an ebullient, talkative man in his fifties who was polishing eggs (we guess by the sheer number of eggs that he is in the egg business), playing with his granddaughter and keeping an eye on his 90-year old half deaf father in law, Mr. Chen.

We learned from Mr. Wei that he and some other folks on the street, who are mostly Chens, are also opposing the forced tear-down and relocation, but they're more concerned with compensation than history. Basically, "you can take the house and property but give me a fair amount of money". (Although he used much more elliptical speech: "they prepared the bento box, but they won't give it to me unless I demand it" and "they know that if you are eating food and have some candy, a child will cry like my granddaughter. Give her a candy and she'll be happy. All I want is a candy" and "If I buy a scooter and you want to take it from me, and I paid ten thousand kuai for it, but now it's worth four thousand, well, even if you give me four thousand that's OK because I am not selfish and I don't want to cheat anyone. But don't offer me a hundred kuai!").

Basically, they feel that the compensation offered - nay, pushed on them - by the government is insufficient for what the property is worth and what it will cost to relocate.

There's more to it of course - most people in that neighborhood are old-school Hoklo and are deep green (Mr. Wei used to vote KMT, then realized he hated the KMT, and began voting DPP but is disillusioned by Chen Shui-bian's actions: "he promised soda for everyone, but only he got soda and we got water!") and the government of Xinbei city is, of course, KMT. I can't help but wonder if they want to break up a chunk of opposition party voters. That's speculation, of course, but not outside the realm of possibility.

As we talked, Mr. Wei told us that when his father-in-law, Old Chen, was four years old (so 86 years ago) a huge flood washed away much of the area, and the only thing not underwater was the roof of the Liu shrine. His father hid him up there and he survived - "he says you could see all the way to Gongguan and it was just water. Jingmei was underwater. This whole area was underwater."

As he told us the story, I looked at old Chen and realized for the first time that he wasn't wearing pants.

He went inside and came out, still in his wife beater and skivvies, and proceeded to stand in the doorway and look at us as he put on his pants. Ah, to be a 90-year-old man who can take off and put on pants wherever you like...

"Does he speak Chinese?" we asked.
"No, you have to speak Taiwanese to him," Mr. Wei answered.

"Have you eaten rice?" (jia-ba-buei?) we asked, and he just stared ahead.

"He's kind of deaf, you need to shout."
"HAVE YOU EATEN RICE?!"

Old Chen looked at us like we were the strangest things he'd ever seen - three foreigners speaking Taiwanese to him - smiled, and said something (I think it was "I've eaten" - jia ba - but I'm not sure). He then went inside to watch TV.

Mr. Wei gave us a tour of his own house, a rambling jumble of corridors built a hundred years ago of brick and wood shipped from Xiamen, with the old roof beams still intact, and lots of metal and old shingles where necessary - we went all the way out to the old pigsty, now a storage area, and the lemon and mango trees beyond that.

"It's a hundred years old or more," he said, "and they can tear it down I guess, but they have to pay me fairly."

A Shenkeng Pictoral

Shenkeng (深坑) is a town near the southeastern edge of Taipei City, accessible by a quick bus ride from Muzha or a longer bus ride from Jingmei. They've recently started investing in renovating the Japanese-era buildings along the old street, and it remains a popular weekend spot. While there you can also take hikes (see the previous post) or visit the old mansion near the main tourist street's entrance.

As a popular day trip destination from Taipei, Shenkeng sees a lot of people with dogs in bags. I love dogs in bags!

It's also famous for barbecued stinky tofu and stinky tofu in general...worth a try even if you're put off by the smell. I like the spicy kind filled with hot red cabbage pickle.

I won't say much more because anyone who's lived in Taipei for even a brief period knows about Shenkeng, and for those who don't, the above is an adequate introduction. I think it's really true that a picture says more than I could in a long post, so enjoy some pictures!

Day Hike to Paozilun Falls (炮子崙瀑布)

Yesterday we took a lovely and not-too-challenging hike from Shenkeng (深坑) to Cannon Mountain Falls (炮子崙瀑布), a high waterfall known because you can wade into the pool around it and stand under the falls themselves.

The hike itself is outlined in one of the two Taipei Day Trips books by Richard Saunders - and provides fairly good directions. Here are some online directions anyway:

To get there, as you exit Shenkeng Old Street at the end closest to the bus depot and old mansion, turn left and cross the bridge. Head right at the Y and take the next right, which turns at a small shop selling cypress wood items (a good place to pick up cypress oil and other things if you want - I want to go back and get a fruit basket). Cross the large road and head straight up the road that starts at the betel nut shop across from you. Keep right at the sign for 文山 spray painted on a metal fence. Keep going slightly uphill for awhile. Ignore the sign telling you to turn right for Paozilun Trail and keep straight up the steep hill. At the top where it evens out you'll see a very small trail inlet to the left - hopefully there will be cars parked around it, better marking it. It's very easy to miss and doesn't look like the right way (but it is). Turn in and walk up - it's "paved" with blue foam pads (???) and at one point, carpeting. Don't ask - I don't know either - and much of the trail is made of sandbags.

The trail is clear with no deviations or turns - follow it to the falls themselves. (There's a continued trail veering to the left behind the shower if you want to keep going - we didn't).

Some hanging vines in the sunlight along the trail.

It was so hot on the road yesterday that I started to feel dizzy as we climbed and got prickles all over my head, so we sat on the trail for awhile as I drank water, poured cold water on my neck and waited for the feeling to pass. I snapped this picture as I was starting to feel better. The hike is not steep, long or terribly difficult (but would be very slippery in the rain, especially going down) but the time spent under the sun on the road really wiped me out.

Once there, you can set up a picnic (there are chairs lying around a makeshift rest area that you can probably use, or just bring a blanket), wade in the water or sit under the falls. These guys - we suspect they were "brothers" (兄弟) but didn't ask - were having a blast doing just that. Towards the end they all went back under the falls, praying both before and after their showers. It was unclear from their explanation but it seemed as though showering under it was both a spiritual and medicinal act. The water exerts a lot of pressure on whoever is below it, and turns the skin bright red from the pounding, which gets the blood flowing - a practice which is very much a part of Chinese medicine. We believe there's a spiritual component as all of them prayed before getting under the water.

Of course, as wimpy foreigners, we just hung out below the falls and got wet that way under the cold mountain spring. It was perfect after a hot and sweaty hike that nearly knocked me out.

Not every local can handle it - this younger guy went under the falls at the behest of his girlfriend, and really couldn't handle it.

Paozilun (Cannon Mountain) is so named because you often hear thunder but rarely get rain along with it. We heard thunder and beat a quick path back to the road. "Oh, don't worry about it," the guys told us, "you always hear thunder here but it never rains."

Well, it rains a lot in northern Taiwan so we are sure that it does, in fact, occasionally rain here too, so we headed back anyway. As we re-entered Shenkeng proper it did in fact start to rain. I waved to the betel nut girl and her two aunties as we returned to eat some stinky tofu and shaved ice.

Update: chatting with a student about this, he said "it's not that there's a god in the waterfall, it's more that nature is full of gods and spirits. So in dangerous areas people will pray or bring ghost money. You can find a lot of ghost money along Bei-Yi Highway (the winding mountain highway that has been the site of many fatalities between Pinglin and Yilan before the construction of the Xueshan Tunnel) for this reason. So those guys were praying to respect nature, because the waterfall must be a little dangerous. Maybe the pressure can break your neck, or a stone could fall down from it. They're praying to 大自然 - nature."

What's in a name?

Leading off from a recent Facebook discussion on the importance of names, I’d like to talk a bit about naming in Taiwan and what I’ve observed of it.

I know a lot of foreigners who applaud Taiwanese who don’t take English names. I have to say I rather like the convention of having an English name, because the culture surrounding what to call someone (vis-a-vis your relationship to them) is so different as to be confusing, especially for people whose roles in your life are unclear – like foreigners, who don’t always fit neatly into defined circles of acquaintance in Taiwan.

I’m going to change names for this but use relevant examples, by the way – I don’t want to publish my friends’ actual full names, even Chinese names in Pinyin.

Here, though, is why I like having an English name to refer to.

I have a student named “Lin Shu-fen”. Shu-fen is a doctor, about fifteen years older than I am, and she and I get along like gangbusters. I’ve taught her for well over a year at this point in a one-on-one course. She has an English name that she’s not only never used, I only know of it through third-person information. She doesn’t care for it and has never told me of its existence.

Many of you are aware that calling somebody by their first name alone is a sign of a close friend or family level of intimacy, and that people in one’s outer circle would generally call her by a nickname – A-fen? Xiao Shu? Something else? – or some variant on Little, Miss, Mrs. Or Old (Lin Xiaojie, Old Lin, Little Lin). Someone who is not a very close friend, spouse or family member would generally not just call her “Shu-fen”.

In Japan they solve this with the suffix “-san” – anybody can be a –san and it can be applied to either the first or last name. In Taiwan it’s less clear, because as a foreigner you might not know off the bat which other name to use, which is too formal and which is too intimate.

For the first year or so of our acquaintance, I had a really hard time figuring out how to address my student by name. I felt in my gut that “Shu-fen” was too familiar, but all of the common nicknames were unclear – which one to use? I couldn’t call her (or didn’t feel comfortable calling her) A-, Xiao- or Lao- because I don’t want to make any statements about our relative positions or ages, and I couldn’t call her any variant on what in the USA we’d refer to as “Ms. Lin”. I was at a loss. Dr. Lin would have been way too formal, as well, and calling her “Lin Shu-fen” to her face? No.

Being a direct person, once I figured we had a strong enough acquaintance I just asked her directly what she’d like to be called, and explained my predicament honestly. She laughed up a storm and told me that “Shu-fen” was fine, and to go ahead and use that. Phew.

Another student, let’s call him “Chang Ying-de” (I am not sure that’s a real name, but whatevs). We were discussing this issue and he said that many of the people he meets as part of his public-relations heavy job call him “Little Chang” even though he’s in his forties. He has an English name, “Bill”, so of course I use that. We talked about what I would call him if he had no English name and, after thinking about it, told me honestly that he had no idea - that he’d probably just have me call him “YD” (for the first letters of his “name”) or get used to me calling him by his first name in Chinese.

He laughed and agreed that Xiao Chang (“Little Chang”), A-ying and “Xiao Ying” would be very strange indeed, but “A-Chang” or “Mr. Chang” in English or Chinese would be entirely too formal.

(Note – the “ying” in his pseudonym is correct, and anyone who called him “Xiao Ying” now would be calling him 小英, the adopted public nickname of Tsai Ying-wen, who is running for President in 2012. Her campaign posters all read “I just want Little Ying!” – 我就要小英!”so he’s abandoned that nickname…”too weird!”)

“Would you be OK with it if I had to call you ‘Ying-de’?”
“Honestly, if you ask me that now, no. That would be too weird. It’s not that I don’t like you as a teacher or enjoy our class, it’s just that you’re not my best friend or close family member. But if I had no English name I would get used to it.”

I’m not sure I would, though. I got used to it with Shu-fen, but I don’t know about doing that as a matter of course. I do of course run into other students, usually in short-term or seminar courses who I see briefly and then never again or not for years, who don’t have English names. I call them by their Chinese first names because I have no choice, but generally speaking I prefer to try to adhere to the local culture as much as possible.

The same holds true for my friends. While I do have friends here I’d consider close, I’d still feel weird calling them outright by their Chinese given names (my student confirmed this – that even his good friends have nicknames for him, and it would really have to be a close, almost brotherly, friendship before someone would actually call him Ying-de). Fortunately, they all have English names – Sasha, Lilian, Roy, Ray, Cathy, Cara – so I don’t need to worry about that. I’d feel less weird calling them by their given Chinese names than I would students, but it’s still a stretch. Yichen, Chiya, Hsin-yi, Xiaozhong, Yicheng…I dunno. I guess I could, but it would feel off somehow.

Granted, I don’t have the same hangups about my own Chinese name, 張白蓮. I’m fine with people calling me “Bai-lian” and would in fact feel weird being called “Chang Xiaojie”, “Xiao Lian”, “A-lian” or any variant thereof. Of course everybody just calls me Jenna, or they’re calling because they’re Zhonghua Telecom, my goat milk company or they’re my Chinese teacher, and they just call me by my full name (Chinese teachers have occasionally just called me “Bai-lian”). I love how the goat milk company, who I never revealed my occupation to, calls me Teacher Chang.

I chose that name, by the way, for specific reasons. Chang because that was the common surname when I lived in Guizhou, and when I chose it, I had no idea that I’d someday live in Taiwan. If I could choose again – I can, but it’s a pain as my Chinese name is on my resident visa and my three chops all say “Chang” – I’d choose Lin (林) as it evokes my middle name, Lynn. “Bai” because my given name, Jenna, means “white and pure” and “lian” (lotus) because my maiden name meant flower in its native language (白花, or literally “white flower”, is a terrible name. It sounds like something a country girl or possibly betel nut beauty would have). My Chinese name means something to me – that’s why I don’t mind when people use it, and I went to the trouble of getting it added to my visa.

Side note as I end this – I’m endlessly fascinated by the reasons behind one’s choice of name, if one has the ability to choose. Yet another reason why I like seeing English names in Taiwan; people can choose them. It’s true that many people don’t – that they keep whatever name they were given in their cram school or by their pre-school teacher or parents, or they just use initials, a la YD, YR, JK, CC. You get an equal number of foreigners with meaningless Chinese names Occasionally, though, you get someone who has really put thought into their English name – I’ve met an Ansel who was really into photography, and a Margaret who chose her name because her grandmother was named Pearl (in Chinese), and she wanted to honor her but felt “Pearl” was too easy – so she picked a name that meant “Pearl”. I’ve met a Blade – changed from “Kevin” – because he wanted to stand out and have a name that sounded confident (his words).

I love hearing those stories, as well as the fairly common tale of changing one’s Chinese name to affect one’s luck. I don’t think this actually works as I’m not superstitious, although it could be a self-fulfilling prophecy: I do think people take on characteristics of how their names feel and sound even if their meaning isn’t evident, and not necessarily in the most obvious way (I’ve met plenty of lovely Angelas btu never met an Angela whom I’d say was “angelic”). If you change your name because you want a different verbal talisman to associate with yourself, it is entirely possible that the new name will affect your personality because you allow it to do so psychologically.

Of course, Taiwanese parents will often attempt this as well. I once had a student named Wen-ya, which is a name evoking ladylike grace. “I have that name because my parents changed my old name,” she said.

“Why?”
“Because I was too much of a…like a boy…”

“A tomboy?”
“Yes! So they gave me a name that is really for a lady to make me more like a lady.”

“Did it work?”
“No!”

Although perhaps if she’d chosen it herself, it might have worked just fine.

Navigating Friendship in Taiwan

Enjoy this horrible photo where only one person looks halfway decent of some of my friends here...before someone asks me to take it down because we all look pretty awful.

I’ve been talking a lot with expat friends about friendship in Taiwan, making local friends and maintaining a social circle in ways that we’re accustomed to, and found a few interesting trends among what those friends are saying (and my own experience).

One thing that people seem to universally agree on – people in Taiwan don’t seem to pick up ‘random’ friends or create diverse groups of friends in the way we do back home. I am sure it happens, but it doesn’t seem to be the norm. Back home, I counted among my circle of friends a guy I met because he was one table over at an Indian restaurant and, as he was south Indian, noted how I was eating like a local. Another I met at a bus stop. In Taiwan, one of my best friends – no longer in Taipei, sadly – I met at a swimming pool. Another few have come from Teh Internets. All of these people have met and more than a few are now independently friends as well.

Of course, plenty of other friends I met in more typical ways – through work, or a club or mutual friends, or my former college friends with whom I’m still close. Maybe I’m the weirdo here – one more shy friend from back home has noted “yeah, you meet people at a bus stop and a month later they’re coming over for dinner and bringing the wine. Some of us just can’t do that!”

I don’t think it’s that weird, though. I do think this happens far more often back home than it does here.

It was noted that it’s typical in both cultures to make friends in groups – classmates and former classmates, colleagues, peers in your industry, and it seems much more common to actually socialize with family as though they’re your friends (and I say this as someone whose sister is also counted as a good friend and who will happily socialize with her brother-, sister- and cousin-in-law). You see a lot more of “I’m going out with my cousins” here and a lot less of “yeah, we met at the bus stop”. It seems like there are three typical circles – colleagues, classmates and family…and not a lot more than that.

I guess my point is I feel more like my friendship “circles” back home are circles that have spokes flying off here and there, and I have a lot more independent attachments to people than many Taiwanese seem to, and I feel more inclined to invite them out together than many Taiwanese seem to. I stick less in tight circles of classmates, family and coworkers than the Taiwanese seem to.

I’ve been told by locals and expat observers alike that it is fairly rare that a typical Taiwanese person will go out of their way to talk to and socialize with someone totally new unless introduced by a mutual friend or that person entered a previously existing circle of coworkers, family or classmates.

Which is all fine if you’re local, but if you’re not it can make it difficult to make local friends. If you don’t have a milieu waiting for you – work, school or family – in which to enter those circles, it’s harder (and made harder still by the aforementioned linguistic and cultural barriers). It does, therefore, make sense that while most foreigners are likely to date locals, they tend to befriend other foreigners with the exception of possibly a few local colleagues and a language exchange partner.

I want to say before I continue that this hasn’t really been a problem for me – I have many local friends, if anything I’d say I have more local friends than expat ones (although I have a fair amount of both). I've written about this before but but it bears repeating: I do feel that there are expected and established communities and circles where an expat would typically make friends: at work or in class, or going out on the weekend with a larger group of people your own age - whether that's 21 or 51 - and joining clubs with those same people. I feel too old for the young buxiban and student crowd but way too young and in a different place in life vis-a-vis the older professional crowd. I don't quite fit into the ABC crowd.

And yes, that makes it hard to socialize, although I like to think I've been successful regardless.

So, some trends I've noticed:

The first is that I think it’s more than language and more than the expected cultural gaps that make it easier, and therefore more common, for expats to socialize with other expats and not as much with locals. If everyone around you tends to socialize with coworkers and classmates, then you will too: and your classmates and coworkers are usually other foreigners. If those around you are less likely to make random friendships, you’re less likely to have the opportunities for connection. So it’s not so much about misunderstanding or misinterpreting actions, and not about communication, but more about a mode of socializing that isn’t so easy to breach for outsiders.

However, I would guess that like me, most longer-term expats have a number of local friends. What I’ve noticed here is that they tend to be one’s girlfriend’s friends (this makes the assumption that a huge number of expats are men with Taiwanese girlfriends, but that assumption is of course based in truth), “Chinese teacher” colleagues from the English schools where they work, and language exchange partners turned friends. Of course, if you’ve got a non-teaching job or are in school with other local students your chances of cultivating more local friendships go up.

What I rarely see, which is a shame, are groups composed of expats and locals in a mix, socializing together. Maybe this does happen more often than I think, but I don’t see it because I’m not exactly a regular on the bar scene and I don’t belong to any local clubs or groups (my work, Chinese study, marriage and current social circle keeps me busy enough). This is where I’d love to hear experiences from other expats that buck the narrative I’m describing.
That said, when I do go out with my mixed group of foreigners and locals – a group that’s ever-evolving as friends are made and friends leave, including Taiwanese friends who have left to study abroad – I feel like we’re the only group like that around.

Another thing I’ve noticed – expat friendships with locals tend to be mostly female. I don’t mean relationships – I mean friendships. This is true for me, as well – and I can’t really explain why (but I’ve discussed it with other expat friends who agree. Making local female friends is fairly easy, but making local friends who are male just doesn’t seem to happen much). I have a few, although all but one are currently not in Taiwan due to work or study. I’d try to suss out some theories on this but none has ever really had enough sticking power that I can confidently post it and defend it. I’ve consistently found, however, that my very small handful of male Taiwanese friends tends to be the exception.

It also seems to be true that while plenty of friendships in Taiwan exist between men and women, it all seems to be in groups: Classmates, Coworkers, Family. Locals I’ve talked to (mostly students) have confirmed this: you rarely get an independent male-female friendship. If you do, people start to gossip and wonder. If a man and a woman are hanging out one-on-one consistently, it’s assumed that they’re in a pre-dating stage, and a married person (such as myself) who has a friend of the opposite gender will sometimes be suspected of an affair. One of my students came out and said that she lost touch with most of her male friends from before her marriage – it wasn’t that she didn’t want to be friends, but it felt “strange” to spend time with them now that she was married.

Which is totally not how I feel at all – one of my closest friends in Taiwan is male (another expat, but still). It would strike me as ridiculous to give up my friendships with men because I’m in a relationship or married. I know it happens in the USA, but it seems to happen on a smaller scale.

Yet another observation – and I’m not quite sure how to word this because it’s supposed to be an observation based on what many of my other friends have said as well as my experience but could so easily be misinterpreted as me complaining, which is absolutely not the intent – is that “foreign friends” of locals in Taiwan seem to get fewer invitations out from their Taiwanese friends than they do from other expats, or that they would back home. I do believe this has to do with the fact that we don’t fit into Classmates, Coworkers or Family, so it would be awkward to invite us to those gatherings, and if you’re the only expat friend of that person, there’s no easy place to fit you in. Almost like a curiosity (although that sounds bad, and conveys a tone I don’t know if I really intend). You might get invitations for lunch or coffee, but you wouldn’t often be invited to, say, a house party or a restaurant gathering. So what happens is that your local friends know all of your friends, but you know few or none of your local friends’ friends (again, exceptions exist in my own life and generally I am happy with the invitation reciprocity I receive).

I can see, though, how a typical expat might cultivate some local friendships and then, after awhile, wonder why he or she doesn’t seem to get as many return invitations, and wonder if he or she is being snubbed, when really the local friend just isn’t sure what sort of gatherings to invite their expat friend to attend. That right there is a huge cultural gap: I remember once someone I know was narrating advice she’d heard aimed at Taiwanese who want to practice their English, and one item was “maintain friendships with foreigners”. “But why would they have to be told to do that?” came the question. Honestly, I can see why. It can make you really think - and question - when your invitations are accepted with alacrity, but you rarely get the same types of invitations in return, and maybe not as frequently (or maybe it's just that I'm a planner and party-thrower and the friends I've made aren't like that).

Another culture gap – family coming before friends. I can see how a foreigner who invites a local out and then gets a cancellation at the last minute because “relative X wants to have dinner” or “mom wants the family to go out” might feel slighted. I’ve accepted that this is how it is – back home we’d tell Aunt Mabel we’re not free that day, sorry. Here, a local friend is more likely to cancel with you to have dinner with Auntie Chen.

I’ve also noticed that parties tend to be a lot quieter. To illustrate this, a tableau: imagine walking into a restaurant to find out it’s been booked out for a wedding that day. A Hello Kitty bride and Daniel groom top a pink-tulle covered arch, and a glittering Double Happiness hangs inside a heart above diners’ heads. Pink tablecloths with white and gold flowers. You are disoriented at first, not sure what’s going on, because it’s so quiet. People are talking quietly at their round banquet tables and music is playing, but you see little of the mingling and inter-table socializing that you would in a lively wedding back home.

This is exactly what we observed when we tried to eat at a famous restaurant in Longtan.

Many Taiwanese friends and students have told me that they and people they know are quite shy when it comes to socializing in a party atmosphere – think like your typical house party back in the USA. My local friends generally aren’t like that, with a few exceptions, but I’m speaking from a few experiences as well as talking to others about their experience. I can name several of my local friends who can be quite sociable at the house parties we occasionally throw (usually on Christmas).

Which – again, I look forward to comments that refute this and tell their own story – but my experience has been that house parties just don’t happen, or when they do, they’re small and contained within a group: Classmates, Colleagues or Family. You sit in a circle; mingling is just different. It looks more like this. (I don't agree with the entire post but the picture is quite evocative).

You don’t see a lot of the sort of parties I throw, where I basically invite everyone I know from every group: Classmates and Colleagues (I have no local family). Locals and expats. People I met at the swimming pool. Former students.

I would cover the psychological differences and toll it takes on people who are not extroverted to have to change out social circles every other year or so - especially if they are here long-term and primarily friends with other expats who come and go - but, I dunno, it strikes me as sort of obvious. I am quite extroverted and it can take something of a toll on me, because one goes through high and low periods. Periods where you have a ton of friends, then a chunk goes home and you have very few until you make some new ones, and then some of those go home, and you are less social until you make still more friends, and then BLAMMO! It's been five years and you're only still hanging out with one or two people from your first year here. If you're not naturally inclined to pick up friends, that can be really hard, and having some local friends who are less likely to leave can help stabilize things a bit.

Finally, I’ve noticed that friendships seem to be conducted mostly in English, even though I do speak Chinese. This is partly because my husband generally comes along and while he can understand most of what is said, he can’t easily contribute in Chinese, and I think partly because the Taiwanese are more used to using English because they have to, whereas Chinese is ‘fun’ for me.

And, you know, after five years I’m still trying to work through all of these things. I’m learning to accept that group gatherings here aren’t done in the same way that they are often done back home. I’m learning to accept that my own gatherings will be a bit quieter and probably end earlier (what often happens is that my Taiwanese friends show up and leave at 11:30pm, and the foreigners stay, talk and drink until 2am). I’m learning to accept that the kinds of reciprocating invitations I get will be different, and that that’s just how it is because I’m not a Classmate, Coworker or Family.

I’m also learning to accept that this is expanding my definition of how friendships are conducted, it’s making me more laid-back and giving me more chances to get to know people one-on-one. That it’s OK to have a quieter gathering, that I don’t have to take it personally when Auntie Chen gets precedence, and that I have to completely abandon my notion of timely and accurate RSVPs because it just doesn’t happen.

And, you know, that’s OK. It’s a new perspective. Some parts of it are awkward and difficult to puzzle out, but that’s life, and if you want to maintain friendships you have to learn to be flexible.

Stressed Out Women

Interesting article in the Taipei Times today, and it's regarding women's issues so I thought I'd give it a nod:

Study finds that women are more stressed than men

I'm not sure what commentary to add, but here's a bit of what I think. From the article:

Women experience more stress than men in the workplace and in life in general, and the sources of stress — such as concerns over sexual harassment at work — are the major difference between female and male employees, a study by the Council of Labor Affairs shows.

...

The survey found that regardless of gender, when it comes to work-related stress, employees are most stressed about “company insolvency,” which received an average of 5.86 points. This was followed by “company’s future prospects unclear” (5.83 points), “lay-offs or mandatory retirement” (5.67 points), “unpaid leave” (5.53 points) and “liability involved in company accidents” (5.00 points).

As to sources of stress at home, employees were overwhelmingly concerned with “decreased income,” which garnered an average of 6.35 points, the survey showed.

This was followed by “injury or illness in the family” (6.12 points), “sudden loss of a large amount of wealth or a large increase in living costs” (5.91 points) and “death of spouse, children or siblings” (5.77 points).

The survey also found that women in general were more stressed both at the workplace and at home.

I have to wonder where this is coming from. Could it be that women just worry more in general than men, or Taiwanese women worry more than their male counterparts? I have a hard time believing this, although I do believe that there are some general differences between the genders that are observable in large trends and groups (but absolutely not on an individual level, and part of the world's problem is taking observed trends in groups and applying them to individuals, a la "you're a woman so you must be like this").

I'd say instead that in terms of work and company culture and modern family life, that while the system has evolved to be more egalitarian regarding opportunities and lifestyle choices for women, that some attitudes have not changed and that while women have opportunities in the workplace and home life, that they're not always fully welcome on a more psychological level - where the attitudes people express and the prejudices and notions they more quietly hold and act on create some cognitive dissonance (I don't think I'm quite using the term correctly, but I hope you know what I mean). As in, "yeah, you can become a manager and work your way up the ladder and expect a household of more equal work-sharing, but culturally we're still going to undermine you in ways that are going to create stress for you, and you won't even be able to pinpoint why."

This can take the shape of longer hours that don't allow families to properly care for their children - something that stresses women out more seeing as women still bear the brunt of household duties (which I also don't like, but one topic at a time). It can take the form of a lack of flex-time and work-life balance, of employers and managers who quietly treat women differently or even hold discriminatory views, but whose actions are so subtle as to be hard to pick out and identify. It could be a lack of help with household duties at home, despite a modern culture that accepts that men should take on a more equal share of housework and child-rearing. It can take the form of employers that discourage taking full maternity leave.

Whatever the factors are, I don't think "women just stress out more than men" is one of them.

The source of work-related stress with the largest disparity between the two genders was “sexual harassment,” which ranked No. 28 on the list of most common sources of stress in the workplace.

Yeah, because women experience more sexual harassment by an exponential amount than men - something which is, of course, totally unacceptable but does, of course, still happen.

The study also showed a positive correlation between an employee’s education and work-related stress. The more educated an employee was, the more stress he or she felt at the workplace. Also, those with longer working hours felt more stressed at work.

The study also found a relationship between the type of employment and the level of work-related stress, with employees under contract or under temporary work experiencing more stress than regular employees or those with long-term employment.

This is all pretty obvious: if you have more education, you're probably working at a higher-level white collar type job and while they might not actually be more subject to the changing winds of the economy, it sure feels like they are. Of course longer hours create more stress, as you tire yourself out, you lack work-life balance and you devote an ever-larger chunk of yourself to work, which can stress you out quite a bit when the work you've devoted yourself to is problematic. As someone who has done contract work (and sort of still does), I can tell you that while it suits my personality beautifully, I can see why it would be very stressful for some, and during slow times of year it can cause small amounts of paycheck stress in me, as well.