Ken hopefully you read this-- I was going to just post a thank you comment on your page but figured I should get to posting. So, Thank You. Ha... I derived some strange warm feeling from being mentioned on your blog, maybe that was the most "celebrity" like moment I can ever hope to achieve in my life. Hopefully not, but likely so.
I got into Columbus Ohio at about 11:30pm Saturday June 21st. The flight was horrific. I had a stop at Newark airport in New York that was delayed four hours and then when we boarded we sat on the runway for over an hour and a half because there was a gathering of rabbits that prevented the plane from departing. Rabbits. They kept the plane from taking off.
In regard to leaving Taiwan, I think the answer is really simple: Teaching is not for me. I like kids. I don't like teaching kids English in Taiwan. I KNOW this is a naive statement. I know that I didn't give it enough of a chance and that I didn't try any other jobs out to see if maybe it was just the company I worked for... but I pretty quickly lost resolve to make any effort to stay in Taiwan.
It would have been a nice vacation. Ken, I should have listened to your advice about not living in a small town-- but I never would have imagined it to be that difficult to live there. In my defense, the only lie Hess really told me was that there would be a larger English speaking community there... and while I did start to meet some interesting people after a week or so, the real isolation of living in a place where I couldn't understand anything going on around me certainly wore me down quickly. My desire to learn chinese quickly burnt into ashes of fuck learning chinese I want out of here.
Staying in Taiwan would have just required time to get use to the place and to adjust... but honestly that seemed really silly to me. When is that not true? In what part of life do you not have to do that? The prospect of staying in Taiwan wasn't really all that exciting to me once I got there. There is a ton of stuff I haven't done in the US... why should I supplant that with things I could do in Taiwan? These blaring questions ripped through my head every day I was there... and again all I had to do was stick it out and they would have faded away. And again, to me that is silly.
I would go back though. I would totally go back in a few years if things here go to shit and I'm ready to roll out and take an adventure. This was just not the right time. I've freshly graduated from school. I took high latin honors. I'm motivated, intelligent, and capapble of excelling at most anything I put my mind to. I kind of ran away to Taiwan-- ran away from facing the reality of job hunting in the US. I knew I could get a job teaching English in Taiwan and then cemented the idea with dreams of continued traveling and saving money. But everything collapsed when I got there.
Having a conversation with a guy from England, he asked me a simple question meant to instigate an interesting dialogue... simply: "So, Than, why are you here?"
I just froze. Why am I here? It was a completely innocuous question. He assumed I had an answer and just wanted me to share it with him. When people asked me: "So, Than, why are you going?" I had a thousand answers. But once I was there, I had nothing. It was strange. I get a little confidence in my decision to return, because the reasons I said I was heading back to the US are still holding strong now that I am here.
I had an image of myself as some fanciful world traveler-- capable of treading across the earth free from attatchment. That was really it. Taiwan was the stepping stone into that existence. But I figured out pretty quickly that this image of me is just an image. I don't really want to be that. I like the idea, but not the execution. Sure I had a bit of culture shock, but nothing terrible... and I'm willing to argue that I got over the majority of it pretty quickly. I'm a thoughtful person who resists complacency, and I very seriously analyzed what I was going through in Taiwan. The job sucked for me. Lesson planning is NOT something I am ever going to give a shit about doing. Figuring out how to get kids to have fun while teaching them english is NOT my idea of a job. I'm rigid and inflexible on that. Which is why I left. I could have stayed and Hess would likely not have fired me. I wasn't a bad teacher at all... the kids loved me, my co-teachers and boss gave me great compliments, and everyone's jaw kind of dropped when I said I was leaving. I left because I didn't like the way things felt. I left because I didn't want the only reason I stayed in Taiwan to be that I was there long enough to get over the feeling of wanting to come back. And also because the kids really deserve a teacher who enjoys teaching. I think anyone who goes to Taiwan and sees these kids faces and gets an idea of how much work they do in their daily lives concerning education will develop sympathy for them-- and if a person does not have any sympathy/empathy for the kids then they are a monster who's existence revolves around making money.
I am a bit of a sappy guy, and the thought of not being able to entertain the kids really got to me. Some of my classes didn't get out until almost 9pm-- these kids still had to go home and eat, and do homework, play and be kids, and then prepare to wake up the next day to do it all over again. Maybe that was my major culture shock. I don't begrudge Taiwan for putting such an emphasis on learning... but I'm not a very good cog to have in that machine. I get all wrapped up in my feelings and lose sight of what I'm doing because I don't like the situation. I really respect those that are good teachers-- the kids need that. I think after about two months or so I would have been completely burned out and everyone would have hated me. Then I would have went home and cried. With my quick departure, I got to have three weeks of high-octane fun teaching and go home with good memories.
I met plenty of people who had been in Taiwan for many years... and the majority of them expressed the desire to go home coupled with the fear of doing it. One lady even looked me straight in the face and said "good for you" when I told her I was leaving-- in context of the conversation she was expressing her envy of my chance to get out. I know me, and here is what would have happened given enough time-- I would have grown used to Taiwan and stayed there indefinately. My teaching style would have probably eventually become perfunctory and uninteresting, but eventually I wouldn't care and would just treat it like any old job effectively reducing the kids to "those things that provide me with money." I met plenty of teachers who did do exactly that.
Life is wonderful. Struggles are wonderful. Achievements are wonderful. It's all pretty spectacular. I wish I had spent more time in Taiwan simply so my words would have more rhetorical authority. But I was only there for a month. But I can say I don't hate Taiwan at all. I didn't leave there because I couldn't stand to be there... I left because I didn't have any reason to stay. I left the US before I gave it a real chance. All things are subject to change, and maybe even every statment and opinion made in this post. I constantly prove myself incorrect and look forward to continuing to do so. But I did live in Taiwan for a month... I am satisfied that I finally got off my ass and went for it.
I am extremely excited to be living in Columbus, and have a long list of interesting jobs to apply for. Had I not went to Taiwan, I would still be living in Shelby, OH... and while Shelby Ohio isn't a bad place to live-- I really want to get out and put my degree to the test. Going to Taiwan forced me to change things. That is really all that I needed.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Not quite sure yet...
I wanted to make a lot of posts before this one... but c'est la vie.
I've been in Taiwan now for about two and a half weeks. God is that it? Feeling like an eternity.
The flight was horrific. Absolutely horrific, and to be honest I'm not sure I've been able to move past the unsettled feeling that overwhelmed me at about hour twenty of the whole flight ordeal. The leg from San Francisco to Taipei was about fourteen hours on its own. So at about hour twelve of that flight I really really really really really wanted this whole adventure to be forgotten. You can't sit in a cramped space like that for so long and not second guess your ambition. You can't stare at a white wall-- a white wall that wasn't supposed to be there because you thought you had an exit seat that would provided sufficient leg room-- and not begin to doubt that what you are doing is probably a mistake.
I am an idiot.
I am.
Life here isn't that bad... and I have a job that apparently I couldn't lose if I tried. In the words of my South African friend Johan, "you could come in drunk and whip your dick out on a table and they still wouldn't fire you." I am an American, I am essentially at the top of the pole. Just having me around raises company reputation and profits.
But I am naive. I couldn't see this for what it is until I got here. I don't like what I do. I don't like what I am here. I thought this would be fun... but it isn't. I don't want to be a shiny American.
Ugh. What is required to explain this may be beyond me. But maybe it isn't so bad. Maybe my problem is that I just miss being home. I miss being where things make some kind of sense. That doesn't sound like me does it? Doesn't sound like the me I thought I was. This is not easy to deal with. I am essentially deaf and dumb here. I could go all day outside of work and no one would understand a single word I said, and nor would I understand anything they said. I have to mime to get food. I have to mime actions to find a pillow. Everything is difficult. I can't figure out how to get rid of my trash.
I feel like a wimp. A complete pussy. I know my frustration in this situation comes from my lack of desire to adapt. I am not embracing what life is over here... instead I am just comparing it to what I left behind. BUT, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, is it?
Is it just that I don't know Chinese?
Am I being xenophobic, ethnocentric?
Should I just relax?
I don't like what it means for me to grow comfortable living in Taiwan. It means, for me, that I let go of my life in the States. I have to just Live in Taiwan. I don't work well when torn between two worlds. It's one or the other. All day I have things in my head about being back home... things that I need to just forget about to survive here. I thought I would be ok with that. In fact, that is part of why I wanted to leave. I wanted to let go of everything, all of my baggage, the good and the bad. I wanted a chance to start new. Why?
This lingering question that is pounding in my head all fucking day long: why?
I arrived at my branch location at 11am thursday morning (5/29/08). I had to get up at 6am to make the train. There was a moment when I was in a cab in Taipei alone and heading to the train station to meet up with someone else heading to the same location as me-- our Chinese translator was in his cab. I arrived at the train station first. I walked in alone hauling my two giant suitcases, my book-laden backpack, and my over filled laptop bag. I stood in the train station alone amidst a sea of people, all of who's attention was on me. I just stood there. Stood there feeling entirely and completely fucked. Tired in every way possible and knowing that I was completely incapable of sorting out what I needed to do on my own. Luckily I saw my companion to Ilan and the Chinese lady... but there was that very real and open moment when my lack of desire to fight to make this work became very apparent.
I don't mind a battle in life. I don't mind trying to find a job, or trying to pay bills, or trying to stay happy when things aren't quite going my way. But it's different for me here. This just saps the life out of me. Saps the will to go on from me. Because EVERYTHING is a battle. Life is hard enough as it is, why did I go and do such a fool thing as exacerbate my entire living condition?
Immediately upon arriving in Ilan (this is where I am teaching, the northeastern coast of Taiwan) I had to start apartment hunting. Tired from everything I've gone through, I pile into a car that is built for humans half my size and ride around to places that are more than alien. Eventually, I settle on one and have to go to the realtor's office to sign a contract. I sit at a table and six people start screaming chinese around me. Everyone yells. They just yell. And then they laugh. It would be awesome to watch from an uninvolved standpoint, but when you are in the midst of it all, it is scary. A red ink pad comes out, my thumb is lunged into it. I put my thumb print on multiple pages. Things are screamed. More thumb prints. Smiles, screams, thumb prints. No one asks me anything; they just point and motion for me to stamp my thumb. No clue what is going on. I don't want to sign a year lease. I don't want to promise anything. But I want a place to sleep. I want a place to lie down... and I want it to be in a place where no one will trouble me. I know this will be the end result; so I go with it.
I get my place. They take me there. I unload my shit. I have no sheets. No blanket. No pillow.
Luckily I meet up with a fellow teacher who understands that I just want to sit and cry somewhere (which eventually I get to do). He takes me to a store and I spend more money than I care to on bed stuffs. We walk probably over four miles between stores trying to round everything up. I get it all, I return home, sit down, and let the wave of emotion overtake me in full.
I think I hate being here. I think I am ok with hating being here.
It doesn't stop. I don't stop. I can't stop criticising everything that is happening around me. Why am I doing this? I miss people. I miss you Trish. I miss friends and family... I miss them in a way that reminds me of how uninvolved I've been with people around me for the past few years. I left while I was all out of sorts. I left without ever giving being where I was a real chance.
Maybe that is it. That is what is haunting me. I ran away. I ran away and brought everything with me, and I don't want to let go. I did this on purpose. The whole point was to put myself somewhere, to put myself in a place where holding on wasn't an option. I thought that living on a different side of the world would force me to just let go and move on and grow as a person in a different place. Stupid. I didn't need to be here to do that.
THAT is naive. Holding on is ALWAYS an option.
It's a simple equation: (Taiwan) - (desire to adapt to living in Taiwan) = Living in Taiwan sucks
Fuck. Do you see this? I know the problem. I really do. I just need to accept living here. That's it. Then I begin to appreciate it. I begin to deal and to cope and to change. This is what I set myself up for. But, I don't want to.
Why?
I've been in Taiwan now for about two and a half weeks. God is that it? Feeling like an eternity.
The flight was horrific. Absolutely horrific, and to be honest I'm not sure I've been able to move past the unsettled feeling that overwhelmed me at about hour twenty of the whole flight ordeal. The leg from San Francisco to Taipei was about fourteen hours on its own. So at about hour twelve of that flight I really really really really really wanted this whole adventure to be forgotten. You can't sit in a cramped space like that for so long and not second guess your ambition. You can't stare at a white wall-- a white wall that wasn't supposed to be there because you thought you had an exit seat that would provided sufficient leg room-- and not begin to doubt that what you are doing is probably a mistake.
I am an idiot.
I am.
Life here isn't that bad... and I have a job that apparently I couldn't lose if I tried. In the words of my South African friend Johan, "you could come in drunk and whip your dick out on a table and they still wouldn't fire you." I am an American, I am essentially at the top of the pole. Just having me around raises company reputation and profits.
But I am naive. I couldn't see this for what it is until I got here. I don't like what I do. I don't like what I am here. I thought this would be fun... but it isn't. I don't want to be a shiny American.
Ugh. What is required to explain this may be beyond me. But maybe it isn't so bad. Maybe my problem is that I just miss being home. I miss being where things make some kind of sense. That doesn't sound like me does it? Doesn't sound like the me I thought I was. This is not easy to deal with. I am essentially deaf and dumb here. I could go all day outside of work and no one would understand a single word I said, and nor would I understand anything they said. I have to mime to get food. I have to mime actions to find a pillow. Everything is difficult. I can't figure out how to get rid of my trash.
I feel like a wimp. A complete pussy. I know my frustration in this situation comes from my lack of desire to adapt. I am not embracing what life is over here... instead I am just comparing it to what I left behind. BUT, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, is it?
Is it just that I don't know Chinese?
Am I being xenophobic, ethnocentric?
Should I just relax?
I don't like what it means for me to grow comfortable living in Taiwan. It means, for me, that I let go of my life in the States. I have to just Live in Taiwan. I don't work well when torn between two worlds. It's one or the other. All day I have things in my head about being back home... things that I need to just forget about to survive here. I thought I would be ok with that. In fact, that is part of why I wanted to leave. I wanted to let go of everything, all of my baggage, the good and the bad. I wanted a chance to start new. Why?
This lingering question that is pounding in my head all fucking day long: why?
I arrived at my branch location at 11am thursday morning (5/29/08). I had to get up at 6am to make the train. There was a moment when I was in a cab in Taipei alone and heading to the train station to meet up with someone else heading to the same location as me-- our Chinese translator was in his cab. I arrived at the train station first. I walked in alone hauling my two giant suitcases, my book-laden backpack, and my over filled laptop bag. I stood in the train station alone amidst a sea of people, all of who's attention was on me. I just stood there. Stood there feeling entirely and completely fucked. Tired in every way possible and knowing that I was completely incapable of sorting out what I needed to do on my own. Luckily I saw my companion to Ilan and the Chinese lady... but there was that very real and open moment when my lack of desire to fight to make this work became very apparent.
I don't mind a battle in life. I don't mind trying to find a job, or trying to pay bills, or trying to stay happy when things aren't quite going my way. But it's different for me here. This just saps the life out of me. Saps the will to go on from me. Because EVERYTHING is a battle. Life is hard enough as it is, why did I go and do such a fool thing as exacerbate my entire living condition?
Immediately upon arriving in Ilan (this is where I am teaching, the northeastern coast of Taiwan) I had to start apartment hunting. Tired from everything I've gone through, I pile into a car that is built for humans half my size and ride around to places that are more than alien. Eventually, I settle on one and have to go to the realtor's office to sign a contract. I sit at a table and six people start screaming chinese around me. Everyone yells. They just yell. And then they laugh. It would be awesome to watch from an uninvolved standpoint, but when you are in the midst of it all, it is scary. A red ink pad comes out, my thumb is lunged into it. I put my thumb print on multiple pages. Things are screamed. More thumb prints. Smiles, screams, thumb prints. No one asks me anything; they just point and motion for me to stamp my thumb. No clue what is going on. I don't want to sign a year lease. I don't want to promise anything. But I want a place to sleep. I want a place to lie down... and I want it to be in a place where no one will trouble me. I know this will be the end result; so I go with it.
I get my place. They take me there. I unload my shit. I have no sheets. No blanket. No pillow.
Luckily I meet up with a fellow teacher who understands that I just want to sit and cry somewhere (which eventually I get to do). He takes me to a store and I spend more money than I care to on bed stuffs. We walk probably over four miles between stores trying to round everything up. I get it all, I return home, sit down, and let the wave of emotion overtake me in full.
I think I hate being here. I think I am ok with hating being here.
It doesn't stop. I don't stop. I can't stop criticising everything that is happening around me. Why am I doing this? I miss people. I miss you Trish. I miss friends and family... I miss them in a way that reminds me of how uninvolved I've been with people around me for the past few years. I left while I was all out of sorts. I left without ever giving being where I was a real chance.
Maybe that is it. That is what is haunting me. I ran away. I ran away and brought everything with me, and I don't want to let go. I did this on purpose. The whole point was to put myself somewhere, to put myself in a place where holding on wasn't an option. I thought that living on a different side of the world would force me to just let go and move on and grow as a person in a different place. Stupid. I didn't need to be here to do that.
THAT is naive. Holding on is ALWAYS an option.
It's a simple equation: (Taiwan) - (desire to adapt to living in Taiwan) = Living in Taiwan sucks
Fuck. Do you see this? I know the problem. I really do. I just need to accept living here. That's it. Then I begin to appreciate it. I begin to deal and to cope and to change. This is what I set myself up for. But, I don't want to.
Why?
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
One more thing... but still minus commitment!
Ok, so let's run with the hypothetical that I do in fact keep up with this blog when I make it to Taiwan. In that case-- for those who may stumble upon this BEFORE I actually get it going--here are some...
Details!
Right now I live in my spider-infested sister's basement. I've never had any real aversion to spiders, but after this three week stay in spider-haven, I have began to develop one. I am in Shelby Ohio-- the same town I have lived in for the past year and a half. I moved out of my apartment two weeks ago... moving into my sister's house to save a bit of money and to get rid of my possessions.
My former Apartment:
Small. Simple. Discrete.
From what I understand, I will be in Taipei for about two weeks of training and then head to Yilan county or Ilan county or I-lan county (all of those being simply different phonetic interpretations of the same Chinese name). I'll be working in Luodong township or Loudong or maybe even Lou Dong which then could feasibly be Luo Dong (same thing-- pointing at an overarching common and frustrating theme that I am sure will only get even more frustrating until I just laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh...)
I don't care what happens. Don't care if I die. Don't care if I love it. Don't care if I hate it. Don't care. I am BEYOND tired of hearing people tell me how I will feel... tired of hearing people tell me what I will miss and on and on.
I
DON'T
CARE.
The experience will be whatever it is-- and I am excited to just leave it at that. I am not going to try and build expectations up around this (read: I am not going to be naive and post anything about expectations because I don't want to see them go unrealized.) If I ever put anything up that smacks of ambition-- realize that I am doing it without any real sense of hope or desire. Who knows? Not me.
I'll fill in some blanks later-- maybe my next post will be during one of my stupidly long layovers on my way to Taiwan.
Details!
Right now I live in my spider-infested sister's basement. I've never had any real aversion to spiders, but after this three week stay in spider-haven, I have began to develop one. I am in Shelby Ohio-- the same town I have lived in for the past year and a half. I moved out of my apartment two weeks ago... moving into my sister's house to save a bit of money and to get rid of my possessions.
My former Apartment:
Small. Simple. Discrete.
From what I understand, I will be in Taipei for about two weeks of training and then head to Yilan county or Ilan county or I-lan county (all of those being simply different phonetic interpretations of the same Chinese name). I'll be working in Luodong township or Loudong or maybe even Lou Dong which then could feasibly be Luo Dong (same thing-- pointing at an overarching common and frustrating theme that I am sure will only get even more frustrating until I just laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh...)
I don't care what happens. Don't care if I die. Don't care if I love it. Don't care if I hate it. Don't care. I am BEYOND tired of hearing people tell me how I will feel... tired of hearing people tell me what I will miss and on and on.
I
DON'T
CARE.
The experience will be whatever it is-- and I am excited to just leave it at that. I am not going to try and build expectations up around this (read: I am not going to be naive and post anything about expectations because I don't want to see them go unrealized.) If I ever put anything up that smacks of ambition-- realize that I am doing it without any real sense of hope or desire. Who knows? Not me.
I'll fill in some blanks later-- maybe my next post will be during one of my stupidly long layovers on my way to Taiwan.
First... last?
Maybe I will, and maybe I won't. Starting a blog about moving to Taiwan conjures two different feelings:
1. Cliché and damning
2. Cliché and informative
I've stumbled over several blogs by people more or less like myself-- young and heading to Taiwan for reasons mostly centered around getting away from what they've known for so long. Some are escaping crappy lives and some are just looking for adventure. Who am I? Which one am? Am I either?
I don't know... and I don't really know that I can know until after this adventure is well underway. I think it isn't really possible to get a sense of myself or my motivations until a bit of time has passed to let the fog of consciousness dissipate. So, I am reticent to blog as I don't want to go back and read this and think "what a fucking idiot."
That's all.
1. Cliché and damning
2. Cliché and informative
I've stumbled over several blogs by people more or less like myself-- young and heading to Taiwan for reasons mostly centered around getting away from what they've known for so long. Some are escaping crappy lives and some are just looking for adventure. Who am I? Which one am? Am I either?
I don't know... and I don't really know that I can know until after this adventure is well underway. I think it isn't really possible to get a sense of myself or my motivations until a bit of time has passed to let the fog of consciousness dissipate. So, I am reticent to blog as I don't want to go back and read this and think "what a fucking idiot."
That's all.
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