Cultural Differences

Star Date: July 22, 2009

Although it has only been a little over 2 weeks in Taiwan I must say I've definitely noticed some cultural differences here. Some that we should have in the U.S. and some I'm glad we don't have.

First and foremost, the toilet system in Taiwan. Now, this isn't 6 years ago where nearly every single toilet was a hole in the ground, although those still remain. Most places now have flush toilets. But here's the catch, you don't throw your toilet paper down into the toilet, you throw it in a waste basket next to the toilet. I still don't understand the reasoning behind this. Why would you want to stink up the bathroom or have to look at your toilet paper again every time you go to the bathroom? And what's even worse is, if you throw even one little bit of toilet paper into the toilet, it punishes you but completely clogging up the plumbing system and blowing up feces all over the bathroom. Whooo.

Squat toilets still exist in many of the public bathrooms, and as an added bonus you have to bring your own toilet paper.

Speaking of waste another thing that's highly noticeable is the complete lack of trash cans around. Now, in the U.S. you can't go into a restaurant or walk down the street without seeing at least 10 trash cans. Now whether people actually make use of them is a whole other story. But in Taiwan there are virtually no trashcans, except maybe one for a 5 block radius. It's insane to have to carry your trash around until you find a trashcan or some store employee is nice enough to take it for you.

Which brings me to my next point, at all the restaurants they usually don't give you any napkins. If you've seen me at the dining halls you would know how many napkins I go through. By the end of the meal I usually have a small mountain of napkins in the corner of my tray. But here they don't even have any on hand! And if you're lucky enough to find any they're about the size of a playing card, and rip after one time use. Real handy.

But it is not all gloom and doom here, one of the most refreshing things to see is you don't have to tip anyone at all!! Things are already cheap as it is but when you don't have to tip that's just the cherry on top. Waiters, taxi drivers, bartenders, you name it you don't have to tip! Sometimes I'll tip if the service is really good or the taxi driver is really friendly, but usually you don't need to and they don't want you to. Awesome. I must say everyone you meet is really friendly and more than willing to help you find what you're looking for or go out of their way to help you which is a completely different attitude than LA or NYC.

On the subject of food and convenience, McDonald's delivers!! How awesome is that haha I can get french fries delivered to me at 3am if I wanted to without even leaving my room, AND I don't have to tip (even though I'm not that big of a jerk haha). Most fast food places deliver and are open 24/7.

One thing that really amuses me out here is in the food, nearly everything has corn in it, no matter what type of food. The other day we ordered Domino's and what was underneath the cheese? Corn. Ordered a salad. Corn. Got a sandwich from 7-11. Corn inside. Dinner at the dining hall? Yep, corn with pudding.

For those of you that have driven in East LA (Rowland Heights, San Gabriel, Arcadia, etc) you know how crappy and crazy Asian drivers are. Now imagine a country full of Asian drivers that have even less regard for pedestrians and the rules of the road and you have Taiwan. Its definitely a free for all on the roads. People don't even drive in their lanes! It's more common to see cars driving in the middle of the lane dividers. And you can all but forget about traffic lights, because those are just suggestions.

Now I know why people look at American's differently and why we think FOBs are so weird. Stay tuned for the next post: Food part 2 woo woo.