Unit Pricing

My first year in Taiwan, which began in July of 1976, was spent in Tainan. Though I didn’t live there again until 2008, I occasionally visited during the decades of my sojourn in Kaohsiung City, a mere 50 kilometers away. When in Tainan, I frequently walked down a particular street and would always recall, “that’s the place where I drank my first ever bottle of Taiwan Beer.”

I’d grown up in Los Angeles. Though my parents always had beer in the fridge, and frequently a can in hand, I was told: “it’s for grownups.” At church a lot of the training passed along in youth groups was about never drinking intoxicants.  Being wired on coffee and overweight because of sugary desserts was fine. Alcohol was “un-Christian.” I resolved the mixed messages after high school when I joined the army and began to imbibe judiciously. I was too much of a cheapskate to get drunk.

That judiciousness continued, and maybe still does.  At about the age of 60, though, my consumption increased. I’d buy about 6 cans per week, usually when I went grocery shopping on Saturday.  My cheapskate ways prevailed. I figured out that the best price was for 3 “tall” cans of Taiwan Tsing-tao (brewed in Pingtung) at the local RT Mart hypermarket. Bought in 3-packs, the price came to about $NT31 per can. 

When I retired to Holland, MI 20 months ago, finding “my beer” became a quest. Holland is home to many craft breweries. When I eat at one of them I pay the going rate for a glass of something good without blinking. It’s all part of the meal.  But, to purchase for the fridge I stick to the supermarket. A few months of poking around helped me find a “price point” with which I was comfortable. I became accustomed to different brands so long as they didn’t vary too much above my price, and they all tasted fairly much the same there, not good beer, but comparable to Taiwan Tsing-tao.  

In this season of plague and lockdown we’ve chosen to order a meal delivered once per week. A few nights ago we had a delivery from a local brew pub. We added a 4-pack of one of their signature products. Good beer, to be sure, but at three times the price of Taiwan Tsing-tao, I yearned, once more, for my home across the Pacific.

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Organ Donors

We were in Kaohsiung, Taiwan through the entire 1990s. During that time, Taiwan’s government put into place a law requiring people riding motorcycles to wear helmets.  Old guys with whom I sat by the streetside complained, “it’s only to profit the manufacturers and sellers of helmets”, and “you’ll never see a grandmother with one on.”  They were wrong. The first few weeks there were reserve police officers at every major intersection. When the light turned red he or she would wade into the scrum of motorbikes and begin writing citations. People began to comply, if not to protect their lives and heads, then to protect their money.

By Prince Roy – originally posted to Flickr as Taipei: Old School, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4556340

 

Men and women who “drive the big rigs” on interstate highways in the USA have colorful nicknames for the others on the highway. The Highway Patrol Officer, the cattle truck, the small sedan and the motorcyclist are all designated by shorthand.  Motorcyclists are called “organ donors”. I used to refer to unhelmeted motor scooter pilots in Taiwan, especially those weaving through traffic at high speed, the same way.

Motorcycle helmet laws in the United States vary by location. Only three of the fifty states are entirely unregulated. In some others, only people under the age of 21 are required to wear safety protection. The State of Florida is one of these. Anyone on two wheels and a motor over the age of 21 is welcome to join the organ donor class.

Recently, in this time of plague, the Republican governor there has welcomed another class of people into the “take your life into your own hands” crowd.  Fundamentalists of all religions are free to gather in large groups indoors for worship and prayer. As in other places, religious gatherings have been demonstrated to be hotspots for the spread of disease. People will die, not FOR their faith, but OF their faith. Governor DeSantis said that he didn’t think it necessary to order churches to stop gathering. He’s ecumenical, though.  It doesn’t matter if the congregations are Christian, Muslim, Jewish or Jain, getting together is all up to the members.

Sadly, when like the two-wheel-equipped death-wishers these folks get what they’re asking for, they’ll not be eligible donors.

David Alexander resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Back to the Boss

The Boss has been a very present help in times of trouble in the past couple of years. 

Winding down in Taiwan, teaching the last classes, preaching the last sermons, preparing to leave the country of our children’s births, the communities of faith that we’d become part of, the jobs that were integral to our identity, and the beauty of the Taiwanese language, we needed help and solace.  To tell people “you’ve got God” rolls off of the tongue all too easily. I’m grateful to God that I also had the companionship of the Boss as I mourned those losses.

We’d transitioned from living in employer provided housing to being first-time home owners. The 93 year old structure with a yard and unattached garage came with challenges. My wife’s mother, who lived in retirement housing a few kilometers away, was having health problems, and she passed away only 11  months after our relocation. To tell people “you’ve got God” rolls off of the tongue all too easily.  I’m grateful to God that I also had the companionship of the Boss as I mourned those losses.

Now there’s a plague and a lockdown. We’re in the house a lot. The weather is not yet warm enough

for me to start many projects in that garage… fingers chill all too soon and paint doesn’t dry very quickly.  So I’ve taken to sorting out decades of photographs that have resided in 

boxes, and scanning them. As I review the life I’ve lived, looking at the record of good times and bad, emotions are close. To tell people “you’ve got God” rolls off of the tongue all too easily.  I’m grateful to God that I also had the companionship of the Boss as I mourned those losses.

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Empty Streets

Our home was in central Kaohsiung City from 1982 to 2007, and from then on until we retired and departed Taiwan in 2018, in central Tainan City. There is much that can be said about those two places, including that there’s never a time when nothing is moving on the streets. The contrast with where we live now, in Holland, MI during a time of lockdown, couldn’t be greater.

We go out and walk, because that’s about the only outdoor activity possible for us. We can’t be socially connected with ANYONE for another 4 weeks, and already it’s been 3 weeks that we’ve been inside.  As things get more and more serious, we find ourselves even crossing the street when we meet people coming our way. And nobody seems to mind. Smiles and waves from across the street are the most common reaction to seeing someone avoid you. 

What’s amazing is that crossing the streets requires only a cursory glance to make sure there’s not a car or truck coming. That’s how few vehicles we see. 

The air is clearer than it has been for a long time.  If we were people depending on current employment, we’d have a second worry. For now our only concern is disease.  Getting run over by a bus just isn’t on the list. 

 

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

More Trains

Soon after Taiwan’s high speed rail began running in 2007, we moved from Kaohsiung (where we’d resided since 1982) to Tainan (where we remained until retiring in 2018). Though there was a Tainan High Speed Rail station, it was located several kilometers from the city center, and the branch line of the regular Taiwan Rail Company to the High-speed station was still years away. 

Our residence was near to the Taiwan Rail Company’s central city station, and only a couple of blocks from us there was a level crossing where traffic would have to stop whenever a train passed. At peak travel times, this could happen frequently.  When the branch line to the high speed station opened, 4 more trains passed through every hour. Drivers of ambulances to the emergency room at the hospital next door learned to take alternate routes.

Through our years of Taiwan life, we often sojourned in the town where we’ve now retired, Holland, MI for months at a time. Tracks bisect the city, and there are frequent trains, including daily passenger service to and from Chicago. Freight is another matter. I recall a time we were here 20 years ago when the US economy was booming, and the freights going both directions were long and almost hourly. Lately, however, it seems that apart from that daily passenger service and frequent unit trains carrying 120 cars of coal to a nearby power plant, there’s not much moving through here.

At least, until a couple weeks ago.  Amtrak suspended our passenger service due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but some company or other has seen to it that we hear the sound of horns and rolling stock through the day.  I’ve not been out to see what that may be, but every time I hear that lonesome whistle blow, and it’s not on the schedule for the now suspended passenger service, I wonder what’s up.

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Chainsaw Massacres

The last 11 years of our residence in Taiwan were on the campus of Tainan Theological College, a parklike oasis in the middle of an otherwise noisy city. Part of the land on which the college sat had been purchased from a man who had planted it in a variety of fruit and exotic trees in the 19th century. To a certain extent, these trees were left in place and buildings situated between them. Not wanting anyone to walk past in ignorance, subsequent educators had labeled many varieties. Living on campus, I learned to identify Australian Beefwood, Cuban Mahogany, Poinciana and Camphor. 

A few years of “deferred maintenance” had led to overgrowth. A passing typhoon could result in banyan trees toppling over. These had to be sawn apart and removed.  In the summer of 2010 something evening more destructive arrived, a tree trimming crew. Equipped with cranes, tractors, and dump trucks, they perpetuated a chainsaw massacre, lopping off branches, topping tall trees, removing nuisance bushes, and generally bringing the sky back to ground level. A walkway that had been blocked by crooked juniper trees became useful again.

Where we now live, on a street in Holland, Michigan, we experienced a chainsaw massacre in 2019. The city was replacing hundred-year-old water mains, storm drains and sanitary sewers. For six blocks, almost every street-side tree was removed. Now, just one street north of us, people live in a green tunnel of foliage. By contrast, we’re in a desert. 

After construction finished, our newly paved street, with new curbs, driveway aprons and sidewalks, was also gifted with new trees. Spindly little things held up by posts until they take root. A few people along the block have tied colorful pieces of cloth and other decorations to them as a way to cheer the visage of a city on lockdown during the current plague. If we can’t have leaves (yet) or even tree trunks (for a few years to come), we can, at least, have color.

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Signs, Names and Clarity

Urban architecture in Taiwan is a mixed bag. Big factories are generally in places designed and zoned for industry, with attendant wide roads for truck access,  but there are older areas where small workshops sit cheek-by-jowl with private residences. On East Gate Road in Tainan, between the Great East Gate and the viaduct that crosses the railroad tracks about 400 meters away, there’s a blacksmith shop with a forge and hydraulic hammer. From only a few feet away one can watch a young man pounding on red-hot steel tools he’s making or repairing. More shops along the north side of that stretch of road are choc-a-bloc with pieces of jackhammers, drills and other noisy stuff.

Holland, Michigan, where I now reside, is home to lots of industry. What was once Heinz Pickle Company’s largest cannery is a short walk from my home. It sits in a mixed industrial/commercial/residential neighborhood about a block from several mid-sized factories. Out on the edge of town” things get big. This is not quite as intertwined as residence and manufacturing in Taiwan, but neither is it as spatially segregated as  what I grew up around in the San Fernando Valley in California. 

What interests me today is the names on buildings. What went on in that forge and those tool shops near my home in Tainan was clear. What goes on in the big factories in Tainan’s Anping Industrial Zone may be less clear from the road, but just might (I say might) be understandable if one reads the company’s name. On one large wall of the Heinz works, there’s a sign shaped like a pickle. Holland also hosts a “Bowl MIll” and the “Holland Bar Stool Company” (both pretty clear). But as for  “Power Manufacturing”, “Challenge Manufacturing” and “Nuvar Incorporated”, other than the idea that they make things, one cannot get the faintest impression of just what. 

A couple days ago, out on a walk on otherwise empty streets, we through the employees’ parking lot at a factory a block from Heinz.  From its name, we’ve NO IDEA what goes on there, but it sounds like something out of the Jetsons. The signs on the wall declare it to be “Thermotron Industries”.  I’m sure I could look it up, but I’d rather just look in the door, like at that forge in Tainan, and see young men making thermotrons.

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Grid Walks

During the last 4 or 5 years that we lived in Tainan, my wife persuaded me to take up walking for exercise. Our residence was near to a local elementary school, the gates of which were permanently open, and the athletic field of which was generally unoccupied before 7AM and after 6PM.  On most days, we’d walk several laps around the track either morning or evening, and sometimes even both. Walking laps is mind-numbingly simple. 

Where we live now, in Michigan, there’s not a school with an open track nearby, but that’s not really a problem, because unlike Tainan, the streets are motor-scooter free and the sidewalks are actually flat. We enjoy pleasant walks around the neighborhood. During the winter, that’s not always possible, because though the sidewalks are flat, they are icy. Besides, it’s just too cottin pickin’ cold out there.  In recent weeks, though, we’ve found outdoor walks to be a necessary relief from being cooped up, social-distancing indoors. This being an American city, we encounter more SUVs than pedestrians while out. 

We began something different a few days ago. Instead of getting out the front door and asking ourselves about a directional vector (East, West, South or North) we’ve begun walking the grid in our neighborhood, starting at a corner of one of the north-south avenues and walking west several blocks to another one, then going a block over, and heading back east. We’re still near home, but are discovering blocks we’ve not walkde before and delightful vistas that were yet unseen by us. 

Tainan could have been like that, except… streets curved, sidewalks stepped up and down, and there were motor scooters buzzing everywhere. 

But still, there was NEVER ice. 

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

On the Porch

According to the calendar, winter is over. The weather seems to have cooperated with that date this year. Our house faces north, so our porch, which is glassed in, isn’t yet as warm as those on houses that face south, but it was several degrees warmer in there this afternoon.

I sat out there for part of an hour, on one piece of furniture that will be moved to the yard with my feet up on another that’s likely to go onto the local Craigslist free section soon. But there was other stuff out there, too. Three bags of groceries which had been delivered the day before and which were awaiting decontamination before their contents would be allowed into the house. 

We wouldn’t have been able to leave bags of groceries on the porch in Taiwan. Where we resided in Kaohsiung for 25 years, they would have soon been filled with ants and roaches, a product of the tropical environment.  Where we lived in Tainan for our final 11 years, on a parklike college campus in central Tainan, they’d likely have become subject to exploration and sampling by stray cats and wandering rodents (otherwise known as “stray cat food”). Both the cats and the rodents were the product of crowded living in Taiwan, which is no more rodent and cat infested than any other crowded place.  Hey, it happens.

 

So though we can leave bags of groceries on the porch here, I’d still rather be in Taiwan.

 

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.

Sometimes it’s hard to be a ___________

Through the many years I resided in Taiwan, the bad old days of Martial Law and one-party rule, the transition to a “cautious” democracy in the 90s, the raucous years of “anything goes” from 2000 to 2008 under the first opposition-party president, and even the healthy back and forth since then, I was not a citizen and therefore had no right to vote. This did not stop me from identifying with one end of the political spectrum, even so far as to make a couple speeches at rallies for the “national development party”, a radical pro-independence group in 1998.

That party folded. Many other parties came and went. I received Taiwan citizenship in 2018, but I didn’t sign up with any party. Instead, I retired and moved abroad.  In January this year I returned to cast my first presidential and legislative election votes. I was pretty sure that the election would go the way I wanted (hint, it did), but, nonetheless, was concerned that the rabid populism, into which the KMT and its supporters in China had fallen, might turn things the other way.  It turns out, though, that results in both the presidential and the legislative polls made it pretty hard to be a KMT member or supporter Taiwan on January 12th. It was so hard that even the party’s central committee had trouble finding someone to step up and take charge.

 

Election year is past in Taiwan, but it’s still election year where I live in the USA. One cannot tell which way the nation may go when election day finally rolls around, but events connected to the shutdown of operations at schools, transport and commerce, PLUS the giant bailout recently passed by the government, make it fairly sure that it’s pretty hard to be a Libertarian this week. I’m glad that I’m not one of them, either. 

 

David Alexander now resides in Holland, MI after 39 years in Taiwan.