Taiwanese Hospitality: A Humbling Experience – 好客

by Charles DeBenedetto

(An alley in Taipei. Photo Credit: 123rf.com)

“This is for you,” she says with a smile. She is a co-worker of mine, but I have not really spoken to her much before. I smiled with I saw that she was also taking her break in the coffee shop.

When she presented the small slice of cake, my first thought was that she must be indebted to me for some reason. “Why?” I ask stupidly.

She continues to smile. “No why. For you.”

I hesitate a moment before accepting it. “Thank you.”

* * *

I am lost in Taipei. I am a country boy in the big city for the first time in my young adult life. My clothes don’t fit quite right because I am afraid to spend money on new things. However, I do buy an MRT (subway) ticket, so I can see a new part of the city without having to drown in the still-too-powerful September Sun. My Mandarin skills are in their infancy, and I stare at the map for a long time. Taiwanese tourists glance briefly at it, and locals rush past it, using their internal navigation system like migratory birds.

Popping out, there is a sea of parasols bouncing above the sidewalk, and the Sun reflects off skyscrapers with blinding ferocity. I duck into alleyways full of knick-knack vendors and food carts, looking with big eyes. I painstakingly jot new Chinese characters into my notebook, glancing up at them and down at my notebook dozens of times to make sure they are correct. I decide to ask my professor about what they mean later. I am alone, because I prefer to follow my whim and discover at a slow, natural pace.

Eventually, after a full day of wandering, I wish to go home, but I do not see any MRT stations nearby. How many kilometers have I walked? I have no cell phone, no local friends, and limited ability to communicate. But these are the moments where you need to be brave and try, and you develop your skills as a result.

So I slowly meander, looking for the perfect stranger to ask for directions.

The muscular, tattooed man cleaving meat with a butcher knife? No, he is very engrossed in his work, I think to myself.

The old grandma in a wheelchair selling lottery tickets? No, she might only speak Taiwanese.

The tall, suit-wearing, briefcase-wielding man half-sprinting down the street, glancing at his watch every ten seconds? He probably speaks English, but he is too busy.

Finally, I walk into a corner store where an older woman in an apron is selling various charms and kitschy souvenirs. She is probably used to inquisitive foreigners, so I ask in the best Mandarin I can muster, “Excuse me…where is…the MRT station?”

She nods that she understood my broken words, and she immediately begins to address the other customers. “Everyone, please leave!” she orders, shooing them out of the shop, as, flabbergasted, I follow them out the door. She pulls an iron barrier down from the ceiling to lock up the shop, looks at me, and, smiling, says, “Okay, let’s go.”

I am stunned.

Robotically, my legs follow her while my brain is still processing what is happening. I am embarrassed, and I feel bad for inconveniencing her and her customers.

I don’t remember much of what she said, and I probably didn’t understand a lot either, but she was trying to tell me the names of streets, which station we were heading to, and how to navigate. About ten minutes later, we arrive at the station. The whole time we were walking I was trying to apologize to her, but she wouldn’t listen. After we arrive, she watches me go down the escalator and to the correct metro line before she heads back to re-open her shop.

* * *

In college, I had a professor who had recently returned from his first trip to Japan. He said, “Being the recipient of such kindness and hospitality was not what I deserved, because in my life I have not acted kind and hospitable toward others. Now that I have seen how the Japanese are so concerned with the well-being of others, I find that I am constantly checking myself.”

The same quote can be applied to the Taiwanese.

I should take a moment to acknowledge that my professor and I are most likely especially prone to be the recipient of Japanese/Taiwanese kindness because we are White. Unfortunately, White people are often adored simply for being White, and are showered with gifts and praise without having done anything to deserve that treatment. If I were Southeast Asian or Black, I would probably still be received well, but not to the same degree.

Just like my professor, seeing how the Japanese/Taiwanese people interact with each other and foreigners really does make me check myself. Many people have offered to pay for my meals over the years, but how often do I offer to pay for others? People have offered me small gifts for various occasions, big and small, but how many gifts have I given? Taiwanese people do thoughtful things for each other and for the foreigners who either visit or live here, but how many thoughtful things have I done for Taiwanese people?

The Taiwanese people set a high standard for how to interact with others, and, being a member of this society now, I can only hope that their positive example has changed me for the better.

Six Years Later: Remembering a Peaceful Protest - 抗議

by Charles DeBenedetto

(Taiwanese gather to support Hong Kong. October 1, 2014. Photo Credit: Foreign Policy)

I grip the dangling handle on the MRT a little too tightly, turning my knuckles a bright white. I’m nervous, and I almost decide to go home. ‘What if I get in trouble?’ I think. ‘Maybe I will lose my scholarship money, and I will have to leave Taiwan. I’ll have to go back home and wash dishes like I used to.’

My thoughts continue to spiral for a while, but then my resolve boldens.

‘No. I am an international relations major. This is important for my education. I need to go.’

So I go.

The doors open at Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station, and a flood of people disembark. There is no need to ask for directions tonight, because the flood acts as one mind. Slowly, orderly, it makes its way to the exit, and ascends the escalator.

As we ascend, I can already hear instruments playing, plugged into amplifiers, and a murmur of conversation is underneath the passionate singing of many voices. From the MRT entrance, I look out at the scene.

There is a massive, Chinese style blue and white gate, flanked on either side by large buildings with red lacquered pillars and curved roofs. Between them, a wide, tiled square. From the center of the gate, the scene is perfect symmetry, with the memorial hall directly ahead. A walk of about half a kilometer will take you to a series of thick, gray steps. Follow them up, and you’ll be greeted by the smiling face of the late-dictator, sitting in an enormous bronze chair like Zeus or Abraham Lincoln. The Republic of China Sun is above him, soldiers guard him, and a behemoth of a pavilion enshrines him. He truly looks like a god.

But he is far away in the background. What overwhelms me is the gigantic crowd of Taiwanese people who have completely taken over the first half of the square, surrounding the entrance gate. They are sitting shoulder-to-shoulder, and singing. They have lights to wave, mostly from their cell phones, and look like they might just be at an open air concert. A lean, sweaty man plays an erhu, a two-stringed Chinese instrument, shredding like it were an electric guitar. The singer instructs the crowd to clap, and the drummer makes me wonder whether I have a heartbeat or a drumbeat inside my chest. After the song, a man grabs the mic and says,

“The people of Hong Kong are our brothers! We stand with you, brothers and sisters! Hong Kong, keep fighting! Taiwan, keep fighting!”

The crowd replies passionately, “Hong Kong, keep fighting! Taiwan, keep fighting!”

I do not fully understand what I see, but as I walk around, I see pain, sadness, and the want for a reality other than what is. I tell myself I should keep a low profile, but I am a white boy at a Taiwanese protest. I walk for a while, and then a tall woman with a microphone approaches me and asks me what I think.

“Here we have a foreigner who supports Taiwan,” she says. She passes the microphone to me. I feel uncomfortable about this, and I cannot say much in Mandarin, but I try to say something.

“I think…this protest…is good. I hope…China can…see it.”

I regret my words shortly after, partly because I know I did not speak with perfect grammar, and partly because I worry about the trouble I will be in when people find out.

I scramble away from the various news channel reporters, and find an auntie who is selling T-shirts. They are black, with a yellow Taiwan in the middle, with the Chinese characters 台灣不服貿. I don’t know what that means, but I understand the English underneath it, “Save democracy. Don’t sell our country.” Sounds like something I agree with, so I buy one.

(This is the same pattern as my T-shirt, but different colors. Photo Credit: tw.carousell.com)

This is not my event, but for a long time I stand at the sides, looking and listening. I always thought of protests as violent and dangerous, but the people here just sing, hold each other, cry, and sway. It is a funeral, or a memorial service for someone recently passed.

It is a long time before I force my eyes away and get on an empty train home.

        

* * *

It has been six years since that day. I see now why the plight of those in Hong Kong resonates so deeply with the Taiwanese. Just like Taiwan, Hong Kong is a democratic country that is being influenced by Mainland China, and China’s long term plan for “re-unification” is simple. First, Hong Kong. Second, Taiwan. If Hong Kong’s democracy crumbles, and the mainland has total control of it, then they will be better poised to seriously consider invading Taiwan. Obviously, the past six years have not seen an improvement in Hong Kong’s situation.

And so, Taiwanese people came out in great numbers that day, to sing, to cry, and to hold each other. The same Taiwanese who overthrew their own dictatorship without picking up a single weapon. Today, they continue to stand up to China in their non-violent, professional, beautiful way.

China is a giant, but it stoops low to pick on the weak, to scare them and to watch them cower. But Hong Kong and Taiwan, though small, stand up tall. Taller, in fact, than the stooping giant.

Six years later, I echo the protestors.

Hong Kong, keep fighting. Taiwan, keep fighting.

Ordered Anarchy: Riding Scooters in Taiwan - 機車

by Charles DeBenedetto

(A normal day on the roads in Taiwan. Photo Credit: Fine Art America)

“I should probably get up before I am run over,” I thought to myself.

I was new, inexperienced with my iron horse. My scooter, which would be called a moped in the States. A 100cc engine, fifteen years old, and bought second-hand for probably too much money. It was not even close to the fanciest thing on the road, but I loved it. From the scraped gray plastic exterior, to the sticker that declared, “the scooter is all my life!” to the specks of black pavement covering one side of it, I cherished it for its ridiculousness.

But I was not prepared to ride it. Growing up with ATVs and snowmobiles, screaming down abandoned trails and across frozen lakes, I knew how to handle a machine, but I had zero experience with the locust swarm-like synchronized madness of scooters on Taiwanese city streets.

“But you had a license, right?”  Of course I did, but that did not prepare me for reality.

* * *

It is a hot, sweltering August day, and I am drenched in sweat before I even walk into the DMV. I take a number, waiting for a computer to be vacant so I can take the written test, and I spend the whole time chugging water, one paper cup at a time, from the lone water bubbler that is meant to serve the hundreds of people here. My number is called, I sit down, and choose the English test.

The first hurdle is understanding the English, because it is not perfectly translated from the Mandarin, but it is alright once you acclimate to it. Basically, you need to know kilometers, what the road signs mean, and a few basic Chinese characters. 停 is “stop,” 慢 is “slow” and 禁止機車 means “scooters prohibited.” I passed, barely, and I distinctly remember wishing to review the questions I got wrong, but not getting the opportunity.

I expected that my “road test” would actually be on the road, but instead, the DMV has a large open-air course, complete with a viewing section for onlookers to cheer you on. It looks more like I am going to play on the bumper cars than an actual road test. I wait in line for a long time, pushing my scooter a few inches every minute or so, until finally it is my turn.

(The straightaway at the beginning is everyone’s worst nightmare. Photo Credit: Nomad Notions)

“Okay, you can go,” the DMV worker says.

BEEEEEEEP!!!!!

I pressed the horn, not the ignition…oops…

Luckily, they do not begin to grade until after you cross the starting line. I drive down a narrow path, stop at the red light, turn left, turn right, stay in the lines, wait for the imaginary train to pass, and drive out. The whole process must have took about a minute.

Yay, I’m done! I have a license in a foreign country, so that’s cool. It takes about an hour for the license to be prepared, and while I’m waiting I am required to watch a short film about all the ways I can possibly die while riding a scooter. Certainly not a feel good ending to the process, but I’m glad it’s required, because being on a scooter is no joke.

And then, I am on the road.

VRRM! Scooters go around me because I am too slow. A car is live-parked in the right-hand lane. I need to go into the left-hand lane to go around, but when? An endless stream of flying cars and bikes. Okay, I made it. What?! Did that old man just jaywalk without even looking? I stop at the red light, but other vehicles choose not to. Am I going to make it home? Did the Taiwanese government really just confirm that I am qualified to be on these roads?

I remained unscathed for about a month, until one day, coming home from work, I was stopped at a red light, with some stopped scooters ahead of me who were in the process of a two-step left turn. By now I was accustomed to hitting the throttle the moment the light turned green, so I went fast before noticing the scooter in front of me was not moving. I tried to brake and turned left to avoid him, and I went down, the full force of the fall going into my left knee. My water bottle rolled away out of my backpack’s side pocket.

“I should probably get up before I get run over,” I thought to myself.

Ignoring the pain in my knee and the scooters scooting around me, I get up, pitter over to the curb, and assess the situation. I seem to be okay, but I have adrenaline in my system. My bike has a few more scratches, but it already had plenty when I bought it. Collecting myself, I ride home to calm down.

* * *

Years later, I have yet to be in another accident, and my knee is fine. But I never forgot that day. Still, I am one of the slowest riders on the road, because I know that at any moment a car could come boldly flying out of a small side road (as often happens). I am one of the few who wear a full-face helmet, because, even though it is expensive and sweaty, it is the best life insurance policy you can get.

Riding a scooter in Taiwan is analogous to learning about the Universe. It is chaotic. It is madness. It is scary to be such a small player in a massive and dangerous place. But you have a part to play in it. You can feel the beat. You can find the rhythm. You can learn to dance in the ordered anarchy. But for God’s sake, wear a full-face helmet.

(I know it is cute. I know. Resist the temptation. If you get in an accident, that cute helmet will not help you, and then you will not look cute anymore. Photo Credit: aliexpress.com)