That Foreign Feeling

Literally Literary and The Writing Cooperative prompt.

I told my friends on Labor Day weekend that I was moving to Taiwan to teach English. They laughed it off and didn’t believe me at the time. That was a bit over 10 years ago.

10 years that I spent living in Taiwan and Singapore. 10 years that I traveled to over 25 unique countries and states. 10 years that I had the pleasure of meeting countless friends from countless countries and went on countless adventures.

I’m now what people in the biz like to call an expatriate. It took me many years before I fully realized what that term truly means.

The one underlying commonality of being an expat? We’re all bound by our cultures and upbringing. When you’re in a country that isn’t your own, that goes the same for their backgrounds too.

I first noticed this in my early days living in the middle of Taiwan, in a remote area known as Chiayi. The people were amazingly friendly, and no one spoke English. Hell, many people didn’t even speak the official national language.

It was a true adventure.

“Hi, I’d like to go to Tainan,” I said in Mandarin to the receptionist at the bus station.

“What?” she asked back in the same language.

“Hmm, I. want. go. Tainan.” I said slowly in Mandarin much more carefully.

“English?” she said in a strong accent.

“Sure!”

She excitedly ran to the back to bring out another colleague.

“Yes?” the new receptionist asked me in English.

“I’d like to go to Tainan please,” I said with a smile in English.

“What?” he asked back in Mandarin.

I sighed.

I was so excited to tell all my friends and family about my adventures in Taiwan when I first went back to Canada. The thing is, they weren’t.

Bored one day after arriving home, I went shopping with one of my friends from university. We went into a big box store that sold some kind of apparel likely made in the broader region of my newfound home in Asia.

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