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I wonder what those of you teaching in Taiwan think of Thomas Friedman's column this week. He goes so far as to call it his favorite country, after America.
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Mar 13, 2012 06:18
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Ravendas posted:Average chain buxiban starting rate: $580nt/hour. 18hours x 4ish weeks = 72hours/month. 580x72= $41,760nt/month, aka like $1,350us. Before 18% tax. Wow, that's atrocious. Do they at least typically provide housing or something? Why would someone move to the other side of the world to earn so little?
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May 24, 2012 20:07
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The Grand Lisboa casino in Macau has a sandwich shop called the crystal something something. Completely authentic but rather pricy deli. They've even got sourdough and Dutch crunch bread. Not only do they have more than one cheese (as Subway does in Hong Kong and the mainland, so presumably Taiwan too), but they have a whole assortment from provolone to white or yellow cheddar. Stanley Ho knows how to outfit his casinos with good food. If you're craving good bread and a real western sandwich, pop over the strait and I'll take the ferry over to meet you because now I'm craving one of those things. They're served with waffle fries too.
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Sep 10, 2012 09:34
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USDA Choice posted:Does a rising tide lift all boats? Well, sort of, but like skysedge noted, some more than others. From 1990-2006, Taiwan's Gini index rose slightly. The USA's rose by about the same amount. Over the same period, China's has risen far more drastically, starting around the same level as Taiwan in 1990 but breaking 40 for the same time period to 2006, and perhaps nearing 50 now. If anyone has more recent info for Taiwan I'd love to get a link, I couldn't find anything in the past 5 years since the global economy has soured. Speculation: I'd imagine it's nudged higher, but not astronomically so. A non-official survey has it over 60 actually.
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Dec 14, 2012 05:49
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I've never tried to learn zhuyin or even casually looked at how I might go about doing so, but wouldn't you start with an explanation of how to read each character that would inevitably have to be romanized in some way therefore eliminating that idea that you're divorcing yourself from romanization?
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Jan 22, 2013 09:20
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Beefeater1980 posted:This thread reminded me that I miss the hell out of Taipei. Absolutely the coolest city in the Sinosphere.
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Feb 22, 2013 04:53
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TetsuoTW posted:Also thanks, you fuckers, for putting the mainlanders off of buying all their baby formula there, because now they're coming here for it. Or at least so the TV news says, which actually means there's a pretty good chance that's bullshit. The Curse of Jimmy Lai.
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Feb 22, 2013 06:55
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I think I lodged my one complaint about Taipei before in this thread. Hong Kong is so ridiculously dense (which is apparently what made it so 'livable'), where Taipei is like the opposite. Endless sprawl forever. I think the entire island of Taiwan is actually suburbs of Taipei, right? It felt like it. To be fair I was only there for like 4 days. But it seemed like everywhere I went was at least a half hour by car. Not to mention that your city only has one skyscraper. I mean yeah it's a badass skyscraper and one of the tallest ever, but still. Just one? Get it together.
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Feb 22, 2013 07:05
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Not even 30-40. When I visited Taipei, I stayed with a family friend who told me "oh man you're gonna live it up here in my penthouse right next to the 101." Sweet! A penthouse! Right by the famous supertall skyscraper, I thought. Such a view I'll have! I get there, it's on the twelfth floor. My apartment in the suburbs of Hong Kong is on 43. And I didn't see any buildings around that were much taller than his. I'd like to see a list of Taipei's buildings taller than 20 floors.
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Feb 22, 2013 11:44
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Oz_Bonus posted:I guess they made this in good humor (although it's a terrible joke). I'd hate to think that young Taiwanese people are really this xenophobic and antifeminist. I dunno about that but it's catchy in that 'Somebody That I Used To Know' neo-new wave way. At least it's not another mandopop love song!
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Mar 25, 2013 02:33
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USDA Choice posted:I'm not so sure, I say this classic is Grammy-worthy. Whatever happened to that girl? Her career (read: breasts) seems to have lasted like six months in 2010. TetsuoTW posted:Also yeah, Taiwanese society has hell of lady and not-like-us issues. I'm actually surprised you've never come across "whitey is only here to steal our women" and its sister "but those girls are all sluts anyway". When I first encountered the phrase "哈洋屌" (which I guess translates to like... sucking white dick?), I of course had to look up what it meant. Almost all the results from googling it are Taiwanese. I mean I guess that's probably because it's Taiwanese slang, but it's worth bringing up that Taiwan has a unique name for this special phenomenon. Then there's lots of pseudo social science surrounding the term that is fun to read.
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Mar 25, 2013 05:54
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KingSlime posted:I'm Hispanic and fairly dark-skinned. Might this be an issue (finding jobs, dating, living in general) or not really?
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Apr 5, 2013 03:51
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The best thing to do is just repeat the whole "You talkin' to me" sequence from Taxi Driver in grizzled Hokkien.
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Apr 29, 2013 04:59
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Is there a Taiwan politics thread? I've got some questions for you guys who are into that stuff, but I don't want to derail laowaichat if there's another option.
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Apr 30, 2013 03:53
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TetsuoTW posted:Fire away. No promises, but go for it. Well, one of the weird things about Hong Kong politics is that you have the normal political dichotomy of liberal/conservative (with a mixed in spectrum of economic versus social permissiveness), but that by far takes a back seat in political discourse to whether or not a politician/group/party supports Beijing and Communist meddling in HK. So that influences the news we get from Taiwan, which always looks like KMT = Pro-Mainland/DPP = Anti-Mainland. I did a big fancy grad school research project on the KMT from 1949-1988, which makes the notion of the Kuomintang being Pro-Commie kind of  to me. When Taiwan voters go to the polls, are they usually thinking more about cross-straits politics or more about domestic/other policies? Also do they still have the Taiwan provincial government (while simultaneously maintaining the RoC national government that effectively controls only Taiwan province)? That was one of my favorite weird things about Taiwan's political situation, but I think I heard it got disbanded recently.
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May 2, 2013 02:51
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Spanish Matlock posted:I really think that the whole Chen going to jail thing is really unfortunate. It sets a really bad precedent to start throwing presidents in jail for things like low-level embezzlement. Or maybe it sets an excellent precedent that corruption won't be tolerated no matter what (even if the true intention is to lock up your opponents/make them look bad). Hong Kong's Independent Commission Against Corruption is having a bit of a scandal right now as its looking like the former Commissioner was slightly corrupt (hosted fancy dinners and gave fancy gifts with ICAC money), whereas the thing had been single-handedly responsible for turning one of So that leads to another good question about Taiwan: is it corrupt? I know back in the one-party rule days, it was just as corrupt as the mainland is now (in fact it was almost exactly like the mainland is now in every conceivable way but that's another topic), but I get the sense that it's pretty clean now. Is that right?
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May 2, 2013 05:08
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Taiwan still has conscription and mandatory service for all males, right? Is that changing any time soon? What do people think about it?
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May 6, 2013 02:42
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One of the more convincing arguments I've heard for why China leaves Hong Kong largely alone in terms of civil liberties and allowing protesters and Falun Gong to be obnoxious here is that they're making it a model for Taiwan. The idea is that the Communists say "Oh look, we could've taken everything away from Hong Kong, but we didn't. They're all free and stuff! Taiwan, you could have this too, and then we'd be one big happy Zhongguo Minzu!" That's looking less convincing to me because of some of the talk from the top of the Communists about Hong Kong's 2017 Chief Executive election, but what do Taiwanese people (who are informed about this sort of thing) think of Hong Kong and the One Country, Two Systems model?
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May 6, 2013 04:16
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They look like Fallout 3. I would've visited 
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May 15, 2013 05:14
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You should've gone with a program that came with a local roommate. That's good advice for every language program everywhere. Even if your own roommate is super goony and never wants to do anything (this happened to me), among your classmates' roommates there will at least be a few social jerks who get you out and seeing the local culture and doing things. Most likely this local culture will be boring, middle class conformity, but it'll be with hopefully interesting people in a foreign country!
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Jun 3, 2013 07:24
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I read way more of that than I should, but down toward the bottom where it gets really crazy, it also starts to look like it wasn't written by a native English speaker. And not just like with grammar mistakes that would be made by a native speaker, but using the wrong articles and stuff that are pretty typical of native Chinese speakers so... I don't know. Is it too  to say the ridiculous parts about ripping Taiwanese girls apart with your monster foreign cock were probably added by a Cosmos People guy butthurt about all the girls going for whiteguoren?
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Jun 20, 2013 07:10
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No idea. But even if they are, they're channeling real feelings that exist. Poe's Law and all that.
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Jun 20, 2013 08:53
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Magna Kaser posted:Sour Skittles have recently appeared all over the mainland as a real made-for-China thing, as have cookies and creme hershey bars and those weird M&Ms with rice crispies in them. I'M WAITING FOR PEANUT BUTTER M&Ms!!!!!! I was excited to try those crispy M&Ms when I first saw them, but at least the ones we get in Hong Kong are like malt-flavored. I don't remember if China or Taiwan has this problem, but Hong Kongers love malt flavor, which I find all kinds of gross.
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Jun 25, 2013 02:29
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I know name chat was last page, but I wanted to complain about all the Hong Kong girls in their mid to late 20s named Hebe. That's a weird fuckin name and I blame Taiwan.
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Jul 9, 2013 08:31
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caberham posted:Tight rear end gives you tight profit margins! This was a really weird and inappropriate post all around but I wanna single out this part and point out that tight profit margins are a bad thing. Also for the English teacher v. real job chat, English teachers are usually fun people and some of them really care about their jobs and some of them take it easy and treat it as less than a real job. Both are cool options. What I'm always raging about in the Red China thread is that too many people in the mainland take horrible, lovely jobs that pay less than $12k USD a year with no benefits, no vacation pay and miserable conditions without negotiating at all. I'm not sure if that's a problem in Blue China, but if it is, consider yourselves yelled at. If it's not, you can join me in a struggle session against the spineless cowards across the strait. Also I have a real job and get paid vast amounts of money to do basically nothing. Suck it, Pandemonium. 
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Aug 9, 2013 04:07
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Pandemonium posted:Making $30,000-40,000 every three-ish months is good money? I saw this again because TetsuoTW quoted it. I missed the 'every three months' part before. So I just pulled out the old Calculator and xe.com and determined that you earn almost US$5500 a year? No wonder you're so bitter. Please seek help or, dare I say, get a real job? You're obviously under a lot of financial stress.
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Aug 9, 2013 04:36
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It sounds like you have a conscience that is well-suited to NGO work, social justice stuff. Have you thought about something the Peace Corps or Americorps? By the way, gently caress you for implying that all of us sheeple are complicit in exploitation. 
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Aug 9, 2013 07:22
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Have any of you long-term Taiwanners looked into getting RoC nationality? It looks like you get visa-free travel to a lot more places than I thought, but I don't know about having a passport from a country that most of the world doesn't recognize.
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Aug 12, 2013 05:52
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TetsuoTW posted:e: Oh, and being able to throw your passport and ID card in the face of banks and phone companies when they decide you're untrustworthy because you're not Chinese. This is a massive benefit in my opinion. edit: not necessarily any tangible benefit of dealing with banks or whatever, but the ability to go ACTUALLY I AM NOT A FOREIGNER 
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Aug 12, 2013 08:04
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How much does a job like that pay, usually?
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Aug 19, 2013 08:54
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Is that also for a standard office worker work week? i.e. 40 hours? That'd be a horrible hourly rate.
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Aug 19, 2013 13:57
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TetsuoTW posted:Most Taiwanese office workers would kill for work hours that short. Are those terrible hours mostly self-imposed though? I always heard about how overworked Hong Kong office workers were, but then I started working in a Hong Kong office and saw that my co-workers spent half the day gossiping either in person or on Facebook. Oh no you have to stay late because you didn't finish your work? This is obviously the employer's fault. I've done like four hours of overtime in in total in the last year, because I just do my work when at work.
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Aug 20, 2013 00:33
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Magna Kaser posted:pinkberry-style frozen yogurt is taking off Evacuate immediately. This stuff killed off actual good yogurt in Hong Kong.
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Aug 20, 2013 04:41
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caberham posted:Hey guys I'm just enjoying my awesome paycheck by living in a Hong Kong shoe box. This raises an important point. Taipei goons please post your goon house. Square footage, number of rooms, building services and facilities (if an apartment) and whatever else. Pics encouraged. There's a job opportunity for me in Taipei and even setting that aside, I have a lot of reasons I could/should be living there. But I really enjoy my life in Hong Kong and I only have four more years until I can get permanent residency here so I'm struggling a lot with the notion of moving.
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Aug 20, 2013 05:17
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hitension posted:Voting?... Most countries don't allow non-citizens to vote, right? Although I'm sure in Sweden or somewhere ideal they do. hitension posted:Do they use pings as a system of measurement in HK? You can browse http://rent.591.com.tw/ to get an idea of what's out there. quadrophrenic posted:Southwestern Yonghe, 8 ping, studio, 5th floor rooftop jag, dingey neighborhood, came with a sink, washer/dryer, TV, assorted furnishings. No building services, no elevator. It's small and crummy, but it's close to Taipei City and I like it for that. 8800 NT (~2270 hkd). I would be working in Xinyi, about a block away from Taipei 101. I assume prices in that neighborhood are among the highest?
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Aug 20, 2013 06:27
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USDA Choice posted:the building is quite new and nice. Does it have any facilities? Most buildings in Hong Kong built after 1997 have pools, gyms, libraries, and dumber more useless stuff like bowling alleys and snooker rooms. Nothing like that in Taipei? POCKET CHOMP posted:Also I've got a pretty drat big apartment (I think the listing was 27 ping, but I never actually measured it) in a pretty nice apartment building for about 8.5k/month. Two floors (!), three bedrooms, living room and the upstairs loft landing room, 2 bathrooms, 2 balconies. But I live on the outskirts of New Taipei City sooooo yeah. It's a 30 minute local train ride to Taipei Main Station.
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Aug 20, 2013 07:37
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The other night in Hong Kong we were discussing how hell must suffer Zimbabwe-like hyperinflation. Everybody's burning bills denominated in the millions.
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Aug 23, 2013 10:17
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It's traditional to give in multiples of 18.
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Oct 2, 2013 14:59
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TetsuoTW posted:18* is good because it sounds like 易發, "get rich quick", 99*(久久) would also be good if you're gonna be paying hella dollars. Also chai.
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Oct 2, 2013 16:34
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poetrywhore posted:Glad the "pump and dump" nonsense got called out for what it was. A type of securities fraud?  Has anyone rented a car in Taipei before? Last time I visited I spent so much on taxis, I could probably have spent less by renting for the few days I was there. Is parking as frustrating and expensive as in Hong Kong?
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Oct 3, 2013 02:02
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