Random notes and thoughts about Taiwan

Talking to a recent Colgate graduate in Taiwan, she called Taiwan “America Light”. It’s kinda true but then some things are just exaggerated to the extreme. Like 7-11’s. There’s quite possibly a million of them on this island. According to the always-right Wikipedia, Taiwan has the highest concentration of convenience stores anywhere in the world and many will be right across the street from the last one. It’s almost an economic mystery to me how they all manage to stay in business. Then again, this one of the most densely populated places in the world.

Taiwan also has one of the lowest birthrates in the world apparently. Going of second hand observations, I’d say no to this since we saw toddlers everywhere. Though I’d probably have to say most of them looked to be only children. Another odd thing with all the babies everywhere was the lack of pregnant women. I mean, babies have to come from somewhere right? So if there’s all these babies, where are the pregnant people? I managed to spot one pregnant lady the last day we were in Taiwan, but that was it. Seems like there ought to be more. Maybe they stay inside.

If most people only have one child, wait until late(r), or none at all, they seem to shower all that unused affection on their small dogs. Every small dog wears clothing and most are usually carried from place to place. Some even ride in strollers. The last entry about moving through crowds might help explain why the dogs are carried. In some areas you can’t see the ground and a small dog would easily be lost.

The clothing concept is not foreign to me since I’ve dogs wearing shirts before. What’s a little strange is these dog clothes have back leg coverings. It’s like a huge gasty accessorized sock with four leg holes that they put these creatures into. We met a nice little hot dog in a bumblebee suite. That was a pudgy little dog.

Not all dogs are so lucky to be carried around and wear clothing. There seems to be an abnormal amount of loose/stray dogs on this island. These are much more ratty and seem rather oblivious to people in general. They sleep soundly in the middle of any kind of foot traffic and can be found nearly anywhere. They all need a good bath and brushing. I didn’t see so many cats, only a couple here and there. Maybe all the stray dogs ate them…

I think these next observations might be just an Asia thing and not so much a Taiwan thing, but museums have been done to death. One of my pictures focuses on the tourist advertisement for the Museum of Drinking Water. Not only have they been done to death but museums strictly contain Chinese things. If you go to a museum in America there’s stuff from all other countries and cultures, and Europe is pretty similar in featuring stuff from other areas. China/Taiwan has only China/Taiwan stuff. I attribute this to having an abnormally long history and being more than capable of filling an entire building with their own history. Not to mention Taiwan sees itself as the preserver of “authentic” Chinese tradition (aka, the old things weren’t destroyed during the Cultural Revolution like they were in China).

Another thing you won’t find in most art museums is the color purple. Pottery is a lot of color, especially blue and white, or red and white, but almost nothing is purple. Light greenish purple can sometimes be spotted but a deep violet is hard to spot. I guess the technique just wasn’t there. A shame really since that’s really the only color I would like on a vase. Chinese art is very much not my favorite type. In fact, art in general is pretty wussy. Unless it’s a good marble carving. Marble sculptures are impressive.

Moving to a different tangent, people love to eat bread filled with meat or sweet things here. It’s the same in China too. Just something about a bread filled steamed bun seems to get people excited. There’s an abnormal number of variations you can do with bread filled meat. I find it rather bland because most of its tasteless steamed bun bread or filled with pork. Neither inspires me to eat more than I have to.

And red beans. What is with the red beans? Red bean soup, red bean ice cream, red bean paste, red bean bread…the list goes on! They’re just red beans cooked with enough sugar to make you a diabetic but they’re EVERYWHERE. I like them well enough, but sometimes you’ve just got to say no to red beans. I find it questionable that the stray dogs don’t want to eat it.

[The following is a homework assignment on which we had to turn in our thoughts on Taiwan. Most of it has already been stated in different ways already but it had to be put into a more stuffy way to present as homework]

Jan. 19-Jan.30: Taiwan, Special Administrative Region of China
I must admit that starting out our trip to Taiwan was not my favorite idea. Taiwan had always seemed like a trouble maker to me, something I can’t stand. Maybe it’s not the “right” way to think, but I prefer falling in line and if I disagree I’ll do it on my own time. All I knew prior to coming was that it was an island and its defense was contracted out to the U.S. Getting there and meeting the people reminded me of what I should have known all along- a country’s image is not representative of its people.

Perhaps it was part of Taiwan’s somewhat unique history of never being…by itself, if you will, that makes it seem like a conglomeration of several places at once. When it was referred to as “America Light”, at first it seemed like that wasn’t giving enough credit to Taiwan and its people, but the longer we were there the more it seemed to be an accurate description. There were recognizable stores everywhere- most notably 7-11, store procedures like America, and everyone could speak English (which they did whenever we wanted to communicate to our unending frustration).

Even the lecture on politics did nothing but remind of America. They have a rather giant divide between the two main parties, which I found remarkable similar to Democrats and Republicans, and they have the North-South disparity and resentment feelings.

There were of course, some differences to be found. I’m inclined to think that people treat their dogs like children (or in some cases in the place of children if the birthrate is anything to go by) with the dressing in clothing and carrying around. Some of them even would ride in strollers! Coming from a doting dog family, I understand where they’re coming from, even if I find it mildly excessive.
The style of eating and type of food still had the atmosphere of being abroad, for which I am quite grateful. There’s (almost) nothing worse than going on vacation somewhere far away and eating something you could’ve had at home.

I left Taiwan much less hostile to the area, but it didn’t really feel like Asia to me (I think it was the abundance of Western style toilets). It felt like the midway point between East and West, just enough of each for everyone to fooled into thinking they’re home.