April 28, 2007: How I Ended Up in Taiwan

I’ve had a few people ask me how I ended up in Taiwan. Well, my boyfriend and I had immigrated to Australia in 1994, after living in London, England for almost two years. After living there for about a year we got married, then about six months later my husband started university in Armadale. I stayed in Sydney (Cronulla) working to help support him. My husband had a lot of good characteristics, was intelligent and could do so many varied things, but he was also a Class A1 mind-fuck. I don’t particularly want to go into details but he really played with my mind. Note to self: marrying someone doesn’t make their irritating traits go away.

I had been managing a restaurant with 60 full- and part-time staff. Unfortunately, I was in way over my head and did a terrible job! My husband’s antics did not help the situation. Six months in I got fired which was, in retrospect, a good thing for all concerned. I started doing ‘temp’ restaurant work (the unemployment office was awesome in trying to find me a job and keeping me solvent. I didn’t need any benefits at all--good for my morale!) I ended up working for a tiny Italian restaurant for six months. I was given the elevated title of manager, but since most of the time it was me, the owner/chef and the dish washer/delivery boy, there was only myself to manage--and I did a great job this time. Five months into the job the owner told me he had found a buyer (I knew the restaurant was for sale) and that the new owners were going to run the place themselves. So I had a month to find a new job.

I started reading the employment pages (this was before the internet!) and applying for jobs in hospitality. One day I saw an ad to ‘Teach English in Taiwan.’ Hmm, I wondered, where’s Taiwan? Asia somewhere. I opened my atlas, saw that Taiwan was pretty close to China and thought, yeah, lots of rice! (I really like rice. For years it was my favorite breakfast food.) I also knew of people who had gone to Japan to ‘teach’ English and had come back with bucket loads of money and this was very attractive to me. I knew nothing about Taiwan.

I sent off an application and then had an interview in Sydney. I was given two small drawings of a boy brushing his teeth and washing his face and was told to prepare a lesson plan using present simple (He brushes his teeth every morning.) and present continuous (He is brushing his teeth now.) I prepared my notes, some props and a song, practiced in front of a mirror, put on a suit and went to the interview. Three days later they called back and said I had the job if I wanted it. Whoo~hoo! Although the school I worked for was totally pathetic in the materials they provided for the teachers (poor, poor students) it was a miracle for me. They gave me a return ticket to Taiwan, organized the paperwork for my visa, picked me up at the airport and put me up in a company apartment, took me to the branch I was working at and got me all organized.

My colleagues were incredibly kind and helpful. One found a place for me to live and bargained the landlord down on the price. Another, an Australian called Stacey, and I bonded immediately. She took me under her wing and explained everything to me: buses, where the chemist was, what food was what, essential Chinese phrases, and the bars. Man, we went out two to four times a week, usually staying out until at least one, but usually until two to four am, sometimes when we came out it was daylight. I have never partied like that before or since. I was on a teeny, teeny budget for the first two or three months. We’d go to the bar at 2-for-1 time and buy two beers each. This would then give us a free ticket to our favorite dance club, ‘Spin.’ We’d go to Spin just before midnight and dance and dance. When we were thirsty we’d go up to street level to the 7-11 on the corner, chug a beer or a bottle of water and go back dancing. I usually only drank three or four beers in an evening, so by the time I got home I was completely sober.

I regret to say that I don’t think I was a very good teacher that first year. We received almost no training; no lesson plans and had almost no teaching aids (flashcards, realia, games etc). But the students, parents and my colleagues gave me something that I had never truly had before: respect. Being a teacher in Taiwan is really considered something.

So I had oodles of fun and respect. I was happy for the first time in a very long, long time. Communication with my husband became more and more difficult and irritating. He really was a complete twit. After a year I flew back to Australia, packed a backpack of belongings and told him I wanted a divorce. He said ‘no’ but I knew I just had to wait for him to fall in love with someone and then he wouldn’t be able to get a divorce fast enough, which is exactly what happened.

I am the ‘black sheep’ of my family. I have occasional contact with one of my brothers and I see my cousins in Vancouver when I go to Canada, but other than that I essentially ‘divorced’ my family twelve years ago. Because of this, I have very few possessions from my parent’s home or mementoes of my childhood. Leaving my husband in Australia I had a box of linens that I had brought with me the first time, a backpack of clothes and then that second backpack of stuff (including my pasta roller and a couple of cookbooks. Yes, Pinkie, it’s all about the food.) So essentially, all that I have now I have earned. My friends here in Taiwan, and a few scattered around the planet, are my family. I have been through a lot here in Taiwan, I think I have grown up a lot and really understand what I need to be happy.

So that is how I ended up here. I stay because I learned how to be happy here and still am. I have wonderful friends, work that I enjoy with pretty good pay and I live in a beautiful area. And I must not leave out the average ‘Joe’ of Taiwan who is almost invariably friendly and helpful. It still strikes many Taiwanese as bizarre that a foreigner would choose to live here or that a foreigner can speak Chinese. Even when I was just beginning to learn and was totally mangling the language, I only got encouragement. Now think about North America (or other places?) where an immigrant is cussed out for speaking poor English (or whatever the local language is.)

There’s nothing like surviving a really crap time to make you appreciate it when your life is good! And it's great. :o)