Tea and other drugs

Bubble tea. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways...

Confession time. Now and again I get homesick. Utterly, irrationally homesick. In moments of weakness, I pine for the banalities and minor annoyances of home. For the damp squall of March afternoon, or a cancelled commuter train on a still-dark morning.

Above all else though, what I miss is a good cup of tea. Comfortingly warm, the bag steeped until the tea is gravy-like in colour, topped off with a liberal splosh of full-fat milk – a great brew solves a lot of the worlds' problems. And that's one of the reasons I love Taiwan. They love milky tea, too.

Bubble tea is a plastic pint of the black stuff, mixed with a load of milk and sweet, chewy tapioca bubbles. You can have it hot or iced, sweetened or not - even switch the bubbles for a caramel dessert in the bottom. I often plump for a straight-up pint of milky tea without sugar or bubbles – transporting me back to a wet weekend in London for ten minutes.

It's the most amazing culinary invention ever. Why it lacks the global ubiquity of the McBurger or the KingSandwich mystifies me, because it's heaven in a plastic cup. From the pan-Asian franchise stores with flashy logos, to the one-off stalls with queues backing down the street, I love them all. If only they did a delivery service...

 

Talking funny

In Taiwan, if you don't have a whiney North American accent, you're considered some sort of freak. 

If you're a teacher, your employment prospects are immediately stunted. Parents demand teachers who are unable to spell colour properly. Students stare blankly as they struggle to comprehend you when you say “banana”. School bosses warn you that you're lucky to have a job at all - what with that spazzy accent. You know, that British accent. That one accent we all have across the whole of the British Isles...

My Taiwanese girlfriend's polished Californian brogue is something to be proud of. I can't wait for the day when I'm good enough at another language to have a discernible accent. But, unfortunately she also takes great pleasure in teasing me about my speech patterns and vocabulary. And one night, when she told me that she thinks that an Afrikaans-English accent sounds “mysterious and noble”, well that really hurt. Surely that's the section of the market us Brits should have cornered?

So, considering the near constant barrage of abuse I receive for having a non-North American accent and vocabulary, it's probably naïve of me to pick fun at another's – but crikey, the Newfoundland accent's a bit weird isn't it?

It's a bastard mix of Irish, Canadian, French and god-knows-what-else. It sounds like a Hollywood actor in a period-piece who got stuck with an awful voice coach. A Newfoundlander I met in a Taipei bar took great pride in telling me his island's history (which is fascinating, by the way, and goes some way to explaining the accent).

Take Leonardo DeCaprio's awful lilt from Gangs of New York, add reactionary Catholic bigot and racist Mel Gibson's attempt at a Scottish accent in Braveheart and mix them together. Then I suppose you're getting close.

But don't take my words for it. Listen to some samples:

An overweight gentleman in a baseball cap speaks about something or other.

A younger man with stick-on eyebrows made of felt makes a telephone call.

A rubbish song, sung by a man called Barry Davis who made a CD of songs about Newfoundland which, presumably, didn't sell.

Matt on a hot tin roof

Taipei. Saturday 2^nd July. About 33°C, 70% humidity – feels like 38°C. Tonight, it'll be more humid, and feel like 28°C. It's been like this for about four months.

Now I'm not complaining, I've seen the bum deal London's been getting this year, but it's a fact that the weather here is pretty brutal.

So how do I cope with it? Well, I don't, for the most part. I sweat profusely and mop my brow like a 19^th century missionary. I cower in air-conditioned rooms. I wear as little as is socially acceptable. Hell, if I didn't dislike him so much, I'd peel my skin off like Robbie Williams did in that rubbish “Rock DJ” video. Anything just to get a bit of air...

And how do the Taiwanese cope with it? Well, until very recently, a large proportion wore coats. Yes, full-on coats. North Face puffa jackets stuffed with downy fur, standard issue geography teacher Berghaus waterproofs, long stylish macs (perhaps in honour of the late Peter Falk) – whatever, really, just something to keep out that terrible, sub 40°C cold.

The longer I'm here, the more I can empathise, if not sympathise. The air-conditioning on the buses and MRT is arctic. But while I take it as an opportunity to reach equilibrium, the Taiwanese view it as some sort of icy hell. There are some things this ginge will never adapt to...

Teacher, Teacher

Not a popular point of view: being a teacher is great fun. But then, I've always been quite the contrary one.

I've had all sorts of great times leading classes here. In a few short months I've collected some priceless anecdotes. A modern-day Joyce Grenfell I ain't, but I've had my fare share of laughs. The good outweighs the bad, for sure.

I taught a class of 4 year old kids not long ago. One lad had an in-no-way-homoerotic obsession with soldiers. My first two days were spent with him calling me a soldier, and me thinking I'd finally perfected a tough disciplinarian air. I later twigged that it was my camouflage backpack that had him fooled. Disappointing.

Later, he took to interrupting my lessons by busting out 10 push-ups, or a load of squats. I assumed he had a family member in the military but, when I asked him, he told me that he watches videos of soldiers working out on YouTube. Bless.

I did an adult conversation activity on childhood, briefly mentioning that I had an imaginary friend when young. Most of the audience looked completely dumbfounded. One girl mentioned that most serial killers have imaginary friends when young. Try arguing your way out of that in front of 15 students. Awkward.

My favourite recent class has been with two 10 year old lads. They're going through that classic pre-pubescent phase of being obsessed with the word “poo”. They wrote me the following story (I promise I had no hand in it):

“Once upon a time there was a poo called Kung Fu.

He lived in home.

He lived with Michael Jackson, Barack Obama, Colonel Gaddafi and Bin Laden.

One day they went to the supermarket.

When they were there, they met Captain Jack Sparrow and Hellow Kitty. And they all played the Angry Birds.

And then, at the end of the day, they all play in the bathroom and eat the poo and all died.

The end.”

Granted, the grammar could do with some work, but there's an off the wall sense of humour there that would get them a scriptwriting deal with BBC3.

So here's a message for all you bellyaching pedagogues – quit whining. Granted, there's the tiresome prep time, the disorganised schools and uncontrollable pupils, but there's also that rarefied job satisfaction. I mean, in what other job can you be paid a reasonable wage for laughing at two 10-year-old scat fetishists?

Adaptation

Humans adapt. That's what we're best at. Today's exciting and new is tomorrow's grey and moribund. Even tragically shit things become tolerable if they are drip fed to us over a long enough period. That's why Armageddon will be met not with mass hysteria, but a swathe of tuts and grumbles, as we slide slowly into the abyss.

In Taiwan, my adaptation has led me to become less impressed by the charming, the wacky and the downright bonkers. And it's lamentable. Not least because it makes writing this blog harder. So this post's for all the little things. All those lovely little Taiwanese happenings. For getting treated like a King – and taking it for granted like a spoilt little Prince.

This one's for the bus driver who stopped outside my house – not an official stop – and made me feel like Tyler Durden in Fight Club.

And it's for the countless 7-Eleven workers, restaurant staff, co-workers, and builders who tell me that I'm handsome (yes, I said builders. They shouted “handsome guy” at me. Things are different here).

It's for the grandmas on the fruit and veg stalls who always give me free samples. And the aunties in the canteen restaurants who give me extra-large portions for cheap.

And this one goes out to the lady in Carrefour supermarket, who tried to convince Jen that she should marry me, on the grounds that she won't do any better. Simultaneously complimentary and abusive.

This post's also for our landlady, who thought she'd seen me and Jon around her neighbourhood before. And when we mentioned that we were new in town, rendering that impossible, she pointed out that all Westerners look ostensibly the same anyway, because we all have massive heads.

It's for the competitive dad. The one who asked if his son Felix could join in with our kick-about in the park, and then filmed the whole thing on his video camera – while shouting at Felix in the manner of a desperate football manger.

And I wouldn't want to forget my trip to an old fortress in Danshui. The rattly old geezer who was a volunteer in the museum hung off my every word, as if I were Simon Schama, asking me questions about Victorian history and taking photos of me for his own collection.

And, last but not least, the guy outside the supermarket last week who looked less mental than his actions suggested. He stood to attention and saluted me. Twice. A gesture of respect which I do not really deserve and, instead, would like to offer to every wonderful Taiwanese person on this island.

God bless Isla Formosa.

It's off to work we go

Here's a lazy stereotype; people in the 'East' are diligent, committed and hard-working, whereas people in the 'West' are decadent, louche layabouts who wouldn't know hard graft if it gave them a lengthy and tedious lecture on the subject. The hypothesis for this differing work ethic? It's the food, stupid.

Us whiteys, you see, have an excuse (don't we always?). Our forefathers grew wheat. Our society is founded on the principles of feast and fallow - a seasonal work pattern. We're used to being able to goof off for most of the year.

In Asia, their forefathers grew rice. Rice is a needy, insecure crop, requiring constant attention. As a result, Asian society is geared more toward a relentless grind, with long work hours and barely any national holidays.

Whatever the theory behind it, there's some truth in the stereotype here in Taiwan. People are putting in work here. Well, Taiwanese people are. Westerners are generally staying true to form, larking about and doing not-very-much.

The average Taiwanese worker puts in a 10-hour day, 6 days a week. No plaudits here for the 60-hour hero. Especially since those are the hours of a softy office worker. If you run a restaurant or a shop, your nose is pressed to the grindstone way longer than that. Most shops are open here until 10 or 11pm. And Christ knows when my betel-nut chewing cabbie last had 40 winks.

If I was in any doubt that the Taiwanese put a shift in, it was confirmed when I found myself drunkenly urinating in the men's facilities of a music festival in Kenting at 4am, while three fellows gave the entire lavatory a scrub up and hose down. If nothing else, it was nice to end an inebriated toilet trip with wet feet and know it might not be my own handy work.

And when the time comes for me to return to the UK, I hope I remember that we have it pretty good in Britain. Our forefathers in the labour movement definitely gave us one thing to be thankful for – 20 days of annual leave and some stonking bank holidays. Keep the red flag flying high...

Drilled

Remember "When the Wind Blows?"

Have you ever been so scared that you actually shit your knickers? No, I mean actually shit yourself.

I'm not talking about watching The Blair Witch Project, riding the Oblivion at Alton Towers when I was 14, or crying with fear whilst watching BBC's Ghostwatch in 1992. This was different. Scarier, probably.

This, for about ten minutes, was the real deal, folks. At 2pm on Wednesday 18^th May, an ear-piercing nuclear emergency siren split the Taipei air. It lasted for what felt like an age. All the while, me and my flat mates stared at each other across the kitchen table. When the wailing stopped, everything became silent. Cars froze in the street, bicycles were left in the road, pedestrians disappeared as they sought shelter in the closest building. The only noise you could hear was the sound of a policeman's whistle... well, that and my bowels being evacuated.

There were three of us in the house at the time. And we're all lucky enough to have no prior experience of pulling a face at each other that says, “so this is it then, you are the last people I'll see before I die”. And, just to let you know, when I thought I was about to kick the bucket, “a sense of amazing peace” did not wash over me. Instead, I was inflicted by a feeling that an utter wimp would get (confusion, panic, hysteria).

Thankfully, we pulled ourselves together enough to switch on the TV and call the tourist information hotline. They told us that, far from being on the end of an impending Chinese nuclear onslaught, we were in the middle of an emergency drill. The government wanted to “practise a bit”, in case we get a repeat performance of March's Fukushima earthquake.

But we, living in a bubble as we do, didn't know in advance. And now we each own a pair of dirty underpants. Thanks, Taiwan.