An Expatriate in Taiwan » Taiwanese Culture

新年快樂! Happy New Year!

The Expatriate — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 05:47:36 +0000

I’ve been pretty lazy lately, but I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Chinese New Year. Mrs. Expatriate and I will be spending some time with her family, playing some Mahjongg, eating some great food, and having a good time. Hope everyone else has a great weekend!

Happy New Year! 新年快樂!

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新年快樂! Happy New Year!

The Gukeng Coffee Festival

The Expatriate — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 03:34:15 +0000

Last weekend, Mrs. Expatriate and I decided to take a trip to the Gukeng Coffee Festival. It’s a small gathering of people selling coffee, food, handicrafts, and other such things. The weather was absolutely gorgeous and there were quite a few people out and about. If you get a chance, I recommend you go.

Our trip started at the Gukeng Honey Museum, which is pretty small, but nice. There are no English signs, so you’ll have to look at the pictures or read Chinese in order to understand. You can also buy a wide variety of bee- and honey-related products, such as honey (Longan flavor, etc), pollen (great in tea or on ice cream), honey Liquor, honey vinegar, and so on. Outside, you can cool down with some honey ice cream, which is simply outstanding.

The Coffee Festival is at the end of a road that starts at the Honey Museum. You can walk down this road, stop for some drinks or food or watch street performers. Finally, you will come to the coffee festival, which is inside a large tent. It’s not just coffee. In fact, overall, there was relatively little coffee compared to the other offerings, but it’s still a great place to visit during this great weather we’re having in Taiwan.

[View with PicLens]

After we got home, we noticed these white-headed birds eating some fruit in the trees. Can anyone identify them? I’d love to know what kind of bird they are.

Erroneous Taiwan Stereotypes

The Expatriate — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 03:25:54 +0000

Catherine over at shu flies had a great post a while back about one of her blogging pet peeves – people who generalize and stereotype about every Taiwanese person based on the actions of a few. This also happens to be one of my pet peeves and something that I, being a foreigner, have to deal with every now and then. That is to say, as a foreigner, it’s easy for me to see a Taiwanese person or a group of Taiwanese people do something and create a stereotype about all Taiwanese people. It’s something that I have to watch myself for.

However, I have an answer.

I have previously blogged on how bad Taiwanese drivers are. This is a prime example of me labeling all Taiwanese as bad drivers, even though it isn’t true. Some Taiwanese are very good drivers. Taxi Drivers, for example, even though they are perhaps the craziest drivers, also tend to be the best – I’ve never seen them crash, they know the best routes through the cities, and if you need to get somewhere fast, follow the cab. Mrs. Expatriate’s father is also a very good driver. But I digress.

It’s easy to drive through Taiwanese traffic a few times and label all Taiwanese drivers as bad. This simply isn’t true. I’ve been thinking about this lately, however, and I believe I’ve come up with a solution that answers pretty much all the “problems” that Expats have with Taiwan.

Population Density.

You see, Taiwan is a small island packed to the gills with people. According to WolframAlpha, Taiwan’s population density is 712 people/km^2 (1844 people/mi^2). This makes it the 16th highest in the world. This means that no matter where you go in Taiwan, you’re going to run into people (OK, most places).

Where I’m from, South Dakota, the population density is 9.9 people/mi^2. Yeah, big difference. If you are from a bigger city, like Manhattan (25,850/km^2), then this is nothing new to you, but it’s still a lot of people.

I guess what I’m taking the long way of saying is that, for most expats, it is a matter of all Taiwanese drivers being bad drivers. It’s simply a matter of having a higher population density and therefore running into bad drivers more often. Taking Catherine’s example, it’s not a matter of Taiwanese women being shallow; it’s merely that you are running into shallow Taiwanese women more often. I’ve met plenty of good Taiwanese drivers and plenty of non-shallow Taiwanese women. However, you simply don’t meet them often enough to people being packed into the island like sardines.

I’ll finish off this post with Catherine’s own quote, which also goes for this blog. Some days in Taiwan are just those kind of days. As foreigners, it’s very easy to cast a wide net over Taiwanese culture and generalize about the people. Therefore, it’s even more important that we are aware of what we are doing and take steps to avoid it. Taiwan is a great place and we should do well to welcome more foreigners here by sharing our great impressions of the island.

I don’t want anyone stumbling upon my blog and leaving with an erroneous impression of Taiwanese culture — and people — just because I had a bad day and needed to vent. I don’t always succeed in this, but I am always conscious of it.

Someone wants us to have kids

The Expatriate — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:41:00 +0000

In Taiwan, it is common to eat sweet foods on and after your wedding day. It is thought that eating sweet food will help the newlywed couple have a baby boy. The reason is a Taiwanese proverb:

吃甜甜，生兒子。 (chī tiántián, shēng érzì)

It doesn’t sound as good in Mandarin, but it rhymes in Taiwanese (jia didi, sei haoxi).

What it means is, “Eat sweet food, have a son.” I’m not sure where this proverb comes from or how long its been around. If anyone has any more info about it, drop me a line in the comments.

Anyway, a student’s mother made us some sweet soup to congratulate us on our marriage. It wasn’t bad. Had some weird things in it, but overall it tasted something like fruit cocktail. I should note that you must first heat it up so as to make sure the ingredients and gelatin inside are cooked. Then you serve it with ice or put it in the fridge and eat it cold.

Happy Bird’s Day

The Expatriate — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 07:02:38 +0000

Today is my older sister’s birthday. She’s come a long way…

To honor this occasion, I thought I would give my Big Sister a uniquely Taiwanese Birthday Present. In my meager Taiwan existence, it has become extremely clear that there is one birthday custom which MUST be honored: a trip to the KTV for a round of 快樂鳥日子 (kuàilèniǎorìzì) by 康康 (Kankan). Literally translated, it means “Happy Bird’s Day” and is supposed to be a humorous way of mocking the way Chinese speakers pronounce “Happy Birthday.” The is entirely in Taiwanese, except for the middle where Kankan addresses the Birthday Boy or Girl and assures him/her that there is nothing to worry about because, at the very least, he/she has him to sing for them.

This really gets the Taiwanese going and, I must admit, is very catchy. My Taiwanese isn’t nearly good enough to understand most of it, but it’s still a pretty good song. So, without further here, Happy Birthday/Bird’sday, Karyn!

新年快樂! Happy New Year!

Buddhist Lottery

The Expatriate — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 02:06:00 +0000

I found something pretty interesting in a newspaper the other day. It’s a pink sheet with a picture of Buddha and several lottery numbers on it.

Buddhist Lottery sheet

Apparently it comes everyday in the paper (China Post, I think) and is placed there, either by Buddhist monks (unlikely) or probably by the lottery ticket companies who want to increase their fortunes.

Lotteries are pretty popular in Taiwan. There are Taiwan Lottery Stores (like the Powerball) pretty everywhere, like 7-11. You can also see people selling lottery tickets in random places, like outside the Post Office, outside Chunghwa Telecom, at the nightmarket, etc.

On this particular paper, you’ve got lottery numbers for every occasion. The Top left is the date (August 14, Year 97) in Taiwanese years. Below that you have 6 numbers if you should need them. The big 06 is for when you only need 1 number, etc. I asked Miss Expatriate, but even she wasn’t familiar enough with it to tell me what all the different numbers are for. At any rate, I thought it was pretty interesting since I’d been living here a year and never even seen one of these before.

新年快樂! Happy New Year!