Foreigner perception in Taiwan : westerners and Taiwanese girls

Is a somewhat sensitive issue. Although nothing close to what I’ve seen in Thailand, there are some sensitivities in Taiwan, even at the rural city of Tainan. I’ve had a few triggers that brought this issue up this week. The last of them was this very peculiar post on Tainan Bulletin, the leading expat-foreigner board in Tainan :

for Taiwnaese Girl – WATCH OUT! A CHEATER IN TAINAN & KAOHSIUNG…

I am Taiwnaese, I met this guy two months ago. He is from
-Fili: origin removed-. He pretends a good guy
to be with girls and give girls expection about future with him. He
got 4 girlfriends in the same time. They think he will marry them. He
is easy to jealous and makes girls feel guilty to believe how much he
love them. He pretend he just only you to make you think you are in
an exclusive rellationship. Actually not, he plays around and he is a
hunter!
He has financial problem also he is a drunker. He need girls to
take care him, so he lies every girl who had sex with him and try to
control them. He is a really good cheater. Taiwanese girls watch out
this guy!
His goal is any kind of girl from 15-40 years old also fat or thin
accepted by him; any kind!!! He got a 15 years old girlfriend before,
the girl was the student in his cram school. Don’t believe him if he
said how much he loved his ex-girlfriend; because he never stays in
an exculsive relationship.
Maybe someone prefer to open relationship, but they will not cheat
girls that i only love you, i will marry you, etc. It is necessary to
have honest in a relationship, right? Taiwanese Grils are not pawns!!!
He was born in 1966; but when he wants to hunt young girl, he will
tell them that he is just 30’s. He has black hair and brown eyes. He
is about 174 cm and 85 kg. He likes to go to Armory in Tainan for
drinking and hunting; but he will tell you his favoriate food is
Ginger Duck Hotpot. He acts that he is a local guy than you are. He
says he loves Tainan and tells you he will stay here for a long
time. Girls are easy to believe him because he pretends very nice.
He plays with kids, see girls family, etc. he is an amaeing cheater!
Other pravicy information, i can’t type here in public. But if you
want to know, i will tell you in pravicy. Unfortunately, I didn’t
catch his pics because I didn’t think he is a cheater…I assumed I
will stay with him in a exclusive relationship for a long time.
Just for Taiwanese girls, watch out this guy. I don’t hope any girl
be hurt by this guy again!
By the way, there is website:
http://blog.pixnet.net/erica1227/post/3777328 for Taiwanese girls
reference. If you want to date with forigners, some difference of
culture between east and west have to be noticed.
Wish everybody gets happiness!

DMOG. If you skipped it – please note a link to a Chinese ‘guide’ for Taiwanese girls on dating foreigners. Earlier this month, I mentioned a whole board in Chinese built for the frustrated Taiwanese girls.

These kind of posts scare me a little. It kind of reminds me of the Haravak sex-blog scandal in Israel , or maybe a little of the Sex and Shanghai get-back-at-the-sex-exploiting-foreigner China gig. This post resulted in a few replies with some more details including the guy’s name. Now, without knowing anything about what went on in that relationship or having ever met this Taiwanese girl or the lad, this is troubling – on many levels. This goes to the essence of the Taiwanese girls – Foreigner boys sensitivity and the perception of foreigners here in Tainan-Taiwan.

Looking at 15-20 apartments before finding the one I’m in, I’ve had the occasional apartment owner ask me personal questions indirectly through the friend or the agent about my dating and girls related life. For the first apartment I took for a trial month (and gave up on), ran by a very sweet couple, my friend was asked quite bluntly whether I was planning on having a different girl in there every night. When I wondered why the hell they would ask him some like that about me, my friend told me that they’re a bit worried because foreigners have a bad reputation in Tainan. Do they now?

I was in a travel agency this week to make a VISA for my winter break, when I came across Xpat magazine’s first issue from 2005. Fascinated, I sat down and read the whole thing. In there, was a humorous sad story about the difficulties for foreigners of finding a good apartment in Taipei, because of the foreigner reputation of hosting wild org-ies and loud sex parties. The story described an owner who insisted that the boys commit to never ever bringing any girl into their apartment for the whole duration of their stay.

Now, I have to say, that although some of the foreigners I meet here are players, to be fair – some of the Taiwanese I met here are players too. For example, on my second week here, I went into a place to get something to eat and soon became friends with the young lady making the food. We sat down and talked alot, her husband joined in after a while, and so in the evening when she went to take care of the children he invited me out for a beer with his friends. I wasn’t sure that was a good idea since my Chinese was still too basic and his English non-existent but thought it would be fun. I was taken to a love-motel to pick up one friend and was then joined by another Taiwanese guy working in security, I think. After about 5 minutes of chitchatting, the guy from the love motel tells me that the sexy girl working with him who saw me for a split second thought I was gorgeous and offer me her number. I politely say “thank you, no” and explained that I was taken at the time. He stared at me for 3 seconds, then bursted out laughing, saying – “yeah, yeah, okay, then…”. I said – “really, don’t want to, can’t, won’t”. Refusing to understand the Taiwanese guy went into telling me about his exciting life juggling between two soon-to-be-very-miserable girls. He seemed a little disappointed with himself at the time, as he usually does this with at least 4 local girls. “It’s difficult life”, he insisted of sharing with me, “a lot of lying and hiding, but it’s worth it for the great sex!”. Whatever, man. The other two Taiwanese nodded passionately through the whole speech, laughing their ass off at those girls.

Anyways, my point is, you’ve got all types in all cultures. Making this a general rule about foreigners in Taiwan creates a big stereotype problem. Why make this about cultural differences in dating like this is what all foreigners do, and why – in any case – post this on the Internet, and in the expat forums of all places. In Israel – you can get sued/arrested for something like that, if the person described decides to press charges.