My Admiration for Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文)

Even though I'm still bitterly disappointed in the election results, I do have a few positive things to say.

First, I can't say enough how much I appreciate the fact that Tsai Ying-wen was a viable female candidate, especially in Asia. Different countries in Asia have had female leaders before: Indira Gandhi, Megawati Sukarnoputri, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, Corazon Aquino, Benazir Bhutto...Golda Meir for those count Israel as Asia (and it technically is - east of the Bosphorus and all - but by that definition I'm part Asian. Haha. Hahaha. Ha. But really, both Armenia and Hatay are east of the Bosphorus, too. Does that really mean I have Asian ancestry? I don't feel it does). I could scour the complete Interwebz for the complete list but I think I've made my point.                    

Of that list, very few female Presidents/Prime Ministers made it to that position on their own accomplishments alone. Would Benazir Bhutto have become Prime Minister if her father hadn't been Zulfikar Bhutto? How about Indira Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru? There's Cory Aquino - who rose higher than her assassinated husband but was lifted there in part by his martyrdom and Megawati, the daughter of Sukarno. Macapagal-Arroyo is the daughter of a former President of the Philippines. That leaves Meir, with debatable geography.

What this means is that Tsai Ying-wen is, more or less, the first female politician in Asia who had a viable shot at a nation's highest office and got their without any family connections, history or prior family name recognition.

And that is HUGE. I don't think many people realize how huge it really is. Even in the USA I can't come up with one woman who ever really had a shot at the presidency and had no husband or father-based name recognition that got her there (basically, Hillary Clinton is the only one who had the shot, and she had the Clinton Brand Name going. Palin and Bachmann never had a chance). In all of modern Asian history, she's the one who got there on her own merits, skill and accomplishments.      

I admire that very deeply, and it's one of the reasons why I not only supported the DPP in this election, but specifically supported her. 

I don't mean to imply that Gandhi, Bhutto, Macapagal-Arroyo, Sukarnoputri etc. were not also accomplished and strong women (although I  have never been a big fan of Indira Gandhi). Even coming from a family of great political pedigree, these were smart, accomplished women of mettle who contributed their own strength to their political careers. Tsai is special because she is a smart, accomplished woman of mettle who didn't have the benefit of that political pedigree. And we almost elected her anyway. On a continent (and in a world) rife with sexism. 

Step by step, I guess.  I do believe in my lifetime that we'll see an Asian female leader elected just because of what she's done and not because of who she's related or married to.

I also admire Taiwan for this: sure, she didn't win, but she had a real shot. She almost did win. The Taiwanese people, by and large, voted based on merits and personal preferences and the fact that Tsai is female didn't seem to factor into it much. The one time it became a national issue and she was accused of being a lesbian simply because she has never married (thanks, Shih Ming-de), the entire "issue" was shouted down by the vast majority of Taiwanese as "ridiculous", "who cares", "not our business", "that's not an issue". Compare that to the American Democratic primaries of 2008 when Hillary had sexist epithets slung at her left and right, with a media happy to join the morass. She got called a "bitch" for things she did that every male politician does - the difference being that the men get away with it. If she showed emotion she was just a "too soft" woman, if she had iron balls she "too masculine/threatening".

That didn't happen with Tsai. Although there is a lot of room to improve on women's equality in Taiwan, this really speaks volumes.

I admire that she could choose pink for a campaign color and not be mocked for it. I admire that her campaign posters often said "台灣第1女總統", rather than playing down her gender as I feared she might do - which many prominent female politicians engage in because they think they must. I admire that when her gender was brought up, it was in a positive light (see: Lee Teng-hui's endorsement).

I am sure there are still some misogynists out there who didn't vote for her simply because she is female, and some who have convinced themselves that they don't like her for other reasons, but their dislike of her is subconsciously rooted in sexism, but I am proud to say that my observation is that these people, in Taiwan, are in the great minority. I don't think I can say that about my own country, the "leader of the free world".  People may not have voted for Tsai because they didn't like / trust her or her party, but I do feel - as far as I've noticed - that very few didn't vote for her based solely on her gender (although I do wonder about that surprisingly low 55% pro-DPP cote count in Pingdong). It just didn't seem to be an issue. 

For that, I *heart* Taiwan. It makes me feel that this country truly is a good progressive model for Asia. There is still a long way to go - it has not quite yet achieved true gender egalitarianism - but it seems to be one step ahead of the rest of Asia when it comes to women's issues. You would not have seen this in Japan, Korea or China.  I'm not sure if a woman not from a famous political family could make this happen in India or SE Asia, either. Asia...listen up. Taiwan is where you need to be looking. You can learn a lot from this election just in terms of women's issues. 

And next time, we'll win. Not just the DPP, but we'll get a female president. Someday. It will happen. It has to. We're roughly half the population, after all.

Annual Party (尾牙) Culture in Taiwan

Here, be cheered up by nearly naked engineers dancing in diapers

Seriously, I got nothin'. I can't write anything except to say how disappointed I am in the election results, and what good'd that do?

So, I'm going to write about the 尾牙, or company year-end banquet that is held by most workplaces of some size in Taiwan. Smaller offices don't always hold them, especially tiny offices with just a few people in them working in Taiwan for a larger global company. Some of the larger companies, like Mediatek, hold them by business unit rather than for the whole company. Others, like Foxconn and Gamania, hold ginormous company-wide bashes (Foxconn even invites reporters; the others don't).

Not many foreigners get to attend these parties - large international companies that employ a few foreigners will certainly invite them, but otherwise there aren't many chances to attend. Some English schools have something similar (Kojen holds its annual banquet at the end of the summer, and my husband's company has one before Christmas), but they're not quite the same and resemble weddings or corporate events back home more than a  knock-down drag 'em out Taiwanese 尾牙(pronounced "wei ya" for all you non-Chinese speakers).

And I really mean knock down drag 'em out:

The lack of foreigners attending these parties could explain why they're not really talked about in expat circles, except to note that adult students take time off around this time of year to attend. And the expat versions are, in my opinion, not nearly as much fun.

There are different kinds of annual parties, of course. One company I work with has an extremely formal affair, which probably did not include engineers dancing in diapers.  Attendees are invited to wear ball gowns, but few actually do. Another has a 1,500 person mega affair in the NTU gymnasium, and this year featured an executive in drag and my student in a sequined top dancing to Lady Gaga (I was not invited; I saw the pictures). 

The one I was invited to last night was for a very local company - you can see the name displayed across the top of most of the photos I've included. They're based in Tucheng (土城) and the party was in Shulin (樹林) - yes, I rode the MRT to the end of the line and then took a cab from the station and back; I was that excited about attending one of these functions. This one, I  have been assured, was about as "local" as it gets, at a seafood restaurant in an old Japanese-era brick building, with backlit stage screen bearing the company's name, smoke machines (no joke!), lasers, confetti, sexy dancers, alcohol and insane talent shows and, of course, a lucky draw. It wasn't terribly formal - I wore a nice but not fancy outfit I might wear to work on any given day, adding only a light touch of makeup - and felt   as though I was dressed just about right.

Here are some sexy flight attendants for you

I believe I was invited at all simply because this company is extremely Taiwanese, locally based, not that large, started by one whip-smart, slightly kooky engineer who decided that he may as well open his own company, who is the CEO but very visible in the company offices. He is my former student (the General Manager is my current student). They have much more of a "come on, the more the merrier, we like you so come drink and eat with us" attitude than other companies I've worked with (although generally speaking I have liked every company I've worked with, even if they didn't invite me to their year-end banquets). My own organization was surprised at their hospitality: I decided that it was such an interesting chance to see a piece of local culture that I couldn't pass it up, even though it meant postponing another class.

The Taiwanese attendees will often tell you that the lucky draw is the most important part of the night, and the best part. Some will even say it's the main reason to attend. Companies do this differently, too. Some give out money and prizes. Some give out fewer, larger prizes (Foxconn famously has a prize in the millions of NT, paid out over several years. Other companies give out smaller prizes to more people. Some give every employee a red envelope with a few thousand in it, and have a few prizes on top of that). Bigger prizes have been things like cars or other luxury items. On the awesome but slightly less extravagant end, my friend's girlfriend won a purse from Tod's.

Many companies have a well-known rule that if an executive or high enough manager wins the prize, he or she has to donate it back to the company for someone else to win, and sometimes add more money on top of that (if it's a cash prize, they either give it back or double it). Some companies get a set amount from the company for the lucky draw prizes, and the higher-ups each put in another NT$20,000 or so to pad the prize-load. If an executive wins and does not do this, he or she is the object of much whispering and tittering in the cube farm the next day, and on Facebook.

I, however, think the best part of the night is the part you don't usually see at affairs full of foreigners (although Brendan's company holiday bash featured a watered-down version of one, which was, honestly, nothing like the one I saw on Friday), the talent show.
        

This is where all the shy, maybe kind of awkward, definitely not wild-n-crazy students you thought you had practice for weeks for the chance to prance around on a stage in Spongebob underpants.

Or do a sexy dance (these are all company employees).

Or do whatever this is.

Basically, they get up there and do things I just don't see foreigners generally acquiescing to, let alone coming up with the idea for.  They tried to get me to sing some random Christmas song from the '70s at Brendan's party, and I was conveniently in the bathroom fixing my lipstick when it was supposed to happen (there was no rehearsal, though. It was just sort of  thrust upon me). Nobody at the party full of foreigners seemed interested in  getting onstage.

And yet, these generally introverted, often (but not always) quiet guys who spend all day every weekday boxed up in a cubicle are willing to do...this:

And this:

And, uh, this:

And, you know, that's what I think makes a Taiwanese year-end banquet so much fun. I was quite literally stunned several times over by the increasing craziness of the talent show acts. Every time I found my mouth hanging open, that no group would do something nuttier or more self-effacing than what I'd just seen, I was proven wrong by, oh, I don't know, dorky engineers in clown wigs dancing with secretaries in black leather corsets.

I left at about 11pm, when the party at the actual venue was winding down. I probably could have finagled an invitation to KTV, but I was tired and needed to catch the MRT home (and wasn't sure who I trusted to drive me among those heading to KTV until 3am). So when the lights came up, I said my slightly drunken Chinese and Taiwanese goodbyes and caught a cab back to MRT Fu-da, stuffed and full of alcohol - but not that drunk, as I'd spaced it out between courses of food.

Although I did have a bit more than intended: my students are the CEO and General Manager, who are of course just the guys who came around with wine, beer and whiskey to "bottoms up" with every table, and they seemed to take great delight in coming by my seat more than once to see if I could handle it (I could). They were clearly much worse off than I was.

Not only did I pull off a decent night of socializing in Chinese, but I made some friends, too. These guys' costumes are probably offensive to somebody but who cares.

 One thing I really enjoyed was the challenge of socializing in Chinese in an entirely Taiwanese milieu for a night, with no chance to slip back into English. It was sink-or-swim social Chinese, and I am proud to say that I swam.  The chance to bring out my Chinese for a real-life event and have to use it all night - not a simulation, not "just for fun" with people who actually speak English, but all-out, all night, with people who don't speak English.

Just the sort of thing I encourage my students to do in English, which they seem to be terrified of (although less so when I am done with them).

It's a fun night - assuming you speak Chinese or the attendees have an overall good level of English, otherwise it could be quite confusing and not that much fun - and something I hope more foreigners get the chance to do. Certainly more fun, from what I've heard, than a typical Taiwanese wedding. Then again, that's hearsay: I've never been to one.

I do think the level of craziness has something to do with the fact that these guys work far more grueling hours than most Westerners, and get out far less often. We foreigners might go out at least once a week, and things like "beer on Friday with coworkers" would be a pretty normal thing to do. It's almost as though we have tiny wei-yas all year, and these guys save it all up for one crazy bash in which they shed all inhibition.

With my student, the General Manager...and his secretary, who won two lucky draw prizes.

Basically, I wish I could go to one of these every year!

So now, my goals for socializing and cultural experience in Taiwan,  beyond the festivals I'd like to hit this year, are:

- A wedding. It's been five years and I've never been to one. My friends just aren't into marriage.

- A street party or "ban dou" (辦桌), for a wedding or otherwise.

- Something featuring showgirls or dancers. Preferably on a truck that converts into a stage and is covered in LEDs (電花車), and as local as possible. I don't want high class professional showgirls, I want the ones who come in on a blue truck for the Pingdong Pineapple Factory annual bash. Or something.

- Something where I actually have to practice with a group and go on stage dressed as something ridiculous (no sexy dancing, though).

And with that, I leave you with a few more amusing photos from my ridiculous Friday night. I can only hope you all get the chance to go to one of these someday. They're a cultural experience not to be missed.

My two students, singing a Taiwanese folk song, completely off their heads

Obligatory group shot before the drunkenness commenced (the guys in suits are my students)

Spongebob, check. Not sure why he needs a Spiderman, but check. But...three Spidermen?

WOOOOOOOOOO!

These guys crack me up

And some more sexy flight attendants for you.

I went to a KMT rally, and it made me feel dirty inside

So I "attended", if you can call it that, a KMT rally tonight. I don't have pictures - my apologies, but I still don't have a working camera, even an iPod or phone camera. Mine traveled up to the great Canon In The Sky to meet its maker last week, and my good one was stolen in Turkey.

I didn't do it because I like the KMT - you all know how much I hope they lose the upcoming election and how strongly I dislike them in general - but because it was quite literally right outside my apartment. Two days before an election if you look outside and see people joining an ever bigger cheering crowd backed by blasting music, if you're interested in politics you follow them. So I did.  

Despite having no pictures I thought I'd recap here.

First, I couldn't help but giggle at the following things:

- Ma Ying-jiu, again trying and failing to speak Taiwanese. I may not be a speaker of Taiwanese but I've been exposed to it enough that know bad Taiwanese when I hear it.

- The giant bouncy castle - I don't know what else to call it -  with "馬到成功" across the top. I have to admit that was quite clever - it means "instant success", and it's President Ma, and the rally was where we live in our apartment complex and I'm not sure I could have resisted that one either. But a bouncy castle? For serious? You're the president of a nation with a population that rivals Australia and you gave a speech under a freakin' bouncy castle? Pull that  **** in the US and you might get elected hall monitor of your nursery school but that's about it.

- The sound kept cutting out. I hope it was the evil eye I was sending his way, mwahahahaha!

- Ma Ying-jiu being introduced and escorted offstage by the music from Star Wars. Wow. Just...wow. Dear President Ma: you didn't destroy the Death Star. You haven't even managed to get China off Taiwan's back. You are not a Jedi. The Taiwanese know that these are, in fact, the droids they are looking for. I sincerely hope the Force is not with you. You don't get to walk onstage to the music from Star Wars. 

- I kept giving him and his KMT cronies dirty looks and sending bad "lose lose lose" vibes their way. Just as I started doing that, the sound started cutting out. Maybe the Force is with me! Maybe I just changed history with the power of my mind!* :) 

- They did that rally call and response thing. It went something like this:

KMT Cronies: 馬英九

Crowd: 當選！**

Me, quietly:（下台）

KMT Cronies: 國民黨

Crowd: 加油!

Me, quietly: (幹你娘)

KMT Cronies: 馬總統

Crowd: 加油!

Me, quietly: (去死)

KMT Cronies: 馬到

Crowd: 成功!

Me, quietly: 口甲賽 (read that in Taiwanese)

KMT Cronies: 投給

Crowd: 二號

Me, quietly: (一號)

I couldn't really be loud about it, seeing as I live in the deepest of the deep blue parts of one of the deepest blue districts in Taipei.  Those old veterans might've killed me. I'm not even sure if I'm using hyperbole.

*I am joking, but if you didn't realize that, the problem's with you, not me.

** I think this is what they said but it wasn't clear - the Star Wars music hadn't ended yet

Some Women's Issues: Links For A Gray Wednesday

I've been working on a post that I'm not sure if I'll publish in its current form, so it's sitting in draft form now, lying fallow in my Posts list. I'm just not sure if it really makes clear the point I want to get across.


So, instead, a few links for you.


Shu Flies writes about depression and living abroad in a two-parter (you can click to Part II from Part I). While mood disorders affect both genders, and yes I know I shouldn't  take Wikipedia at face value (but I wanted to check my knowledge somewhere), women are "twice as likely" to develop them. This makes it a topic worth discussing not only in the larger sense of being an expat, but in the more specific sense of being a female expat. I've discussed postpartum depression here, and discussed how people I've known with depression - or who I felt likely suffered from depression -fared in Taiwan, but I personally can't write about it, because I don't have it. This limits how much and how knowledgeably I can cover the topic as it regards women's issues. It's good to see something out there for the Great Internet Readership from someone who is dealing with it.


Lee Teng-hui is expected to publish a statement endorsing the DPP in the upcoming presidential election. Interestingly, one of his aides said that Lee feels "Taiwan needs a head of state who is competent, strong, responsible, approachable and harbors compassion for the people, and that these traits are especially obvious in Taiwanese women".

China apparently has the highest ratio of C-sections in the world, according to a Slate article. Not Taiwan, but regionally something worth noting. I don't know the C-section statistics in Taiwan, though I would be interested in finding out (I know, I can be a terrible researcher sometimes). I don't know many women in Taiwan who have had C-sections, but that doesn't mean the ratio isn't high. 

Updated: The Best Pizza in Taipei

I've updated my post on The Best Pizza in Taipei to include Zoca on Linjiang Street (near Anhe Road, north of the biggest nightspot area). Really good stuff! Also, I can walk there. Bonus!

I know I should probably actually rank these, but you can't rank something as ineffable as good pizza.    I can try to make some order out of the chaos, though.

All pizza places I list below are in the post linked above.

I would say the two absolute best pizza stops in Taipei are now Faust and Zoca - Zoca's great but rather than unseating Faust, it has made it to the great height of rivaling it. For very different reasons, of course: Faust offers low-oil, super thin crispy crust delight with a big focus on the toppings (like the bleu cheese that sends me into rapturous bliss). They only do pizza and beer and I appreciate the minimalist approach.

Zoca  is right up there with Faust, but the actual pizza on offer is quite different - softer, slightly thicker crust, tangy sauce, more oil (but in a good way). The beer on the menu is not as good as Faust's one-label offering, but they have some nice desserts going and homemade limoncello. The pumpkin soup was good but not to die for. We didn't try anything else (I'm afraid to get salad at a pizza place anywhere that is not Amore).

Amore Pizza on Xinhai Road is not a step down, it's just very different. So different that you can't even really judge it by the same criteria. Where Faust and Zoca make good, arguably gourmet, pizza, Amore makes New Jersey pizza.  You aren't going to find capers, sundried tomatoes, pesto, grilled zucchini or any of that at Amore. You're going to find the pizza I grew up with (I'm from the tri-state area, close enough), with those glass jars in the swirly pattern and metal tops with parmesan, oregano and  dried red chili and metal napkin dispensers. You know the jars I mean. If you're from that part of the country, anyway. Plus they make their Caesar salad dressing from scratch, with real ground anchovy. The one place in Taipei where it's worth it to get a salad with your pie.

Just a slight step down from those dizzying heights, but still very good, are So Free and Fifteen. I still heartily recommend either, but for very different reasons, again: Fifteen is the sort of place where you can get pizza with caviar on it and Belgian beer. So Free is bare-bones thin crust vegetarian pizza with just a few choices, a small space with very little seating and generally healthy drinks.

Still good - as in better than Domino's and not a bad choice if you're looking for some decent slice action are Alley Cat (which I used to love and now merely like) and Maryjane's. Alley Cat, to its credit, seemed to be the driving force that brought good pizza to Taipei. I am fairly sure that the other places opened after it did, or around when it did. It's still good, with excellent tiramisu, but I never quite forgave them for screwing up the check a number of times at their Huashan location and I do find that the toppings you get are a bit skimpy (Zoca, Faust and Fifteen are quite generous with their toppings). Maryjane's is sturdy, decent pizza but I wasn't thrown to the heights of rapture with it: their feta cheese was not nearly pungent enough (I was actually not even sure they'd used real feta on my pizza), the cheese was workmanlike and the crust good but not memorable.

On some weird other level, there's Bollywood Indian Pizza. The thing is, I don't include it in "pizza" because it's not pizza, really. It's more like a flat naan with curry spread on it and some cheese, to approximate pizza but really be curry in a different form. It's good. It's not pizza, but it's good.

I still have to try Pizzeria Oggi in Tianmu. I just rarely make it to Tianmu, is all - not my preferred haunt and a bit inconvenient to get to (for me anyway). We'll see if they stack up.

Double Triple Culture Shock

I've written before about reverse culture shock, something Kath at [insert suitably snappy title here] has described as feeling like "something has grown and it no longer fits like it used to, like a favourite t-shirt you used to wear all the time that accidentally got shrunk in the wash".

I could swear I wrote another post on the topic more recently, where I talked about how going home felt like watching all sorts of once familiar things that I once interacted with, but seeing them through a pane of glass, or Bubble Boy. You're there, you can see, hear and talk to people, but you're somehow separate.

I can't find that post now, but if I do I'll link back to it.

Well, since I've been back in Taiwan from our extended stay in Turkey, I can say that something along the lines of a double reverse culture shock has started to sink in. I'm sure it'll dissipate soon enough; it also only seems to have affected me to the point of me, myself noticing it. Nobody else seems to have.

It doesn't seem like this feeling is terribly common - seems it would be rather rare for someone to move abroad to one country, go through the usual culture shock, and then leave to spend long enough time in another, third country that they'd come back to their second country and culture shock about it all over again, from an entirely different angle. In this way, I'm probably writing about this more for myself and  the perspective that chronicling and describing this brings, but who knows, maybe someone out there in Internetland feels the same way and will stumble across this post.

I also kind of felt that this was strange about my experience in Turkey. I didn't feel  culture shock regarding Turkish ways of life vs. American; I felt it regarding Turkish ways of life vs. Taiwanese.

So of course when I then returned to the USA for a visit I had no fundamental frame of reference for anything at all, and was very confused indeed!

It would be great to be able to articulate exactly why I feel this way, but I can't really. What I can do is give some examples.

 First, I feel that same odd "looking at everything through the skin of a soap bubble" feeling I often get in the US, where I can see just fine, and interact and all that, but there's some barrier there that wasn't there before. I feel I've been relating to my friends differently, but I can't describe exactly how. My values have changed a bit, from being fine with living in a crummy apartment with crummy things but traveling fantastically, to being willing to scale back the travel a little bit and compromise on a nicer apartment and nicer things. I've also become more productive and in some ways, I think more cheerful, even when I'm in one of my fairly common cynical, curmudgeonly, critical moods. The  strict, unending and rapidly-approaching deadlines of our course were such that I've now trained myself - hopefully permanently - to be better with deadlines. I've proven that I can do so, if they're truly important. That's why I always had my class prep done on time but rarely had my reports done on time in the past.

Weather in Taipei is more miserable than I remember it; this is probably due to a month of sunny Turkish skies raising my expectations. Things that either didn't bother me or only nominally annoyed me before - people walking too slowly, especially if they're hogging the sidewalk or dawdling just inside MRT train doors (so nobody can get on quickly behind them! Argh!) or just outside turnstiles or doorways. The habit of pretending to understand something said in English when really, that person doesn't understand. The habit of not just asking when you don't understand - which Turkish students had no problem doing. The tendency to over-adhere to process over usefulness, feeling that keeping with a strict process is enough to feel like one is accomplishing something. I don't see this all the time in Taiwan, but just enough - especially at work - to annoy me. Listening to one's boss as though his or her words are the words of God.  Over-devotion to work: when someone in Turkey says "I have to leave class for a meeting, after that I'll have to go back to the office to finish up a few things", you can assume that once he's done with the meeting he's probably just going to cut out of there and head home if he can. In Taiwan, you can assume that he really is going to go to the meeting then do some work afterwards. Which is fine, doesn't affect me, but it's not how I roll.

I'm not nearly as interested in nightlife, and I don't think that's a function of age. Istanbul reeked of stuff to do at night. Entire neighborhoods were given over to nightlife. The tackiest, but arguably most "lose yourself in the crowd and have fun" of them all was Taksim, walking distance from our apartment. It was as big or bigger than the Xinyi Shopping District and packed bottom floor to top, building-against-building with bars, clubs, restaurants, live music, cafes, lounges, shops and pubs. You quite literally had all the choice in the world, from hippie lounging on beanbags outside among curls of incense with raki and hookahs to hip, red-lit booty-short-tacular dance clubs to fancy dinner at a bistro to coffee with friends in a bookshop. Taipei has most of that, but it's spread out and sometimes hard to find and no one neighborhood has enough of it to have a nightlife vibe.  As a result, I just haven't been going out much: one late night, total, since I've been back (late for me means "out past 2am").

This really isn't hitting the heart of it, though, which shows you that I don't really know where the heart of it is. Taipei is the same; I'm different. I went to Turkey with Brendan, so it feels like we're both just different enough after the trip that we've maintained the same dynamic. I feel different around everyone else, though.

It could be because going to my ancestral homeland of Musa Dagh was an inwardly emotional experience for me, even if it was a relatively quiet trip and quiet day. The full impact of the trip I'd made, the first in my family to do so since the Armenians were killed or forced out of Turkey, has been hitting me in stages. It may well have made me both more sanguine and more maudlin, possibly a bit more phlegmatic than before. I'm more irritated by things I'd previously gotten used to in Taiwan, but my temper flares over it less.

The new apartment could also have something to do with it - I've written before about how it's impacted my life and even my habits and personality a bit. I don't know though; our return from Turkey and our move happened so close together that in terms of emotion, the entirety of November and December is one big, murky pool.

In sum, I just don't know.

Something's shifted. Something's different. I'm definitely feeling that ineffable separation from my surroundings that I get when I culture shock. I can't articulate why in any clear way. I can't even clearly tell if anyone else has noticed the change. All I can say is that it's there and I'm hoping I figure it out or work through it soon.

2012 Election Posters, Such As They Are

This is one of my favorites - a bus wrap encouraging people to buy their train tickets to go home and vote.

This year's election...well, it's hard to tell there's an election on, not to mention a presidential election. Where are the trucks blaring music? The posters? The fliers? The campaign ads? The candidates shaking hands and giving you tchotchkes? In the last election - which wasn't even a presidential election, I got keychains, pens, notepads, a magnet and so many tissues that, well, I'm still blowing my nose on 張慶忠.

Generally speaking I've seen more campaigning from the DPP than the KMT, which surprises me - not that the DPP seems to be doing more (at least that's my impression - I can't back it up with stats) but that Ma's hold on the presidency is so tenuous that it almost seems lackadaisical, even arrogant, of the KMT not to be stepping it up. I thought it was because I live in Da'an, where a KMT majority is assured, but no, I've left Da'an and not seen much different.      

I'm not lamenting the trucks - they were annoying - but I kind of liked the long lines of drummers pulled on a towing apparatus going down the street and the free stuff. I used to draw devil's horns on the Ma Ying-jiu notepads.

In the past two days there has been a ramping up of campaigning, but still not nearly at the level I'd expect. Tsai has a fighting chance; why not fight harder for it? Ma's incumbency is precarious;  why not fight to preserve it?

My favorite ad so far has been Tsai's bus campaign to encourage people to buy tickets home to go vote. I've discussed before the fact that the lack of absentee balloting seems to hurt the DPP more, as more of them are registered to vote in southern Taiwan but work in Taipei/northern Taiwan than the other way around. Without absentee balloting, fewer people who need to travel to vote will do so.

I can't seem to catch the "Taiwan Geographic" bus ads I've seen - I'd love to feature one here if I could get a shot fast enough. My camera's dead so I have to borrow Brendan's iPod whenever I want to take photos.

I also regret not taking a photo of the election posters in Burmese when I had the chance a few weeks ago. It doesn't look like I'll get another chance to go to Nanshijiao and do that.

Finally, on Hengyang Road near Cha For Tea/Bo'ai Road Intersection/Shanghai Dispensary is a GINORMOUS poster of good ol' Mr. Soong. I mean this thing is huge. It covers a third of a building. If you're eating in Cha For Tea and looking out the window - which is how I noticed it -  you're basically staring at him. His pores are each as big as your face, or at least they would be if he weren't airbrused.

Other than that, here are a few posters and other things I've come across, with a bit of commentary for some.

This is one of the first references in campaign materials I've seen to Tsai being the first female president (if you look at the sticker, it says "Taiwan's First Female President".

Smiling George makes me smile. 

I can't imagine a politician getting away with posters that say "Smiling ________" on them back home. Smiling Mitt? Only if his circuitry misfired. Smiling Barack? Sounds dumb. Smiling Newt Gingrich? Eeeeeeewww.

I hope Smiling George wins. I like him just for this.

A book for sale at "The Taiwan Store"

 A book in Chinese full of political cartoons sympathetic to Tsai and the DPP. I think there's a pun or idiomatic joke in there somewhere regarding Ma's "horse foot"...I mean other than the obvious surname joke. My Chinese isn't good enough to figure out if I'm right, though.

This is one of the few pedestrian bridges in Taipei covered in election posters. I suspect in the next few days we'll see more. So far so good, except...

Really? Does he not realize that this is a little too close to "Heil Hitler"? I mean it's not, but it's just...too...close.

Wait, are these guys Marxists? If my memory is correct, Communist parties are now legal in Taiwan (please, please correct me if I'm wrong. I'll edit this in that case), although that was not always the case in the democracy's infancy. I know 主義 as meaning either "doctrine" (which is far too vague) or "Marxist". Either way their sign is not very exciting.

Let's all go buy more khakis together!

 Seriously, Ma Ying-jiu wearing his mother's pants.

Please vote for me, please please please! Pretty please? Vote for me? Please?

This is some graffiti - possibly far too old to be a reaction to the election, on a mountain in Zhonghe near Yuantong temple. It says "The KMT and the Communists Get Together to Conquer Taiwan". The person who wrote it is probably against that, but according to Joseph the writing is not entirely clear.

Up close, this one says "Taiwan Next, Zhonghe Best" with a view of urban Taipei County...err, Xinbei City.

This kind of Star Wars-esque poster saying "Go Taiwan" (台灣加油, once used almost exclusively by DPP candidates) is on many buses.

Mr. Happy Face wears a Taiwan Next sweatshirt at the Qingshan Wang birthday celebration.