Pests

Ms. Huang, ivory and proper, contorts her face in horror, reaches down for a slipper, and lunges toward the cockroach. She jostles the table, spilling the tea, and missing the roach, leaves a mark on the wall. 

Two of her guests stood up in sympathy. I remained seated.

Really, Ms. Huang, you should think of the roach as a tiny folded amber fan, a silent listener, with breath likely sweeter than that of your aunt, who nearly knocked over her chair. And did you know, Ms. Huang, that roaches groom themselves ceaselessly, are even cleaner than your cat, whose hair already clings to my slacks? In fact, sorry to tell you, the roach’s body hosts fewer bacteria by far than either my or your fingers, not to mention your aunt’s mouth, which just now has bitten a cookie, and soon will start gossiping again. 

A folded amber fan, a slim golden fingernail, hardly heavier than confetti—-and you’ve put a gray mark on your wall. 

QED: Idiocy, Ltd.

Chinese edition / 中文版 : Idiocy, Ltd.

Taiwan Love-Hate

The novelty of being here is starting to wear off. I know that’s an absurd statement on the face of it, given that I’ve been here more than two decades. “Novelty”? That I could use the word in regards to Taiwan--I suppose it reveals something of my character: compared to most people, my enthusiasms move and develop in geologic time.

Still, slow as I am to change, my love for Taipei is wearing thin. The roads always blocked by blockheads double-parking; the constant racket; the hardware stores and pharmacies with aisles so tight you can’t turn around without knocking things from the shelf; the crowded sidewalks, now with women pushing their dogs around in oversized baby strollers--and finally, this cursed tonal language that still, after decades of my singing along, leads to misunderstandings.

The Taiwanese are wonderful, yes, impressive in every way; you can’t beat the Taiwanese. But the space they’re crammed into, that’s another thing.

I did move house a few months ago, out of one of the city’s most double-parked districts. The new place I moved into was “christened” almost immediately. Within a week or so of getting settled I was shaken awake one morning by an earthquake. Then a major typhoon hit, which caused the ceiling in one room to leak.

But these things don’t really bother me. What bothers me is the piling up of annoyances in public space. The feeling of being constantly harried by inevitable nuisances that are no one’s fault, given the population density.

Whenever I arrive in Taiwan after being abroad I’m always greeted by the unique scent of the air. I’ve noticed it every time, starting from my first visit. The air of Taiwan smells of a faint mixture of car exhaust and rotting fruit. Sounds awful, but there’s something attractive in it, something that always cheers me as I leave the airport. For decades this scent has carried a certain promise, and that promise has largely been fulfilled.

If I left Taiwan I know I’d miss it, probably within a month after leaving. Were I to move back to the US, at this stage, I’d be in a somewhat foreign country, a land now made up of two distinct tribes, with rank idiots everywhere, especially in the leftward tribe. I’d join with the mostly sane tribe (with its small corners of idiots too) and try to do my part to save our tottering Republic.

Taiwan's subtropical climate, which I’ve not really mentioned, only exacerbates every annoyance I’ve cited above. It is a climate suited for mold and fungus more than for humans.

嘿! 去台中念大學的台北男生—要小心! 叔叔警告 (English)

Dear Howard:

Maybe you think it’s a little strange to get a letter from your Uncle Tony. But I’m writing to give you some important advice. You probably know that like you I finished high school here in Taipei, then went to university in Taichung. But you don’t know some of the things that happened to me there, and I don’t want the same to happen to you.

When I arrived in Taichung, 18 years old, everything was new. I was ready to explore, ready for adventure. You’ll feel the same way when you start school. But you need to remember that Taipei and Taichung are different.

First, do not swear or be impolite to the local citizens, especially the ones who look like gangsters. In fact don’t be impolite to ANYONE in Taichung, because many people who don’t look like gangsters sometimes have gangster relatives.

Second, do not go to the pub near the KFC near your university. The girls there are ugly and the drinks are too expensive. If you do go to pubs, do not end up in bed with every girl you meet. This is very serious. A lot of Taichung girls have gangster boyfriends, and the gangsters are always watching them. You know how I'm missing one finger on my left hand, and how everyone says it’s because of a motorcycle accident? Well, it is not because of a motorcycle accident. And even after I lost that finger, I still didn’t learn my lesson. I just went to another part of town and other pubs. In one of those pubs, a really adorable bar girl seduced me. Her name was Carrie.

“Tell me the truth—do you have a gangster boyfriend?” I asked her.

She promised and promised that she didn’t. So I went to her little apartment with her. It was a really nice apartment. And then I went again, many times. Well, she wasn’t lying that she didn’t have a gangster boyfriend. But what she didn't tell me was that she was an important gangster’s daughter.

What could I do? I thought that if I met the family and tried to convince them I was honest, things might go alright. Unfortunately, the next day after I left campus, two guys came up to me and smashed me up with a bat. You know how my right eye is a little funny, and that scar next to it, and how everyone says it’s because of "the motorcycle accident"? Well, it’s not.

But the truth is I STILL didn’t learn my lesson. I just decided to start chasing girls in other places, like at my school or at night markets. And I had many one-night stands. A lot. But let me tell you, there are disadvantages to having too many one-night stands. One is that if you don’t prudently use some security, I mean a condom, you might end up getting girls pregnant. Did you ever wonder why you have five cousins, Howard? Your aunt is a very understanding woman. I am lucky I met her.

So these are some things I hope you remember. But maybe I'm writing too much. You probably won’t get in as much trouble as I did, because you are short. Taichung girls don’t like short guys so much.

But also, when you go out in Taichung, always remember to lock your door. Check twice. And make sure your roommate follows the same rule. I lost a computer and my Japanese DVD collection because I didn’t lock my door.

I will say one more thing before ending this letter. One of my classmates, also from Taipei, decided that the best way to avoid trouble with gangsters in Taichung but also be able to chase hot girls in pubs was to just join the gangsters. He thought it was fun. He even got to do shooting practice with them. But where is that friend now, Howard? Can you guess? You know those cement tetrapods they use on the shoreline to keep the waves from eroding the coast? My friend is in one of those, somewhere south of Ilan. So unless you want to end up being a tetrapod, never join with the gangsters there.

Keep your clothes clean, brush your teeth every day, and study well, even for classes you hate. When I had a class I didn’t like, I didn’t study for it, and it took me five years to graduate. Don’t make the same mistake. Call your parents at least twice a week or they’ll worry about you. Also: Don’t tell them I sent you this letter about Taichung, or they’ll worry about you even more, and they will yell at me too.

In fact, don’t tell anyone about this letter, okay? It’s just between us.

Best Wishes, 



Uncle Tony
06/28/18

[Compiled from compositions written by Howard’s classmates in my Friday class.]

Tetrapods: Don't end up in one
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English:

Check out Idiocy, Ltd. at Amazon. Dryest humor in the west.

中文:

《白痴有限公司》: 有犀牛、蝙蝠、obasans 、海豚、真英雄、台北秘史 and more. 你可以在台灣買到:

at Books.com

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Like my Facebook author page: Eric Mader 枚德林

我哈台灣奧巴桑

一、

好啦你最了不起啦擋在旋轉式柵門的入口前翻找包包裡的悠遊卡彷彿天底下就你一個人而已嘛後面六個人全都擠在那邊過不去嘛你還瞥了我一眼好像在說「我都五十六歲了一手養大兩個兒子其中一個還是台大畢業的老娘讓個屁路!」哎喲台大是嗎啊不就好厲害陳水九騙的母校嘛我上班快遲到了一邊涼快去啦奧巴桑

二、

我每逢星期六就只能抓緊下課時間去買杯咖啡喝或許只 有三個人在排隊吧兩個奧巴桑加一個男人那兩個奧巴桑跟 櫃檯小姐說拿鐵會比卡布奇諾大杯嗎?對了刷什麼什麼卡是 不是可以打折?哦等等哦我有帶什麼什麼卡阿娘喂 2% 的折 扣溜我來找一下卡什麼星巴克又出全新系列的隨行卡了哦那 我先前那張隨行卡裡面的點數還能用嗎裡面還有一些點數咦 有折扣嗎朵拉你看星巴克新推出的隨行卡溜(開始討論新舊 隨行卡哪張比較美老天饒了我吧)要不要買張新的你覺得咧 你覺得這張顏色好看嗎小姐你們有別的顏色可以挑嗎好了朵 拉你要喝拿鐵還是卡布奇諾哎喲他們有聖誕節限定的噁心巴 拉摩卡溜這下好了已經有七個人被她們堵在後面了既然肢體 暴力在這個城市屬於犯法行為我就撤了我就兩步做一步直奔 Cama Café 去了我去你們的奧巴桑

三、

我要買體香劑就我太太只喜歡的那一款可現在是我的午休時間還有位要買兩小罐護膚乳液的奧巴桑就站在結帳櫃檯前然後櫃檯小姐說小姐(!)現在只要多花八百塊就能獲得這張價值五百元的折扣禮券明年就可以用啦奧巴桑在考慮了我還不清楚接下來會怎樣嗎老子二話不說揚長而去

四、

我在 7-11 正打算買點薄荷糖就發現結帳隊伍裡連續排 了三個奧巴桑而且最前面的奧巴桑已經跟櫃檯小姐吵了起來 說便當不是要比結帳金額便宜個三塊錢嗎那奧巴桑邊指著發 票邊說啊櫥窗上的海報不是寫便當只要多少錢喂喂我難道得 在這邊聽她高談闊論不成何況她後面還有兩個奧巴桑在等我 沒吃薄荷糖又不會少塊肉閃人了閃人了

五、

我有件包裹要寄去紐約結果人一進郵局就看見現場排了兩組人馬其中一排有五個人不過都是男性和女職員另一排則是兩個分別抱著一小件包裹的奧巴桑我可沒那麼傻我走向那支排了五個人的隊伍然後哈沒想到吧我寄了包裹錢也找好了隔壁排的第二位奧巴桑還在那邊郵資哪個方案怎樣又怎樣問個沒完媽呀!

六、

隔天,我們一行七人緊緊挨在擁擠的捷運車廂裡面對車 門站著。我們這群人稍後就會一片黑壓壓地蜂湧而出,準 備下車轉乘綠線。我身後有個奧巴桑,穿著花俏橘襯衫。奧 巴桑這邊推那邊擠,試圖從我們之中開出一條路— 就因為 她已經,呃,五十七歲了?她好像迫不及待要下車,好像等 不及要奔向某個地方的收銀機,隨便什麼地方的收銀機。她 拚了命想擠過去,那可惡至極的超大 LV 包的金色搭扣也開 始勾住我樸素包包上的黑色帶子。我也下車— 我嘟噥著中 文。她沒抬頭看,也沒搭腔,倒是露出若有似無的淺笑。她瞇起了眼在計算,過分嫣紅的嘴角嵌著一小滴晶瑩剔透的口水。我知道她腦子裡正轉著會員卡、折價券、禮券、贈品的畫面。八秒之後,她又試圖從我們之中穿過去,即使用膝蓋想也知道我們會在這站下車。我也下車!我又說了一遍。我也下車,奧巴桑!

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Taiwan Succumbs to Same-Sex Marriage

Protesters for and against meet face to face in Taipei.
Next year Taiwan will become the first Asian nation to legally recognize same-sex marriages. With the passage of relevant amendments by a legislative committee two days ago, the outcome is all but certain when the proposed amendments get their final reading next year.

It is no surprise that Taiwan is the first Asian country to go this route. A mid-sized democracy of 23 million people, the country’s culture is a blend of Chinese, Japanese, aboriginal and western elements, but in recent years its political elites take most of their cues from the West, and since democratization in the 1980s and ‘90s, generations of Taiwanese have returned with advanced degrees from western universities, deepening the western influence. Taiwan is also a staunch ally of the US, and the changes in American marriage law brought by Obergefell played no small role in convincing many here that Taiwan should follow suit.

I’ve lived in Taiwan as an American expat since 1996 and love the culture and people. Though I have been for much of my life an advocate of gay and lesbian rights (which I understand as rights not to be harassed or discriminated against in employment or education) I am against this change to the country’s laws, which is happening in unfortunately familiar ways.

Familiar is the top-down manner in which the new definition of marriage is being imposed. Rather than allow for a referendum on the issue, which most opponents of the change demanded, the legislature is seeking to pass the new marriage law on its own. As in Australia, supporters of same-sex marriage here do not want to take the risk of allowing the citizenry to weigh in. The citizenry, after all, might give the “wrong” answer.

So there is widespread suspicion of a betrayal of the will of the people, as we saw also in the US when the Supreme Court decided the marriage debate on its own in Obergefell.

Also familiar are the crowds of mostly young protesters surrounding the Legislative Yuan, the energy and moral certainty of these crowds, and the crowds of protesters on the other side, mainly from Christian, Buddhist and Taoist organizations, firmly against changing the meaning of marriage. Whereas the former are celebrating the joy of their certainty with the élan of attendees at a pop concert, the latter, to judge by their looks, seem mainly to be saying: “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

To talk to Americans in the pro-LGBT camp, one often gets the impression that they believe Christians and Muslims are the only staunch opponents of same-sex marriage and gender ideology. This is myopic of course. Most of the world’s cultural and religious traditions, across Asia and through Africa (whether Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, or the myriad African and more local traditions) understand that marriage is between male and female. Thus the Buddhists and Taoists protesting the new marriage amendments in Taiwan. Their opposition, interestingly, surprised a few of my western peers.

“Aren’t Buddhists more progressive?” one asked.

“Yes,” I said. “Their ideas of progress are not yours.”

Familiar also is the arrogance of those pushing the law through. They know what human rights are, they just know, and if anyone opposes their proposed redefinition of marriage, it has to be because of a lack of knowledge.

One of the legislators active in pushing the amendments, Yu Mei-nu, was quoted at length in the Taipei Times, an English-language newspaper that solidly supports the changes (and that recently ran an editorial prodding Taiwanese to reform their “archaic ideas” of marriage):

“The public can rest assured that the legislation will not change heterosexual marriage in any way, but it will extend [the rights and obligations of] such marriages to same-sex couples,” she said. “The legislation will not destroy the family or abolish marriage.”

The legalization of same-sex marriage does not cause civic unrest in the Netherlands, which was the first country to legalize same-sex marriage, Yu said, urging marriage equality opponents to exercise tolerance.

She rejected proposals to launch a referendum to decide on marriage equality, saying a human rights issue should not be put to the vote.

“We are not God. How do we have the right to decide on other people’s human rights?” Yu asked.

That too is depressingly familiar. Legislator Yu is part of a cadre of lawyers and politicians, largely from one party, seeking to railroad through legislation that offends against the basic male-female understanding of marriage common to all the cultural traditions that have made up Taiwan since time immemorial, yet somehow it is she who is warning people against pretending to be God.

Blindly assume that whatever you assert human rights to be must therefore be human rights, then accuse those who disagree of being arrogant and judgmental. I’m saddened to see this kind of SJW demagoguery here in Taiwan, but on the marriage issue, it looks like the die is cast.

Check out my book Idiocy, Ltd. and begin the long, hard reckoning.

My Porn

If you live in a foreign country for any number of years, you are certain to offend people. And the more distant the culture is from yours, the more frequent your offenses will be. There’s really no getting round this. You can use your own language, their language, or a mix of both, but every couple months, in one context or other, you’ll set someone to muttering curses at you under their breath.

Just today, here in Taipei where I live and teach as an expat, I ran into Daniel, a student I’d taught five years ago when he was a senior in high school. I was waiting for a traffic light, and noticed a young man on the sidewalk a few paces away, staring at me gravely but not moving. I finally recognized it was my ex-student. I said Hi to him, he loosened up a bit, and told me he’d just graduated with a degree in finance. I wished him well on his job hunt, but explained that I had to run as I was late for my class. As I stepped away from him to cross the street, I couldn’t help chuckling to myself, wondering if he still remembered the terrible insult I'd delivered him when he was my student.

Given his initial glare as we waited for the light, I was guessing he did remember.

The insult, as usual, was an accident, actually more his fault than mine.

Back in the days when I taught him, Daniel was known in our school for two things. First, he was obsessed with magic. Rather than prepare for exams or finish homework, he spent free time before class performing magic tricks for the other students (who then likewise couldn’t finish their homework). I’d come into the classroom and Daniel would be at the front, in the middle of some trick.

“Uh, sorry,” he’d say, and sit down.

Second, Daniel was hopelessly smitten by a classmate at his high school, a girl who rejected his love and now and then left him visibly on the verge of tears. When Daniel had no one to watch his magic tricks, he could often be found sitting in a funk, staring at the floor or wringing his hands. None of us at our English institute knew who this mystery girl was; we only knew she was ruining his life.

In short, I knew Daniel as a budding teenage magician whose tricks did nothing to sway the unknown beauty he loved and whose picture he refused to show us.

How then did the insult happen?

One day after class, Daniel came up to me at the front of the room to show me a copy of a copy-shop printed magazine. He opened it to a certain page and pointed at a simple line drawing of a girl in a miniskirt on a park bench, sitting in what was supposed to be a seductive pose. There were some lines in Chinese next to the drawing.

“Teacher, this is my porn,” Daniel announced weirdly, pointing at the page.

I thought the drawing wasn’t very good, and as for porn, it didn’t even count. But Daniel was waiting for my reaction.

“Hm,” I said after looking at it for awhile. “That’s pretty bad porn. I feel sorry for you.”

I remember that his face went red at these words, and he clenched his fist, ready to punch me. But since the students had been raucous during class, and Daniel was something of a performer, I thought he was just joking, so I laughed and walked away.

Ten minutes later, after Daniel left for the night, my colleague Erica was putting away papers next to my desk.

“Poor Daniel,” she said. “He’s really totally in love with that girl. He thinks about nothing else.”

“Nothing else except magic,” I said. “Anyhow, suffering is good for art, so maybe he’ll end up being a great magician.”

“Did he show you his poem?” she asked.

And then it hit me. What Daniel had tried to show me wasn’t the lame line drawing of the girl, but the Chinese lines next to it, which I hadn’t bothered to read, and which were obviously a love poem he’d written. And the book he’d shown me must have been his school’s literary magazine, in which he was declaring to the world his true love for the girl. And when Daniel had said to me “This is my porn,” what he really was trying to say was “This is my poem.” So that, from Daniel’s point of view, our brief exchange had gone like this:

“Teacher, this is my poem [which I wrote for that girl I love].”

Teacher reads through poem, says: “Hm, that’s a pretty bad poem. I feel sorry for you.”

Student is mortally insulted, wants to stand up for himself and his love, wonders if he should punch teacher.

But before he makes up his mind, the teacher laughs in his face in front of the whole class, and walks away.

It was all so sad. I knew I’d have to explain to Daniel what had really happened the next time he came to class. But in fact, that night was the last time he ever came. It was end of semester, and he wasn’t taking summer classes.

Though this particular insult was mostly the fault of Daniel's poor pronunciation, I know for a fact I’ve also offended more than a few people thanks my faulty Chinese pronunciation. Any Westerner who lives here is fated to say at least a handful of outrageous things in public per annum. It comes from the fact that Mandarin is a tonal language, and if you get the intonation a little wrong, if you sing the words a bit off key, the words become entirely different words.

I knew one Canadian who, when he first got here, wanted to get some aspirin for his cold symptoms. He went into a pharmacy.

“Uhh . . . I have a problem,” he said to the woman behind the counter.

“Yes? What is the problem?” she asked.

“Mm . . . Uhh . . . I fuck cats.”

The pharmacist stepped back from the counter, and the other people present all turned to look at him.

What my Canadian friend had meant to say was: “Mm . . . Uhh . . . I have a cold.” But get the tones wrong, and “have a cold” quickly becomes “fuck cats”.

This is only one of thousands of possible slip ups given the slipperiness of tonal languages like Mandarin. I once left a coffee shop with all the counter girls laughing aloud at me. I’d wanted them to help me grind the beans I’d just bought and couldn’t figure out what was so funny. Later I figured it out. What I’d been saying was: “Excuse me. Do you think you could help stroke me?”

Often enough I leave people laughing or frowning, but still, later on, can’t figure out what I’d actually said.

With more Westerners in Taiwan now, the locals have grown used to these mishaps. It makes for good comedy. But still a basic rule applies: If you’re a man who makes it a decade in a country this foreign without getting punched, you’re already doing pretty well.

E.M.
Taipei

My new book Idiocy, Ltd. is now available at Amazon.

The Dangers of Marriage

A few weeks ago I taught one of my classes of Taipei teens a deliciously idiotic text by American prose poet Russell Edson, “The Automobile”. The piece opens like this:

     A man had just married an automobile.

     But I mean to say, said his father, that the automobile is not a person because it is something different.
     For instance, compare it to your mother. Do you see how it is different from your mother? Somehow it seems wider, doesn’t it? And besides, your mother wears her hair differently.
     You ought to try to find something in the world that looks like mother.

     I have mother, isn’t that enough of a thing that looks like mother? Do I have to gather more mothers?
     . . .

Then after we’d finished the reading, I gave them a half hour to come up with their own short text about either a man or woman marrying some inanimate object. Predictably, some of their tales were obscene. Flora and Angel wrote the best of them, below.

(As for Russell Edson, whose work is precious to me, the best collection available is The Tunnel: Selected Poems. For those of you who may be curious.)

E.M.

But here are Flora and Angel.

The Dangers of Marriage

by Flora Zheng 鄭佳峰

A man decided to marry the sun.

He liked to sunbathe in his yard, and was fascinated by the beauty of sunrise and sunset.

In order not to have to share his wife with others, he broadcast through the media that nobody could be shone on by her. They were not to go outside, but just do indoor activities.

The announcement spread quickly. Everyone had a different opinion.

Mr. Smith: “That’s crazy! The sun belongs to nobody. It’s nature’s creation.”

His parents: “OK! We must all respect our son’s decision. He has many challenges ahead and we should help him. It isn’t easy keeping such a marriage together.”

Of course, opposed by most, the marriage was finally not allowed. But the man was determined. He even began researching how to make an environment on the sun in which a human could live.

As global warming got worse, the man began to argue that it was his wife, she was angry, she wanted to be alone with him.

“Once the earth is finished, you will have to find a new planet for yourselves!”


The Dangers of Marriage

by Angel Zheng 鄭安婕

There was a young Taipei woman who loved shopping even more than most women. She shopped every day. One day she told her parents that she wanted to get married to a department store.

“Are you crazy?” said her father.

“No, I’m not,” she said. “I think he is strong and tall. And besides, he is rich. You should be happy.”

“What’s his name?” asked her mother.

“His name is Taipei 101.”

“But how can I get a grandchild?” asked her father.

“Don’t worry, Dad,” the woman said. “You’ll have new grandchildren all the time: the new bags, shoes and clothes I’ll bring home!”

“New bags?” said her mother. “Alright, you can marry him. But he has to get me what I want too!”

“No problem, Mom!” the young woman said.

Her father thought the two women were crazy.

The marriage happened and the young woman and her mother were very happy.

But three months later they were no longer so happy, and the father was yelling all the time, because there was no more room in the house for all the “grandchildren”.

And not only that, but the young woman’s new husband, Taipei 101, was discovered to be having an affair with a famous Taipei actress. The wife knew nothing about it until her husband was photographed by paparazzi one night in a pub with the actress. The photos showed up in Next Magazine. And there were other photos of the actress out biking with a tall building--her husband!

When she saw the news, she cried and was very angry. She slapped her husband and yelled at him. In the end, she divorced him and had to bring up the children by herself.

But her mother helps her a lot.

How I was born

As my English students here in Taipei loved Daniil Kharms’ zany narrative of how he was born three times, I set them a challenge. Write a short tale about their own birth, but in some fantastic register: in short, a myth or legend of how they came into the world. The following are some of the better ones--or at least those I had time to type up.

E.M.

How I was born

by Ryan

Ryan, showing typical Ryan face
If you are one of the dummies like me, you may have wondered why I have the incredible Indian accent which Indians can’t even imitate. I often tell that it is just a horrible joke, but it’s actually a terrific joke. Let me tell you about it.

As some of you know, my father’s pet cat loves Indian food. So my parents and their cat went on a trip to India. After filling a whole suitcase with cans of Indian curry beef cat food, they were ready for the way back home. They had their lunch in the airport, but the food in the airport McDonald’s was terrible, especially the curry-flavored smoothie. It was so disgusting that they threw it away after trying it. But just as my father tossed the nasty cup into the trash bin, he saw a cute infant dancing in it. The infant looked Taiwanese.

“Holy shit!” he said. “Why is there a cute boy smashing my dear smoothie?”

“Shit? I love shit! I want one of those spicy ones!” I’m told I said in perfect Taiwanese.

My parents thought I was so dumb, so they took me home.

Two months later I was jogging on Xin-Yi Road when I saw a strange Indian obasan who loves Taiwanese culture. She asked me if I could teach her my famous Indian accent that even people in India can’t imitate.

“What will you give me?” I said.

She said she would give me a curry-like object she found on the street.

To get more shit, I said: “Fair trade!”

My Indian accent is very good to use. When I see a ghost, a vampire or some other grim specter, they’ll think I’m an Indian math professor, which makes them scared and run away.

If you dummies want this benefit, I can share some of my Indian accent with you. But remember: Bring something to exchange!

How I was born

by Tommy

In 1999, tensions were roused between Taiwan and China owing to Taiwan’s first presidential election. Many people were afraid we would be attacked by China. My father was one of them, so he decided to try to hack into Chinese government computers to find out what the Chinese plans were. If he found some possible plan for attacking Taiwan, he would do his utmost to stop it.

One day he discovered a message that said a Chinese official was going to send a “surprise” to Taiwan, and it would arrive at Taoyuan airport the following Sunday.

My father hurried to Taoyuan that day. He carefully seized all packages people carried out from the airport and inspected everything. People protested, but my father insisted he was doing it for national security.

Suddenly someone screamed inside the airport and chaos broke out. He rushed toward the commotion and grabbed the object around which a crowd had formed.

“It’s alright! Everything is in my control,” he declared, quickly weaving through the crowd toward the exit.

“Sir! Is that baby yours?” a police officer asked as he tried to get through the exit.

He looked at the object he held. It was actually a baby.

My father was stunned, but with the police officer glaring sternly at him, he saw he had no choice but to take the baby home.

This is the story of my birth. Actually, it was not so much a birth as an incident. On the other hand, my father still doesn’t know what the “surprise” was that China sent to Taiwan that day.

How I was born

by Claire Fan-Chiang

If you’ve listened to the gossiping of the women in the local market, you might have caught a few rumors about my birth. And since it’s become quite a taxing thing to explain the truth seven times a day, I’ve decided to write it down, explaining my birth once and for all.

Storks are real. The scientists and biology textbooks might tell you that babies are born after nine months of pregnancy, but actually my mother knew what I was going to be like before she gave birth to me.

The STORKS is a worldwide organization that delivers children to mothers. It used to be a wealthy baby-delivering organization, but as medical technology has gotten better and better, and the amount of hospitals has increased yearly, people now get their babies through birth rather than stork delivery. This has led people to forget about the STORKS, and it’s caused a lot of storks to lose their jobs.

It started one day when my mother saw a stork on our balcony, holding a package in its beak. My mother, although surprised by the fact that the stork had managed to squeeze through the iron bars of the windows, was more worried about the sanitary problems and told the stork to leave.

The stork, however, had set its mind on finishing the mission no matter what the cost. So it told my mother that she could buy the baby half price. My mother rejected. She already had my sister then, and needed no more babies.

After that day, however, the stork continued to come for nine months, when my mother finally agreed to take the baby. Half moved at the stork’s dedication and half exasperated, she offered the stork 1NT. Though the price was the lowest possible, the stork’s eyes filled with tears when it saw the coin. It left the balcony then, whistling, which my mother said sounded like a cat dying.

My father didn’t say anything when he saw me that night. He just nodded and went to bed. And this is the story of how I was bought for 1NT.

How I was born

by Jenny Xu 許嘉瑜

Jenny Xu. Watch this girl. She's here for a reason.
I’ll never forget the night I was born. It was a full-moon night. My father went home with his heavy steps as usual. When he got home, my three-year-old brother was playing on the floor.

“Daddy! Welcome back!” my brother said.

“Hey, my boy, did you behave well today?”

“Dinner is ready,” my mother said, stepping out of the kitchen. “How was your day?”

“Alright,” my father answered. “But on my way home, earlier, something strange happened.”

“What?”

“Come here and I’ll show you.”

My parents stepped away from the table over to the balcony.

“Look at the moon,” my father said. “Don’t you think it’s somehow bigger today?”

“Yes . . . It seems that it’s getting bigger . . . and . . .”

My mother stared at the moon, didn’t say anything more. Suddenly a mysterious light flashed into her womb and something began growing there.

That’s right! It was me!

A few hours later, amazingly, I was born. Although my parents had no idea what was going on, and still don’t understand it today, they brought me up as a normal child.

People may doubt that I can remember clearly how I came into the world. But I can. And I will always remember my mission, which is secret for now, but which you will learn about some day.

How I was born

by Angela

One day my mother was chatting with her friends. They were talking about babies and how hard it was to go through pregnancy. None of them wanted to have a baby by herself. They started talking about a post on the Internet: “Healthy babies available. Call 2368-5925.” My mom actually thought it might be a good idea. The others thought she was joking.

That night she discussed it with my father. After a few days, they decided to order one. The delivery date would be October 31, 1995.

When I got to my house, I remember how they all cried. They cried with joy because many people said manufactured babies were ugly, but I was adorable!

At first my parents had some trouble studying the information included about how to raise me. I had been manufactured in Korea, and the manual was in Korean.

I believe this is why I now love Korea so much.

How I was born

by Benson

It was a sunny day, but my mother was in pain. I kept hitting and kicking her inside. So my father finally took her to the hospital to see the doctor. Together with the doctor they decided that they could induce birth a little early. My mother couldn’t bear the pain any more.

After many hours, I came into the new world successfully. My parents were so happy they couldn’t say anything. They wished me health forever.

How I was born

by Yvonne

A handsome man that a woman meets after marriage is sometimes dangerous. For my mother, one such hot man gave her me as a gift.

It happened back in 1995, the year before I was born. Since my parents already had my brother, they didn’t think of having any more children. One day, when my mother was out window-shopping, suddenly she ran into a man more handsome than any she’d seen in her entire life. There were sparkles in both their eyes, and my mother tells me she even felt a kind of electricity running through her body.

The man came forward and said: “Hello, young lady. Free now?”

His voice was too charming. My mother fainted.

When she awoke, a week had passed. And soon she learned she was pregnant! She could only remember that soon after she’d fainted, as she was in a taxi with the man, that he had told her his name: Zeus.

Surprisingly, my father wasn’t angry and never even questioned my mother about her pregnancy. He was just thankful to God for bringing him this child.

Later, in July 1996, I was born. I grew up normally except for one thing. My first word was neither “Mama” nor “Dada”, but “Hey, young lady. Free now?”

Only my mother understood what it meant.

How I was born

by David

It was a cold night in April, 1995. My parents and my brother were walking in a park near their house.

“Look! There’s a comet in the sky!” my brother said.

But my parents didn’t take it seriously because they knew my brother was a fan of Godzilla and Ultraman.

Minutes later, the comet slammed into the side of the building where their apartment was, then bounced down to the ground.

The next day, as my mother was cleaning the living room, she noticed a part of the comet stuck in the sofa. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t pull it out. So they gave up, sat next to the piece of comet and started watching TV.

A few minutes later, as the news was playing, a strange gas came out of the comet.

“Sorry. I had to fart.”

Grass Eating (啃老族)

Shawn Chuang’s name was Shawn Chuang, but everyone called him Steve Chuang. He lived with his mother in a large flat above a bowling alley in the Shih Lin district of Taipei. The flat was large and the sofa in the flat was large and Shawn Chuang spent a lot of time on the sofa.

Though Shawn had been out of university for two years, he still hadn’t found gainful employment.

Shawn’s mother nagged him daily to find a job, any job. It wasn’t that Shawn hadn’t tried. In the two years since graduating, he had applied at three different companies for jobs. But finding work was basically impossible.

It hadn’t always been like this. As a kid Shawn had shown great signs of intelligence. Sooner than other kids, he yawned, he ate, he daydreamed. He could turn on devices with his fingers.

And Shawn was braver than other kids. He launched a rocket under his bed. He fired a cannonball at his navel. He swallowed gum--at a time when other kids still believed their mothers who said gum must be spat out. He combed a stray dog’s fur with his own comb. He put a cockroach in his shirt in math class. And left it there.

The girls admired Shawn for this bravery, showing their admiration by saying “Gross!”

In all these ways Shawn showed great promise as a child. It looked as if he would have a brilliant future. But now what?

Shawn lay on the large sofa in the large flat and considered his prospects. His major had been chemical engineering, but what could one do with that?

Just the day before Shawn had seen a TV show about Taipei young people who had learned to turn their hobbies into small businesses. The lesson of the show was “Do what you love, and you will be successful!” The host suggested the first thing for a young person to do was make a list of things they loved doing, then consider which one might be turned to profit.

Shawn took a piece of scrap paper from the coffee table and started to write his list. After fifteen minutes he had a handful of items to consider. He went through the list one by one.

Item 1: “Getting up after 11.”

It would be great, Shawn thought, but I don’t see a way to make money from getting up after 11:00 a.m. Too bad.

He crossed out item 1 on his list.

Item 2: “Putting feet up on the coffee table.”

It was true Shawn loved doing this, and he could get away with it when his mother was out, but he couldn’t see any way to make money from it. Could he maybe charge old people to help them put their feet up on their coffee tables?

He didn’t cross out number 2, but kept it open for further thought.

Item 3: “Scratch back on door frame.”

After graduating from university, Shawn discovered a great way to scratch his back on the door frame between his bedroom and the hallway. Could he maybe teach other people to scratch their backs this way? He could go to houses and say: “Hey, I know a secret way to scratch your back that is awesome, and if you pay me 250NT I will teach you.”

At first Shawn liked the idea. But then: Not everybody has itchy backs, he thought. And what if their door frames aren’t good for scratching?

He scratched out item 3.

Item 4: “Computer games.”

He crossed out item 4. If you want to make money from games, you have to be a game designer, and he didn’t know how to use the software.

Without even thinking about items 5 and 6, Shawn tossed his list on the floor.

If I could only make money somehow without leaving the house, that would be the best, he thought. Or if I could make money by staying in the neighborhood. I have to think of something I can do right near here.

Shawn considered it a great rule of life not to leave the house if he could avoid it and not to use any kind of transportation to go to other parts of the city. It had already been three months since he’d left the city block where his mother’s flat was.

Hm. There was that one time Mom bent that fork and I used my teeth to bend it back. Maybe I could open a small silverware repair shop and do pretty well for myself. Shawn’s Silverware Rebend. Maybe I could start to put some money aside.

Or how about hide and seek? Everyone likes hide and seek. If people gave me their things before they went to work I could hide the stuff in the neighborhood during the day and when they came home they could try to find it. I could charge 50NT for every fifteen minutes of seeking, which would be fun for the people after a boring day at the office and would besides encourage them to move faster, getting some exercise, because they'd know the longer it took to find their stuff the more expensive the game would be. I bet I could turn a pretty penny with the city’s first Hide and Seek company.

Or I could help the police with crime investigation by working with hair evidence. Whenever there's a bunch of hair on the ground or the stairs I can always tell which hairs come from which persons. Just by holding them up in the light. The police could call me in to help solve crimes.

Shawn imagined a scene in a crime documentary where the police detective is carefully examining the surface of a sofa. “Get Shawn here,” the detective says gravely to his assistant.

Shawn was imagining more scenes from the same documentary when his mother entered the living room.

“Hey, I told you to bring in the laundry!” she snapped. “Get off that sofa already! It’s almost 2:00 p.m.”

“I’m thinking about possible jobs,” Shawn said.

And he explained to his mother his idea for the Hide and Seek company, and after he was done explaining it the strangest thing happened: his mother removed the slipper from her left foot and came over to the sofa and started beating Shawn's head with it.

“Hey! Hey! Hey!” Shawn protested as the dusty slipper whacked repeatedly against his head and other parts of his body.

“If you don’t get off your ass and find a job this summer, I’m going to throw away your iPad!” his mother yelled. “I’ve already thought about doing it. I’ve had it in my hand and was this far from junking it. I swear I’ll do it next time too if you don’t get out and find a goddamn job!”

Shawn felt a wave of nervousness wash over him. Throw away his iPad? Things were getting serious.

After his mother had stormed back into the kitchen, Shawn reached down and picked his list up off the floor. He wrote down a number 7 for item 7. He set himself to thinking.

by Eric, Ryan, Claire (范姜詠欣) and Anthony (黃聖翔) at ZEI

My New Class of Troublemakers at ELT (英利特): Cute or Headache-inducing?

新的一群小屁孩--可不可愛?

Click to enlarge: Eric, Justin, Chuck,
myself (Teacher Eric), Yuki, Dora, Vivi, Tina.
帶你的孩子來ELT學英文以免有朝一日後悔。

ELT / 英利特
羅斯福路三段253號四樓之一
Tel. (02) 2368 5925 / (02) 2368 5963

My Shifting Racial "Default": How Race Perceptions are Changed by Circumstance

Some of my peeps: Taipei teens I teach in a Monday night English class.
I'm on the sidewalk in front of a Taipei book store. A woman is walking past, around thirty-five. I watch her approach, glance at her face, and my mind says: "Is that a Westerner? Is that an Asian?"

For some reason my mind can't distinguish. I look at her face carefully, but can't decide. Then, when a few seconds has passed, my mind says: "It's happened again. She's Asian. Of course."

What's it all about? Somehow I know intellectually that the woman is Asian, but can't tell, at the level of immediate perception, that she is.

In fact this happens to me a few times a month in Taiwan. I will look at a man or woman and not be able to tell if the person is local Taiwanese or a Westerner. Then, within seconds, the fugue dissolves and I realize: "Of course. Taiwanese."

The process from confusion to clarity never lasts more than ten seconds. But why does it happen in the first place? And why does it feel so odd to me when it happens, as if there's some kind of deep and nagging confusion going on.

I have a theory. My guess is that people who spend half their life among their own race, then move to another continent and live many years among another race undergo a shift of sorts in racial perception. What happens, I suspect, is that the mind starts to take the facial features of the new race as the "default" human features--with the result that the new race comes to be perceived as one's own; i.e., it loses its aura as "foreign"; one's sense of difference becomes confused.

In my case, my own race, that race I grew up with, is white-bread American. For nearly twenty years I've lived among East Asians.

Please note that I am not here looking at people of mixed ancestry. It's not a matter of people who have evidently Asian and Western blood. The issue here is different.

It's a commonplace that we typically perceive people of another race as all looking similar to each other. So that the white, black or Latino American first arriving in East Asia will walk the streets and half-consciously think: "Wow. These people really look alike." In an extreme version the thought might be: "How do they even tell each other apart?"

Growing up in a uniformly white midwestern American suburb in the 1970s and early '80s, this is a question I occasionally heard about big city blacks: "How do they tell each other apart?" The question, usually stated with a kind of smirk, was of course tied up in complex ways with the racism of that white suburb. Having created a social order that more or less kept blacks in their own city neighborhoods, it became easy for the white privileged class in the suburbs to perceive black Americans as somehow foreign. And that's just what they did. As often the case with racially-marked foreignness, the feeling that "they all look alike" appeared there as well, but this time applied to citizens of one's own country. (Of course this desire to separate, to project a racially different community as also deeply other, is far from overcome in America. Anyone who doubts it need only consider the shameful nonsense our current president has been subjected to. But issues of how race gets ideologically charged, in America and elsewhere, are different from my topic here, so I won't pursue them further.)

I've learned firsthand that in any case the perception of "similarity" in the features of a different race is by no means hardwired. It wears off quickly with contact, and may even reverse. Yes, eventually people of one's own race may come to look more and more similar to each other. Doubt it? It's happened to me in striking, almost unsettling ways.

Living in Taipei, I try to get back to the States once a year. Once when I flew back to Wisconsin, and was waiting in the Milwaukee airport for my father and sister to pick me up, I got a bizarre lesson in the depth of the racial-perceptual shift I'd undergone. In sat in the arrivals hall, people approaching from down a hallway. With the second or third 30-something blond woman I saw approach, my mind said: "There she is: my sister." When she got closer, I saw it wasn't. In fact the woman wasn't even very similar to my sister. Odd. And she had to get quite close for me to realize.

Next: "That's him: my father."

No. It was just a white American man in his sixties, who, as he approached, really did look quite a bit like my father; but no, as I analyzed the features, I realized they were actually quite different.

So what gives? I false ID'd two more sisters and three more fathers before I started to laugh at myself. In terms of perceptions of white Americans, I realized, I'd actually become Asian myself. Aside from the different hair colors and different sizes (fat or very fat) all these white Wisconsinites looked pretty much the same to me.

This is just one of the anecdotes I could bring up. Many times my perceptual grasp of Western faces has proved suddenly not as sharp as it should have been.

And now here I am in Taiwan, in a country where nearly everyone has black hair and dark eyes and olive or ivory skin, yet I almost never mistake people at a distance. To me they all look quite distinct from each other. And in fact my mind occasionally gets confused as to whether they are not actually part of my own tribe--as with the woman by the book store.

Ideologies of race have proven to be one of the most poisonous of cultural phenomena, and we are unfortunately far from done with the challenge they pose. Yet there are other levels of racial perception, where racial difference is first noticed and marked--"Those people are different from me and my people"--and these levels too seem to be in some degree a construct of sorts, though in this case I'd say they're a kind of cognitive construct rather than an ideological one. I'm sure this question has been studied, though I haven't tried to research it. It's this cognitive shift that I've experienced firsthand. (The ideological shifts I've experienced are another matter: a long learning process that continued through university and beyond, and probably still continues.)

Interestingly, it seems to me that the ability to distinguish racial difference (or at least the perception that such difference is meaningful) only begins in the late toddler stage. It's only approaching age three that children begin to see people of other races as "different", sometimes different in a troubling way, as I know very well from the curious but frightened looks 3- or 4-year-olds often give me here. Infants never. To Taiwanese infants I am obviously just a person: they don't notice my odd facial structure or skin tone as marks of (problematic) difference.

I've raised a various points here, which may have been a mistake. My main questions remain: How is it that our minds construct the basic paradigms of sameness and otherness between different races? How does my sometimes confusing experience relate to these perceptions of sameness and otherness? Where is the fluidity and where the solidity? Do we all carry a somewhat unstable sense of a "default" human race in relation to which others stand apart in difference? Is (as is likely) evolution somewhere in this mix?

Heady questions, and no, I haven't done the work even to look into answers that may have been proposed by anthropologists, etc. I'm just a guy on a street in a foreign city noticing his mind in occasional fugue.

In conclusion I should point out that I understand very well that many people who read this piece will have good reason to say: "Hm, it must be nice being able to consider racial difference from such an easygoing vantage point. It wasn't like that for me." I'm aware of this distance--that it is a heavily charged one--one that makes it somewhat inappropriate for me even to write about what I've noticed. Yet I write anyway. Readers are welcome to tell me if or where I've been insensitive. Aside from in that initial step of writing. Which may in itself be insensitive enough.

馬的問題 -- The Problem With Horses

從前，馬是非常好的交通工具。如今多數卻成為上流社會女性用來炫耀的裝飾品。

如果人人都能有一匹馬，牠應該會獲得尊重。可惜，目前來看，有錢有閑的人才有能力養馬。

在目前無解的難題中，暫且拋開階級層面的考慮。單單探究馬的智力就是無比沈重的負擔：馬究竟有沒有自覺？

由於馬頭乃是木刻而成，馬會有智能，使人感到意外。在木作的腦內，到底可以有多少個神經元同時運作？科學家仍然十分困惑。

從外觀可我們明顯可以看出：馬頭從馬的身體長出，宛然樹幹，又從樹幹長成馬頭的樣子。眼睛有真實動物的模樣，其實不過是木刻。看來也不過就是樹木。牠在看人的樣子就像呆呆的木頭。你怎麼可能對牠有所寄望？連流浪狗都可以在牠腳下繞，也，佔上風。

勞勃‧瑞福的電影＜＜輕聲細語＞＞可能會誤導人們對馬的理解。事實與電影情景相反：對馬輕聲細語的那位，並不希望別人聽到他說什麼。

馴馬師可以教馬跳舞。通常馬能跳舞，也可以跑得好。

散文名家蒙田寫過一篇文章，提到馬可以用蹄數拍來回答算術。我可一點也不信。

以上這些討論都只是初步探討階段。我還未進行到問題的核心。問題關鍵在於：馬總是讓執韁者決定行動方向。對於任何一匹馬而言，我們該問的是：誰在騎馬？

換一個角度來問：權貴階級究竟想往哪裡去？

* * *

THE PROBLEM WITH HORSES (original)
Once a useful helper and means of getting where one needed to go, horses have become largely a decorative toy on which upper class ladies show off their poise.

Horses might still be respectable if everybody could have one, but at present only the idle rich can afford to keep a horse.

Class issues aside, the problem of horse intelligence is no small matter in our current impasse. Are we even dealing with a creature with a mind of its own?

Given that horse heads are carved from wood, it is amazing the animal shows any intelligence at all. How many synapses can fire simultaneously in a wooden brain? Researchers still puzzle over this problem.

Having grown out of the horse's body like a tree stump, the head slowly carves itself into standard horse shape. This much we know. The eyes make it look like an animal rather than a tree, though in a way it really is a kind of tree. It stares dumb at you, all wooden. What can you expect from such a creature? The lowest street dog could run circles round it, and does.

Don't be fooled by the Redford film. In reality a horse whisperer is someone who doesn't want you to hear what he's telling his horse.

Horses can be taught to dance and seem to enjoy both dancing and running.

Montaigne writes of a horse that could tap out the answers to simple sums with its right front hoof. I don't believe it for a minute.

But all this is just preliminary. I haven't gotten to the real problem with horses. It is as follows: Horses always go wherever the person holding the reins wants them to go. In other words, for any given horse we must ask: Who holds the reins?

Or to put the question another way: Where do the rich want to go?

Eric Mader
Taipei

Progress--Our hope or our doom?

Here we come!
Some quick essays on progress by Taipei teens. I talked about different sorts of progress in class--technological, medical, social--then wrote on the board: “Many people believe progress is good. What about you? Explain using examples.” Students had twenty minutes to write an answer.

I’ve corrected grammar mistakes, but otherwise left the essays as are. Sitting in front of the class for twenty minutes or so, I also penned an answer, which I place last here.

No, this post is not related to Taiwan's Sunflower Student Movement. These are mostly teens writing here.

Eric Mader

Kelly on Progress

As the world progresses, many things progress too: technology, media, society, etc. I think progress is good, but too much is bad. Some social progress is good. For example, ensuring women’s rights, children’s rights, etc. But technology is just a little too fast so that this world can’t keep up with it.

For example, now many companies need people whose technology skills are good, so some elementary schools or junior high schools start to use the method of technology to teach children. Every child has an iPad or iPhone for class. I think it’s bad for them because children’s eyes aren’t completely developed. Putting them into the phone world for a long time will cause their eyes to be worse.

Many kinds of progress are good, but we don’t need more now. We need to think about whether we can digest them.

Tina on Progress

To be honest, I agree that progress is always good. Thanks to perfect constructions, the economic development in our country can be faster and faster. Without progress, we can’t live so peacefully and conveniently as now.

For example, if there weren’t an airport in the north of Taiwan, it would be very difficult to interact with foreign countries. No one could see our country’s features and culture. And business people couldn’t even earn more money. Without new construction, our commercial development might be worse.

But if the progress goes too quickly, it may cause some problems and serious damage. In that case, the air may be polluted. Besides, people would flock into the cities. It would be too crowded. We should find some approaches to solve these problems in the future.

Jenny on Progress

The modern world has considerable progress in many areas, such as technological progress, medical progress, social progress, etc. For most people, it seems that “progress” is seen as something that always brings them happiness. However, as far as I’m concerned, this idea of progress is too narrow.

For example, social progress enables people to have more freedom. They can say whatever they want to say and try to get the rights which benefit them. Indeed, in many ways people’s lives become better than before. Nonetheless, there are more and more battles, whether protests or civil wars, at the same time. Then I start to question whether progress is always good. My answer is negative. Progress brings people happiness, but it brings people misfortunes too. Because of social progress, there are many innocent people suffering from others’ irrational attacks.

Therefore, as we push for progress in our lives, we should also learn to be understanding and respect the difference between ourselves and others so that everyone can enjoy the benefits from progress. We should not try to impose our own ideas of progress on everyone.

David on Progress

Most people think that progress is always good, but they don’t think about the bad things that will come with it.

Thousands of years ago, Chinese people invented paper. After they could control the skill of making paper easily, they started to cut trees. When recycled paper and iPads were finally invented, it was too late. The pollution and damage they made on the Earth was nearly impossible to fix. This is one of the reasons That I can’t agree that progress is always good.

Although progressing is an important part of human civilization, people often regret things they did. They always have to worry about how to fix problems caused by themselves. That’s what we do.

Schani on Progress

Progress is a power for the improvement of human life. However, is progress always good? My opinion is that it depends on the circumstances: sometimes it’s good but sometimes it isn’t.

For example, I think social progress from emperors to democracy is good. In past Chinese history, when kings ruled the country, you could easily be killed because someone near the king didn’t like your style. Or you could easily get banished to a very far place if you said one wrong word. Living in that environment made people unsettled and afraid of expressing their own feelings, which I think is nothing good.

Another example is the technological progress of cloning things which I am worried about and think is bad. When the first cloned sheep “Dolly” was created, people knew that our genetic engineering technology wasn’t far from cloning human beings. But as many Hollywood science fiction movies have shown, people might have problems agreeing on self-identities. You don’t know whether your parents cloned you from someone or if you are a real person and they are cloned. The confusing situations may lead the world into chaos.

In conclusion, to say if progress is good or bad, we have to consider its effects on humans. After weighing all the advantages and disadvantages, we can announce whether the progress in question is positive or negative.

Bryan on Progress

I do not agree that progress is always good. Let me show you some reasons.

For example, the technological progress is good, but on the other hand it is bad. Why? Although it brings more convenience for us, it often pollutes our environment. It may have benefits for progress, but also may be bad for our lives. Many people think that progress is always good, but I don’t think so.

Perhaps not all progress is bad: there is still good social progress. Women’s rights are raising. It’s good progress. Everyone, no matter men or women, have equal rights.

Eric on Progress

Some people say that progress is always good. In fact in modern societies it’s hard to find anyone who thinks it is bad. Our scientific and capitalist cultures are busy 24/7 trying to persuade us to pursue new and “better” things. I’m different from most people here. I think a lot about the bad side of progress.

Consider the current world population. Though humans have been around for around 200,000 years, the total world population for most of that time was only a few million. In 1800 the population reached one billion for the first time, thanks to agriculture, trade and other kinds of progress. But now the population is around 7 billion. A thousand years ago the world didn’t even have half a billion people on it. Suddenly, in a few centuries, we went from half a billion to 7 billion--a 1,400% increase! And in the next thirty years, if we survive, we may reach 9 billion. Our environment cannot support so many people, and the result will be not only the possible permanent destruction of our planet but also terrible wars and famines.

This population explosion only happened because of scientific developments in agriculture and other areas. Wouldn’t we have been better living more in harmony with nature, with a much smaller population? The way we are now, we may not even survive another two centuries: we may become extinct.

But also I am very sceptical about technological progress in terms of everyday life. Our machines (cars, etc.) get us around but also make us fat and lazy--all while polluting the environment. And look at our TVs and portable devices. They allow us to think we’re experiencing the world when we just sit and absorb sounds and images from a screen. Our devices make us think we are communicating with people, but in fact they mainly help us to ignore the people around us.

There is a legend I heard many years ago that conveys something of how I feel about progress. Long ago an inventor came to the Emperor with his new invention. He’d made a perfectly clear kind of glass that could not be broken. The Emperor’s guards tried to break it with their weapons, but could not. Nonetheless the glass was perfectly clear! The Emperor thought about it. “You are the only one who knows how to make this glass?” he asked. “Yes,” the inventor said proudly. The Emperor then turned to his guards: “Kill this man,” he said. “And go to his house to burn his papers.” The Emperor took the glass and flung it into a lake.

Although the Emperor could see the glass was amazing and could be used for many things, he also was wise enough to realize that it would change the world in ways he couldn’t foresee. It was better not to start making such glass at all.

[Alright, I cheated. I planned to add the legend about the Emperor while in the classroom, but didn’t have time. I’m adding it now at the computer. --E.]

Impressed by Taiwan's Sunflower Student Movement

我在台灣快20年教的學生很多。 我可保證他們其中有一大堆很驄明很成熟的人。 我教過太陽花活動其中一些學生很,引以為榮。 你們台灣年輕人太利害!

Yesterday BBC profiled the Taiwan Sunflower Student Movement, stressing the vision and organizational skills of the students involved. Myself, having taught some of these students, I can only agree: there are many brilliant and serious young folks here. I wish American 20-somethings would study what is happening here and learn from Taiwan's Sunflower Generation.

BBC: What unprecedented protest means for Taiwan

中文: BBC讚太陽花學生有秩序,決定台灣未來

E.M.

Recent Angels: 台灣最近出現的天使

這是我學生高鉞雲教我畫的天使。

Understanding Taiwan's Tobacco Labels

A Disassociated Press Public Service Memo [黑色幽默, kuso, satire]

by Eric Mader

The Chinese writing system is the world's most difficult--by a long shot. Foreigners who move to Taiwan engage in a daily uphill battle to read shop signs, posters and product labels.

Having been here awhile, and studied Chinese, I thought I should do my part to help newcomers make sense of their environment. Today I'll post these translations of Taiwan's tobacco warning labels for the foreigner smokers here who can't yet read Chinese.

Label 1

This one says: The wife and kid getting on your nerves? Time to step out for a quiet smoke. And why not stop in at the pub for a pint while you're at it?

Label 2

This one says: One of these lungs belongs to a street-smart big city detective always one step ahead of the game. The other belongs to a suburbanite flake who believes in crystal healing. Can you tell which is which?

Label 3

This one says: Yes, it is possible to continue smoking while having sex. Just be careful you don't stub your cigarette.

Label 4

This one says: Colas and other soft drinks not only rot your teeth, they can also lead to obesity. Tobacco, a known appetite suppressant, can help you shed those unwanted pounds.

Label 5

This one says: Smoking is one of life's great pleasures. Given the current state of smoking technology, however, you will have to wait to be born before you can begin.

Doing Everyday Business in Chinese: What Is the Problem Here?

I want to be clear from the start that I'm not writing this to complain and I'm certainly not writing it to imply that the people I deal with every day are idiots. No, I'm trying to raise certain questions about communication in English, say, vs. in Chinese. I'm trying to present what to me is a cultural mystery because, really, the people I deal with every day are clearly not idiots. The mystery is why they choose to communicate as they do.

The following runaround happens to me all the time. In fact it has happened to me so many times during my years in Taipei that I'm now going to take the trouble to type out an example of it verbatim. Today I walked into a restaurant to order food and the ordering process went like this:

At Mos Burger, a fast food restaurant. About 1:00 p.m. All dialogue is in Chinese:

SERVICE PERSON (a woman, about 23): I can help you here, sir.

ME: Yes, I'd like to order three original flavor MosBurgers, two for here and one to go. On the one to go I'd like no mayonnaise or butter.

SP: Okay, three original MosBurgers. Would you like them with a meal or a la carte?

ME: A la carte. All three a la carte. [I repeat the order exactly] Three original flavor MosBurgers, two for here and one to go, the one to go with no mayonnaise or butter.

SP: Okay. [she incorrectly repeats the order to me] Three MosBurgers, two to go and one for here. And you don't want any mayonnaise on them.

ME: No. I want two for here and one to go. And I only want no butter or mayonnaise on the one to go. The two for here are just regular, with everything.

SP: Okay. Three MosBurgers, two for here and one to go. No mayonnaise on the two for here. [she starts to pass my order to the prep people] Three MosBurgers. . .

ME: No, no. Excuse me. The one to go is for someone who is allergic to dairy. So it's the one to go that has no butter or mayonnaise. No butter on the bread or mayonnaise. The two for here are just regular, with everything.

SP: [she thinks for awhile] Okay. Do you want the original sauce on the three burgers?

ME: Yes, original sauce. Three original flavor. It comes with the sauce.

SP: Okay. So you want three MosBurgers, the one to go with no mayonnaise. Do you want mayonnaise on the ones for here?

ME: Yes. It's only the one to go that has no mayonnaise.

SP: Okay.

[Another service person has been listening. She helpfully pipes in:]

SP2: Would you like cheese on the one to go?

[I begin to feel like I'm on a sinking ship. Consider: 1) original flavor MosBurgers don't come with cheese, and original flavor is what I've now three times expressly ordered; 2) I've already said the one to go is for someone who is "allergic to dairy"!]

ME: No. I don't want cheese on any of them.

SP: Okay. Three original flavor MosBurgers, two for here and one to go, no mayonnaise or butter on the one to go.

ME: That's it.

SP: Would you like those with a meal or a la carte?

[What should I say at this point? Yes, a few years ago I'd have angrily pointed out that I'd already answered that question earlier, and that in fact I'd already given my order four times and it should all be clear by now. But I want to be helpful, the girl is in fact polite, so I just repeat:] All three a la carte.

So I've finally placed my order. But wait. Now the woman has to pass my order to the food prep people. And it happens almost just as I predict. I stand there and listen as almost the same conversation she's just had with me, only slightly less involved, occurs between her and her coworkers. In fact I have to talk to the food prep people myself to clarify what the order really is.

I go sit down at a table and wait for my food to arrive. In my experience, after all that has transpired, the chances are about 50/50 that the order will be screwed up. But when it comes, I check it and it's correct. I then go back to the counter and order a medium iced tea.

Why, you may wonder, didn't I order the iced tea to begin with? I made the omission intentionally. It's because I've been here many years and didn't want to add any further complicating elements to my order--radically complicating elements such as a drink. Since I knew I'd already have to place my order half a dozen times, I wanted to be sure the burgers were straightened out before even thinking about drinks.

This is how it has gone for me countless times in restaurants and other businesses. It was the same again today. Now let me make a few things clear.

1) This is not happening because the service person is stupid.

2) It is not happening because the service person is especially irresponsible or inattentive. No, she was polite and clearly trying to do her job.

3) It is not happening because the restaurant is busy or the service person feels rushed or is otherwise multitasking. No, I was the only customer ordering at the time.

4) It is not happening because Mos Burger doesn't like to deal with special orders. No, they deal with such orders all the time. And after all, my request wasn't even very special: I wanted three of their most common product, one with slight modifications to go.

5) It is not happening because of my Chinese. Though I'm a foreigner speaking Chinese to a native speaker, my Chinese is certainly good enough to conduct a simple hamburger order. A few years ago I used to suspect otherwise--that maybe these runarounds were my fault because I wasn't communicating clearly. Now I highly doubt it. Why? Because I regularly watch locals getting into the same kind of back-and-forth dialogues with each other that I myself just underwent. And today again it seemed the counter person had nearly as much trouble communicating my simple order to her coworkers as I originally had communicating it to her. But why? Why couldn't she just put it into a sentence and they listen to each of the separate elements of the sentence and make sense of them? Why all the back and forth for God's sake?

6) I am not exaggerating this phenomenon. In fact today I wish I'd recorded the whole thing so I could type it out in Chinese as proof. If anything, I've simplified the dialogue.

7) I'm well aware that such things occur in every culture, my own American culture included. But in the West so much back and forth is certainly not the norm. And the point is that even before walking into that Mos Burger restaurant I had a pretty good idea what was going to happen at the counter--that I was going to have to repeat myself at least four times. Because for some reason, in many situations here, repetition of details is the norm.

So what gives? There seems to be something like the following going on: When I as a Westerner go into a shop to place an order or conduct business of some kind, I expect that if I carefully formulate my request in a simple sentence that the service person listening to me will absorb my sentence and organize the elements in his or her head so as to get the desired result. But-- When the Taiwanese goes into a shop to place an order, things are quite different. What he or she expects, and the people taking the order expect, is that there will be a repetitive and circular back and forth about the order, a kind of verbal touch and go, that will continue until the order is all clear in both parties' minds. Further: If the person listening to the order misunderstands it the first two or three times around, this is not rude or inefficient service but rather just how things are expected to be. In short: Taiwanese don't mind repeating themselves: for them such repetition is part of the nature of communication. And further: Taiwanese don't bother to listen carefully, because they know whatever they hear will be repeated anyway.

Am I right about this?

My anthropological suspicions on this point perhaps get some support from another aspect of communicating with Taiwanese that I've long noticed--and one that has often driven me nearly mad. I'm talking about the tendency not to answer Yes/No questions with a simple Yes or No.

Example, on a Taipei bus:

A: Excuse me. Does this bus cross Chung-Hsiao East Road?

B: Where do you want to go?

A: Uh. It's hard to explain. I just need to know if the bus crosses Chung-Hsiao East Road.

B: Are you going to Chung-Hsiao East Road?

A: No. I'm going north of Chung-Hsiao East Road. It's straight north of where we are now. Does this bus cross Chung-Hsiao East Road?

B: What section of Chung-Hsiao East Road?

A: Never mind. Thanks for your help.

Now of course in this case the person might be commended for wanting to know precisely where I was going so as to better help me. But the gist of my question was clear. Either the bus crosses the road in question or it doesn't. The man I was talking to knew the answer, I believe. He just didn't want to tell me with a simple Yes or No. There were so many other issues to be raised, it seems.

I'm afraid this bus dialogue isn't the best example though. It's hard to capture these exchanges in print. It's true that at least weekly I will find myself posing questions to people--friends, strangers, etc.--that have simple Yes/No answers, but I will never get the answer I need. Instead I will get comments on tangential issues or answers to questions I didn't ask. I almost wish I'd kept a journal on these kinds of dialogues: some of them are almost uncanny in the sheer irrelevance of the evasion.

When I want to know if a bus crosses a certain road, why should I be made to feel that I'm trying to coax some secret out of someone?

I'm aware that in business negotiations refusing to give clear-cut answers is often a matter of strategy. And that Asians--Japanese and Chinese in particular--are particularly good at being noncommittal as the terms of a deal are hashed out. Still, why should this kind of dogged avoidance of clear-cut answers happen when the stakes of the discussion are minuscule?

I overhear Taiwanese conversing with each other and notice the same kinds of non sequitur. Namely, 1) a clearly stated order at a counter is not taken as such, but is rather a kind of invitation to go round and round restating the order's elements; 2) a direct question is not respected as such, but is instead an invitation to talk about something else.

What gives? I'm aware that linguists and people in East-West relations have probably studied these questions.

Make no mistake. I love Taiwan and its people. I've come to think of these linguistic oddities as a kind of mystery more than an annoyance. At times such runarounds are humorous because they are so predictable. But what are they grounded on?

Comments very welcome.

You've been in Taiwan too long if . . .

1. You stop conjugating verbs.

2. You look both ways before crossing the sidewalk.

3. You turn left from the right lane.

4. 70 F feels cold.

5. You see three people on a motorcycle and figure there's room for two more.

6. "Squid" sounds better than "steak."

7. There are more things strapped to your motorcycle than you ever put in a car.

8. You drive on the shoulder to pass traffic.

9. The main reason you stop at a 7-11 is to buy tea eggs.

10. Firecrackers don't wake you up.

11. You can distinguish Taiwanese from Hakka.

12. You consider fish chins, drunken chicken and black fungus to be normal menu items.

13. Taxi drivers are considered "good drivers."

14. You've seen versions of this list before.

15. You stop and look both ways before driving through a red light.

16. "A", "an" and "the" are optional parts of speech.

17. You wear out your horn before your brakes.

18. The police call you to get information about other foreigners.

19. You know which place has the best noodles and duck meat at 3:00 a.m.

20. You speak Chinese to your foreign friends too.

21. You own a karaoke machine.

22. You leave the plastic on all new purchases.

23. Forks feel strange.

24. The shortest distance between two points involves going through an alley.

25. People don't see you for months, and when they do, they don't ask you where you've been.

26. You hear Chinese remakes of Western songs before you hear the originals.

27. You stare at other foreigners.

28. Over half of your clothes were bought at night markets.

29. You become an expert on bug zappers: the best brands and where to get them.

30. You have an arsenal of subtle verbal dodges to deflect taxi drivers from prying into your personal life.

31. You know which turn signal should be on when reversing the wrong way down a one-way street.

32. You get homesick for Chinese food while away from Taiwan.

33. Praying at a temple for a winning lottery number becomes a regular thing to do.

34. Other foreigners give you a funny look when you tell them how long you've been here.

35. You can't think of any good reason to leave.

36. The Statute of Limitations has expired and you still don't go home.

37. You understand that smiling and nodding is Chinese body language for "Go away and leave me alone."

38. You've spent more time on the island since 1990 than most of the Taiwanese you know.

39. Locals are surprised to find out you can't vote in the upcoming election.

40. You never bother to ask locals questions like: "Is that north of the park?" or "Is that on the east or west side of the campus?"

41. Pizza just doesn't taste right unless there's corn on it.

42. Your preferred parking spot is on a sidewalk (and you get upset when someone else parks there).

43. Most meaningful conversations take place in doorways or on slow-moving motorcycles.

44. Your job title has more than three words.

45. You think the service in restaurants isn't that bad.

46. You're always the first on the elevator to hit the "door close" button.

47. You start cutting off the gravel trucks.

48. You eat squid on a stick.

49. You no longer send home bizarre and humorous articles from the paper.

50. You think of walking down the sidewalk as a sport.

51. You spend more time driving on the lines instead of in between them.

52. You read books from back to front.

53. You start to like Kaoliang more than XO.

54. You think packs of dogs are cute.

55. You are back in your home country and you say "hsie hsie" instead of thank you.

56. You think that all babies have flat heads in the back.

57. You think that $3,000,000 NT for a golf club membership is a steal.

58. You drive like this all the time.

59. You think that Taiwan is really trying to protect endangered species.

60. Your pinkie nail is over one inch long.

61. You catch yourself telling a taxi driver to hurry up.

62. You hum along to the tunes in the taxi.

63. You think walking up Yangmingshan looks like fun.

64. You think it's normal for people over 30 to zigzag down the sidewalk.

65. You can tell the difference between spring rain, plum rain, and the rainy season.

66. The last time you visited your mother you presented her with your business card.

67. You can tell, just by looking, which moon cake has the egg in it.

68. You feel nervous and giddy when you get around fresh air.

70. Everything you own is pirated.

71. You get used to the habit of not paying any tips while traveling.

72. You can read and write romanized Chinese in three different systems.

73. The red light is merely suggestive to you.

74. You greet people by inspecting whatever they're carrying or telling them how fat they've gotten.

75. You can no longer tell the difference between a cracker and a cookie, or toast and bread.

76. You stop telling people about the giant cockroach you saw.

77. Metal scaffolding at construction sites seems much more dangerous than bamboo scaffolding.

78. You can tell the difference between different foreign accents in Chinese.

79. Your parties have an agenda, but your meetings don't.

80. Getting in an accident, you tell the ambulance driver which hospital to take you to.

81. You stumble going up a flight of steps that are all the same height.

82. Rats are considered "wildlife."

83. You salt your fruit.

84. You don't much mind drinking beer with ice cubes in it.

85. You don't expect to get workable directions, whether in English or Chinese.

86. You wear your coat backwards when riding a scooter.

87. You make elevators go faster by boarding first and taking over the controls.

88. You're very concerned about not losing face.

89. The words "Ice Cream" never enter your head when you hear the garbage truck.

90. You don't feel comfortable using a urinal unless there's a woman mopping the floor behind you.

91. You say "Wei?" instead of "Hello?" when you pick up the phone.

Any you'd like to add to this list, feel free to do so in the comments. --E.M.