Gimme those eggs!

It's been awhile since I have had a cultural experience in which I made a total fool of myself, but I had one happen recently and wanted to share about it.

To me, many cross-cultural mishaps occor when people assume things, or are unable to explain things because of language barriers or cultural differences. This is true for both serious offenses and funny social mishaps. Sometimes we don't stop to think about a situation, but get caught up in the moment and assume that we have certain rights or that a situation must be the way that we see it. This is the background for what I find to be a quite humorous and humbling story a couple of days ago on the school trip.

Every year before the first week of school, the CMS faculty takes a school trip to some location in Taiwan. Thes school hires a company to drive us around and set up sight seeing excursions in the places that we visit. It is a wonderful time to get to know my fellow Taiwanese co-workers and many of their families. It is also a good chance to see a new part of the island and have a quick 3 day vacation before school starts the following week.

On these trips we usually stop at fancy traditional Chinese restaurants where the meals are served family style and are set meals in which every table gets the same food. On the first day of the trip we stopped for lunch at a restaurant just like this. Now, these restaurants are sometimes hit and miss. Don't get me wrong, my Taiwanese co-workers seem to love each and every dish that is brought out, but not all of the dishes appeal the American teacher portion of the faculty. In fact, while our Taiwanese counter parts are stuffing themselves and getting doggy bags, I am sometimes just scrapping by to be satisfied until I can get a snack at the next rest stop. So as I sat down with my fellow American teachers to eat lunch, I was a liitle worried about what delacacies would be coming my way.

All 9 of us Americans ended up sitting together at a table, and we began discussing what would be served. A couple of things were already sitting on the table, including a dish of eggs that looked absolutely delicious. Eggs are a great food because for the most part they taste the same in all cultures. I mean an egg is an egg and provided their are no srange sauces on them, they are easy to enjoy. Thus we knew we had one dish to look forward to.

Our hope was soon to fade however. Within less than a minute of sitting down a man came back and snatched the egg from our table. He walked quickly with it over to his table, where he was seated with several other men. We were in a state of shock over why our eggs were stolen and how we could get them back.

It was decided that we should go over and talk to the person who took them, so I went and approached the table to ask about the egg. At this point my mind was a little confused and my Chinese seemed to fail me, because about all I could say as please give us eggs. I was unable to communicate what had happened or why it had happened. I stood there for a little bit, and the man looked confused but eventually he got up and went to the main counter. It seemed like he would be getting us our eggs that he took.

So, I sat back down and we continued our conversation, trying to unravel what exactly had just happened. Within in a few minutes, the waitress came by and put a new plate of eggs on our table, and we were satisfied. In fact the eggs ended up being very delicious.

As the meal wound down, we wanted to see if we could get another egg dish because it was that good. So Kevin went to talk to one of the teachers we knew and asked him to get us eggs, but he kind of joked around but didn't seem like he would get us anything. Then, we saw the man who had taken our eggs in the first place, and Kevin went to talk to him. He said that we wanted another plate of eggs, and the man eventually went up to the counter again and we soon received our second helping.

At this point we were feeling pretty good about the meal and the wonderful eggs that we had the chance to eat. We saw some other teachers and looked at some other tables and wanted to know if they too had enjoyed the eggs in the set meal. I found a couple of teachers in the English department and inquired to them about the eggs, and they had no idea what I was talking about. They had not gotten any egss. As I looked around at more tables, I did not see a single faculty table with eggs on them.

I eventually decided to go talk to the man who had taken our eggs. I spoke to him a second time and asked him more about the eggs and who he was. I soon discovered that he was a tour guide and that he was sitting on the table with all of our bus drivers. I asked him if the eggs were only for their table and he said, yes!!! He informed me that there were not supposed to be any eggs for the teachers from the school. At this point I began to feel rather embarrassed and I apologized for our requesting of the eggs. He kind of laughed and said it was ok, but I still felt bad.

We had assumed that the eggs were for us, and that this man was just taking them because he wanted some more eggs. I felt bad for going and talking to him and asking him to get us something that was not rightfully ours: more eggs. I did not take the time to consider that he was probably intimidated to speak to a group of foreigners using Chinese. He probably did not feel he could explain the situation so he just took the eggs.

On top of that, we asked for a second helping of that which was not ours, and received it. Again going back to cultural miscommunications because of things that cannot be communicated and because people think they have certain rights.

Thankfully, the tour guide (Kay-wan), was a good sport and laughed about it. In fact, Kevin and I ran into him later that night in the hotel and played some cards and had a beer with him. It was fun and we all laughed about the eggs.

On top of all of that, when we went to the restaurant on the third day of the trip (yes it was the same one, but we had a different set meal), he came up to our table and gave us another plate of eggs. He held his finger over his mouth, saying "ssshhhhh", but had a smile when he gave them to us.

So yes, we got our eggs...and a little bit of humble pie, along with a story.

Brown Bagging It

The past three years, I have spent nearly all of my meals eating something that someone has prepared for more...in other words I never cook. People back home would always ask me about this and be surprised that I usually ate out. And it's that I NEVER cooked, but the times I did were so few and far between that they don't really count.

So meals in Taiwan have typically looked like this: a doughnut or prepackaged pastry for breakfast, the school lunch that is delivered to my office, and then going out to supper at a restaurant.

Let me justify myself. Going out in Taiwan is a little bit more economical than in America, so I never really have felt bad about this, plus it is a nice way to socialize. In addition the school lunch is under $1 per day, so it is impossible to argue the dollars and cents about that one. And breakfast...hmmm, breakfast. I never ate breakfast during college or my first 2 years in Taiwan, so I figured prepackaged pastries was a step up from nothing, right?

Now that I have totally justified my laziness, I want to share that I am turning over a new leaf. I have decided to cook my own breakfast before going to school. I am going to make eggs, toast, and have some fruit, in addition to other things that I might be able to figure out throughout the year. I am also planning on bringing a sack lunch most days to school. I have been making sandwhiches, both ham and cheese, and peanut butter and jelly. In addition to the sandwhich I pack some fruits and vegetables.

I came to this conclusion after realizing that I was sick of eating the school lunch, which is always rice, meat, and some vegetables. It's not that it is terrible, and in fact there are some times when I enjoy it. However, I have mostly grown tired of eating it and want to have sandwhiches and fresh fruit, which is more similar to what I used to pack during my days of student teaching.

I have one week down of packing lunches and have started week two. So far so delicious. Now if I would ever start to cook on my own in the evenings...

The First Week Back

Well my first week back has come and gone. I always love returning to Taiwan after being gone for awhile. There is so much excitement as I look forward to the new school year and it seems everyone is full of energy, which is a stark contrast to the end of June when most of the missionaries and teachers are running on fumes.

One of my favorite things about coming back is seeing all of my former students walking around campus. When I see them or a group of them, we usually both get big smiles on our faces and say hi or wave.

I love seeing them and saying hi, or stopping to chat for a little bit. I try desparately to remember all of their names, which I am not always able to do. Sometimes I'll have to tell them to wait while I think for a second. I must say that for the most part I am pretty good at it. The Lord has blessed me with the ability to rememeber my students names fairly well, and it is something that I appreciate having as a teacher.

I ask them about their summer, and they inevetiable ask if I had a chance to go back to America, and then act so amazed when I tell them that I did. There is the feeling that yes I am not there teacher anymore, but it's ok to say hi and chat, and it's just fun to see them.

In addition to chatting with my former students, I have also been teaching 3 classes of 7th graders. I see each class once a day, giving me 15 teaching hours for the week. It's really not too shabby! Some of my classes have been a little bit...energetic...and we have been working on routines and basic classroom expectations. I have seen some improvement and will continue to press on in hopes of laying a strong foundation for the rest of the year.

Back on the island...

Well I made it back to Taiwan without any major problems. My plane did sit on the runway for an hour and a half in Detroit (this was due to a computer malfunction, so thankfully they did take the time to fix it). However, we actually gained quite a bit of time flying over the ocean and ended up landing 10 minutes earlier than scheduled.

These past couple of days I have been trying to adjust my body to the new time zone, clean my desk and room, teach classes and exercise. For teaching, I have 3 7th grade classes everyday. We are learning basic English such as colors, numbers and simple verbs such as give, take, and stand. The trick is that we are also teaching past tense with these words and the students have had a difficult time picking up the past tense.

The excercise is to get back in to the habbit and to help shed some of the pounds I put on while back in the States. I love being home and eating all of the delicious American food that is harder to come by in Taiwan. Unfortunately, I like it a little too much and usually put on some excess weight. This summer it was 8 pounds, which is less than last year, but still will be nice to lose in the coming weeks.

Signing off for now!!!