Subject: Taiwan
From: Patrick Martino

The Short Update

It’s been nearly exactly two years now since I left America. I am still on my great grand adventure around the world. I thought it was about time to send out another update.

I have stopped off for the last year in Taiwan to learn Chinese and have been teaching English to support myself.

I am by no means fluent in Chinese but I am proud to say after a year of hard study I can hold a conversation with someone in Chinese, get what I want to eat in a restaurant without having to flap my wings like a chicken, and can even talk to cute girls, the true measure of any person’s language ability.

My daily life is not too exciting. I follow a pretty regular routine. I study Chinese in the morning, come home and practice my Chinese characters, and then go to work in the evening teaching little kids how to say A-ah apple.

It’s an easy life. I work only about 14 hours a week, make plenty of money to live off of, live on a tropical island, have gorgeous mountains to hike in, and the ocean only five minutes away. Life is rough what can I say.

Even with so few work hours I have been keeping myself extremely busy. If I’m not studying Chinese I am working on my writing. I am proud to say I am finally a published travel writer.

I have been writing regular travel articles for Taiwan’s largest English newspaper the China Post. It has a circulation of about 270,000. Not bad for my first published stories. The only problem is my editor’s English isn’t fantastic, I’m still learning how to write, and he occasionally likes to change my stories so the English makes absolutely no sense. He pays me though, about $100US for a 1000 word story. It’s not much but I am getting paid to drive my motorcycle to mountain resorts, go hiking, visit waterfalls, write stories, and take pictures, all things I love doing anyways. If your interested you can check out some of my stories in the travel section of the China Post at http://www.chinapost.com.tw/.

I am still living in the small beautiful city of Ilan on the Eastern Coast of Taiwan but have recently moved to a new apartment. My dragon lady landlord, more about her later, wouldn’t let me stay in my old place.

I plan to stay here to at least after the Chinese New Year, which is in Mid January. By then I figure my Chinese will be really pretty good. From there I may come home for a short visit and then travel onto the big boy: China.

While my day to day life isn’t too exciting I’ve tried to write below in the Long Update what it is like to live in Taiwan. What its food, language, and culture are like and what its like to teach English. I hope you enjoy. And I look forward to hearing back from you.

Sincerely,

Patrick Martino

The Long Update

I landed in Taiwan in the capital of Taipei one year ago on August 16th 2003. I arrived in the evening without a guidebook or a clue on how to find the hostel, whose name and phone number I had written on a slip of paper. All I knew was it was near the train station.

I had long since stopped worrying about where I would sleep, where I would eat. I assumed some taxi cab driver would know where the hostel was or a tout would be at the ready with an alternative hotel business card. I found no touts and no cabbies at the airport. The arrival hall was empty. It was late at night. I had no one to help me.

I called the number of my hostel and got no answer. I took a bus downtown to the train station to try to find the hostel on my own. I wandered the city with my heavy bags. I grew tired and my arms grew sore. I soon found I had not converted enough money to afford the most basic of rooms in other hotels I passed. I wandered more into the night.

But I knew I would like Taiwan. There were no stray dogs, litter, hawkers, or beggars on the side of the streets. There was neither burning trash nor any gaping unfinished construction. There was a 711 on every corner and great avenues of electric lights. Taipei was modern, a city of tall buildings, rapid transit, clean water, refrigerators, fixed prices, and food I did not have to fear. I was free of the third world at last.

The crosswalks surprised me the most. After having had to fear for my life crossing the street into a maelstrom of traffic in Vietnam, the cars actually stopped at the traffic lights. As the crossing signal, a flashing stick figured green man would stride with large slow steps to indicate when it was safe to walk. He would increase his pace, then bolt into a full run before the red light would change to let the cars out of the gate. I laughed. I could actually cross the street without the chance of getting killed.

Even better the cabbies were not cons. They were actually helpful. They were actually friendly. They did not want to take me to some exotic dancing club, get a massage, or sell me drugs. Most cabbies couldn’t speak English and had no idea where my hostel was. When I found one who did speak English, he didn’t immediately try to entice me into his cab to take me on an expensive joy ride. Rather the cab driver actually dissuaded me from taking his cab. He gave me directions and told me I could walk. I was shocked. What was this place? A cabbie actually giving directions, and being honest. Incredible. Taiwan has only continued to amaze me with its friendly nature and amazing hospitality.

After a year of traveling through SE Asia and bartering every day for everything, being ripped off, stolen from, and having a defensive shield in permanent place to protect against yet another hawker trying to sell me something, Taiwan was the perfect place to come. I love it here.

Ilan

“You should go to Ilan. No really. Ilan is great. You can study Chinese and its easy to get a job. Its small, close to the ocean, and the mountains, and its not polluted.” Said Terrance Tam

Terrance Tam was an astute looking young man with black-rimmed glasses and an Asian face. He was a Canadian who loved to talk and had fascinating stories to tell. He was a world traveler and the same age as I was. I met him in a dorm room in Bangkok, five mattresses on the floor on the sixth floor of a concrete row house off of Kho San road. “Really Ilan is great.” He would remark again and again as he waxed on about teaching English in Taiwan.

I had told him after I journeyed to New Zealand and finished up traveling in Cambodia and Vietnam how I planned on going to teach somewhere and study Chinese. He had suggested Ilan. I wrote it in my notebook and then forgotten about it.

I had forgotten about it until I awoke in Taipei. I had found the hostel with the assistance of the cabbie.

Taipei in the morning light showed a bustling gigantic metropolis. Motor scoters dominated the streets. Noodle shops dished out steaming bowls of soup. Men and women walked briskly in their business attire one hand on a handbag or brief case the other attached to their ear chatting away on a mobile. It was big, loud, and hot like any big city, like any modern capital. I knew it was not for me. I wanted the countryside, the mountains and the sea. I wanted Ilan.

Ilan is a city of 96,000 people on the East coast of Taiwan. It sits on the Lanyang plain a large wedge of flat land sandwiched between 10,000 foot mountains and the Pacific ocean. It’s large enough to have a McDonald’s and a modern movie theater but yet still small enough to get around in with a bicycle. Rice paddies and rivers surround it.

Taiwan is best know in America for the name stamped on the bottom of a cheap plastic toy, a computer microprocessor, or a bicycle. The West coast of Taiwan is a concrete jungle of polluted industrial cities. If there weren’t mountains running down the middle of Taiwan, the Taiwanese would have probably paved the land over in concrete. Thanks to the mountains however and the limited space on the east coast there is very little industry in Ilan. The water is clean and the air is fresh. There are fewer cars and motorbikes than the big cities and it is easy and safe to get around. From the center of Ilan it takes ten to fifteen minutes by motorbike to get to the ocean and twenty to escape into the majestic green mountains.

The train ride from Taipei to Ilan only takes an hour and a half. I got off the train for the first time in Ilan and did not know a soul. I did not speak Chinese, know how to get a job, or find an apartment. Luckily, I found help once again amongst the gracious Taiwanese. I checked into a hotel and knowing I wanted to study Chinese asked around where the University was. It took awhile but I finally got someone who spoke enough English to tell me.

I walked to National Ilan University. I walked into the administration office and announced I wanted to study Chinese. I got nothing but stares from the staff.

Not being able to communicate, the staff sequestered a student to lead me to the English department. I found help.

Olivia Chang is an English professor at National Ilan University. She is an amazingly gracious woman with glasses and long hair. I told her I had come to Taiwan to study Chinese, how I had found out about Ilan, and inquired if Ilan University had Chinese classes. She responded they did not but she knew where in Ilan they did. She asked me if I had a place to stay a job etc.

It turns out she went to school at Northwestern in Evanston Illinois and lived for a time just a few blocks from where I was living when I was working a Brunswick’s corporate headquarters. She explained how people helped her when she first arrived in America. Now she was helping me.

She first arranged for me to stay at the house of a fellow professor while I would be looking for apartments. She then started calling students home phone numbers and arranged for two students to take me around Ilan to translate for me and to help me find an apartment. One of the students, Eros, I am still very good friends with. Finally, Olivia even let me borrow a bicycle for several months so I could get around town.

I will never forget Olivia’s kindness and generosity in helping me. I was a complete stranger, but within five minutes she was bending over backwards to help me. I have been bowled over by the extreme generosity of the Taiwanese towards guests. They have to be the friendliest people I have encountered on my travelers and that is very high praise as Kiwis and the Burmese are also extremely friendly.

With the help of Olivia and Eros and his family I was set me up with everything I needed within a week. Eros and his family even graciously lent me dishes, cups, towels, and a small toaster oven for my new apartment. I registered for Chinese classes at a Buddhist University in town, Fo Gauwn, where I am still enrolled and thoroughly enjoy studying Chinese. The only thing my new friends couldn’t help me with was finding a job.

Teaching English in Taiwan

Terrance told me it would be easy to find a job teaching English in Taiwan and he was right.

The Taiwanese are obsessed with education and teaching their children. One only has to look at their money. The 1000 NT bill the equivalent to an American $20 bill doesn’t have a picture of a president, a monument, or a national symbol but children in uniform studying in school. Schools are the nicest buildings in every town and one of the few buildings architects must actually be hired to design as most buildings follow a shoebox design, four concrete walls and a door.

Taiwanese education has its roots in Confucian ideals that date back thousands of years. If you wanted to elevate yourself in ancient China you needed to pass the Confucian exams to become a mandarin scholar. Parents apply the same logic for their children today in Taiwan. In order to become successful they believe their children must study. Studying English ensures an opportunity not just to pass the college entrance exams but to communicate in a global world where English is the language of commerce. This is why parents are willing to shell out roughly $17 to $18 an hour for me to teach their kids. This is an incredible amount to pay someone as far as the Chinese are concerned. The Chinese are incredibly thrifty because money has a near direct correlation to happiness in Chinese beliefs. About the only thing a parent would ever willingly shell out so much cash for is the education of their children. On such a high salary I can live comfortably in an air-conditioned apartment, stuff myself with food, and still have change left over to go see a movie for $11 or $12 a day. My monthly rent for example is only $120 a month and dinner rarely costs more than $3.

The way English teaching has developed in Taiwan, or education in general is a bit wacky. Kids can’t be kids here. Forget about soccer games, basketball, Boy Scouts, 4 H, being in a school play, or doing anything remotely fun. High School kids start school at 7:30. It goes until 5:00. Immediately after school kids go to cram schools for science, math, or English. They study for another 4 hours until 9:00 when they finally get to go home, eat, do their homework and repeat the whole process. The kids are walking zombies because they are so tired. For high school kids summer vacation might last two weeks if your lucky before you have to go back to summer school for review sessions on what you learned doing the year.

Critical thinking isn’t stressed. Rather students are tested every single day on what they were taught the day before. It’s like having a mid term except everyday.

This is great for memorizing facts and math equations but ask a kid in your English class to spontaneously come up with ten things they will take with them on a deserted island, to think for themselves, and they have an extremely difficult time.

The pressure is intense for these kids. Everything is geared towards passing a set of college entrance exams. The pressure is so sick parents have their two and three year olds starting English classes so they can have a leg up on other students.

This is where I come in. I used to work for a cram school, know as a bushiban here. It is an after hours school where parents send there kids to improve their English. I am marketed by my school as the magical foreigner with white skin who will magically teach their kid perfect English pronunciation. This despite I have no formal training as a teacher and especially when I first arrived didn’t know what the hell I was doing. Bushibans are in it for the money and could care less what is really best for the students. Whether the kids learn any English or not depends on the teacher. Half of the foreign teachers here care. Half don’t and are just in it for the cash. Bushiban owners pull all kinds of stupid stunts to make more cash, like packing classed with too many kids or my old boss having me teach a class of students whose ages ranged from 4 to 12 in the same class. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know a 4 year old doesn’t have the same cognitive ability as a 12 year old.

Hats off to all my teachers from Mrs. Swatoski my first grade teacher to Mr. Burke my high School Englsih Teacher. All my teachers were excellent. And I’ve learned first hand teaching is not easy. To borrow an expression from a friend of mine, teaching is like surfing. Sometimes its easy and everything flows. At other times all you can do is keep from drowning.

I drowned on my first day on the job. You can read about it from my journal entry below.

Happy Marian has two floors. The 1st floor is devoted to offices and administration. There is a front desk, a rack to put shoes, coat hangers, and a ball play room. There is an activity room in the center and then to either side of this activity room a set of stairs leading to the classrooms on the second floor.

Above the 1st floor activity room was a small cafeteria with tiny chairs and tables the proper height for the children. In an open horse shoe facing the cafeteria were a series of six classrooms. Room 205 was the closest to the southern staircase. It had no outside windows but was brightly lit with a wet board on one wall. Pictures and drawings from the kids hung on the walls.

There were four low wooden tables and tiny varnished chairs situated around each tiny table. It was a cute classroom and not unlike one you might find in the US except there was no American flag in the corner or a string of alphabet letters above the board.

At first I had no idea how many students I had, their names, or even a book to teach them with.

I still don’t know where the bathroom was in the place. I soon found out who my students were as they began climbing the stairs to the second floor. I arranged them in a line to enter the classroom as I saw other classes following the same procedure.

My first student was a cute girl with a pretty white dress and puppy dog eyes who stared at me as she lined up outside the classroom door. “What’s your name?” she asked and smiled. How cute I thought. This is going to be easy. “My name is Patrick.” Her name was Tracy I later found out and she was the only girl in a class of 12. She was a certifiable doll, the boys on the other hand.

“New!! New teacher.” One of the boys screamed running up the stairs and darting into the classroom ignoring what was supposed to be the start of the line. More boys emerged with smart smiling faces ready to torture a new teacher.

I got the boy out of the classroom. I tried to get the students into a line but it was far from orderly. Two boys were in the midst of Kung fu action and fencing with empty plastic water bottles. Others sought to escape the line, scream, run, and do anything to avoid the dreaded boring confines of a classroom. One girl and 11 eight-year old boys spelled disaster. No wonder the school was desperate and couldn’t find another teacher.

After a few seconds trying to maintain any semblance of a line, I realized it was impossible. I stopped trying and just let the kids into the room. The boys were like monkeys filled with inexhaustible energy as if someone had given them a direct IV of sugar cane juice. They jumped from chairs ran about the room chasing each other and refused to sit down.

I raised my voice. “Please Sit Down!” Yelling a complex command to a preschooler in an English as a second language class is an oxymoron. It doesn’t work.

Only the good kids who could infer from my tone the commands meaning sat down.

I was soon discovering who the rascals were. There were two of the irascible imps. They were cute kids but Dennis the Menaces at heart.

One’s name was Eric. He had sharp eyes and facial features and came up to about my waist. John was the other early offender with tall lanky arms and skinny legs. I had to learn their names from the good kids.

Both refused to sit or have any inkling of the idea of standing still. John wanted attention and when he finally did sit, wouldn’t sit for long. He would leap from his chair run across the room and try to steal a pencil from one of the good kids or he would attempt to move his chair to where his buddies sat. He had a banana he had brought for snack time. I took it away from him and told him he couldn’t have it until he behaved. Like he cared. He didn’t listen. I had to take it away.

No matter how hard I tried kids, still got up to run about the room. They screamed played. It was chaos. Hell isn’t a burning inferno it’s a classroom filled with screaming 8 year olds.

I tried vainly to regain order. I attempted to write on the board a list of quick class rules. Not only did the school not provide me with a clue as to what I was supposed to be doing, there was also not a single dry erase board marker which worked. It was a waste of time to write rules on the board. The kids couldn’t read “No hitting” and “No running,” anyways.

I have no recollection of my first grade class being this out of control. I think these kids are the equivalent to first graders. I never recall having run around the room throwing things, having sword fights with rulers, or Miss Swatowski ever having to raise her voice.

I remember good times learning my ABC’s from big pictures that looked like cartoons. There was Annie A and Betty B. I remember phonics books and big fat pencils. I think the most trouble I ever got in when I was in the first grade was when I asked Mr. Frito our principal if it was really true if he was a bag of chips and bouncing a ball against the building, something Mr. Frito was quite adamant about not doing.

I don’t remember spitballs, jumping off my desk, or disrespecting my teacher. Perhaps I was too young to remember but I don’t think so. Oh today was surely hell.

I have done many challenging things in my life. I have climbed mountains, hiked long trails, biked long distances, visited foreign lands, and helped manage large budgets and accounts. If I ever learn how to control and teach a class of rambunctious 8 year olds it just might be the most challenging thing I have ever done in my life.

Things were beyond out of control and the good kids knew it. The teacher’s pet, the smartest student in the class named John suggested I get a Chinese teacher for help and even ran out the door to get her.

The Chinese teacher a petite woman in a pink dress with a plain face walked in and instantaneously brought fear into the hearts of my students by muttering a few rapid fire sing song phrases. She spit them out as if on fire. The words pierced, attacked, and penetrated the little hellions armor like tracer bullets.

I had regained control. Barely. As soon as the Chinese teacher left the kids knew they could being their free for all again.

I tried my best to teach from the brief syllabus the secretary had given me stating today I was supposed to teach the kids the phonetic pronunciation of M N H and J. Without a book I had to wing it.

Half the class listened. The other half continued to terrorize the room. I made it to snack time and was only saved from my misery when the Chinese teacher stayed permanently in my classroom to help me double team Eric and John.

The day did have its highlights. Most of the kids are good and eager to learn. It’s just trying to control the bad ones that makes teaching difficult.

Kids are cute ad innocent. They are extremely intelligent too. Like my mom used to say “Kids aren’t stupid their just short.” When I was asking the kids for words which started with N and M for example they were throwing out words like Ness Tea and Mega Man. I thought their words were brilliant.

Some are even hell bent on learning. One little boy a short little pudgy kid named Jeff always with his hand up to answer a question, was almost in tears at the end of class. He had to go to the bathroom and did not return for close to ten minutes just as class was finishing. He moaned to me just as tears were starting to form. “I missed it.” He said. “Missed what?” I asked “I had to go poopy. I missed learning.” No you didn’t I tried to console him. He hadn’t missed a thing. I was just trying to control the class and get Eric and John to sit down by physically picking them up and plopping them in their chairs.

His statement was touching almost sad. What motivates kids at 8 years old to learn English? What kind of sick societal forces, what kind of pressure, or type of parental oversight makes a kid feel guilty for missing five minutes of English class to go to the bathroom. Is teaching 8-year-olds English as a Second language really a good idea?

As I tried to line the kids up to dismiss them little Tracy was first in line again. She gave me a hug around the legs and made my day. Kids can be fun to teach, at least the good ones who don’t need to be on Ritalin.

Life in Taiwan (The People-Food-Environment-History)

May be boring. Feel Free to Skip.

The Happy Marain job only lasted two days. They didn’t want to hire me permanently without a contract. I found another school with older kids and have just finished spending a year teaching children. I eventually got the hang of teaching especially the discipline part. I enjoy teaching, I have fun doing it but I don’t think youngsters are my cup of tea. It’s too tiring to always be jumping around, singing songs, entertaining the kids and then making sure little Johnny isn’t making little Susie cry.

I am moving on to teaching adults and teaching private lessons where I can make more money, teach fewer hours, and have less stress.

My day follows a regular routine of Chinese classes in the morning, studying in the afternoon and working in the evening but I love living here because every day I make a fresh discovery.

The People and Observations

Taiwan is a small island which has an area only slightly larger than Massachusets and Connecticut combined. It has a population of 23 million. Because of the tall central mountains running down the spine of the island little of the land can be used for cultivation or habitation. This makes Taiwan one of the most densely populated countries in the world with roughly 698 people living in each square kilometer.

• Police cars drive with their flashing red and blue lights on and turn them off only when chasing a criminal.
• The prime emergency number in Taiwan is 119 not 911
• The garbage is collected every day by garbage trucks at night instead of in the morning and make no effort at being quite blaring Beethovan’s Moonlight sonata to let you know to bring out your trash.
• People think Karaoke is the greatest thing since sliced bread
• Northwest isn’t Northwest but Westnorth and Southeast isn’t Southeast but Eastsouth
• My name in Chinese isn’t Patrick Martino but Martino Patrick

The Chinese are incredibly polite, gracious, and accommodating to guests in part because of the whole notion of face. Making sure you don’t embarrass yourself would be a good explanation of face. While Americans are forward, confident, and individualistic to the point we at times come across as loud and arrogant, the Chinese conform, follow authority, and try not to ruffle feathers. This can make it extremely annoying at times to get a straight answer about something, or get anything planned and done unless its at the last minute.

Because the Chinese are so gracious to guests, foreigners get treated like rock stars. At least once a week somebody gives me free food when I walk into a store, a free cup of tea, or an extra helping of rice. The police let you go if you get caught for a traffic violation and everyone always smiles, says hello, and wants to know your name. It’s like being the star quarterback on campus. It can get a bit heady at times but truth be told is quite fun.

Japan and America have heavily influenced the people and the country. The Japanese occupied Taiwan from 1895 until 1945 and many of the older generation still speak Japanese. Kids watch Japanese cartons, and follow Japanese baseball teams. Because of close business ties and military support for Taiwan the Taiwanese also like all things American. The Taiwanese love basketball and when they discover I once worked in Chicago will ask if I know Michael Jordan. They eat McDonald’s, KFC, and drink coke.

The Chinese are both Buddhists and Taoists but their true religion is ancestor worship. Ancestor spirits are offered food and fake paper money twice monthly. Keeping the ancestral spirits of a home happy insures the sprits will care for and watch out for the living. The Chinese love money, gambling, and senseless bureaucracy. There is so much bureaucracy at times the only way to get things done sometimes is to break the rules. If the government makes a rule, rest assured there will be someone within a day who has figured out a way to break it. My friend summarized his thoughts on rules nicely stating, “The law is everything and the law is nothing. First comes your relationship with a person, then what you think about the law, then the law. In America it’s the opposite. The law is the law.”

I think my friend is right. The Chinese place emphasis on personal relationships. If you have enough friends in high places, if you scratch their back and you scratch theirs you can get anything done. Taiwan is certainly a lot better off as far as corruption and mismanagement than lots of countries I’ve visited and it continues to improve but there is still definitely a shady underbelly to politics and some businesses.

Food

Taiwanese food is very good. I wouldn’t say it’s mind blowingly good like some of the Thai or Vietnamese food I’ve had but it’s still very good.

Noodles and rice are the backbones of Chinese/Taiwanese cuisine. I eat lots of rice and lots of noodles. There is also lots of Tofu. I always thought Tofu was for vegetarian granola nuts but with so many kinds here and ways to prepare it I’ve found I really like it. I even like soybean milk which is very good if you but a little sugar in it. Breakfasts aren’t too unusual. People will eat noodles for breakfast but also eggs, steamed wheat buns stuffed with pork, and bread, which kind of tastes and looks like plain pizza crust. Probably my favorite thing to eat here are the dumplings, small flour based crusts packed with pork and then steamed, boiled, or fried. They’re delicious and I usually have them for lunch dipped in a little soy sauce.

For dinner I’ll have anything from hotpot( vegetables and meat thrown into a bowling pot of broth) fried rice, or the ubiquitous noodles. The fruit her is not as good as in Thailand but is still miles away from what you can get in America. I live on mangoes, oranges, and strange exotic tropical fruits I don’t even know the English names for. Living on an island also as its advantages because I’m a seafood lover. You can get any fish imaginable still flapping and fresh for less than a dollar, shrimps that are longer and larger than my index finger and crabs whose meat is so sweet you would swear it was dipped in sugar. Plus because Taiwan isn’t a third world backwater I can get the ingredients for any American dish I might want to make at home. There is a Costco in Taipei and a local expat takes orders and makes monthly runs. I can get real pancake syrup, Doritos, cheese, French wine-- you name it. About the only hard thing to find is good sandwich bread. The Taiwanese love to put sugar into everything so eating a slice of plain white bread is like taking a bite into a Twinkie.

And if I’m really desperate and hankering for home beside McDonald’s Taipei has a Ponderosa and a TGI Fridays. Every 711 even sells Miller High Life!

The Chinese do of course eat everything. It’s not uncommon to be in a market and see chicken feet, cow’s stomachs, and ducks heads. Give them a try and you’ll find they are actually pretty good. About the only thing I can’t stand is stinky tofu. It’s a type of tofu they essentially let rot until it smells like moldy socks then fry it in vegetable oil.

The Land and Environment

Taiwan means big wind for the frequent typhoons that hit it. But before the Chinese gave it their name the Portuguese were here first in 1517 and named it the isle Formosa: Beautiful island. And they weren’t lying. Even though Taiwan’s cities are overcrowded lack any green and are generally polluted the mountains and the undeveloped East coast are spectacular.

Taiwan was formed some 12 million years ago when the Eurasian and Philippine continental plates collided. The collision created a spectacular set of mountains and an island which still has frequent earthquakes because of the grinding plates.

The island is only 245 miles long and 89.5 miles across at its widest point. It rests only 80 miles from the Chinese mainland on the Western most ring of fire, the term given for the perimeter of the Pacific Ocean. It has no active volcanoes but plenty of hot springs including one not ten minutes from my house.

Taiwan’s highest mountain Jade mountain is over 10,000 feet and is the tallest mountain in North East Asia, taller even than Japan’s mount Fuji. There are beautifully maintained hiking paths up to several peaks. Above the tree line the views are superb.

The coast varies from sheer rocky cliffs to long stretches of sand and palms. I’ve both camped several times in the mountains and set my tent up along the beach to watch the sunrise.

Taiwan is cut nearly in half by the Tropic of cancer which means its generally warm and pleasant with palm trees and sun most of the year. The winters here suck though. It rains and although it doesn’t get below 40 degrees no one has heat in their homes. You go from it being cold and miserable outside to changing you wet clothes in an equally cold and miserable apartment.

The rain doesn’t last too too long and I’ve found Ilan is the perfect place for me. I’ve got mountains, coast, and palm trees. What more could one ask for.

History

Taiwan’s history is an interesting one especially its relationship with the United States and mainland China.

As was already mentioned Taiwan’s indigenous groups were the first to arrive some 20,000 to 10,000 years ago. They came across a land bridge when water was trapped in the ice of the last ice age lowering the world’s sea levels. They were hunters and gatherers. Later more indigenous groups came by boat that had developed farming.

The Chinese didn’t begin arriving until the 15th century. From the 15th to the 16th century marauding Chinese and Japanese pirates used Taiwan as a stronghold.

The Portuguese were the first Europeans to discover Taiwan. They arrived in 1517 and set up a trading post on the North of the island in 1590. They didn’t last long and soon left.

The Ming Dynasty had little interest in Taiwan. The Dutch came after the Portuguese and set up shop in 1624. The Dutch organized what few Chinese settlers were on the island into collectives, and brought the land under cultivation. Trade flourished. The Dutch traded spices, amber, kapok and opium from South East Asia, silver from Japan, and silk, pottery, herbs and gold from China for sugar camphor, venison and deer hides from Taiwan. Taiwan became one of the most profitable possessions of the Dutch East India Company in the Far East.

The Spanish wanted in and tried to set up shop with several forts but the Dutch finally ran them off the island in 1642.

When the Ming dynasty in China collapsed in the 1600’s a military general named Koxing or Zeng Cheng –Gong pledged to use his army of 10,000 men and a flotilla of boats to reestablish Ming rule. From 1646 to 1658 Koxing was a scourge on the Chinese coast.

The new Manchu government eventually forced the people of coastal cities to move inland depriving Koxing of both safe havens and supplies.

In 1661 Koxing decided to attack Taiwan and use it as a base to attack the Manchu. He defeated the Dutch who hung on for 8 months before surrendering and leaving the island. Koxing set about making the island a Ming enclave but soon died at the age of 38 from illness.

Koxing’s son Jheng Jing took control of Taiwan and ruled for 20 years. He died and his 12 year old son was put on the throne. A year later the Jheng navy was destroyed by the Manchu, better known as the Qing, and Taiwan became a part of the Chinese Empire.

At first the Qing were not interested in the island and only sought to see it did not become a haven for pirates and revolutionaries. They banned immigration. People didn’t listen and immigrated anyways. Despite tough conditions and hostile natives Taiwan’s early Chinese settlers thrived. Tea plantations sprang up, rice fields were plowed, and camphor became a major cash crop.

Taiwan was a backwater, virtually ignored by the government in Beijing and partially controlled by aborigines who liked to cut off the heads of ship-wrecked sailors.

The Japanese got a hold of Taiwan as a result of a war between China and Japan in 1894 when the Japanese invaded the Chinese vassal state of Korea. The Chinese lost badly and gave up Taiwan and the Penghu islands to Japan.

Qing officials on the island in a futile act tried to resist by declaring the island a new country on May 25 1895. It didn’t work and the Japanese slaughtered 7,000 Chinese troops who resisted.

Japan set about modernizing Taiwan. It built roads, railroads, built dams and brought power to the country. Schools, hospitals, and universities were built. The Japanese also did something no one else had been able to do up to that point, bring law and order.

Later compulsory Japanese education and cultural assimilation was introduced. Economic development focused on building Japans war machine. Thousands were drafted into service to fight for the Emperor during world war two. Side note –One of my friend’s grandfathers still speaks Japanese. He doesn’t speak any Mandarin only Taiwanese and Japanese. My friend told me as a young man his grandfather trained to be a Japanese fighter pilot and was to be a Kamikaze pilot before the war abruptly ended.

Taiwan was returned to China after WWII as agreed to by Chinese Nationalist leader Chinag Kai-shek, Franklin Roosevelt, and Winston Churchill in the Yalta agreement.

The Taiwanese initially welcomed the Chinese mainland forces. In October 1945 12,000 Chinese military personnel landed on the island. The warm welcome soon evaporated, as the poorly trained and undisciplined troops were more intent on plundering than maintaining order.

The Republic of China put in place a particularly brutal administrator Chen Yi who appointed only mainland officials and who was incredibly corrupt. He ran Taiwan not as a part of China but like a colony. The people became second-class citizens in their own country as the Nationalist party, KMT, officials stole and did what they liked.

The Taiwanese resentment of the mainlanders control came to a head on Feb 2 1947 when a street vendor was beaten by police for selling contraband cigarettes. A crowd gathered to protest and one innocent man was shot by a stray bullet. The following day a huge crowd gathered in front of the government buildings to protest and to ask for justice. Sentries opened up fire with machine guns and many were killed. Governor Chen declared martial law, which would last for 40 years. He also called for reinforcements and started indiscriminately killing intellectuals as well as ordinary farmers; any one who spoke out or the government feared might speak out. Known as the white terror, thousands were killed.

The white terror is the reason many older Taiwanese people will talk with hatred about “Mainlanders” and spit with vehemence as to why it’s a sham that Chiang Kai –Shek has a massive memorial in Taipei and his face on Taiwan’s money.

Chiang Kai Shek was the president of the Republic of China when his forces were defeated by Mao’s red army. Chiang Kai Shek took his government, what was left of his army, as well as two million civilians and fled to Taiwan. He vowed to retake the mainland from the communists, an ideal not officially abandoned until 1991.

Chiang who liked to call himself generalissimo set up economic reforms on the island ensuring Taiwan’s superb economic growth. Political reforms though weren’t in the playbook. Marshal law wasn’t lifted until 1987 and Taiwan only became a full-fledged democracy with free elections after extensive work by political activists in 1996. Even today politics in Taiwan is highly contentious. The Current President Chen Shui Ben was only elected this past year by a narrow margin of 20,000 votes after escaping an assassination attempt leading many on the island to cry foul believing he staged the assassination attempt to garner sympathy votes.

Not only is politics contentious-you can frequently see Taiwan’s legislature get into brawls on TV, but Taiwan’s relationship with China is especially hot. The UN and the United States stop recognizing The Republic of China-Taiwan’s official name in 1978 switching recognition to the People’s Republic of China. It lost its UN seat and is only recognized by 25 countries in the world that Taiwan gives significant economic assistance to. Taiwan is a country that no one wants to call a country for fear of pissing off China.

China considers Taiwan a renegade province and has threatened to invade if Taiwan ever declares it’s independence. The only thing stopping the Chinese from invading is the US 7th fleet. The US has pledged to defend the island if ever attacked.

The Chinese are real a-holes when it comes to Taiwan. Whenever Taiwan wants to do something, join the world health organization, send athletes to the Olympics, invite the Dali Lahma to speak China tries to use its enormous muscle to block it.

I believe it is really a face issue now. China has been saying for so long that Taiwan is a part of China and that if they don’t come home to papa they’ll attack that the Beijing government will look like idiots if Taiwan ever did become independent and join the UN again. Most Taiwanese I have talked to don’t believe they are a part of China. They would prefer independence but are happy with the status quo if it means not going to war. They have a democracy and a prosperous economy. There’s no reason to be considered part of China.

As to weather or not it will ever happen I don’t think it will. Even though China and Taiwan hate each other politically Taiwan is one of the largest investors in Chinese businesses. China would lose not only business with Taiwan if it attacked but business with the US. The Chinese will rattle their sabers as much as they can but when it comes to actually unsheathing them I don’ think they will.

Learning Chinese

So what is it like to learn Chinese? Well first off its incredibly hard. But not impossible.

There aren’t many sounds in Chinese. It’s a language of homophones. Instead of adding more syllables to differentiate a word from another as in English tones are added. You can say the exact same word, for example the word tang, and depending on the tone have it mean soup, sugar, lay down (as in lay down on a bed), or really hot (as in burning hot like this pot is really hot I could burn myself).

Getting the sign songy tones right is only half the battle. Chinese is a character-based language. Each character represents a word. If you don’t have the character memorized you won’t be able to read it. It’s not like in English where you can sound out a word. Reading in Chinese is one incredibly large jigsaw puzzle with each character a piece of the puzzle.

Chinese’s saving grace is its grammar. It’s incredibly simple and logical far more so than English with all of its rules and exceptions to the rules. If Chinese didn’t have tones and had a phonetic alphabet it would be extremely easy.

My dad keeps on asking me what I’m going to do with my Chinese when I come home and why I want to learn Chinese. I suppose it’s for the challenge. I’ve done lots of physically challenging things in my life, climbing mountains, and hiking and biking long distances and they were hard but they didn’t take much brainpower.

I look at learning Chinese as a supreme mental challenge the equivalent of hiking the Appalachian Trail for my mind.

It’s also a bankable skill. I will when I become more fluent be able to converse with billions of people.

Finally its fun. I have always enjoyed figuring out puzzles and using my logic and learning Chinese is perfectly suited for this. I enjoy learning the stories behind characters origins and figuring out that if you put this tiny symbol for electricity next to the symbol for brain you get electric brain or computer. I suppose you have to be a little bit brainy or nutty to try to learn Chinese and travel around the world. I’m doing it though and I’m happy.

The End
I’ve hoped you’ve enjoyed the update and gotten at least a little insight into life into Taiwan.

Sincerely,

Patrick Martino