Following Matsu (updated!)

I have a lot to say about our trip to Matsu the week before Mid-Autumn Festival (the long weekend was all booked out in terms of flights and hotels - turns out we lucked out, as most of those flights certainly never took off thanks to the typhoon).

Considering the fact that my other interesting domestic (as in, in Taiwan) trip this year was to see the kick-off ceremony of the Matsu pilgrimage in Dajia, near Taizhong, I feel like 2013 has been the year of Matsu - the year of me, consciously or not (I'm not really sure), following Matsu and her influence around Taiwan.

Matsu Village (Nangan), where Matsu is said to have washed ashore, and Jinsha (a great place to stay):



The goddess Matsu (the same one I followed the pilgrimage of in Dajia earlier this year) is said to have washed up here after drowning - in fact, the beach she's said to have washed up on fronts a town now called Matsu, which has a statue of Matsu (above) whose lantern lights at night. In Magang Temple, overlooking the water, is an old stone coffin set into the floor. Engraved on it are phoenixes - it's said that this is Matsu's grave (others say it's her clothes, or the brother of hers who died when her meditative trance was broken as she was saving her father and brothers from drowning).



I strongly recommend staying in Jinsha, the tiny, picturesque town a short drive south of Matsu (you can drive between them both on the tiny seaside road - don't try that at night - or on the "main boulevard" of Nangan). It's got better accommodation than Matsu village itself - the Jinsha Culture Village (0928812879 or 0836-26190) and the #1 Youth Hostel are in traditional buildings next door to each other and are probably your best bet on the island. Jinsha doesn't have a lot - one restaurant, really, and a shop for snacks and old wine that you can bring back with you - but both offer breakfast in the morning, and the hostel has coffee. You're a short drive away from Matsu, however, where there are a few good eating options (including the excellent Dazhong Restaurant - see below) and a 7-11.



I also strongly recommend renting a car, not a scooter.

A few things about that.

One, yes, I did learn how to ride a scooter just for this trip. No, I won't be riding one around Taipei anytime soon (they still look like death traps on wheels to me), but I can ride one now and am willing to on easy roads in the countryside or on outlying islands. That didn't work out for us, though, so we rented a car.

Boy are we glad we did - Matsu's the first place I've been to in Taiwan where a car (or scooter if you enjoy dying - I would have skidded right off one of those hills and down into the ocean) is 100%, no way around it, can't avoid it necessary. I felt the hills in Nangan and Beigan were far too steep to safely ride a scooter up and down, so we rented the hotel owner's friend's old Toyota, and it was great. I'd say my whole "NO DRIVING IN TAIWAN" policy - I just don't feel safe doing it and I am not an experienced or confident city driver - has been overturned, but it hasn't. Driving in Matsu was fine. We felt safe. The hills were steep and the turns crazy, but that was never my problem: I freak out when there's too much traffic. Too many other people. I can't do it. A windy, hilly road is no biggie as long as it's not that busy.

You could get away with not renting a car, but I wouldn't. You could get a taxi driver's card and just use him as your personal driving service during your stay (I've done stuff like that), or you could try and take the bus...but really, it's not that hard to drive. The roads are nearly empty.

What struck me was this: we tried to go to Matsu 7 years ago. Our flight was cancelled due to fog (that's common) and we ended up in Penghu instead, where it's easy to get taxis to take you here and there, and the landscape is flat so you can walk more (the hills in Matsu are steep...and everywhere). 7 years ago I would have relied on taxis: no way would I have gotten behind the wheel of a car, even there. The fact that I was happy to just hop in the driver's seat (Brendan and I shared driving responsibilities: I don't really get the whole "the man drives" mentality at all) now is indicative of how much I've changed in this past near-decade. I am a much more confident person than I was in 2006, and I'm happy for that. 2007 me would have freaked out a bit at the hills and lack of transportation. 2013 me was totally fine with it.

By the way, don't let anyone tell you that you can't rent a car in Beigan. You can. More on that when we get to the Beigan photos.



The beach where Matsu is said to have washed ashore:



Very high quality woodwork in the Magang temple:



Matsu is full of temples - most are either to Matsu (duh) or to the White Horse God - a god whose spirit is a general (or somesuch) whose body washed up ashore not far from where Matsu's did, but at a different time - and each is interesting in its own way. Some follow the Fujianese "Fire Wall" style - pictures posted below - which I've dubbed "Fujian Psychedelic". Others have roof/cornice (?) designs that look like a type of stepped pyramid, others still have unique roof and wall patterns not found in mainland Taiwan. All in all if you're even passively interested in temple design, or just think temple iconography is cool (and it is cool), Matsu is a good place to stomp around looking for unique designs that you won't find in Taipei.


I also love this cool old building housing Matsu Village's "bus station". Note the torn Ma Ying-jiu poster at the bottom. We had great fun watching the 陰莖之戰（英金之戰）on TV - the people of Matsu, who lean dark blue, are just as displeased with Ma as the rest of the country. One person asked me as I watched TV "what party are you?" - quite straightforward, no? Maybe indicates cultural differences between Matsu and Taiwan? - and I figured, "hey, ask a question get an answer" so I told him "Well, DPP or TSU, but really, they're all terrible (天下烏鴉一般黑), really I just support those parties' ideas more than the people themselves". He gave me a thumbs-up - I guess I found the only green guy in Matsu!

Jinsha's one restaurant:



Pretty good local food here - yu mian (fish noodles), giant mussels/clams called "shenghao" - basic, rustic stuff. Tasty. I recommend it. They also have the locally made "aiyu" (transparent fig juice with jelly) which is refreshing on a humid Matsu day.

"Downtown" Jinsha:





It says "Iron Blood: Kill The Reds and Push Out Mao, Stop the Chinese and Soviet Communists".

I mean I agree, but really they both suck - the CCP and the KMT.

Matsu, with its military history (it was bombed toward the end of the Chinese Civil War, then bombed on "odd days only", and retained strategic importance even after bombing stopped, and was heavily militarized for years), is full of these vintage KMT slogans, painted and carved everywhere. You can explore the tunnels of Matsu (many of them, at least) but I find searching for these bits of history - as much as I disagree with them - to be even more fascinating.



Definitely get some 老酒 - old wine - while you are there. The store with the teddy bear outside, across from this wall of wine fermentation pots, sells it at NT200 or 250 a bottle depending on the length of fermentation of the wine.





Someone explained to me why Jinsha has brass instruments tacked up all over it, but I didn't really understand (something about a musical instrument factory, or shop, or a music school). My fault: they were telling me as I was perusing a map and I was only half paying attention. Perhaps a commenter could come weigh in.



This shop sells good local products you can buy and bring home.



Jinsha's Matsu temple, with gorgeous floor design.



This shot captures both our hotel (foreground) and the youth hostel (background) - both are good value for money (they're linked to above).



One of the best things about Matsu is that even on Nangan, which has the archipelago's greatest concentration of sights, there's not tons to do and nothing is terribly far apart. That makes it easy and fun to just drive around for the hell of it, exploring, enjoying the view and weather, stopping to eat or have a coffee...you can't not relax. We quite enjoyed just driving our little Toyota around, stopping in towns with traditional granite houses and just wandering and taking photos, maybe stopping to eat, getting lost in the lanes, getting exercise on the hills.

There are also a lot of cats on Matsu - notably, more than dogs in my observation. They tend to be street cats, but are clearly cared for and fed by people.







Do you see the little tortoiseshell kitty looking at us?

The decorative spouts (as below) in dragon, lion or fish shapes are popular home accoutrements. They almost certainly function as storm drains or runoff spigots, as Matsu gets a lot of rain (although the ground seems dry - the climate is almost Mediterranean, with dry rocky soil but humid air, at least when we were there - perhaps because the soil sits atop pure granite).



The scenic drive between Renai Village and Matsu Village:



I love this shot - look closely at the dip in the road. See those two figures? They're soldiers doing exercises (or just exercising for fun - who knows?). Matsu gets a smattering of Taiwanese tourists, very few foreign tourists, and is mostly populated by locals - many of whom still fish for a living - and soldiers, due to its strategic importance and overall military history.

People tell me that young soldiers doing their national service hope not to be posted to Matsu as it's far away from Taiwan. I wonder about that - can you think of a more gorgeous place to just take a nice run? And I hate running! Looks like it's a kind of paradise if you think of your posting optimistically, no?



Guess the age of this pavilion. Qing? Ming? Song?



...it was built in 1990.





Things on Matsu - even Nangan - close early. This is Matsu village at 8pm (tons of dodgy KTVs and Internet cafes for the soldiers). The only other open establishments were Da Zhong (seriously, eat there) and the 7-11, which closes at midnight.

I strongly recommend Dazhong (大眾) Restaurant in Matsu Village (same road as the 7-11, "uphill" away from the parking lot a bit, on the right). It's excellent and well-known, and rightfully so. Ask any local - they'll direct you:



Old Wine Rice Vermicelli (老酒麵線) - the best in all Matsu, I guarantee it. You MUST try this.



"Jiguang Bing" or "Matsu Hamburgers" - soft, sesame flavored bread rounds that you stuff with an oyster omelet of tender oysters, greens, onion and egg. SO GOOD. You won't find this stuff in mainland Taiwan, and if you do it won't be as good.



Near the Beihai Tunnel (my photos in the tunnel weren't very good):









Matsu's famous "yu mian", or fish noodles (noodles made of fish paste and starch):



Matsu's famous hongzao (red date cooked) eel and pork:



LOOOOOOOOSER!

We drove over to this giant sign (it translates as "sleep with your sword ready until dawn"), the characters for which were originally written by Chiang Kai-shek, and which looms over the harbor in Nangan so all ships coming and going can see it. Under it (and pictured below) is a sad little old man (Chiang Kai-shek) looking at the China he lost.

I'd say I'm happy he lost it, but the folks who won it were even worse than his sorry self.



Poor widdle Chiang, stuck in Taiwan (he never liked it here, and his wife liked it even less), pining for China. Boo hoo. I feel so sorry for him [/sarcasm].

In truth, while people defend him as the "one who industrialized and modernized Taiwan and its economy", and I do see where some of the truth in that lies, I see him as the single worst thing to happen to Taiwan in modern history. He never loved Taiwan - his eyes were only on China. He never understood Taiwan and didn't want to. Taiwan is still suffering under his wrongheaded ideology, dictatorship and well-documented mass murder.

And yet he's memorialized. He has a memorial hall, he has statues, he's remembered and not always in a bad way. I don't think he should be: banish this asshole to the annals of history where we can learn from his mistakes (it's thanks to him that Taiwan's not in the UN).

So you can imagine my delight when I saw this sad, lonely little man staring back at China.

LOSER! Not even Taiwan wants you.



That's China in the distance, by the way. It's very clear from a few points on the various islands of Matsu. At one viewpoint you can actually see cell phone towers and roads.

A temple in Niujiao:



Anyway, temple design, even inside, differs from that of mainland Taiwan:





Wandering the streets of Niujiao:









The famous Furen Coffee near Siwei:



LOOOHOOOOOSER!



We stopped and got coffee at Furen (夫人咖啡) Coffee...a locally famous coffeeshop on the peninsula north of Matsu village in Furen village (夫人村), near Siwei. Drive up there, and past Matsu you start seeing signs for it - just follow the signs on down to the cafe. Get their house special - mild coffee (it doesn't need milk) topped with a thin layer of high quality, lightly salted cream. It's fantastic. Their shaved ice, covered in traditional dessert items (red bean, sweet potato gummy etc) is also tasty.







Dongju:

The next day we took a boat to Dongju - this is one island where we truly could not rent a car - although I bet if we'd stayed there, we could have found a local with two cars who'd rent one out to us informally. As we were only going for a few hours we didn't have time to set that up.

So, we joined a small tour group. Our hotel gave us the number of Chuan Lao Da - 船老大 - 0933-814986 - who runs tours of Dongju. It's NT$1500 per group, assuming 5 people per group at NT300 each (they'll feed you for an additional NT300 each, or you can just figure out food on your own). Not wanting to pay the full NT1500 ourselves, we joined a group which we believed were all put together and didn't know each other. Turns out they were friends from Taoyuan who'd booked this whole three day tour through a travel agent so they wouldn't have to worry about their own transportation.

On the good side, they were friendly and didn't seem too annoyed by our intrusion into the group (we truly didn't know - I'll just go ahead and assume the tour guide asked first). We got transport around Dongju without being in some huge group herded around.



On the bad side, first, it was a tour group of slightly older people, which meant being herded from one visitors center to another to watch a presentation on the sights rather than actually seeing them (we'd drive by). I wasn't too interested in that (in fact during the first presentation I fell asleep in the visitor's center theater), so whenever we stopped I negotiated with the tour guide to just let us wander around and take photos, which is all we'd wanted to do in the first place, while everyone else saw a presentation. Why would you go somewhere to drive past something quickly and then go watch a presentation on it? That's dumb. But, it's apparently what some people want or expect. Okay. Well. It's still dumb.



It also turns out that the group was coming down with food poisoning, from (from what I understood of the conversation that was half in Taiwanese) oysters. So one person didn't get out of the van at all, one was in the fetal position on her seat by about halfway through, and nobody seemed to have any energy. By the end, only we and one other person in the group was actually getting out of the van...but at least there was no puking.



I felt bad for them - three days in Matsu, and one of those days ruined by bad oysters. We saw them again in Beigan, mostly recovered. The sickest of the lot was "resting in the hotel" though. Poor thing. Her whole vacation ruined!

Dongju was beautiful - there's not a lot to do, the fun thing here is really to just drive around and enjoy the view. The hills weren't too crazy and I would have liked to have rented scooters, but that was not an option for us (Brendan hasn't learned yet and I can't confidently carry him on the back - I'm still new at this), to just drive around and enjoy the air. All in all you can take the 11am ferry and come back on the 3:30 and pretty much see everything. You could even walk it, if you like steep hills and no shade (I don't recommend this - not so much for the no shade as the hilly terrain. It wouldn't be strolling).

Some photos from Dongju:



A "Fujian Psychedelic" ("Fire Wall") temple:







This little temple is so damn cute:



View from the lighthouse:








Some soldiers stationed on Matsu were out here for fun. None had cameras or cell phones (as you may remember, those are not allowed on army bases) so we took photos for them and I emailed them to the group a few days later. The friendly black goat came up for a visit.



Dongju is gorgeous and picturesque - too bad it's hard to get around:













We got back to Nangan before sunset, worked out a deal with the hotel owner's friend with the "rental car" to take it for the evening at a discount (worth it!) and drove around at sunset enjoying the view before stopping for dinner in Renai.

Back to Renai for dinner:



This was the only night in Nangan that we didn't eat at Da Zhong. This place was pretty damn good too - we ate at 鐵板小館 (Tieban 88 - call 083623531 or 0925096250 if you need directions) near the shoreline in Renai. It's in a restored granite house with a traditional wood interior, more beautiful upstairs with some great balcony seats. Although I feel overall that Da Zhong has the best food in Nangan, this place was great too, and I recommend it for the food and atmosphere.

They also have accommodation if you want to stay in Renai.







The most famous White Horse temple (白馬宮) in Ke Ting village just a few clicks north of Matsu village (walkable if you don't mind a hill). Just keep driving north from Matsu, the road will narrow, and on your left will be a big building with a parking area. Just past that is a little walkway - you could scooter it but don't drive it - down to the temple, which is closer to the shore. It's not far down but only visible from the main road if you're coming from the other direction (southbound).



And the next day to Beigan:



Now, don't let anyone tell you that you can't rent a car in Beigan. It is patently false. You can. We did. What you'll hear at first is "there are no car rental agencies on Beigan, it's too small". That's true. But you don't have to rent a car through a car rental agency - on Matsu (and Orchid Island for that matter) - most of the time you just pay someone who has 2 cars (or doesn't but doesn't need their car) to use it for a period of time - usually about NT2000/day.

On Nangan this was easy - they handed us a beaten-up Toyota and didn't even ask our names. On Beigan it was harder. First the hotel asked if we'd take a taxi around instead. Okay...I mean we were willing to. Then we said "so you don't know any local with two cars who can just rent us one for the day? We'll pay!"
"You can drive?"
"We can! We just don't think scooters are very safe, he can't really ride one well, but we are both pretty good drivers."
"Beigan has a lot of hills, more than Nangan."
"That's OK. We can handle steep hills" (a lot of the terrain isn't too different from the hilly driving conditions not far from Brendan's hometown) "it's just scootering....ah...no. But we CAN drive."
"Okay."



So she called someone up in Tangqi - turns out right across the street from the airport. If you fly into Beigan, exit the airport and look to the left. There's a big sign that says "scooter rental" on a building that has a green corrugated tin building on top. The shop itself is sort of like a pharmacy/variety shop, but they also rent cars and scooters (the sign only says 'scooters' but they have at least one car). We drive over there to rent the car. They think the 14-year-old local kid who drove us - hotel owner's son - was renting. When they saw we were, they were all "they can't drive here!"

Ugh. I have nothing to say about this except that at this point I realized it wasn't about there not being cars, it was kind of about racism, too. Or at least racial prejudice. A Taiwanese person could rent a car just fine, but they just didn't want to rent to foreigners. I realize they probably thought "if a Taiwanese person wrecks our car, we can recover damages, but foreigners can just leave".

Um.

That may be the thought in their heads, but it's still racial prejudice. No thought to whether we were careful, responsible drivers (we are, almost to the point of comedy), or that we looked to be a clean-cut, straight-laced, "boring" (honestly) married couple in their early thirties. We weren't exactly a bunch of crazy people happy to get drunk, drive their car off a cliff and laugh all the way back to America.

It's also possible that that was their own car, and they really only had that one to drive as well as rent out. Matsu is not a rich place, I doubt they had the money to own a fleet of cars for rent. However, the fact that they'd have rented it without a problem to a 14-year-old Taiwanese kid but not two thirtysomething Americans still makes me wonder.

So we talked to them, convinced them we were responsible people and would care for their car (a minivan really, or SUV like car), gave them our IDs which were clipped into a binder full of IDs of people who'd rented scooters, and off we went.

Tangqi also has a 7-11 a short walk from the airport and car rental place - if you need anything, this is the time to stop. There's also a post office if you want to mail postcards...and don't believe guidebooks who say there's no transportation at the harbor or airport. There are taxis and scooter rentals at both.

We started in Qiaozai, a small town with "more gods worshipped than people". Qiaozai only has a few elderly residents - the "market" is a truck full of vegetables that drives through once a day - and a bunch of temples among its old stone houses. I counted six.













We stopped for lunch in Qiaozai - you can also get shaved ice here by the way, if you're hot and tired - and had an excellent meal at the one restaurant, which appeared to be made of driftwood (it wasn't, it was just old and weatherbeaten) and run by an old guy who sure looked like he knew his way around a fishing boat.



This was delicious. Get this:





Then we drove to Banli, which has a beach, a lovely restored old house you can wander in, a homestay connected to that house, and the cutest damn Matsu shrine ever - seriously, this thing is adorable. Note the differences in color, architecture and design from temples in Taiwan proper. This is pretty typical of the Matsu temple style.



Matsu's friends, Thousand Mile Eyes and Ears on the Wind - two demons who fell in love with her. She promised she'd marry the one who defeated her in martial combat. She defeated both and they became her friends and acolytes.





The beach at Banli. Walk to the left of this, towards the visitor's center, for a better, more accessible beach. There are shower facilities and a visitor's center, but no lifeguard. It looks safe, but don't take my word for it. Take care. The signs state you can swim there, but not here.



At the Banli visitor's center, you can watch even more movie presentations on Matsu, including in English (which is overwrought and oddly written but generally accurate).

I get the feeling that a bunch of money was just poured recently into Matsu tourism infrastructure. There are more taxis and scooter rentals, visitor's centers everywhere, a whole series of movies in a few languages on different parts of Matsu, new parks, museums and exhibition halls, beach facilities. Someone or some people clearly took the time to develop these amenities to make Matsu an attractive and accessible destination, offering things tour groups generally like (like those video presentations) but that individuals can also enjoy.

I hope that's not a precursor to casinos going up - something I had hoped local residents had voted down, but it turns out I was wrong - Penghu voted down casinos, Matsu didn't. I get why - jobs, jobs, jobs. I don't quite get the profit end, though: Matsu isn't a pleasant place to visit for much of the year due to weather, and for another chunk of the year heavy fog causes many cancelled flights and ferries. I can't see a casino making much money. But developers gonna develop, I guess. I heard they're planning to build this huge bridge to connect Nangan to Beigan and...well, who am I to stand in the way of progress? But I can't help but feel that the entire character of islands will be changed, and not for the better.

Overall, though, those lovely tourist facilities and infrastructure, on a quiet Monday as we drove around, seemed like they were ready to welcome tourists, but there were none to be had.

Of course, it was a Monday, and the Monday before a long vacation for which all flights and hotels were already booked. It makes sense that it'd be a quiet day in terms of tourism. If you know anything about Taiwanese culture, you know that people will take Thursday and Friday off, maybe even Wednesday, go to their destination, fly back Saturday afternoon or night, and "rest" on Sunday before work. It's the total opposite of American culture where we stretch our vacation to the limits of our leave. My students were shocked that I flew back Tuesday morning and taught a class Tuesday night, but to me it was really no big thing.

One place where we did meet a lot of tourists was Mount Bi (Bishan) - while we were enjoying the view, four tour buses stopped to regurgitate passengers who milled about in sports-fabric protective sleeves, hats, sunglasses and wielding all manner of cameras. Bishan has a great view of the airport, but sadly we didn't get to see any plane take-offs or landings (there are only a few flights a day).



During our entire trip we didn't see one other foreigner of any descent. There were plenty of Taiwanese tourists (mostly in tour groups - even in their own country people seem to prefer to sign up for a group rather than travel on their own, although in the youth hostel in Nangan we saw several independent travelers), but foreigners really don't make it out here often.

People are therefore more curious, more openly interested, more plainly "you're a foreigner!" (in Taipei nobody cares), kids stared more (that's OK) and few people speak any English at all. It would be a goo idea to go with a Chinese speaker, if you can (although you'll be OK if you don't - maps and such are available in English, some of the soldiers will speak it as they'll be from Taiwan, not Matsu, some hotel owners speak a little bit, and there's always charades. If we could get through eastern Turkey without speaking Turkish, you can get around Matsu).



We stayed in Qinbi, the most well-preserved stone village in all of Matsu. It's not totally empty, although a lot of the old house are abandoned. You can tell some money is flowing in, and there are restoration efforts underway. There are a few hotels and coffeeshops and one small restaurant (for anything else, you have to drive to Tangqi). More on that later.

We then drove under the airport (yes, that's what I meant) and across the causeway to Hou'ao, another small stone village. It's not big but it's picturesque and also has its own temple.











From Hou'ao we drove up to the old military installation, where there's a new exhibition hall of military relics and some placards of "oral history" which I found interesting. The center's not quite finished, but just as with Qinbi and Banli, you can tell some money is being poured into readying it for a greater volume of tourists. It was, along with Bishan and Qinbi, one of the only places where we did see tourists, mostly in groups, as usual.

From there, what's even more interesting is driving out to the various scenic viewpoints now open to the public. From here you can see the "Lion islands" (they're said to look like Chinese male and female lions):



...and other viewpoints that feature old machine guns, tanks and howitzers.

Two shady characters shaking hands over a tiny island. Can't help but feel this is a metaphor for Taiwan's treatment in the international community in general:





Here's me with a howitzer. The best part? Brendan was all "oh, a tank" and I was all "that's a howitzer, honey...at least I think so." And he looked at me like "how the hell do you know what a howitzer looks like?" and I was all "my dad's into this kind of stuff".



The famous stone village of Qinbi (definitely stay here):



I really recommend staying in Qinbi. You may have to drive to Tangqi for a few things (really not a daunting proposition) but you can eat, drink coffee and enjoy yourself just wandering around the stone houses. There are a few hotels and coffeeshops and there's one restaurant - and they all have wifi. That's good, as if you have Taiwan Da Ge Da as we do, not China Telecom, you won't get a signal here, you'll instead pick up China's signals and be on their telecom network!

Most hotels will pick you up and even drop you off at the pier or airport (if you rent a car or scooter you can drive yourself and drop it off there, too). We stayed at the Chinbe #25 Guesthouse, which I highly recommend (083655628). . Pay for the sea view. Trust me.



The houses are under various stages of renovation - you can tell some money is coming in here to preserve and restore them, as well. They are clearly hoping that more tourists will come by to see what Matsu has to offer.























I'm really not sure if they actually used to have an opium den here or if this was always meant to just be decoration:







...but do come to Matsu. I can't recommend it highly enough.

Richard Saunders' exhaustive guide (I don't agree on the 'scooter' thing, but for everything else he's on target):

Exploring Matsu (just keep clicking forward for the entire five-part series of posts)

Taipei WhiskyLive Expo 2013

You know I love me a good booze-fiend expo, and I'm a bit of a whiskey dog, so Taipei WhiskyLive was right up my alley. Having no idea that there apparently were similar expos in 2011 and 2012, I excitedly rolled up to this one ready to try me some fancy rotgut.

We had a big Indian lunch, which was good - smart to start on a full stomach and delicious meal. Brendan joined my friend Joseph, my sister Becca and I for lunch and then saw us off - he's not so into whiskey.

I went with a budget of NT$3000 (about US$100), figuring with the discounts on offer that I could get myself a pretty nice bottle or two without breaking the bank, and also knowing that a budget was essential: I am quite aware that I am capable of spending that much and more on good whiskey.



For the cost of NT$500 (the price of one admission ticket), you get a free glass (it's lovely and tulip-shaped and is engraved with "Taipei WhiskyLive". Like at wine expo, you can try several different kinds of products, but while WhiskyLive is smaller than wine expo, it seemed to be more crowded. There weren't as many booths and there were far fewer "small booths of importers and distributors selling a curated selection of fine labels". WhiskyLive had a few of these, but it seemed anchored by lots of big "brand name" booths, in various degrees of fancy set-up.

You could even pay extra for special tastings or tastings of very expensive whiskeys - I felt that after paying NT$500 to get in that I wasn't going to pay for tastings once inside. There were also classes held and full-on tastings with professionals.

You could also pay extra for access to something called "Jim Murray's Inner Sanctum", which...well, maybe they need a new name for that. One thing I don't want to enter is Jim Murray's inner sanctum (or anyone else's for that matter).

Best line from the expo was from one such tasting - "and now let's try the twelve-year-old!"

Uhh.

 

Think novelty photos, whiskey ice cream (so-so) separately built spaces that you have to queue up or pay a fee to enter complete with fancy colored mood lighting, smoke machines, chrome and marble tabletops, leather sofas etc., and large signage for well-known whiskey purveyors - Suntory, Johnnie Walker, Macallan, The Famous Grouse, Glenmorangie and Ardbeg, Highland Park etc. etc..



Because whiskey has a kind of "businessman" vibe in Asia, not in quite the way wine does, this place wasn't geared toward foodies/gourmets/whiskey aficionados so much as businessmen who think they're aficionados but are really in it because it's expensive and an image boost.

So...smoke machines, fancy "VIP" areas, and booth babes.

Lots of booth babes.



But there were still some good things to try, and anyway one can't drink too much whiskey. I was quite taken with a brand called Ben Nevins...I tried some, immediately started calling it "Ned Bevins", and moved on to try some more kinds before making a decision of what to buy.



We tried some Japanese whiskies - "I still liked the Venn Beavis!"



We tried some samples of other alcohols - there were also booths for midori, rum and Svedka vodka - and something good called The Arran - "that was good, I'll probably buy some, but I also really liked that Len Kravitz." I've had Hibiki before but I was happy to enjoy some again, and plenty of distributors had various kinds of Laphroiag (spelling?) on offer. I can get that in Taipei, though, at a regular store, so I'm not too worried about it.



"OK, so you got your ridiculous photos with these Johnnie Walker people. Now let's go so I can buy some Zen Nebbits!"



Joseph: "It's Ben Nevis."
"Yeah, Venn Bobbit!"



"BEN NEVIS."
"Bob Venus!"



Anyway, I got my Zen Levitz (13 year), and also tried a rather nice "heavily peated" whiskey from these fellows:



And a delicious NT$6000 (approx. US$200) whiskey that was just as expensive on discount...



And also got The Arran 12 Year, which has a nice caramelly taste.



I did like that while people seemed surprised at times when I asked to taste the peatiest whiskies and the oldest vintages with the strongest flavors, but I didn't have to literally wave away bottles of lighter, sweeter whiskies that I wasn't as interested in. At wine expo, I felt at times like people saw me (a woman) and picked up the light, fizzy, white or pink wines and I had to be more aggressive in demanding (nicely) what I really wanted samples of: the darker, spicier, woodier, drier wines.

I also appreciated that the crowd was mixed. No idea how 'into' whiskey the women where, but some sure seemed to be. A refreshing change from the common teetotalling, or "I'll drink one Taiwan Beer fruit flavor, that's all!". Which, of course, is fine - I'd never pressure someone to drink something they didn't want to or couldn't handle (I didn't pressure Brendan to come to this expo at all), but it's nice to be around others I can enjoy a nice whiskey with. Men and women.

All in all, a great way to spend a rainy Sunday in Taipei.

Of Naked Emperors

This isn't Taiwan centric, although it seems to happen to a frightening degree in Taiwan. Let's be fair: and elsewhere, too.

Simply put, one great failure of capitalism is this:

A company needs to improve the English communicative ability of its staff. It's a large company with a generous training budget. Some money is allocated to English training. The person who oversees that training is an HR representative. While they generally have a grasp of things like benchmarks, showing improvement, KPI etc. etc., and may know how to achieve that in a managerial/office context (the extent to which this is actually true is fodder for some future post), they generally do not know how to achieve that in a teaching or training context. They know enough to contract that out, but because they have to be involved, they create the achievement benchmarks and try to cram the classes and seminars into their own rubrics.

I'm not against this generally, but the whole point of a good rubric or KPI is that the person who formulates it is someone who has intimate knowledge based on experience and training in the field they're setting achievement benchmarks in. In this case, it means any HR person who sets benchmarks for English improvement (which I'd argue they can and should do, if they have the appropriate knowledge) should be at least somewhat experienced and trained in language teaching. This is usually not the case, but for the money to keep flowing, someone in power has to set the benchmarks, and the flow of the money means that the person doing it isn't the person who best knows how to do it.

But I'm not writing this just to slag off HR people - some of them are intelligent people with a solid understanding of when, where and how much to get involved in training. They're not the main problem.

So this budget is set and a company goes about looking for trainers. Knowing there's a market for such things, companies pop up to provide teacher trainers for such jobs.

The companies that pop up also know nothing at all about training, language acquisition or English teaching. They are not totally useless - they do know about marketing, market potential, negotiating, contracts and sales. These are important skills and I am not arguing that all "management consulting" firms that provide English teachers to foreign companies should just shut their doors.

So the market-potential guy who wants to cash in (not necessarily a bad thing) on this demand hires some teachers. But he doesn't actually know anything about teachers, so he mostly hires people who "look the part", maybe with a few real teachers mixed in there, and some who aren't teachers but as experienced businesspeople who are native English speakers, they do have something to offer.

He then negotiates a fat slice of his new client's training budget, pays the teachers as little as the market will tolerate, set at just a little higher than the rate for the typical teacher in that country (say, Taiwan) - the rate is high enough to attract people, but not so high that he will be able to fill positions with only experienced, talented professionals. He looks up online what sort of credentials he should be looking for - he doesn't know already, because he himself doesn't know a damned thing about the field - and sticks them into his job advertisement, like plastic roses on a cake. Pretty, professional-looking but ultimately just decorative. He'll hire people without them because he doesn't understand what those qualifications are actually worth. To him they are truly just decorative.

He knows nothing about actual language teaching and as such, provides his new teachers with basically no support (what is provided is utter crap - not worthy of being called "training" or "support", but is billed as such because he's the boss, and the boss MUST know what he's doing). The teachers - some great, some good, some OK, some bad, some with potential and some without - do all the grunt work to meet benchmarks set by someone who isn't trained enough in language acquisition to set them with any degree of professional competence.

So he's paying the teachers about a third of what he's getting from the company. In return the company gets what should be talented, trained and experienced teaching professionals but instead gets a mixed bag of the good, the bad and the inexperienced. They're passed off as "the real deal" because nobody really knows any better. Nobody except the few trained teachers in this whole exchange actually knows what a good teacher/trainer is, so nobody thinks to do any QA (beyond those meaningless benchmarks).

The good teachers eventually get fed up with the no-nothing, no-support school and boss, and leave. They're not earning that much anyway. The bad teachers stick around because the pay is better than teaching kids. And there are plenty of bad teachers - the market will tolerate them because they can be paid less, and nobody at all in that system has a freakin' clue how to actually teach English. Not the administrators, not the school owners, not the students and certainly not the teachers. Nobody really cares, because nobody really knows what student achievement could be if they did only hire good people.

The boss, who doesn't know a damn thing about teaching, earns money from this whole teaching venture. The worst teachers earn an OK salary. The good people move on. The competent people (the students, the good teachers) lose, and the incompetent ones (the boss, the bad teachers) win. HR could fall on either side of this equation (I've met plenty of good ones, really).

What should be happening in a utopian world is this:  company needs English training. Company sets training budget and starts a search for competent teachers. Person who is a trained education and training professional runs a firm to provide such teachers and pays them a fair chunk of the course fee, as well as providing them with meaningful professional development. Competent teachers are provided at a fair rate, successfully fulfilling the company's need. HR knows enough to let these teachers set benchmarks for themselves, and they do (without setting bullshit achievement goals), because they are experienced, trained and talented, and assesses based on that. Everybody wins. Teachers who deserve good pay get it for good work, students learn a lot, HR is happy, and the person who runs the whole thing earns a profit they deserve for their marketing and sales.

This beautiful summation of how things should work is how business English training is too often marketed, in Taiwan and elsewhere. Everyone pretends to be a professional, everyone claims they provide a valuable service and that they, themselves, have the knowledge to be competent in the subject taught.

But we all know that's not how it is - the long-winded dystopia above is how things really work.

And here most of us are thinking that capitalism helps direct funds and skills in the most efficient fashion possible. Not so. It's a brilliant host for parasites whose only talents are sucking the system dry. Which, don't get me wrong, is a considerable talent (I certainly won't be entering marketing and sales anytime soon), but not one that deserves such a fat reward.

It won't change, because people trying to tap this market don't really want to hire good teachers - they'd have to pay them more. Good teachers don't want to get in the game because they have a very low tolerance for bullshit. HR isn't about to admit they aren't always the best people to set classroom benchmarks (although, again, I've worked with some really great ones), and bad teachers aren't likely to decide to either stop teaching or get better.

Color me disillusioned (and color me Captain Obvious, because I am sure any half-reasonable person has figured out this game already), but there you are.

Just yesterday I took on a course at a more traditional buxiban-like school, teaching test preparation. I had a meeting with the DOS for basic orientation. The DOS is certified, experienced and competent. He knows what a good teacher is and how to find and retain one. He knows what sort of training and development is required for his staff. He knows what skills to look for in a new hire to give students what they need. In short, he actually knows how to do the job he's hiring others to do. It's not a full time job - I still have my freelance thing going - but I'm looking forward to working there. A school where I get support! A school with real avenues to real professional development! A school where the person employing me actually understands what a teacher does and what a good teacher is worth!

That's such a huge change from the job I just left that I couldn't help but write about it...at length. Now it's out...please forgive me.

But in my defense, we already knew the emperor was naked, didn't we?


Sent from my iPad

Culture Fatigue: "I get it but I don't like it"

I had a conversation earlier today (OK, a thread of Facebook comments, DON'T JUDGE ME) about "cultural fatigue" - vs. culture shock - with a friend. The context: the curriculum where she works in Japan requires that a certain article on the topic be assigned, but the article itself is outdated, and not in a "this is foundational" way.

"Culture fatigue" is a concept I came across awhile ago, when I did some searching (OK, Googling, DON'T JUDGE ME) to figure out what was bothering me on a near-daily level, like a low-grade chronic ache, about my life. It wasn't depression. It wasn't my marriage. It wasn't my job. It wasn't my apartment. It wasn't my social life. It wasn't living in another country per se, and I wasn't unhappy with Taiwan overall. But it was something.

After our conversation, I did another search to see if anything new had been written on the topic, and came across this. It more or less perfectly encapsulates what sometimes bothers me about life in Taiwan (or long-term life in any country). His examples are generally money related.

Although occasionally, very occasionally, I've felt nickeled-and-dimed in Taiwan (a taxi driver taking an obviously inferior route, a dry cleaner charging me a touch more than I thought dry cleaning usually cost, a guy showing me a price on a calculator for a scarf (299) and telling a local woman the price in Chinese for the same kind of scarf (250 - and I did call him on it and I got it for 225 - "you should knock off 25 more for giving me the foreign price" I said, and he did!), mostly money isn't a problem. Things cost what they cost and yes, friends and relatives get a discount, but you the foreigner generally get the price that an unfamiliar local would get. At least in Taipei.

So these aren't my issues. Taiwan is a very different place from Colombia (I think I just won the "duh" award with that statement), and the culture fatigue issues I face are, understandably, quite different.

My examples for Taiwan are below.

Before I get into them, please keep in mind: I really do love living here. I don't mean these as an ad hominem attack on Taiwan. I could write a similar post of similar length on great things about life here and aspects of the culture that I find positive or preferable. I do not mean to imply that these happen every day to me (they don't) or that I think they make people here crazy or "inscrutable" (they really don't). I don't think all of these are "wrong" per se, just a very different way of looking at the world. My point is that these are the cultural norms that give me trouble; they are the ones that cause culture fatigue. It doesn't mean they are "wrong", just that I find them difficult to deal with.

In fact, because this sort of post tends to get people angry, I've gone ahead and highlighted in pink the areas where I try to empathize with, or at least understand, the other side of the issue.

- - Never knowing if "sorry, I'm just so busy these days. I still want to hang out and see you, I'm just very busy", after you haven't seen a friend in months, is really "I'm busy" (it can be - considering working hours and family obligations in Taiwan), or if it's a polite brush-off. In the USA I'd know.

- - The concepts of respect for rank and giving "face" to people higher in rank than you (I naively thought face was something everyone got in equal measure. Boy was I wrong), meaning that if you have a dispute with someone higher-up than you, even if you are right and everybody knows you are right, they may well not support you. This can happen in the USA too, but it isn't as common. I do get it - face is a big deal, and if you are judicious in giving it and then trying to get what you want through other means, it's not that hard to be successful. It just wears me down to have to do things this way so often.

- - Not imparting important, or even just pertinent, information if informing somebody of something too early (or at all) could make waves in the placid surface on the lake of social harmony. As in, the other day I was in the Eslite Dunhua cafe after a class, and I was hungry. It was about 2:30pm. I asked for the menu, saying "I'm quite hungry, so I want to order some food" in Chinese. They give me the menu. I pick out something healthy and light - the smoked salmon salad. They say "oh, I'm sorry, the kitchen is closed".
"OK, but I said I wanted to order food when I asked for the menu."
"You can have a cake!" (pointing to the cake display).
"If I wanted a cake I would not have asked for the menu because I can see the cakes."
"Oh, yes, that's true."
"So why did you give me the menu?"
"Excuse me, I don't understand."
"I asked for a menu saying I wanted to order food. If you knew the kitchen was closed, why did you give me the menu? Why didn't you just say the kitchen was closed in the beginning?"
"Uh..."

I mean I guess it's possible that the server was either a.) not that smart or b.) not having a good day (we all have Stupid Days, it's OK), but this sort of thing has happened many times before. It's happened enough that I recognize it as a cultural tic and not just One Ditzy Waitress.

I get this one too: social harmony is more important than individual wants, and social harmony must be achieved and maintained (that's why we smile and shake hands after an argument at work when nothing's actually been resolved. OK). So you just go with it and assume the other person gets this on a cellular level too. The waitress probably figured, when it was clear I did not want a cake, that I would be all "oh, OK, well, thank you!" and not call her out on giving me a menu when I couldn't order anything. My calling her out disturbed social harmony. Her giving me the menu, however unthinking it seemed to me, was trying to maintain it. I get it, but it wears me down.

- - Related to the example above, the whole listening to your requests and suggestions, the person nods that he or she understands...then completely disregards them. Or, as you make a request or list a requirement, the person says that would be fine, and then proceeds to go against everything agreed on to try to get you to bend even after you've already said you can't or won't. Again, nodding and "understanding" uphold social harmony. Nobody can say directly that they don't agree or can't grant your request. So they don't say it. You are just expected to understand. And again, when this happens I know why it happens and I try to handle it with grace. But it wears me down.

Example: let's say you are asked to create material for and teach a series of workshops on some business skill. You agree, and you get to work. You say you will need a projector and screen in class. to show a short video in the workshop. "I understand." The morning of the workshop - no projector or screen. "Oh, we don't have that, sorry. You can teach without it." Yes, by changing my entire lesson plan with about ten minutes to spare, I can. ARGGGHHHHH. (One day I decided I was done. Done. I just flatly refused to do that when confronted with material changed without my knowledge ten minutes before class. "You can just teach this instead." "No." "But..." "NO. You get me the agreed-upon material or I won't teach. I am not joking. You have ten minutes." "But..." "Do it or this class doesn't happen." It felt so good.)

Or you tell someone you need a month's notice to clear time to do something on weekday nights, but weekends are generally fine. Then they call you up and ask when you are free in two weeks. You list weekends and one weekday night because it happens to be open. They call you and say "what other weekday nights are you free?"
"None."
"Oh, well, we want to do this on weekday nights. You said you could do that?"
"Yes, with a month's notice."
"Oh. I see. Well, could you try to free up those nights now for two weeks later? You have two weeks!"
"No, I'm sorry."
"Are you sure? We really want to do this on those nights."
"I already told you, to get those free I need a month's notice."
"Well, maybe you can try?"
"No, I'm sorry."

And then you are made to feel bad - well, if you let them make you feel bad - for declining to try, because you look like the uncooperative, inflexible one. The point is that they want to do something, and that means they'll try to bend every factor to fit in place to make it happen. That means asking you if you can also be flexible so they can make it happen (which often, but not always, may also benefit you). What you told them before...yeah, it means something, but if they need to ask for something you said you couldn't give to achieve what they want, they will anyway. It's not that they didn't understand, it's that this is a country in which almost everything is flexible if you know where to press, push, twist or bend, so they're hoping they can bend you. It's not personal. Again, I get it but I don't like it.

- - Lying, especially at work. Either employees lying to avoid being blamed for something, or bosses lying to try to manipulate employees into doing something they might otherwise resist (this covers 99% of "please finish this tonight, it's an urgent issue!"). Related: when you call someone out on that lie and the mood of the room turns against you, not the liar, because they lost face when you called them out for...blatantly lying. I do get that "lie" doesn't quite mean the same thing in Asia as it does in the West, but it doesn't blunt the force of the culture fatigue.

- - Not apologizing. I understand this one: apologizing puts an unnecessary spotlight on you in a situation where everybody already knows you screwed up. Not apologizing is a way to save face, but it's not like you're not accountable. People know. If you say it openly people don't let it go. Totally different from the US where apologizing is what you do to get people to let it go. I get it. I do. But I still get irritated when someone screws up royally and doesn't acknowledge it.

- - Very strange assumptions, to me, about what constitutes a "good relationship" or even "a marriage". Like, the idea that if you are moved to hire a private detective to spy on your spouse, that the problem isn't the marriage itself but his mistress (or her "mister"). Or that it's OK if a husband stands with his parents against his wife on some issue, and the wife is expected to cave (so happy that I don't have this problem: and it involves things like "my mother wants us to have a baby so we're going to do that", and if the wife makes a fuss she's the bad guy). Or that if he retreats emotionally and gives her, basically, The Fade, and she shows up crying on his doorstep, and he reluctantly goes back to her, but she has to sa jiao him to get him to do anything at all, that this is apparently a happy ending.

Let's be fair here - not all, not even most, relationships in Asia are like that. It's one subset of people, one cultural meme among many. And plenty of Taiwanese would find certain Western relationship norms odd: I mentioned to a class I've had for awhile that of course Brendan knows of my not-terribly-many ex-boyfriends. We were roommates twice as friends: he's met most of 'em. It's really not a big deal. I know his history too. NBD. It's normal. Your past is a part of you. It would be odd to withhold it (of course you don't give lots of details, but you know, the general outline).

Well, they were shocked. SHOCKED! Apparently none of them had told their wives about their ex-girlfriends (not even general details - nothing at all, as though they never existed). They knew nothing of their wives' ex-boyfriends. "It's better that you don't get into that," they said. "That can create bad feelings. So there is no reason to say it."

My thought: if it creates bad feelings, there is a problem in your current relationship. And if you don't know at least the general outline of someone's past, I feel that you don't really know them. But those Taiwanese guys don't see it that way at all. My way is culture shock to them (not so much culture fatigue: they don't live in my culture; I live in theirs).

- - The acceptance of sexism as "that which we cannot change", even as someone espouses generally feminist ideals. It's fine for a woman to be President of Taiwan, or for a woman to be powerful (Cher Wang, Chen Chu, various General Managers and politicians), wealthy, successful. It's fine if other people's wives are breadwinners (among the younger generation, it's apparently more acceptable for their own wives to be breadwinners). If I mention that I am a breadwinner, nobody gasps. And yet, it's just accepted as "that's the way things are" when asked how they feel about how Taiwanese women are so harshly judged on their appearance and age, how divided-by-gender some industries are, how a wife is expected to submit in small but significant ways to her husband's family, that her husband's family is always the one given priority on holiday visits (nobody thinks to question how patriarchal it is to always give Chinese New Year's Day to the husband's side, and the less important day after to the wife's), that the husband's family has a lot of say in when they start trying for a baby, that a man can have support for women's rights and yet still feel that his son should grow up to be a provider, but that his daughter need only find a good husband.

Related: "women do X, men do Y". Men can say bad words; women shouldn't. Men are strong, women are not. Men prefer pretty women, women prefer rich and powerful men. Women love babies, men like 'em well enough. Women don't drink as much. When they do, they prefer light drinks, sweet cocktails, low-alcohol fruit beers, and fizzy, white or pink, light wine. Men drink whiskey and Kaoliang. Men shake hands with men, they don't extend their hands to women. Women may extend their hand to men. I am sorry, I just don't like this. I can try to empathize but this is a hot button for me and...well...no. I just want to scream "講三小!"

(That's Taiwanese for "WTF are you saying?")

Same with racism by the way. Seems everybody has egalitarian views on race, and yet everyone considers racism against non-white foreigners including Southeast Asians to be something that can't be changed.

This one? Well, if you come from a culture that values harmony, conformity, stability and tradition, it's understandable that you might throw up your hands at a difficult situation and say "it's our culture, it's always been this way, we can't change it". I can't come up with an "I get it" beyond that, though. I really can't. It just sucks.

- - "I have to" - when someone who doesn't actually have authority to tell you what to do...tells you what to do. "I have to diet this much, people will think I'm fat if I gain weight". "I have to have a baby, my mother-in-law wants us to". "I have to stay late at work, my coworkers will think I am not loyal to the company." "I have to make my kid go to buxiban for 200 hours a week, everybody else does so I have to, too". "I have to have a big wedding and invite 500 people I don't know." "I have to invest in my brother's idea for a milk tea stand even though I don't want to because my parents say I should." 'I have to buy an apartment near my parents even though I don't want to live in that neighborhood." The boundary violations...my god. My boundaries are such that they're practically guarded by an electric dog fence (and all of y'all except Brendan are wearing special collars - sorry). I want to scream "You don't HAVE to. You are CHOOSING to! And that's OK! You have decided that you'd rather go along with this social expectation than fight it. You think that's preferable for you. FINE! That's great! You do you! But YOU DO NOT HAVE TO!"

But, I've come to realize that what "I have to" really means is "I choose to, because going with the flow is preferable to me, but I want to express that the expectation is very strong and that maintaining social harmony is still more important to me than getting my own way, while also expressing that I am not really happy about it." So...okay.

This happens in the USA too: "I HAVE TO wear white on my wedding day because it'll upset my mom if I don't!" 

But I do kind of wish that people generally (not just in Taiwan) would be more cognizant of the differences between what they actually have to do, and what they choose to do, albeit under pressure.


- * - * -

If you've gotten this far and are fuming angrily about how much I hate Taiwan, how whiny I am, how I "just don't get it", well, mosey on back and read the stuff in pink, thanks.

I do feel, though, that this is difficult to talk about for a few reasons. One is that I do feel as an expat, that either I'm supposed to happily embrace my the culture of the country where I live, and if I really love it in that country, I can't show any irritation or criticism of that culture: either you love it or you don't, goes that binary thinking, and if you complain at all, you don't love it. It's not true, and people surely know that on some level (I get annoyed with constant complainers, but will defend anyone's right to vent a bit or complain for awhile even if they love a place).

Another is that I feel that as openminded, 21st century folk, that we're supposed to approach culture differences at all times with "it's not bad, it's just different" or even "their culture is BETTER than ours", and no criticism shall pass our lips lest we be labeled 'narrowminded', 'ethnocentric', 'culturally imperialist' or just 'racist'. Believe me, there are ways in which I do feel Taiwanese culture is superior, but there are times when I really want to say this: there are other ways in which I do feel American (narrowed down to my home country for simplicity's sake) culture has one up on Taiwanese ways of doing things. I don't think that makes me narrowminded or racist. Examples: I think that in Taiwanese companies, when you want to get rid of someone, strongly encouraging them to quit rather than firing them is better. People screw up, people are sometimes just not good fits. That's no reason to poison someone's chances, in a small country with a very interconnected culture, of getting another job and making something of themselves by firing them publicly.  But then the American way of insisting on accountability and prizing efficiency and "it's not personal, just fix your mistakes and get it done, don't waffle, don't get defensive, don't hide behind 'face' to avoid accountability" is probably better than the Taiwanese way of often getting defensive (due to loss of face) when publicly or even privately-but-directly called out on a mistake. Not that everyone in either culture always conforms to these norms, just that they are common.

Finally, the idea that "under our skin, we're all the same" applies to all people in all ways. It does not. Sure, under our different races we are all born with similar ranges of intelligence and stupidity, aptitudes and idiosyncracies, good and bad people. There's no gene that makes "Asians smarter at math", or "Jews better with money" or whatever. That's ridiculous and we all know it. But we actually aren't all the same under our skin. Not for genetic or racial reasons, but that our cultures make our outlooks and fundamental worldviews, well, fundamentally different. We're the same in so many ways, but different in others, and it's time we acknowledged that more openly. I don't think it's un-PC to say so.

What are your "culture fatigue" issues in Taiwan (or elsewhere)? Got anything to add? As long as you don't just dump on Taiwan (and even if you do, although I'd hope my lovely, intelligent commenters would be the sort to attempt understanding and empathy), I'd be glad to add to this list. I am sure someone else out there in Taiwan in the throes of cultural fatigue will come across this post and be able to see the source of their anger and frustration more easily. Maybe it'll keep an expat from exploding somewhere, or giving up and flying home in a fit of rage. And that would be all worth it.

Of Typhoons and Fighting Back: Consumer Rights in Taiwan

Several years ago, I took a series of one-on-one Chinese classes at TLI (Taipei Language Institute), and while my teachers were fine (not particularly trained, but nice people and I did learn from them - mostly I got in some good speaking practice). I didn't continue the course for a few reasons. Because I didn't like that my two hour block was split between two teachers - I liked them both but I really just wanted one teacher so we could progress more. Because I was not allowed to take any classes off and make them up (if I couldn't take a class, it was considered forfeit), but at one point one of my teachers took a few classes off and I got a substitute (again, really hard to progress that way), meaning she could take time off, but not me. Because at one point a teacher just didn't show up and I waited 20 minutes or so before telling TLI, and they got irritated at ME - apparently I should have told them almost immediately so they could find me a quick substitute and not have to do a make-up class (again, how does this help me progress?).

And finally, because one of my classes was postponed due to a typhoon day. When I asked when the make up would be, I was told there would not be one. I asked, then, when I would get my refund as I'd paid for two hours of class (it was an hourly rate) that I would never receive. I was told there would not be one. 

My teachers seemed genuinely surprised that I was upset by this: "but we're teachers, we're guaranteed certain earnings! It's not fair to us to not get paid because there was a typhoon!"

Okay. I mean, office workers and others get that courtesy. You don't have to go in to work but you still get paid. So I understood why they might feel that way, and why the school might back them up.

But this wasn't office work, and it wasn't a course for which you paid tuition for the entire term. This was paid by the hour. As I saw it, I paid for two hours of a service (Chinese class) and as such, I was owed the two hours I'd paid for. Otherwise I'd paid for something I'd never get. It would be like paying a plumber to come to your house on Tuesday, but he's sick that Tuesday, so he takes your money but says he's not coming. Or paying someone to translate your resume into Chinese by September 1st, but they go out of town unexpectedly until September 5th, don't translate your resume and don't return your money. 

As a teacher myself, if there's a typhoon day I don't get paid. I mean, we make up the class. I always get the money eventually. But I don't get it right then, for work performed that day. Is it totally fair? No, but you deal with it because that's what it means to work this kind of job. If it was so important to me I'd go looking for a salaried position, and I notably have not done so.

And my students? If there's a typhoon day, they get a make-up class. I have a student who pays me for ten classes at a time. Last week our Wednesday class (#9) didn't happen because of Typhoon Trami. If I'd then said, "well, #9 was cancelled due to typhoon, next week is #10" she would simply decline to be my student any longer. I teach her privately, but I don't know of any English school that would have any other policy. They'd lose too much business.

Taiwanese learners of English who take one-on-ones don't stand for that sort of bullshit, so why should I? I left TLI, figuring it was one bad experience and I'd just go elsewhere. I still wasn't fond of Shi-da, so after another tumultuous semester there, I decided not to return. I happen to think the most common "methodologies" (if you can call them that) used by teachers at MTC are atrocious, even outright wrong from a language teaching/Applied Linguistics perspective.

It didn't occur to me to complain, because I didn't realize something: typhoon day policies like TLI's are illegal. If you pay for a service by the hour, you are to receive that service or receive a refund. 

So I drifted for awhile, and finally signed up for one-on-one classes at Chinese Culture University. Again I liked my teacher, my class wasn't split in half, she helped me learn some Taiwanese, and I was mostly happy. I was told that in the event of a typhoon, there would be a refund or a make-up. Yay!

About halfway through the course, right after Typhoon Soulik (which did not affect my class), they sent me an e-mail saying that the rules had changed - in Chinese - "for the next term, in the event of a typhoon cancellation, there will be no make-up and no refund" the e-mail said. "I know we promised you this term that you would get a make-up or refund, so if there is a typhoon cancellation, we will help you to make it up. For the next term, however, the new rules will apply. We are sorry for the inconvenience."

So I wrote back (in Chinese, badly), saying "unless this rule is changed there won't be a second term. I've already told you that I lost money from TLI for this reason, and I refuse to accept that this may happen again. If I sign up anyway, your management may feel that this rule is fair and acceptable, but it truly is not. I don't blame you" (the admin who wrote the e-mail - not her fault) - "but I hope you will pass my message on to the boss to let him know that this policy is not fair to students and Chinese Culture University will lose students and revenue as a result. I simply cannot accept it and I am not prepared to negotiate."

She wrote back to say she understood, and would pass on my message. Nothing happened. I posted about it on Facebook - yet another school off my list because I could not abide this policy.  

A few people replied - and I found out that this policy is, in fact, quite illegal. 

I took it up with the government, sending in a complaint (in Chinese, badly), with screenshots of the e-mail I received. They sent me a letter within a week to say they'd received it and, as it was the jurisdiction of the Department of Education (or somesuch) that they'd sent it on to them. I didn't have to do anything. I got a letter from the Education department saying they were looking into it and to sit tight (but in Chinese Bureaucratese, of course). 

Then two weeks pass. Nothing. I begin to worry that CCU has some sort of 'guanxi' or relationships in the government and so they got them to just drop this complaint from a small fry like me. Damn it. I didn't really want to write an editorial or something like that, I just wanted it taken care of. I was assured again that the policy was quite illegal. One friend noted that his school used to have such a policy, but they had to change it to offer make-ups as students complained and the government came down on them.

On the last day of my course, Chinese Culture University gave me a final letter, again in Chinese Bureaucratese. I could barely read it; we read it together as a part of my class (my teacher was well aware that I was complaining and said she agreed with me). It said, after three or so bullshit points (they always do that), that in the case of a typhoon, there will be no refund but I will be able to schedule a make-up. 

Okay. That's fair! 

I haven't signed up with CCU again yet, as I can't really take an evening class right now, but the teacher who teaches Taiwanese is only free after 4:30pm. I want to see how my September schedule might work out before resigning. I couldn't help but note, though, that on my last day I was not handed a feedback form or a sign-up form. I was not contacted at all. It was done, and I couldn't tell if this was just them not providing good follow-up, them just assuming I'd take the initiative, or them thinking I still would not sign up for a new term...or them trying to indirectly tell me that I may have won the fight, but they didn't really want me as a student anymore, so to kindly not return. I have no way of knowing.

I just wanted to share this to let you all know: if you take a Chinese one-on-one class and your school (if you take it through a school) tells you that you won't get a make-up or refund in the event of a typhoon, that it is illegal, that you can complain through official channels, and that you absolutely should.  It's not even that hard to do.

Why they think they can have policies like this is beyond me - the Taiwanese would never stand for it. Do they think foreigners are dumb (I don't think so, but I have to wonder sometimes)? Do they think they can get away with it because there aren't as many Chinese schools as there are English schools, and less competition means they can get away with more crap (see: airlines)? Or do they think this is actually a fair policy (I can't believe they do)?

I don't know the answers to these questions, but I do know this. The state of "getting things done" in Taiwan is not totally broken. Consumer rights exist (although property rights don't seem to) and even if you're just one person you can sometimes get someone to enforce laws that are on your side. DO complain. DO make a fuss. DO stand up for yourself. DON'T let them steal your money.

Not-Really Doing The Delta in Taiwan: Preparation for Module One

I'm posting this - and more blog posts to come - because there isn't much talk of doing the Delta or having a Delta credential among teachers in Taiwan: this includes teachers who are more serious about actually teaching and aren't just kids looking to travel or older dudes who never really thought about doing anything else, or doing what they do now better (I know, I said dudes, not people. But I've never met a long-term female English teacher in Taiwan - or anywhere else for that matter - who didn't at some point seek out training and professional development in order to pursue it as a proper career. There seems to be a time limit on women willing to do this job without improving their skills and 'getting serious'. But, sorry to say, I've met plenty of men who are in exactly that rut).

So what is it like to be based in Taiwan as one works their way through the Delta modules? I aim to find out (also, I'll end up with a Delta) and I figure I may as well blog about it.

This is a "Not-Really" series because we're not really doing the Cambridge Delta course in Taiwan, we're doing Module One online, Module Two - well who knows, really, but if we can't get a Local Tutor here we're going to have to go abroad for it - and Module Three will almost certainly be online (but who knows).

Another option we could have taken but didn't is a 12-week intensive course (I think shorter options are available, though) - they're offered in various centers around the world. We looked into doing it at International House Bangkok but the up-front cost for both of us at that time was just not feasible (and we weren't really excited about repeating our four-week CELTA experience over even more weeks). Why Bangkok? Cheapest to live in of all the nearby cities, and the program director was very responsive. I got a good vibe. If we have to go abroad for Modules 2 or 3, we'll probably put them as our top choice.

These are, at the moment, the only option available for those who want to do this, and I do hope in the future that the number of people who do will increase.

Module One hasn't started yet, but we're already pre-reading for it, because we figured that'd be a good idea. So, some preliminary thoughts:

Why would you want to do the Delta from Taiwan, if you want to work in Taiwan?

The CELTA and Delta are not officially recognized in Taiwan, because the government is stupid that way. Sorry, it's the honest truth. After doing the CELTA, I truly believe that it's the best initial ELT qualification out there, it produces teachers with a good foundation in basic skills for the job, a foundation that further training and support can build on. If the government of Taiwan can't be bothered to recognize that, they're stupid. 

They're also paid for (maybe not literally, but close enough). They're not interested in having quality English teachers, they're interested in keeping wages low at buxibans, because the bosses have more influence than the foreign teachers. One way to keep wages low is to make it easy for the workforce to be unqualified - it's not like most people understand on a deeper, more complex level what a professional, talented, qualified teacher actually does. Doesn't take too much thought to put it all together: they don't want a qualified foreign teacher workforce, because then those foreigners might demand better pay, and the laobans wouldn't want that (the laobans don't seem to care much about good teaching - - generally speaking, they are not teachers, although some believe they are).

But there are other reasons to do the Delta, even if your home base now and for the foreseeable future is Taiwan. Here are mine:

1.) It will make you a better (real) teacher. The CELTA is an initial qualification. It doesn't make a full-on professional teacher. It's a foundation. The Delta, I daresay, will make you an actual professional who knows what they are doing. Besides being more impressive in interviews and demos, if you're going to be an English teacher for realsies, wouldn't you want to be the best one you can be? No matter where you live? Isn't self-improvement a good thing? I was impressed enough with the CELTA that I do believe a Delta is a good move in terms of professional development.

2.) It's affordable. It's cheaper than a Master's, and will count as credit towards that Master's. It's not dirt cheap, but that's OK. I felt that what I got from the CELTA in a highly professional center (ITI Istanbul) was well worth the tuition. I believe the same will be true for Delta. I trust the program. If you want to be an English teacher, a real, qualified one, it's a wise financial bet.

3.) It's practical. I will eventually get a Master's degree. I can't imagine not doing that. But Master's degrees in Education, Applied Linguistics and TEFL/TESOL tend to be theoretical, not practical. The Delta is a practical, in-service qualification and I value that over academic learning in this particular instance. Eventually I want both, but I place more value on the practical qualification first.

4.) It will prepare you for further education. Imagine if you were plonked down in a Master's program with a few years' experience and an initial qualification, and everyone around you seemed to know better than you what they were doing. I could imagine myself there, and I wouldn't welcome such a scenario (would anyone?). After the Delta I'll feel poised and learn-ed enough to enter a Master's program - a reputable one - with confidence. It also takes about as long as one semester of a Master's degree, meaning that if you choose the right university it'll count for a heck of a lot.

5.) It may not be recognized by the government, but foreign prospective bosses LOVE it. If your prospective boss is Taiwanese, they likely won't know a Delta from their butthole (well, that's a bit mean - some will. I'm really just drawing on my own experience at my last job. But in general it's true). This may or may not be their fault (it's their fault if they're one of those this-is-business-I-don't-care-if-you-can-actually-teach bosses, but not their fault if they are qualified teachers who, by dint of being from and educated in Asia, simply aren't familiar with it). But if your prospective boss is a foreigner - especially if (s)he's British - it won't matter what the government recognizes. You'll be gold.

6.) It's a good credential to have if you ever have to leave Taiwan but still want to teach. It's recognized elsewhere, and having it means you'll always be at the head of the pack when it comes to finding a job.

7.) It may someday be recognized in Taiwan. Don't get your hopes up, but there are people with a strong interest in seeing this happen. Maybe. Someday. One can dream.

8.) It can be done online. I know Taiwan doesn't generally recognize online Master's degrees, but I do hope that someday it will be different when it comes to recognizing a comprehensive Delta. After all, if you're in Taiwan there aren't many other options. You could go abroad for each module, but that costs a fortune.

Why are you pre-reading for this thing? Can't you just take it and read the books as they come up in the course?

Plenty of people have already blogged about why pre-reading is a good idea. I know you'll hate me for this, but I'm going to give you another list of my own reasons:

1.) Because there is a lot of terminology, and the sooner you are exposed to it, the better. It may seem silly to you now, but it counts.
2.) Because the course references scads of books, and if you haven't read any of them, you'll have to work your ass off. If you have read a few, life won't be so horrible for you.
3.) It gets you familiar with the sort of things you'll have to know to take the test (which is for-realz difficult, it's not a fluff course, nor is it a fluff exam).
4.) Because the rubrics are extremely strict, and you'll want to know that and understand how as early as possible so you can prepare appropriately
5.) Because if you're in Taiwan you probably had to order the books online, so you may as well crack 'em open. After all, this is not a course to take if you're not serious about teaching.
6.) Because I want to not just be good, I want to be great, fantastic amazing, whatever, and if I want to not only pass this test but shake it 'till I break it, I'll need to pre-read.
7.) Because although this is a practical qualification, there is an academic component. The sooner you get yourself re-adjusted to academia, the better. Academics generally don't go out of their way to write things in clear, concise, accessible ways.
8.) Because you probably won't have time to read every book cover to cover, but if you eventually go on to get a Master's, having done so will really help. A lot. A lotsy-lot.

And most importantly (so importantly that I'm putting it in hot pink):

7.) The Delta is aimed at people who have an initial qualification (preferably CELTA) and a few years' experience. The problem here is that they seem to assume that that experience came with things like "further training" and "support" and "a knowledgeable, qualified school staff". So they expect you to really know more than you did when you took the CELTA. Which you do, because you have more experience, but if you didn't get any further training or support, you won't know much more. So...if you're like me (zero training post-CELTA and the level of "qualification" of the office staff at my former company would be laughable if it weren't so sad), you'll need to pre-read just to feel like you can hang with the cool, experienced kids. You'll need to be Mike Wazowski in Monsters University, because you're not James P. Sullivan.

The Delta website recommends two years' post-CELTA experience. Other bloggers say it could easily, perhaps should be, more. But with no support or ongoing training, more time won't make me a better teacher. I've reflected as much as I can reflect. I work to improve, but feel a bit rudderless. With that kind of obstacle to overcome, knowing that even if I had more "experience" it wouldn't matter much, I have to pre-read.

OK, so what should I pre-read?

1.) Beyond The Sentence - this is discourse analysis. a fairly easy book to pre-read, you can plow through it without needing a course tutor to walk you through it. Also, totally fascinating and I don't mean that sarcastically. This is an especially good book for terminology - keep a notebook of new terms you come across. Stuff like deixis, parataxis, anaphoric reference, adjacency pairs etc.. If it sounds fancy and Greek, write it down like the good little nerd you are. These are very likely to be on the exam, and the sooner you are exposed to them, the better.

2.) Linguistics for Non-Linguists - I will be a linguist someday (DAMMIT!) but for now, I am not. I have not read this yet but Brendan either has or is currently in the midst of it, and says it's easy enough to read, accessible and interesting. I trust his judgment, so I give it a thumbs-up.

3.) About Language - I haven't read this but it comes highly recommended from several trusted sources, many of whom say "if you read one book before the course, make it this one".

4.) If you didn't read it for CELTA, read it now: The Practice of English Language Teaching. I am a very big fan of this book. Our CELTA course was basically a vehicle for inserting the knowledge, with practical use, from this book into our brains Matrix-style, and I ain't complainin'.

5.) Delta Module One Exam Reports - read, read, read, and note the correct answers and why the incorrect ones are so. Read more than one (just Google, they'll come up).

6.) Anything else that strikes your fancy on the reading list (varies by center).

7.) Blog posts like this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, this one and this one.

8.) Get yourself some Quizlets

There may be more - if so, I'll come in and edit this post.

WHERE CAN I BUY ALL THAT CRAP IN TAIWAN? ESLITE IS USELESS. JEEEEZUS.

1.) books.com.tw for pickup at 7-11. Most titles take time to arrive, they're not immediately in stock.

2.) http://www.bookdepository.co.uk - FREE DELIVERY WORLDWIDE!


Anyway, that's all I've got for now. Check back in later when I've actually started the course!