Work abroad: Pierre and his KTV gigolo job in Taipei III

Just a reminder this is the third installment of the story of Pierre's work as a gigolo in Taipei. Best to go back and read all in the Pierre and his KTV gigolo job series from work abroad.

After his one stab at paid sex, Pierre had sworn himself off preferring to just drink with the women. Six months later Pierre had found his feet and in doing so rediscovered his sense of the melodramatic, and that melodrama expressed itself in clients with overlapping schedules. He was sure that if a client saw him with another it would be disastrous. His gigolo colleagues told him that it is generally not a problem, but he replied with: “Yeah, right, what I am going to say to her, ‘Sorry, I was fleetingly making someone else’s life less lonely. Now it your turn.”  Still, his gigolo colleagues knew there was no need for embarrassment, but were not interested in arguing (Taiwanese are very good at that) and decided it was best to just play along.
That evening:
He made an excuse to a Miss Chen to approach the bar and talk to his colleagues.
“Has Miss Hu arrived?” asked Pierre.
“No,” said his colleague.
Pierre did his phew, the world isn’t going to end face and waited for someone to be interested.
Nobody was.
Pierre continued: “I don’t know what time Miss Chen is leaving.”
“Should be no problem,” said his colleague again. But nothing was ever ‘no problem’ in the Pierre universe. He started to pull his this is deadly serious, man face, but got no joy. He then pulled it harder and harder until all the energy in his entire body was helping to radiate seriousness; but, all he got was a polite smile (Taiwanese were also very good at polite smiles).
Besides, they had seen and heard it all before: at the start he had just talked about the possibility that he would get a clash of clients coming to the KTV, then he invented them and had everyone running around pretending he wasn’t there, or in the bathroom, or covering for him at a table so that he could sneak out the emergency exit. Now, he was throwing out names that made no sense to them for authenticity.
“Is Miss Chen a regular,” asked a different colleague.
Pierre raised his eyebrows, but said nothing.
“Well…is she?” asked the colleague again.
“She might be,” replied Pierre.
Now his colleague was raising his eyebrows because he didn’t understand. He thought about getting to the bottom of the situation, but decided to walk off instead.
Suddenly Miss Hu arrived and it was a perfect chance to invent a problem. 
“Miss Chen, excuse me, I have a problem...I am really very sorry,” he said.
“No need to be so polite,” she replied. And she actually meant it because she didn’t much like foreigners, and was waiting for someone else.
Pierre went out the emergency exit of the KTV, clambered over the empty beer crates, slipping on a fire extinguisher buried underneath; down one flight to the office below, then took the lift back up.
He straightened his tie as he approached Miss Hu. “Sorry, I have got here. I was late tonight,” he said. Miss Hu looked baffled why he would lie - She knew he was already there with another client, and if he wasn’t popular, she wouldn’t be interested. Anyway, he had told her to be there at 10:00…Insisted in fact.
A little white lie. It wasn’t entirely accurate to say that he had decided never again to take payment for sex. He had decided never to take payment from a nice woman. A few weeks ago Miss Hu had taken a shine to him, and, at the moment, she was certainly fulfilling the above criteria.
Typical Miss Huisms:
“You know, even though I have a lot of money, I like to have normal friends. I don’t show off my money -I have 3 houses, one in the California, but I don’t it doesn’t make me arrogant.”
“I am really nice to my friends. I always forgive people when they are mean to me. But one time, I don’t like to use my power, a friend of mine doubled crossed and one phone call and they had their business closed.”
“My friend are only secretaries, but I don’t tell them that they should do better with their lives.”
“I pay for everything, and I never ask for anything, but I know they don’t respect me.”
And it went on and on…he was sure he was going to go mad. The first time he entertained her was the first time rage had been so intense he could have killed someone. Everyone, from time to time, was stuck talking to someone they didn’t like, and watched their clock desperately hoping the next sentence would be the last and you could get away. That first time, he had watched her lips and wondered how such beautiful, thick things could allow such obnoxious, arrogant drivel past. Didn’t they have a sense they were being showed up? It quickly became clear there would be no respite, so he concentrated his attention on those lips, convincing himself that when they stopped, she would stop. Unfortunately, they’re momentary stops were only pauses while she gathered together another snippet of self-absorbed reflection. Still it helped to see them unmoved for just a second, it was a moment’s relief before the torturer put the electric tongs back on his balls. Each sentence hammered into his head on the same spot. And it was so much worse because he was not just required to appear to listen to someone else but to actually listen and respond - She continually asked him what he thought and pulled him up if he wasn’t listening, but she wasn’t looking for a discussion, merely an acknowledgment of her plight: your empathy showed that you had digested what she was saying.
While he tried to keep his attention focused his teeth clasped tight, and his eyes stared forward, then he was hit by the sensation the parts of his face had got so close together they could feel the presence of the others and were about to engage each other in conversation. When she went he just stumbled around dazed, shell-shocked. He was afraid to go to sleep – Initially surprised he had not gone mad, he then decided the experience would be like when you play on an injury and get used to it, but the next day, you have done so much damage you are out for the season. He expected to wake up dribbling and babbling; or somewhere in a small African country, having undergone plastic surgery, carrying a new identity, with no knowledge of the past twenty-five years, only of unspeakable past trauma. He tried to run and hide second time she came, but she sought out the manager, who asked him to do a favor, and therefore he had no choice. It got better from then in - You will get used to hell. He knew what she was going to say, developing the ability to wake back up just when she was finishing a sentence. She was so obsessed with face that he could wrap her around his little finger: Keep telling her what a nice person she was; misunderstood, down to earth, sincere, and she would keep coming back. And, he wanted a woman who he could rip off, but had been restricted by conscience, so a candidate like this, that he disliked so intensely, wasn’t going to appear too often. He knew he shouldn’t miss hopping on the broom stick.
The next evening we were all out together.
“Have you sorted anything out yet - what you want to do?” I asked.
The fact that it had been eight months now since Pierre entered the KTV club, wasn’t lost on his friends either. He was still talking about how: he was going to change the world, do something different, not rely on his status as a foreigner to earn money, and now the period in which we were too impressed to say anything was over.
“I have been working 4 nights a week. It was not as easy as I expected you know,” he replied.
His expression was humble, introspective, and everyone wanted to feel sorry for him, but nobody could really take it seriously: you don’t believe the gambler who says he has quit, you don’t believe Pierre will start approaching life by realistically assessing his strengths and weaknesses.
Sometime during his upbringing his parents stopped trying to tether his self-belief to reality - Presumably, as he is still alive today, it was sometime after teaching him to cross the road, but the indications suggest not long.
He continued: “Having to drink so much everyday and deal with the people, I don’t think you boys could handle it.”
Ah, back to normal, we thought.
“What about that cash? You must have a stack saved up.”
“I have some, but meeting business contacts is not cheap here. You have to keep up appearances.”
We didn’t believe the excuse. We also disputed he was working at the club four nights a week --The regularity with which we saw him meant there would have to eight or nine days in a week.
Anyway, we knew he was spending the money. You can pretend this is independent cinema and invent the killer who likes to prune roses or work with disabled children when he is not lopping and dismembering, but in the real world, most of these guys follow the stereotype. Pierre and his colleagues spent fortunes on clothes, cars, drinking, and cards in illegal gambling houses. It was stuff right out of the movies for Pierre – dumping one or two thousand US dollars on a bet and losing it all. At times, we wanted to feel sorry for the naïve boy who we were sure was going to regret it bitterly later, but there was no need to feel sorry for him: Pierre only remembered the experience.
Still, even the most optimistic guy can have a few regrets. The Miss Hu situation would come to be one.

Work abroad: Pierre and his KTV gigolo job in Taipei II

Just a reminder this is the second installment of the story of Pierre's work as a gigolo in Taipei. In total there are six parts to Pierre and his KTV gigolo job series from work abroad.

For a long time he had contented himself with drinking with the younger girls, then teasing from his gigolo colleagues made him have to take things to the next level. Finally, a couple of months after going to work in the KTV club, he sold himself for the first time.
We heard the story in one sitting of two parts. The first his manful boasts then the real story of how he felt. As suspected he wasn’t as big an asshole as he tried to be.
We pick up the story at the love hotel with Mrs. Jiang, a woman fifteen years his senior and married to some rich guy who spent all his time in China.
This Love Hotel was an up-market one recently opened by a Japanese Love Hotel Chain, leaders in this market. It was themed Africa Nights: mud hut texture wallpaper, African masks, shields and spears, and fake antelope and elephant heads adorning the walls; the bed had a leopard skin bed spread; the toilet was in the shape of a hippo's mouth; and the center piece of it all, a giant massage chair in the shape of a spider which shook, vibrated and closed its legs to give you a tickle when you sat on it.
“What are you laughing at?” she asked. “You don't like here?”
“It is great,” he answered, then slipping into French so she didn't understand. “It is just what I need to take my mind off things.”
He stood staring at her for a minute. It wasn't her forty years that were putting him off. She had smooth white skin, the result of years of expensive European cosmetics, wearing factor 50 suntan cream, and carrying a parasol (older Taiwanese do their best to keep their skin as white as possible to show they don’t have an outdoor job; they are not low class). She is decked from head to toe in designer clothes, and carrying a Louis Vuitton bag. She is well-manicured and made-up with her hair dyed a taint of dark brown instead of her natural black. In fact, she wouldn't look out of place pulling up in a Land Rover to pick her son up from any of the best public schools across England.
She was only five-foot high, petite, slim, not more than fifty kilos; she is ethnically Chinese and therefore exotic. But all of that misses the point completely: she is attractive; he wouldn't choose her as a girlfriend but he wouldn't say no to sleeping with her based on looks. And, most importantly, he wanted to sleep with her because he have seen her prim-and-proper lady-like exterior, and was aware of the ironic contrast.
They had taken up positions on opposite sides of the leopard skin bed spread. She was sat down on a bamboo chair in front of a huge mirror; back straight, knees, elbows and wrists together checking her mobile for messages. A lady to the last.
He was loitering; leaving himself open to being asked if he was staying or not.
She looked up from her phone.
“Are you ok?” she asked.
She had gone quiet once they got in the taxi, but now she was looking at him with a motherly concern. Suddenly, she had the upper hand.
“No problem,” he had to answer. “You want a drink?”
He had already entertained for an hour before Mrs. Jiang came to the club, but the whiskey wore off easily these days.
She said no, headed to the shower, and he got a little bottle from the mini bar - and lied on the bed to ponder his doubts.
Mrs. Jiang had been coming to see him at the club for about a month now – paid for his company at least eight times before he had agreed to be taken out.
What did he know of her? - Very little. She had two children. And, her husband lived in China with his air hockey table factories and several mistresses. No doubt she was lonely, but there were lots of lonely women who didn't employ the services of a gigolo. He told himself he didn't know the whole story and it wasn't his job to do so. She had decided to come to the club.
But he felt sorry for her. He used to feel sorry for female prostitutes. Now he felt sorry for being one. A contradiction if it wasn't for the lowest common denominator: a liberal middle-class white male upbringing, that always seemed to find another way to bite back.
And that was another thing: he was getting those pangs of guilt you do when you cross a moral boundary. It made no sense as he was hardly robbing a bank or selling drugs - but then again, after living here for more than a year, he had forgotten how Christianity, unlike the local one, does equate purchased lovemaking with murder and mayhem. He wasn’t religious or anymore moral than the next twenty-five year old; it was surprising those values are still lurking in the subconscious, raising objections when he least expected.
He started playing with the electronic panel next to the bed to pass the time. He hit the button below the Chinese characters for Office, and the sound system kicked in blasting the noise of a busy meeting. He had heard of this - It was designed for when you get a call from your loved one. Next to it was the characters for restaurant and motorway. Presumably, if you are in the room for a long time…
He started to roll around the floor after hitting the last button: Atmosphere - Suddenly 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' was shaking the room, and the elephant trunk was swinging from side to side. He turned it off, figuring he would need it later.
Five minutes later she emerged from the bathroom; tiptoeing, hip wiggling and holding her towel at the chest to protect her dignity. Her exposed slim white shoulders, ankles and calves were getting him excited. It occurred to him he could presumably do this for free, and then he wouldn't need to feel guilty.
“Why don’t you take off your jacket?” she said now back in the wicker chair.
“Sorry,” he said jumping up off the bed. “I hate it too when the whores play all coy and waste my money.”
He took off the suit – black Emporio Armani – that he had been wearing almost constantly for the last three months, and jogged across the room to the wardrobe. The wardrobe door was in the shape of a huge African shield with crisscrossing spears, split vertically down the center into two doors. He grabbed the hair on the imitation shrunken head door handle, and hung up his suit, then his shirt. For a moment he knew what a girl felt like when she displayed herself for cash, and he thought about shouting 'so here are the goods, love.'
He guessed a little bit more subtly was in order.
“Lay on the bed - I'll give you a massage,” he said.
For the next five minutes, he worked his hands over her body, still stung by that feeling he wasn't doing a good job.
Soon his hardening dick woke him to decision-making time. He knew he wasn't going to give it out for free - if he did, he would have to pay the club's cut out of his own pocket. Her husband would be paying for this not her, so he wasn't making her destitute. Which left the question of exploiting her loneliness? He knew the guys in the club would just say he was providing a service; temporary relief from loneliness and it sounded right, even if it didn't feel that way.
He looked at her face, eyes closed, relaxed with just a faint sadness bubbling around the surface. I would only make her feel worse if I walked away now, he thought.
“Turn over,” he said, and then undid the towel from the front.
Her breasts were in fact a wonderful pert c-cup that sat up nicely on her chest. Fakes he guessed.
“What do you think?” she asked.
“About what?” he replied.
“My breasts - can you tell they are fake?”
“Really? I didn't notice.” he replied.
“Yes - I went to the best plastic surgeon in Taipei. I even swapped the nipples - After you give birth, they are very dark.”
He perched himself up on his elbows, above her chest and turned up the brightness of the lamp to check.
“Look,” she said now animated grabbing her right breast and pushing it towards his face. “The nipples are very pink again. This technique was pioneered by a Japanese surgeon - Only one place in Taipei knows how to do it.”
“Those are truly the nipples of a fifteen-year old.” Then speaking a bit faster. “If I hadn't seen your face first, I would now be running for the door.”
“What?”
“They look fantastic. I am honored to get my grubby hands on them.”
“You really think so? Wow. You know - you are the first person to see them.”
“As I say - honored love. Now let's not waste them talking.”
He smiled to myself, figuring he wouldn't need to listen to Tight Fit anymore.
Still he had had many questions - Was she just going to lie there? Was she going to do anything for him? Then he remembered she didn’t have to: this was a service. In that case, was he expected to warm up with a lot of foreplay? If, so? How much? He had a large ego, but for once he was not sure if he wanted to do his best. If she didn’t cum was he obliged to go again? Female prostitutes have it easy, the extent of their service was clearly defined: get the jizz out; payment was always per hour or ejaculation, but here a satisfactory conclusion of service was unclear. He was supposed to stay with her for the evening, but otherwise…?
He started to head downstairs.
“Take it slowly,” she said.
“Hmm, trying to get your money's worth then…What ever that may be.”
Anyway, he headed back up to her neck and then jerked his head back as she tried to kiss him - You are not supposed to let a client kiss you. At least that is what happened in the movies.
“What is the matter?” she asked.
He thought for a moment: “Nothing…I presume you want me to just pretend this is a romantic encounter. Save your face. I can do that. I have been here a while.”
“Ting bu dong (I don't understand),” she said.
“Nothing,” he repeated and started to kiss her.
A little while later, he went for the condoms in his trouser pocket and took one out.
“What are you doing?” she said.
He wanted to scream: I am a whore. Are you mad? But it wasn't entirely unexpected. He threw it away.
It was time to penetrate, and now the adrenalin was rushing, almost like it was his first time. Once he did this he was officially a whore. He concentrated hard on what was important in life: experience, risk-taking, enjoyment and pride; something to tell the grandson.
Once inside, he had the feeling you do when you have got anyway with something naughty; he held things in press up position enjoying the moment. 
“Just a minute,” she said.
She then twisted her body round and started to look at the control panel next to the bed, while he twisted his torso trying to stay inside. Soon it too resembled a game of Twister and he gave up.
“Ok,” she said, and 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' started blasting out. “This is romantic. Don't you think?”
“Totally - Sade and Barry White will be relegated to student all-you-can-drink night from now on.”
Twenty minutes later, the alcohol meant things were taking a long time, which was kind of good and bad: good because she was getting her money's worth, and bad because he was flagging. He wanted to tell her to get on top so he could take a breather, but he reminded himself that this was what she was paying for and kept chugging away….
He noticed he wasn’t really making any noise, and he wondered if he should. Ordinarily - Yes - noise showed you were turned on, gave her an indication of your progress, but now he was providing a service. Too much noise might appear like you were in it for yourself; too little would make her embarrassed. Men like girls to make a noise because it signifies that we are giving them pleasure, but is the reverse true?
Another ten minutes and it was all over. He lay on his back. As post-coital adrenalin dissipated, and the cold light of day crept back in, he began to ponder his actions.
“You don’t like?” she asked.
He thought it a strange question, irrelevant in fact, still: “Of course,” he replied.
“I am not so bad, no?”
“You are very sexy?” He replied because it was the truth. If she just got a plane to the West she would be the one getting paid.
She put her arm across his chest and tried to engage him in eye contact. He suddenly got a sickening feeling and tried to change the subject.
“How is Michael (her son)?” he asked because I knew he had been in trouble at school (Only 99% on his tests apparently).
“I know, you don't love me,” she said rubbing his chest with a tragic look. “I just want a man to make love to me, sometimes that's all. Is that so bad?”
He said nothing because he was an immature twenty-five year old who didn't deal well with reality. Yes, he was admittedly an attention seeking, manipulative, arrogant asshole, who liked the idea of being a gangster, but his was the romantic world of crime, where there are no innocent victims. He had wanted his first one to be a bitch so he wouldn’t have to care. Now, he could see his mother’s sad told-you-so face, like that time when he hadn't listened, let the dog run in the road, and it was hit by a car.
“You will find someone,” was all he could muster, and he turned over and pretended to sleep.
Two hours later - six a.m. - he stopped pretending to sleep and sat up. The rhythmic, peaceful chants of Daoist music and a drum beat were coming from outside, reminding him of where he was. He pressed the button for Tight Fit, lit a cigarette, and focused on the swaying rhino head.
The sun was beginning to come through the curtains, it was going to be a beautiful, hot sunny day again. It was a pity he would be getting up at three in the afternoon as usual. Simpler pursuits like teaching English and studying Chinese suddenly seemed attractive again. He couldn't remember why he had given them up.
He really had learnt his lesson this time, he was sure: he was going to lead a normal life.
Suddenly, he was horny again - and she looked fantastic with the light on her shoulders. Presumably, it was a simple matter of waking her up, but he didn’t know what to do - If he made love to her again was it part of the original price or a separate item? If she had paid for just the once, he felt obliged to negotiate a new contract, and he was too embarrassed and lazy to do so. Anyway, she might not want to pay for a second time. He decided to give it away, but then the words of the gigolo guys from the club started ringing in his ears, and he felt Scrooge-like towards the thrusting of his thighs: if she did want it she would be getting something for nothing.
He decided to head to the bathroom to resolve the problem
…Nah, he wasn’t like the other guys he would give it for free…

Taiwan Blog Awards 2010

Hi all,

If anyone has enjoyed the blog this year please go to below and vote for me. If no time don't worry.

If you liked somebody else you can also vote for them here.

Voting has now started in the 2010 Taiwan blog awards. Full details are available at http://www.taiwanderful.net/blog/voting-2010-taiwan-best-blog-awards. 

Anyone can vote using the Digg style voting mechanism and there is no need to register to vote. There is a limit of one vote for each blog from any IP per 24 hours. 

Cheers,

 

Dan

Work Abroad: Pierre and his KTV gigolo job in Taipei I

A long time ago i started to tell the tale of Pierre’s most off the rail moment (http://betelnut-equation.blogspot.com/2009/07/temptation-of-being-treated-v.html), but i stopped because my blog wasn’t just about sex in Taiwan and i didn’t want to give the wrong impression. Hopefully, now i have built myself a little credit and it is ok to finish the tale.
If not, never mind, because it is a damn funny story and the deuce bigalow comments can come later.
As i have mentioned before Pierre was determined to prove he wasn’t just another teacher overseas like everyone else, he could find any work abroad he wanted. Still: laziness, refusing to take the gift horse of teaching overseas, the effects of watching too many gangster movies, and a chance encounter combined to make him very broke and willing to try anything, ie. a Friday club or KTV gigolo club.
BTW - This is all a while ago now so i have no idea if these gigolo KTVs still exist – Back then we didn’t all have beer bellies.
We take up the story a few months after he started work. Below is what he told us it was like.
The gigolos sat at one end of the KTV behind a glass screen, up straight on their chairs waiting to be picked. When the women came they could select a guy or behave embarrassed, sit in one of the high-back sofa booths that surrounded the dance floor and wait to see who was sent. The first night he had at once been repulsed and excited by what he was going to do - And scared; scared mainly because he had a bad temper and he knew that if he met someone rude he was likely to be fired first night for retaliation. He knew the substance of the job was to entertain and charm, and of course he could do that. He had charmed girls, friends and family before to get his own way, but he could walk off or shout if they were rude, now he was very aware that he was supposed to smile and blame himself. If they didn’t want him to sit at the table he couldn't say, ‘Fuck you then bitch.’
He said he had got all competitive about being chosen at first, until he realized he was the only foreigner at the club and therefore only really competing with himself – Taiwanese generally have an opinion on race so they were not considering whether they wanted the tall, fair-skinned, blonde guy on the left or the yellow-skinned dark-haired guy on the right.
He had also had to make many adjustments to his style.
As a man he had spent his whole life trying to get his grubby hands on women - theirs on him - and then drag them back to his cave at the earliest opportunity - Words spoken in lead up to sex were inversely proportion to excitement of the event as far as he was concerned.
“You will come to my house tonight?” asked a client.
“Of course!” he answered the first time he was asked, only for his colleague to pull him over.
Colleague: “Pierre come here. How many times have you seen her?”
“Once.”
“That is not the way it is done,” he replied, explaining that you were supposed to say no to keep them coming back, spending money in the place, and the more you said , no, the more presents and money you would get.
“But she wants it,” replied Pierre. “What about feeling her up? She just asked me to touch her boob?”
“Any promises of a watch?” said his colleague.
“No,” said Pierre. “I mean. I will enjoy...Really. I am happy to do for free – Ok. I understand…Jesus, this is no fun.”
“You are not here for fun,” said the colleague.
“I seem to be learning that,” replied Pierre.
On the first evening he had rushed back home to change his boxers because he expected to be taking his clothes off in the club. His image of these kind of bars had been set by his one visit to the male equivalent - Girls came in g-strings and bras, which they removed extremely quickly on pain of being thrown out of the room, while the guys helped themselves to a grope of any body part they wanted. He had been looked forward to that, later disappointed to find out he was not going to have a bunch of women groping him up and down and ripping off his shirt. His new suit had stayed firmly on.
Two main motivations brought women to the club: loneliness and desire to be given respect. It could be just one of these emotions; usually was both, and each woman had their own unique ratio. About half the women who came to the club were young hostesses, who after a week of waiting on men, now wanted to get a little attention themselves. Pierre hadn't got the hang of demanding watches yet or the fact that this was supposed to be a job, so he preferred to spend his time with these hostesses, because he didn’t feel have to feel sorry for them. They destroyed the myth that all women in this profession were victims: If they had been born boys they would now be gangsters, and there would be no debate about them being bad people. They were rude, crude, hard but fun; they were not here to complain and moan about their unhappy lives for two hours, like the older ones, and having spent the week aware of its financial value, they were not interested in sex. They were interested in drinking a lot of whiskey though and he was paid commission on how much alcohol he got them to buy. And the only way you got them to buy more alcohol was to keep toasting them, and downing drinks yourself. The blinder drunk you were by the end of the evening, the more you had earned. Good for Pierre but really bad for us, as it meant we had to put up with himre at his obnoxiously worst, staggering and tottering around the disco at five or six in the morning.
“You can’t stand up you twat! Go home,” yelled John over the music. “You are going to fuck up your suit and then I’ll have to lend you more money.”
Pierre's capacity for the melodramatic was 24/7. He never went off air, took a break for adverts, or went on strike for better pay. And, he could bring attention to himself in a fifty-thousand strong stampeding crowd.
“Do you think people guess what I am up to? Pretty fucking obvious I suppose,” said Pierre. It was not obvious, at all. Yes, he was in a disco that was ninety-nine percent populated by people in jeans and t-shirts, but this was Taiwan and so nobody cared too much what you were wearing. If they did notice, they assumed you were just one of those businessmen who occasionally turned up, sweating in the corner looking bewildered.
“If you say so,” I said trying to limit the conversation. Before I had said no and he had gone on for hours talking about how other people weren't as naieve as me.
Unfortunately, it wasn't the end. “Fuck. Really,” he replied. “I heard some guys were thrown out for doing similar. I guess they are not as smart as me about it, but still you have to be careful. If anyone asks you, you deny it don't you?”
Of course I couldn't bring myself to answer. To lower myself.
“Dan,” he said. “You are a friend. I trust you. I know you are a nice guy and I know you like your stories but this is serious stuff...”
I started to fume. “Look behind you,” I said. “There is an older woman waving at you.”
He looked. I disappeared to the other side of the disco. Fortunately, our paths didn't cross again that evening.
Apparently, he made Eric spend half an hour searching the disco looking for the older Taiwan lady.

Mothers, old people and their scooters

Taiwanese mothers and scooters
“I saw the kid go into the air and hit the car window,” said the wife after finishing throwing up. We had just witnessed a motorcycle accident in which a father was missing a daughter and a wife.
The woman in question had of course not been looking when she came out of the lane at speed assuming there would be no traffic on the 10-lane road. It wasn't the first time. Mothers on scooters are one of the most tragic thing you will ever see - Sat bolt upright, one or two children riding pillion, they never look anywhere but straight ahead, ignoring completely the inconvenient presence of other traffic on the road. Perversely the more children they have on the scooter the more dangerously they drive: usually one or two; three means they are unlikely to get through that day. Under constant time pressure - after finishing work, they rush desperately to get their kids to evening class – hence two kids, means two schools and more danger – then get home in time to cook the parents-in-laws' dinner, while deep down the stress is stirring feelings of unfairness: if my husband can’t afford to get me a car, then he is not working hard enough; if his children die on the road, it is his fault and with that she declares defeat in the daily battle to manage everything. She decides the consequences for her of not getting the mother-in-laws dinner are more painful than not looking at the other traffic on the road and she ploughs on ahead.
School gates are the worse place in the world to be stuck around school finishing time as thousands of like-minded mothers: dragged kids onto scooters, let them down again when they realized they were not theirs, picked them up again after they fell off the back, and then picked everyone up when the scooter in front of them, that appeared not to be in the way was. All this, like baby turtles rushing to the sea, just to get into the traffic and be the first statistic of the day.
“Hao dao mei. (So unlucky),” sighed the wife. As usual luck dealt someone a cruel blow, forcing them to plow across the road blind past a parked van.
Old people
Old people are really different when they are driving: they actually do look first, but still pull out - which kind of makes you begrudgingly respect their absolute selfishness and lack of respect for anyone else on the road. Case in point (almost everyday). An old man was coming down the wrong side of the road slowly in my direction so I applied my horn in a manner that would get me the 10 years for disturbing the peace in the west. The old man looks up reluctantly because he knows he is driving down the wrong side of the road in my direction, and is selfish not stupid; he stares blankly, sees he is not going to be hurt just inconvenience me and the whole road. He then slows down even more and eases himself across my path into the parking space that he was going to park in whether the rest of the world existed or not. I duly applied my brakes hard and hoped the car behind didn't run over me.

Teach English in Asia: Eric and the eight-year old Taiwanese intellectuals

As I say Eric had had a reaction from hell to the idea that all westerners can think independently and the Taiwanese couldn't. On one occasion he had been substituting for me at my school.
“Hey, Dan, what is up with the boss at your school?” said Eric while we were having lunch.
I didn't need to ask him what exactly the problem is. “Yes, Eric, I need to talk to you about that...”
Apparently he had been teaching them the sentence: 'What do you like? - I like music.' And it had turned into: 'Do you like....?” And when the kids answered, 'No, I don't', he had asked, 'Why?' And of course they didn't know why...and it was pointless and stupid and not part of the repetition exercise, but he had stood there for 10 minutes repeatedly asking why until all the energy from the room had dissipated away and the kids started climbing on the chairs. Unfortunately, this had happened more than once.
It was necessary of course because Asian education system was based on rote learning and memorization, and so they needed his help to teach opinion forming and the ability to think abstractly.
“Eric,” I said. “They are eight years old. No education system in the world believes eight year-olds can debate politics. And frankly it is not an admirable skill as most politicians are full of shit.”
Still, I knew it was pointless - he was sure that when he was 11, in between reading comics, playing on his skateboard and sniggering over a pack of cards of naked women he kept in his underwear; cards that he coveted, took out and pawed over and examined so often if he could use them in Vegas he would be a billionaire, he could debate with lawyers and politicians. So what if the entire education establishment – western and eastern - believed kids of that age needed discipline, repetition and order, he knew better.
Man, I am doing you a service here. Get these Asian thinking when they are young,” he replied.
“Well, you will have to do a service at another school if you continue as my boss doesn't want you back,” I replied. “Again, if you want to eat sometimes you have to keep your mouth shut.”
“Man, this culture,” said Eric, pulling this big offended face because: why were these people again stifling his creativity.
We paused for a moment both taking a breather from our frustrations at each other.
John was the next to speak. “Look at that guy in the suit,” he said. “More specifically the ass pant of his trousers. Now that is an Asian cultural difference.”
“What are you talking about? I asked.
“He has been in that toilet for twenty minutes and it is a squat toilet – I know because I was there earlier; in and out in less than a minute, precariously trying to support myself over the bowl by putting my hand on the back wall – still it killed my thighs in seconds and at the end I had to check the back of my trousers hoping for no accidents. That guy went in there in his best suit, read a newspaper, did his business and hasn't even broken a sweat. Man, these people can squat.”
“It is beautiful when they are on top,” mused Pierre.
“Ahem.”

Expat and studying Chinese: The friend who never learns Chinese

We all have a friend who still can't speak much Chinese after 10 years in Taiwan, that was John. At once best able to deal with the Taiwanese but not able to say more than 20 words of their language. Because of it you would get stupid phone calls like the one below.
I was in an important meeting:
“Dan I am getting a hair cut, and these girls don’t seem to understand what am saying,” said John agitated.
“I am kind of in a meeting, John,” I said. “Don't you have a girlfriend for the week or something who can deal with this?”
I said this because taking you to the hairdresser was one of the P.A roles a Taiwanese girl performs for her new boyfriend. Among the hundreds of little tasks we passed onto our girlfriends this was actually one of the most necessary - Applying for a phone number could be done ourselves because their would be someone in the office wanting to practice their English, and even if you insisted on speaking English when ordering your pizza their would be a student who could sort it out, but hairdressers were populated by girls who left school at sixteen and were not so fantastic in their own language, let alone English.
In fact, most of the younger girls loved taking you to the hairdresser and it was great to see the competition that would play out between stylist and girlfriend:
Stylist would be just giving girl in question a knowing dirty look about her being a stupid whoring western lover.
Girlfriend: ‘Have you ever cut western hair before…isn’t it so soft…please shave his neck; you know he has too much hair, it like that all over his chest.’
The stylists would be polite, complimenting the girl on her English.
Girlfriend: 'Have you ever had a foreign boyfriend before?”
Stylist: 'No, my English is so poor.” Trying to be polite.
Girlfriend: 'Many foreigners these days can speak Chinese.'
Stylist: 'Really?' While thinking: 'Who cares? I am not a stuck up fucking whore…Anyway, you know he is going to dump you soon and return to his country.’
Back to the conversation with John:
“I was walking past this place and it said haircuts for 200,” he said. I wondered why he insisted on trying to get a cheap haircut when he earned a lot of money.
“You read Chinese?” I replied.
“Yeah. My Chinese isn’t that bad, you bastard.” Then why are you calling me, I thought.
“Look, mate. Can you help? They have me sat in the chair here with the apron on for a while now and I am feeling like a right tool.”
It seems girls didn’t know what to do with him and so came back and forth every 5 minutes or so to check if he had learned to speak Chinese.
“She is back again, how to say, ‘just a little off the sides’?”
“Pang bien, duan e dien dien,” I said.
“Pang bieng, dan e dien dieng,” repeated John. All the tones wrong and some of the actual sounds.
“She’s not responding,” he said.
I excused myself from the meeting and went outside the door.
“Give the phone to her,” I said.
I then took the assistant step-by-step through how to cut his hair. It was a weird feeling, describing how to cut another man’s hair; like buying shirts for a guy and telling the assistant: “Well, he has a large muscular chest…” A little too intimate, and I wanted to go home for a shower.
I then went back into the meeting ready to apologize profusely for answering my phone. It didn't matter as they had all taken their chance with the foreigner gone to start dialing away.
Twenty minutes later and my phone was ringing again.
“Hey, Dan,” said John.
“What?”
“She says it isn't 200.”