the fat teacher

Any of you who have been privy enough to view Aerobics Mike-Style, have already been exposed to the very Asian trait of calling people fatties in full-colour action. You may not know however that this DVD came secondary to a visit from my borbor (grandmother), who on spying my aging father declared: “geez, you’re looking old and fat Michael!” Oh cruel world! She alone has the power to bring the ego of her favoured first son down a notch or two. Nonetheless, one thing no guide book can equip any unsuspecting visitor to Asia with, is a thick enough skin to deal with the fat comments. On my first day of teaching at IEA, my school laoban niang (boss) gave me two pieces of helpful advice: “learn American, your English no good,” and “you should eat less, you’re too fat.” Welcome to Taiwan!

It’s not just aging women who make these comments though - I have also been subjected to a year of toddlers, who on sight run up and slap me on the ass chanting: “this bit is so big!” Occasionally they stop to grab my waist and say in a confused way: “this bit is small” (pause) …then back to the ass: “THIS BIT IS SOOOO BIG!!” A good friend of mine has been branded THE FAT TEACHER (FT), after overhearing her new manager tell a group of students they’d be joining ‘the fat teacher’s class.’ And another friend received a note on the bottom of a test from a twelve year old boy that read: Teacher Holly! You’re too fat!!! I think you have to eat vegetables and you’ll get thinner. But I like you!!! From Vincent. Schools are a minor sufferance however, compared to joining a Taiwanese gym. During my first training session they measured my fat with tongs, and stood me in front of the mirror to wobble my flabby bits. The trainer then grabbed hold of both cheeks of my ass and pushed them up as high as they could go; “SEE,” she told me gleefully, “you’ll have longer legs if you lose weight.” When FT (who weighs 60 kilos by the way) joined the gym, the trainer casually asked: “so, when did you get so fat?” commenting she must have eaten a lot in America. He was later amazed to find out she could run after all!

It is my opinion that being called fat is not just a point of contention for foreigners though, but for Taiwanese children, teenagers, and women as well. One grade two boy wrote in composition class: If my mother says I always cry, I get very angry, but when my father tells me I’m a fat boy, I get very, very angry, because I am NOT fat!! Then there are the pallid hordes of stick insects on ‘one-milk-tea a day’ diets, and the corset bearers who practice starvation. Starvation may not lead to enlightenment as the great Buddha teaches, but it definitely leads to fewer fat jokes – a lesser prize perhaps, but not undesirable. So long ago, the Fat Teacher and I concluded if you can’t beat them, join them. We now tell people daily that they’re looking fat, chubby, chunky, wobbly, stacking on the choccies. Hey, I even call my best friend here ‘fatty!’ Sometimes I worry about my re-entry into Australian society though, and this newfound loss of basic social decorum.
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loss of the gay radar

One thing even a seasoned foreign woman has to accept upon arriving to Taipei is a complete LOSS OF THE GAY RADAR. Aside from the accessories, it is common for two young, attractive, metro-sexually clad boys to stand in a nightclub or party with their arms around each other, and deep in conversation. My final misjudgement came about nine months ago in Barrio, a Latin nightclub down the road from my apartment. Put on my stilettos for a moment, and picture the scene: a Lone Ranger was casually seated by the bar; he had come down just to see the DJ - an ultra-hip, dreadlocked Asian boy with Latin moves. In each song break the DJ sauntered over to the Lone Ranger to ‘whisper dreams’ and exchange meaningful looks. After a couple of tequilas I invited the Lone Ranger to dance, and met rejection. Not one to accept straight-out rejections (as my Aquarian friends well know), I took it as an indication of faithfulness to his lover. In my mind it was all logical assumption, and found my thoughts verbalising - “you’re very dedicated to come here and watch your boyfriend work.” This led to some spluttered confusion, and adamant denials of my claim. It also led to the dance floor for some serious grinding, which is completely out of character for your average Chinese punter, and a brusque, awkward, yet unrelenting bear hug to prove he liked women … the DJ couldn’t stop laughing! I have since avoided shocking any “non-couple” couples by not enquiring about their relationships.
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hello kitty is for everyone

If Australia teaches us that everyone looks stylish in thongs and a beanie, Taiwan has taught me HELLO KITTY IS FOR EVERYONE, not just five year old girls. Taiwanese men of all ages love this icon of Japanese imperialism. This is not to say Taiwan doesn’t have the macho, macho, macho man of course – Confucius has made sure men keep their ‘rightful’ place. However, instead of worshipping the clueless, D-cupped, beer-sculling blonde who frequents the Grand, the Taiwanese macho goes for cutesy, whining, pouting creatures, who act as helplessly as humanly possible, and dress in hot pants and fur parkas. These traits ignite his desire to protect and guide the weaker sex, and justify catering to her every childish whim. He also insists on paying at all times, and has tendencies to become physical if this right is denied. I once had a ‘whim’ for 7-11 instant noodles, and ended up with a bruised arm. Despite this ‘manly’ behaviour, he may: come decked out in a pink or purple Hello Kitty motorbike helmet with a matching raincoat; carry a man-bag adorned with small, pastel plush-toys; wear hoop ear-rings to dinner; hang a plethora of trinkets on his phone; and stage a full array of painted nails with jewelled decorations – and all this without fear of ridicule.

Can you imagine your typical beer-swilling, footy-lovin’, pie-munchin’ bloke out of his wife-beater, and in this get-up?? It’d give the Grand a serious face-lift!!
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the second flow plan

Generally speaking, dating in Taipei is in serious slow motion – and it’s the longest road you could possibly imagine to establish a long-term relationship. The flow plan goes something like this: introduced by friends – 6 to 12 months of courtship called friendship – relationship founded – another 6 to 12 months of kissing – copulation (maybe) – marriage. An alternative route is: high school classmates – long-standing friendship for 2 to 5 years – relationship founded – kissing, copulation – marriage. THE SECOND FLOW PLAN is a romantic story I have seen in action – a friend of mine (who is now 23), has just started dating a boy who was on the same cheerleading squad as her in high school!

So ladies, if you want to date in Taipei, forget about giving smutty, sex looks in nightclubs – they definitely don’t lead to love, and for all the attention they are given, you might as well fuck the wall. Nevertheless, if you don’t have a spare twelve years to invest in one of the flow plans sex is readily available - bear in mind all men get hard-ons. And, more often than not, Chinese boys are too polite (or scared) to say no – even if they really want to. To this day I ascertain, and I am not an innocent, that there are many terrified Chinese boys accosted in foreign pads. I have even seen one teary specimen in the stairwell outside my apartment, after being man-handled by one of my roomies.

The greatest slow-motion dating conundrum though, has to be the six month stretches between phone calls. Lengthy breaks between messages (with no mention of time passed), is not only a recurring pattern, but integral to the dating scene. I once went out with a tall, stylish, Louis Vuitton sales assistant, only to get a text from him eight months later which said: this is austin, do u remember me? merry xmas. On this point about dating Chinese men, I may remain permanently in the dark - some behaviour is truly confounding, and not even I can construct a convincing explanation.

As a result, my cell phone is frequented by sporadic calls from Zhi-Wei, Huang-Wei, Wei-Zhen, Wei-Zhang, Wei-Chang and Wei-Ming, of whom I haven’t the foggiest ability to discern. My closest Taiwanese confidante told me: “Chinese boys are shy and probably wait for you to call; they just plan their next move” … for six months?? Apparently I have the problem, and this is a-ok – its all just part of dating in Taipei. So, in true Taiwanese style I sent an SMS to One-Way last night, (after all it has been five months since he last texted) – he was of course thrilled to hear from me!
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skewered chicken hearts

My first Chinese date was with a break-dancing, bisexual bartender covered in self-drawn ghoulish tattoos (One-Way), two of his friends, a translator, and many “delicious” night-market snacks. By delicious I am referring to the congealed duck blood and rice cakes, and SKEWERED CHICKEN HEARTS. The first lovely snack was a slimy oyster-filled broth, which despite a lifetime of chopstick practice, I failed dismally to eat. This confirmed the suspicion that a fork should be carried at all times when taking foreigners to eat in public. I can’t say what brought about my serious failings - it may have been my fear of the snacks, the pressure of having to eat first, or being watched so intently, but either way my ancestors hung their heads in shame. Apparently being half Chinese means you can only do half things, so I told my ancestors “I can successfully eat with one chopstick,” but they just ignored me.

Despite the shaky beginning, One-Way and I dated for three months after the night market. We spoke in Chinese (I didn’t understand him because I don’t understand Chinese, and he didn’t understand me because I don’t make sense in Chinese); he made me free cocktails at the bar, and I in turn slapped him on the ass; and we shared a love of game arcades, or so he believed. We learnt about each other slowly, and sometimes by accident - like the time I found out he was afraid of heights on the roof of my 15-story apartment building. Eventually it had to come to an end, but in retrospect, the best thing about One-Way though was he always had ‘plenty of time.’ Despite working a 7 day week, he got off at 3am – a great time to call and wander the streets of Taipei, even on weekdays. Oh, the Taiwanese!
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life in alley 44

Taking a walk from our apartment off heping dong lu, past the diner for a late breakfast, and on to daan park for a little afternoon sun!



.heading down alley 44


.the view out of the alley



.walls on the way to the diner


.the best breakfasts in taipei


.lanterns at daan


.flower show at daan gongyuan I


.flower show at daan gongyuan II
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canadian psycho

Only locals here know that eighty per cent of Taiwan’s expat community is Canadian. There is about one Canadian for every roach in this city. Considering the levels of this infestation, it is impossible not to meet them – they’re everywhere. On every street corner, in every bar and restaurant, on the MRT, in the bus – and they’re always yelling “fuckin’ A,” or being revoltingly encouraging. I could be taking off my shoes at the door, and my Canadian manager will breeze past with a “you’re doing a great job there!” I’ve even seen an Aussie sporting the slogan: I’m a fuckin’ Canadian – yeah!

Despite their general goodwill, I had the unfortunate experience of share-housing with the original CANADIAN PSYCHO (CP). The thing about a real psychopath is that they look normal - they dress in civvies, go to work like everyone else, and leave chocolate bunny-face croissants outside your bedroom。At first CP was a fairly quiet roommate, who tried to keep his long, unrequited love for Miss Canada out of sight. The first release from his tormented bondage came just before my arrival, when he got funky with her cousin. This was his first ‘man power’ experience, and brought up a plethora of father issues, which subsequently drove his lover out of Taipei. Following his lover’s quick departure, CP went to India and ‘found himself,’ then fell into rampant denial about his homosexuality; stalwartly insisting he could never fall in love with a man, and would never engage in the ‘disgusting practices’ of anal sex. Nonetheless, drunken nights always ended up with Chinese boys on his cock, and the empty threats that he was going to urinate on my face. These events were inevitably followed by seventeen page letters of tearful abuse directed at Miss Canada, accusing her of being a cold, heartless, soul-less bitch skank who fucked up every relationship in her life. Not forgetting he was Canadian however, he still courteously greeted us whenever he came home, before running to his room and slamming his door.

At this point let me mention that I had a total of three extended conversations with CP during our four months of share-housing; but in his mind I became part of the axis of evil – a fucked-up bitch – a sidekick to Miss Canada’s cruel torment – and a first-class enemy. I first realised this when CP put his single birthday card out on display which read: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SORRY YOUR ROOMIES ARE SUCH HOES!! Soon after, CP convinced himself I was involved in espionage and sabotage, and ascertained that I was a mindless puppet under the directions of Miss Canada … Paranoid schizophrenics eat your hearts out! It all began to climax around the time Miss Canada and I made arrangements to move apartments. I sent CP an SMS to make a time to tie up our apartment’s odds and ends, and was met by three days of silence, then an onslaught of wild accusations and emotional guilt trips. I was like: “CP, I just want to talk about the bills.”

In the final days, and to guarantee complications as the mentally disturbed do, CP accosted most of the furniture which he strategically hid around his locked room. I know this, because feeling I had restrained my cuckoo-nest alter ego for too long, I broke into his room and returned the stolen goods to the living room. He responded by throwing rice all over the apartment, re-accosting the TV, and leaving me a note that said: I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU THREW MY CLOTHES ALL OVER THE FLOOR (as if I would), and Knowing you has taught me a whole new level of immaturity – good luck with getting a mind of your own. I should have left it, but the cuckoo was out; I re-re-accosted the TV and left him a page long letter that concluded: It’s not my fault your parents neglected you. Crawl into a fucking hole and die! And just for the record, if I ever see you again I’ll have you knifed in the liver. CP’s new roommates arrived home first that day, and found my note. Bear in mind that what I have shown you was just the endnotes, and at first the new tenants thought the entire letter was for them. It was too much for their darling British souls, and they called me in teary distress: “Um, we found your letter yeah. Well, um, it wasn’t very nice. You didn’t mean it right? It was just a joke yeah?” No, no, my soft-hearted friends, “I meant every last fucking word – and make sure you give it to him.”

I guess they finally decided to give my letter to CP, because on the day the soft-cock left from Taiwan, a series of ads appeared in every personals column on www.tealit.com (a site frequented by Taipei’s foreign community). They all bore mine or Miss Canada’s names and phone numbers. Some claimed I was: a young Canadian girl, looking for fun with both foreign and Chinese men, and some claimed we were: seeking new room-mates. The first call came through from Dubai at 3am in the morning - a soon-to-arrive freak-box had seen my Arabic name, and was looking for a wife. Miss Canada and I received close to a hundred phone calls that week; everything from men wanting sex, to language exchange prospects, to new roomies. Viva la Vida!

"killer roaches"

Despite the lack of food scraps in our bins, they still make a great breeding ground for Taipei’s “KILLER ROACHES.” Killer roaches are not bigger than Australian ones, they just have more charisma. They live in squats, hide out, and chortle in their roachy ways about the hysteria that always accompanies their timely raids. They’re fucking anarchists, and have no regard for their neighbours.

Here in Taipei, I have borne witness to the most rampant, panic-stricken horror brought about by these diminutive shuttling creatures. Aside from Taipei’s city slickers who fear everything that is not made of plastic, it would seem the ‘Ice People’ (Canadians and Europeans) are particularly terrified of these ‘monstrous’, tropical manifestations. I am not trying to say I want to have a cockroach as a pet, just that I feel no overwhelming emotion towards them. Nonetheless, my Ice People theory doesn’t quite justify why it was an Australian who first warned me to never open the door to the kitchen balcony in the apartment. Behind, she told me, lay a hovel of breeding roaches, awaiting any opportunity to invade our territory with their vile diseases and impure ideas – Victorians mate!

After a confounding spell of share-housing, I become accustomed to my Canadian roomie’s tradition of giving a series of rapid claps and whistles at the doorway of each room before entering. This was done to ‘scare’ the roaches into hiding, so there would be no impending confrontations. The highlight round of Miss Canada versus Killer Roaches everywhere though, was brought to me live in a Ko Phangan Island beach cabin. In the early hours of a humid morning, a particularly petulant Thai roach was bent on tormenting her. It shuttled back and forth across the room, before running at her in a full-fledged muy-thai style attack; it then gloatingly crawled all over her bed, before using it as a runway to fly into her hair. During these ten minutes of terror, Miss Canada slipped into the fits of an anxiety attack, enhanced by wide-mouthed screams and hyperventilating. It was a great show, but it quickly ceased to entertain me. I was driven to genteelly release the roach into the night, thus diminishing chances of either of them suffering any long lasting, post-traumatic stress disorder.

Miss Canada’s neuroses were not outstanding though; in my apartment alone, there has been Miss Poland, Miss Switzerland, and Miss Japan. I have been crowned The Cockroach Queen - a saviour of the people, for my courteous and unfailing dedication to roach removal. The outcries always begin with an ear-splitting cry of my name, followed by sporadic screams and general hysteria – they can come at any time of day, and continue until the offender has been expelled. Miss Japan has recently taken to sleeping on the couch after being unable to apprehend one suspect intruder – a master in the art of shape-shifting - who insists on disappearing and reappearing in her room ...

As one would expect, I have a number of male competitors for roach saviour status; and I have to say, I am just ‘not man enough’ to kill a cockroach by shooting at it for ten minutes with a handheld firecracker!

the sanitation officers

Twice a day, five days a week, the familiar dinging of Beethoven’s Fur Elise drifts through the sliding doors of our apartment. Neighbours rush outside bearing their official, powder-blue, Taipei-City garbage bags, filled with the day’s trash. In hordes they hustle down the streets to meet the long foray of rubbish trucks. In our apartment we tend not to ‘hustle’; mostly because we never quite adjusted to the system, and usually let our rubbish live with us until it becomes unbearable. Eventually (and it is always a spectacle), we load ourselves up with our copious, oversized bags, baskets of beer cans, and kilos upon kilos of frozen food scraps. Like donkeys we herd down the three flights of stairs, out into the street, and around the corner. From time to time our incompetence has sparked the empathy of our neighbours, who kindly offer to lighten our load.

Personally, I am not afraid of the trash, but of THE SANITATION OFFICERS, who not only drive, but guard the rubbish trucks. These watchdogs are the main reason I evade this nightly event, which for some locals is the social high point of their day. The Sanitation Officers have taught me: the official garbage bags are not just official, but mandatory; waste must be separated into general trash, paper, bottles, food scraps, and unidentifiable things; not every day is bottle recycling day; I choose the wrong truck because I am an illiterate; and some trash I will have to take back to my apartment. Without their help I have learnt just how long maggots take to breed in the tropics. Sanitation Officers are licensed to fine any offenders who don’t separate their trash properly, and in my opinion, the stench from the trucks makes them testy. As a foreigner, I am considered an ignoramus, so they tend to just yell at me, and angrily gesture that I: STEP-AWAY-FROM-THE-TRUCK! I am then grudgingly allowed return to my apartment with bits of my trash.

On a good night, the kindly junk collectors are passing by - they are the toothless, cart-pullers hidden under rice hats that like trash. They at least, are ever willing to lighten my load of styrofoam, cardboard, and plastic bottles!


.cardboard collector (photo: nicole simes)

the putrid cat-vomit stench of chou doufu

After 18 months of living here, I now think nothing of people shoving and pushing each other in crowded streets and shops - the night-markets wouldn’t be the same without it. Nonetheless, this type of physical hostility remains a point of contention for many foreigners. There are the irate venturers who protest angrily; the timid and fatigued who avoid busy places; and the offensively ignorant who repeatedly claim the Taiwanese are uncivilized and inhumane. I knew one foreign enthusiast who used to give a good ten minute lecture: “Let me tell you something. I am a NIGERIAN MAN, an AF-RI-CAN MAN. Why do you think you can push me? In Africa, people are not pushing in the street. This is something you need to understand today. I am a MAN … from AFRICA.” I am not one to wage a losing war of such frivolous nature however, and long ago became a convert as many of my friends know. Pushing in the night-markets is one of my favourite pastimes – and I sometimes even go out of my way for a little shoving action!

There is one very serious, lurking danger though ... If you push your way into the wrong crowd you risk getting trapped and then violated, as THE PUTRID CAT-VOMIT STENCH OF STINKY TOFU starts creeping into your nostrils. One deep intake is enough to make your insides curdle. In these moments you can only pray the police will appear and the hundreds of illegal street vendors will disappear into shop storerooms and alleys, clearing the desired escape route. Stinky tofu (known locally as chou doufu), is a night-market favourite made from boiling fermented bean curd. Ever true to its name, in any given moment you can see ‘fresh-off-the-boat’ foreigners, retching in the streets, and frantically trying to cover every facial orifice from its impending onslaught. I have discovered that the best cure is to start voraciously chowing it down; once you’ve sat in the stench for a while, it miraculously seems to normalise. I am still not convinced however it is a great delight, just that its flavour is delightfully bland compared to its odour!


.chowing down some chou doufu at shilin night market