TAIWAN ADVENTURE

One: Flights, Friends, Squat Toilets, Chopsticks and the Village that wasn't.

Chpt. 1, 1000 Steps, An ESL Teaching Adventure in Taiwan (c.2008) Claudia Carroll

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Yongding Village, Taiwan: September, 2006: Today is my first day with the teachers at Yongding School, site of my mountain top teaching experience for this coming year. What I’ve learned thus far: I will get fit. Ability to climb stairs, thousands of them, ought to be a priority for a year in a rural area of Taiwan.

I am preparing for classes which will begin on Wednesday. The principal, Amy, gave me a teacup inscribed to memorialize this location in Taiwan, Yongding Village and surrounding areas, for their growing of tea. A teacher gifted me with a candle log in a metal holder, “for your new home.” My “home” is, for the year, a lovely two bedroom, furnished, 3^rd floor apartment, on the school campus. Another teacher gave me a matching amber bowl, cup and beautiful pair of wooden chopsticks. 

The young male teacher, Guan, whose desk is next to mine, gave me a set, in a metal case, of steel chopsticks and two spoons.  And yet another gift from principal Amy, sheets and a comforter for my bed.

My trip to Taiwan had been surprisingly pleasant. I left from the San Francisco, California airport, with a tourist visa, and a pre-paid, e-ticket arranged by Footprints Recruiting, the Canadian ESL recruitment agency I’d signed on with. My contract, and all details were handled by the agency, dealing directly with the Ministry of Education in Taiwan, and in this, I felt secure.

I had secured my tourist visa in San Francisco, filling in the form to indicate I was visiting someone in Taiwan for three months.  Once in Taiwan, the agency assured me, the school would make arrangements for my working visa, since they needed that, legally, as much as I did.

Few of the on-line recruitment agents I’d investigated offered much attention to details. Once hired, I’d heard, you were often “on your own.” But with Footprints Recruiting, I received a carefully defined contract, a guaranteed salary and good benefits.

In addition to round trip airfare, I would receive a free apartment, medical insurance, and a monthly salary, sufficient enough to provide for both a considerable savings, and a long-desired visit to France, since I would receive several paid holidays, and a three week winter holiday, which I had already planned to take in Paris.

My salary, I was told, would be deposited directly into an easily accessible account each month.  

I’d been anxious about the living arrangements though. “Apartment provided” could mean sharing with other teachers, living in an area near or distant from the school location, or in my case, on the home-school campus itself. But I’d lucked out by being given my own no-sharing-required, apartment. Hoping to spend evenings continuing my writing projects, I was glad I would be alone.

The decision to accept the teaching offer required a lot of adjustments; an apartment and car to be concerned about, a visa to obtain, what to pack. And then, knowing this special year would go by quickly, I had to consider what I would do and where I would live when I returned. I suspected this latter issue might be easier for younger teachers, who might have family or room-mates, girl-friends or guy-friends, back in the states.  But, as an older, single woman, I’d have to start all over again.

Finally though, everything was taken care of.  My brother-in-law would keep my car, and I would keep my apartment. My visa application at the Taiwan Consulate in San Francisco was approved in a day. And the e-ticket arrived online.

At the San Francisco airport, still in awe of the fact that I was really going to Taiwan only 3 months after I’d applied, I’d mistakenly waited in the business travelers’ lane, talking to a young man from Taiwan. When I, the third person up, arrived at the counter the attendant just smiled, accepted my apology, took my bags, and I was done.

On the plane, I was relieved to find that, with an injured ankle and knee, I was assigned a seat in the EVA plane's escape area, next to Kevin, a lanky young man from the U.S who was headed, not to Taiwan, but back to Thailand to open a restaurant. Well over six feet tall, his legs were too long for the regular seats.

We both were excited to be going to a new adventure to Asia.  The airline food was great, with both Asian and U.S. style food choices, and it seemed we were being fed and offered beverages every hour or so. 

I transferred planes in Thailand, receiving VIP treatment because I carried my handmade walking stick. I didn’t really need it for my knee injury, but flying gave me such vertigo, that walking around after landing, I was likely to be mistaken for a drunk! 

The Thai airline hosts and hostesses were so professionally dressed; the men in suits, and the women with long dresses and lavender banners across their chests, orchids in their hair. Greeting us at the door, hands together in a mode of respect, they bowed, and welcomed us onto the plane.

At the Taiwan airport, twelve hours later after leaving California, I easily found my baggage and loaded it onto a FREE cart. I made my way to the immigration line, and with my passport in hand, was through that process in a few moments.  Then, I headed toward the waiting area, feeling a little like a bag-lady with my carrying cart packed with three suitcases. I looked around, wondering if I’d see someone holding a sign with my name on it then laughed at myself. I was the only blond getting off the plane, as easy to spot as if I’d been wearing neon.

Suddenly, I was surrounded by several smiling, friendly people. Apparently, the whole administrative staff of my home school, Yongding Elementary, had come to meet me.

Amy, the school principal, her husband, and Teddy, the young academics coordinator I'd exchanged e-mails with, and Jay, and Stephen. I would discover later that while Teddy, Jay and Stephen all had administrative duties, they also taught: Jay, computer and media classes, Stephan, music. Teddy had taught English at the school for five years.

Amy, in her forties, slim, with short brown, professionally coiffed hair, looked lovely, and cool, at 5 a.m. in the morning! The heat hit me in the face like a blast furnace: 85 degrees and humid, and I was already drooping from the long flight from San Francisco. I was wearing a long skirt and a tee-shirt, feeling more like a tourist than a teacher, and had little hope of making even a passable impression on my new friends. .

If that were true though, my welcoming committee showed no signs of disappointment, but rather embraced me happily. After handshaking from the men, and hugs from the women, the men loaded my baggage, not letting me lift a thing, and then we drove off, three cars in tandem.

I was to discover this car partnering facilitates parking in the crowded towns with little on-street parking. One car parked wherever, and we piled into the next, and finally into the last car which found a space nearer to our destination, a small, open-aired family-style cafe in Taipei. I hoped they did not notice my careful manipulating of the broken concrete sidewalks. My head too often in the clouds, or capturing my surroundings with a camera, I had a tendency to trip and fall, thus my already injured knee.

While breakfast was being ordered, I excused myself to go upstairs to a restroom. I opened the door, to have my first experience with a squat toilet, the urinal-like depression in the floor. Well, I thought, it beats sitting down on some the toilet seats I've seen in sparkle-clean U.S. restaurants!  I was glad I had worn a skirt, making standing, squatting over the thing a bit easier.

I wasn’t dismayed. I had traveled in remote villages in Guatemala during a revolution, and lived in rural areas of Mexico, so I was not that concerned about things that would be different to me here in Taiwan. In fact, I looked forward to discovering the differences. That adventure began with breakfast.

Food had already arrived when I came downstairs. I’d eaten so much on the plane that I really would have been happy with coffee and toast. Instead, my friends toasted me with small glasses of juice and cups of tea, expressing happiness that I was there. They were truly concerned that I would like the food they ordered.

Offered my choice of what I think was hot peanut-milk or soy-milk, I accepted a bowl of steaming peanut-milk. That alone, being a late-morning breakfast person, would have been sufficient, but soon everyone was encouraging me to try a bit of everything, I sampled plates of dumplings and assorted delicious dishes I yet have names for. 

My new teaching associates were charmingly admiring of my attempt to use chopsticks. I’d had some practice on Chinese food, after all, back home. Though Teddy insisted I use a spoon and enjoy the food, I was determined to start mastering the chopsticks. On the other hand, I could scarcely eat. Still in shock that I was actually in Taiwan, I just wanted to look around at this new, warm, welcoming "family."

We walked back to the car, and when I dared to look up from the undulating, broken concrete sidewalks, I had an impression of rows and rows of barred window apartment buildings, narrow streets and more motor scooters than cars.

After about fifteen minutes driving, we stopped at a type of super market. At first, I didn’t realize they were stopping there for me so that I could pick up things I needed for my own apartment. I wasn’t expecting this, and didn’t even know what came with my apartment

Both the men grabbed a cart, thinking I guess, being an American, I would pile both carts full. Little do they know what a non-shopper I am, I thought. Besides that, I was tired really, and so overwhelmed that I was actually in Taiwan after several months of submitting applications, documents, wondering and waiting, that I couldn’t think “shopping” at the moment.

I would need towels, they pointed out helpfully, and in that section, I looked, in vain, for a shower mat. Later, standing in my bathroom with its toilet, washbasin and open shower, I saw that a bath mat would have been useless. What I would need there, was a mop! I tried to ask for toilet paper, but Teddy helpfully pointed out someone had already put a box in my cart. I’d thought it a box of table napkins. I came to find out these were all purpose tissues, and served for toilet paper, napkins and Kleenex. 

Now the men were steering me down the frozen food aisles. I felt truly helpless. In the states I tended toward fresh vegetables, salads, some chicken and fish, seldom if ever buying anything frozen. I had in my mind, going out into Yongding Village and shopping at a little open air market, like I did in Mexico or in France. I was in for a huge surprise.

My confusion was obvious, so Amy's husband picked out some microwavable mixed dishes—rice or noodles combined with vegetables and fish, and helped me find a few green vegetables, some sort of cabbage, cucumbers and tangerines.

We drove south out of the city, but climbing steadily into the mountains, it felt as if we were headed north. The green countryside on both sides of the highway reminded me a little of Marin County in California where my sister lives, or of Hawaii, with masses of trees and vines securing the hillsides.

I was surprised that there were no houses on the mountains, but I assumed, as in Mexico, that most people preferred, or needed to, live in or near the towns or cities.  Here and there though, small “cities” of ornate memorial houses for the dead, dotted the hillsides. Only these “residents” had the benefit of what was likely a spectacular “view.”

We were, I was told at last, nearing the school, Yongding Elementary in Yongding Village. Thus far, I’d not seen a village at all. We’d passed what we might call a small “strip mall” in the U.S.: a 7 Eleven type of store and an open air take-out restaurant. But there was no sense of a “village.”

Perhaps, I thought, as we approached the walls of the school complex, the village was beyond, further up the mountain.  I only hoped I could walk to it. Opposite the school gate was a small, ornate Buddhist temple. Its roof, curved upward at each end, conjured up the image of a an ancient boat.

“You’ll see these road-side temples throughout Taiwan,” someone said. “They are intended to bring safety to travelers.”  Through the open door of the temple, I could see a man lighting incense.

 Inside the school gates, we parked next to a three story dorm building. I stared up at the mural on the building, a rendering of Confucius in the midst of trees, birds and mountains, just as the school is. I could scarcely believe I was standing outside the buildings which up until now, I'd only seen on the Internet.  I was actually in Taiwan, and on the school campus, standing in front of the building which would be my home for the next eleven months.

 

                    

Two: 3 flights up; Eyes of fish; Welcome toasts; Butterfly campus

                               Excerpt, Chpt. 2, 1000 Steps (c.2008) Claudia Carroll

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  The men grabbed my luggage, the women my shopping packages, and they bounded up the three flights of stairs to my apartment. Embarrassed, I struggled, with my injured knee, to get there before they actually started coming down again. How would I manage these steps?

When I finally got to the door, my friends were busy examining the apartment to make sure everything was in order. I paused a moment to catch my breath, and look over the balcony at the lush green hills, so close on all sides and sloping upward so steeply that I felt as if I were inside a dormant, jungle-growth covered volcano. The sound of the river below, hidden behind tall trees, assured me I was not.            

In the living room, a heavy sofa and arm chair, with a lavender flower print; matching coffee table and end tables, and a huge television. I had cable they told me, pleased. In the kitchen, a propane stove, propane tanks, sink, and a separate unit that provided filtered drinking water. 

The refrigerator, too big to fit in the narrow kitchen, was in the living room, along with a clothes dryer; the washer, in the enormous, white tiled bathroom. I’ll have to move the refrigerator closer to the kitchen door anyway, I thought, and that dryer to the bathroom, doing some mental re-decorating. Then, I laughed at myself. I’d not even had a washer, dryer, or cable television in the states. I might just stay on another year!

There were two bedrooms, each with a bed, mattress, desk, and chair.  The rooms each had lovely, sliding shoji screen doors.  As it turned out, with no roommates to share my space with, I would use both rooms during the year: the back room, the first semester, to lessen somewhat, the noise of the weekend traffic using the narrow mountain road like a speedway all night long, and the front room, during the spring and early summer, to catch the evening breeze, and listen to the monsoon rains.

Two Taiwan teachers, a man, and a woman, also had apartments in the building, as they were single, and their families lived too distant from the school for them to make a daily drive. My own apartment had been reserved either for the new, incoming principal, who, in Amy’s case, did not need it, as she had a condo-type home with her family near Taipei, or for an incoming ESL teaching couple. So, I would have this lovely apartment all to myself. I loved teaching kids, but having time alone would prove very supportive of my being able to stay in the non-existent village of “Yongding Village,” for nearly a year.

When everyone was certain I was comfortably installed, they announced it was time for picture taking. If I looked as fatigued and droopy as I felt, the photos would be an embarrassment.  I made sure to take a few photos with my own camera, so that I was not in the photos!

They urged me to take a rest, but totally soaked with perspiration from the humidity of the August day, I just wanted to stand under a cold shower forever.  Teddy, who served as our interpreter, though both Amy, her husband and Stephan spoke a little English, told me, in a sighing gesture indicating she was still full from breakfast, that they would all be back later to take me to lunch.

I pulled out a change of clothes, showered, changed, and left my bags for later. Alone, I suddenly felt apprehensive about my coming teaching duties.  Arriving just a few days before school was to start, due to the last minute processing of all my documents by the Ministry of Education, I had missed a week-long ESL teachers orientation in Taipei. Now, school was upon me, and I was a suddenly, and intensely, nervous.

I lay down on the bed for a few minutes, so it seemed, then heard cars driving into the parking lot below my window. My new friends were back. I waved to them from the balcony. Happily for me, climbing down three flights of stairs was easier than climbing up. Now, I’ll get to see the “village” I thought. But still, no sign of a town. Instead, we drove a short distance to a charming restaurant located at the top of winding rock steps. We stopped by a pond full of purple lotus and tiny frogs.

“Listen,” Amy urged. The frogs’ croaking sounded exactly like small terriers barking. “Dog-frogs," Amy explained.  Her English was limited, but she indicated right away she wanted me to correct her, or otherwise help her with this second language, so important, she felt, for her country to learn.

Joined by two other teachers I had not met yet, we sat at one of the big round tables. In a moment we all had either a cup of tea, or lemonade. I was astonished to see everyone lifting their glasses in a toast.

“Claudia,” Amy's husband said, “We welcome you to Taiwan!”

I returned the toast, saying as simply as possible that I felt I was surrounded by family, and so pleased to be there.

Two or three people emerged from the kitchen carrying platters and bowls, and soon, the lazy-susan in the middle was full.  Platters half emptied were taken back to the kitchen, and the food brought back to the table neatly arranged on small plates. I lost count, after fifteen, of the great variety of dishes.

I sampled all the food, and Amy's husband instructed me how to manage the chopsticks better. “The bottom chopstick is held stationary, only the top one moves,” he said, smiling.

Someone else again encouraged me to use a spoon, but determined to chopstick, I made my way through noodles, vegetables, pork and chicken, actually getting the food to my mouth.  Finally a whole broiled fish was brought to the table. Stephan deftly carved this up, placing the head on one plate, the tail on another.  Someone seemed to have told a joke, as everyone laughed. 

“He is saying,” Teddy explained, that ordinarily, the head of the fish would be given to the guest of honor, but considering Americans don’t….”

I laughed and waved my hand in a gesture of “no thanks,” but Stephan handed me a nice slice from the center of the fish. Finally, dessert: a platter of sliced oranges, pineapple and guavas.

"You will experience your first festival here, the moon festival," Stephan explained. His description of everyone taking to the streets to celebrate with a bar-b-que, conjured up visions of a small-town, U.S. Fourth of July.

I wished I could join in their conversation. I would try, during the coming year to learn some of what, I discovered was mostly Chinese language, rather than Taiwanese, but I would, requested as I was, to speak English to everyone, end the year knowing little more than  “Neehow,” my spelling of “hello.”

The day was fiercely hot, but mercifully, the rain began and cool air drifted through the open windows and doors of the restaurant. By this time, I’d been informed there was no “village” per se. Where would I walk to, I wondered?  Where would I shop? 

I was dropped off at the school, and after many assurances that I had my key, everyone left.  I walked around the school campus, across the playing court, and along the vine covered wall that bordered a path on the other side, which led to steps going down to the river. I nodded to someone, apparently the only person around, standing in water up to his knees, cleaning the pond

Walking back, I looked into the windows of classrooms and the office, then unlocked the outer door of the dorm building, and walked up the three flights to my apartment. I was about to begin what I came to call, my year in Shangri-la.

Three: Families by the river; Mosquitos, Umbrellas and Race car drivers

              Chapt 3, from 1000 Steps, An ESL Teaching Adventure in Taiwan

                                      (c.) CJ Carroll 2000. 

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Yongding Village, Taiwan: September, 2006:

 

I spent Sunday putting my things away and arranging my room. The third floor, 30 steps up, location will challenge me, but I've often joked I planned to spend my 90th birthday climbing the Himalayas, so I've apparently I’ve begun training on the steps to my apartment. 

 I thought I would walk down to the river, but there are more steps, a long way down, and no railing or banister. I’ll wait, I thought, until my knee is better, and I recover from the vertigo that always lingers for a week or so after a plane ride. Some jet-setter!

Instead, I walked along a path which borders the school. From the path, I could see the river, wide but shallow this time of year, tumbling over rocks around a sharp bend the road to form a wide, shallow pool. Nearby, some adults were sitting on rocks, watching children play in the shallows.

 The mosquitoes seemed intent on making a feast of my arms, so I fled to the relative safety of my rooms again. I showered, and stood naked in front of the fan, watching, CNN and HBO, just to hear English. Finally, cooled off a bit, I pulled on shorts and a tee shirt, and from my balcony, watched, with envy, the families trekking through the schoolyard to get down to the river for an outing, then turned back to the television.  Suddenly, while accustomed to be alone, was overwhelmed with a sense of loneliness.

I’d not even had TV in my apartment in the U.S., spending my hours writing or painting. But here in Taiwan, these few English language channels would prove to be my only source of real English “conversation,” for the year.  I wondered though at the view of America being presented, given the overwhelmingly violent nature of most of the films.

Mid-afternoon: a torrential rainstorm. I stood under a protective awning on my balcony enjoying the rain. I expected the families to come running back to their cars, parked precariously in the bend of the narrow road. But rain or river, water was water to the children.

The women had carried umbrellas to shield them from the sun, so they were equally prepared for rain. As for the children, when the families did come back to their cars, they simply carried the children's clothes, and the kids splashed along au natural. Two families took shelter on the portico of the little temple across the street, opened lunch or dinner baskets and just let it rain. I hope I do get to go out and around. At this point, it felt I’d come all the way to Taiwan just to play Emily Dickinson, observing the world from a bedroom window.

My first night: I slept very little sleep despite jet-lag fatigue. It seemed the narrow well-paved, sharply curving two-lane road is used the whole week-end as a race-way: drivers testing the speed of their new cars, being passed by squealing scooters and roaring motorcycles.  

Interested in Teaching in Asia? 11.18.08

    From time to time, I'll add information here, my own experience, or that of others, re teaching abroad.

     My experience in Taiwan my not be typical. But if you are interested in teaching abroad, and have at least a BA degree (often, in any subject), I can recommend the following two sources:  Footprints Recruiting, the Canadian based agency which placed me, and Serious Teachers, an on-line source, listing hundreds of schools or recruiting agencies, mostly in Asia.

    Neither Footprints (footprintsrecruting.com)  nor Serious Teachers (seriousteachers.com) charge a fee to the potential teacher, as the schools, ministries of education or recruiting agencies pay that fee.  The application, in both cases, are very easy to fill out, but there are two major differences.

    Once you've indicated, with Footprints, the country where you would like to teach, your application and correspondence are turned over to a staff person dealing with that country. You may have to be fairly assertive to get them to contact you, and follow through, but once that contact is established, you can be confident , or at least I was, that all the details of your contract, trip, visa information, etc, are handled professionally.

     With the Serious Teachers site, you can, during the application process (or any time thereafter), select a country, or "all countries." You can choose whether you wish to receive e-mail alerts of job postings, re those countries, or  whether you prefer to brouse the listings, and make contacts in that manner, or do both.  With Serious Teachers, you will be corresponding directly with a school, ministry of education, educational institute, or recruiting agency.  While I have inquired about some jobs listed, I haven't been in a position to accept any offers yet. My experience thus far, however is that the replies are relatively prompt. Follow up, after a brief e-mail exchange, is usually done via telephone or Skype.

More later.... good luck, bon voyage, happy landings.

Just a word of caution re teaching in Europe: since the formation of the European Union, most ESL jobs you will find listed there - in Spain, France, Germany, for example, require a teacher with either an EU passport, or in some cases, a native English speaker from the U.S., Australia, Canada, who is already living in Europe.  Your best bet, is to teach in Asia, research how you can live in a European country, then take your holidays, or "after contract completed" holiday in the European country of your choice, and scout out the prospects of teaching privately.  Once there, and with connections made, I've been told you can sometimes land an assignment, and the coveted working papers. Don't count on it, but if you can afford to take the risk, financially, then go for it.

Comments? 

claudia