Has the political situation in Taiwan affected expats?

Not one bit.

However the Canadian government did have a travel advisory for Taipei a few weeks ago. To avoid large crowds and demonstrations.

Down south, it is only a topic of conversation

There has been less violence on the streets than occurs weekly in the Legislative Yuan (pushing, mostly).

Been in TPE around 5 months now - relocated from NY
As most previous posters have said, very easy city to get around. Most things are fairly easily available. Decent choice of restaurants etc.
"Forumosa" is a pretty good site to check out to get a better feel for some specific topics...

Cheers!
:)

Two factors to compare for Taipei vs. HK:

(1) Environmental air pollution in HK is worse than Taipei. HK is getting progressively worse in last 3 years mainly from the polluting factories in Shenzen... media reports of increasing number of long-time western expats with children (who have been afflicted with asthma) have recently decided to leave HK. If you have breathing problem/ lung condition, this is factor.

(2) Without knowing your focus of business... Taipei is better for high tech assignment. HK is better for investment banking and finance-related marketing assignments.

This getting to sound like NYC vs. LA type discussion - although I would still maintain HK is truly an international city ;)

I think it's fair to conclude you can't go wrong with either location.

Thanks for all the tips. At the moment, the project is on hold because of that age old issue: money (and how much). I do feel comfortable about Taiwan, however -- it certainly doesn't sound like a bad place to spend a year or two. So I hope it ultimately pans out.

Actually just wondering? Why is this thread in the China thread?

Is flyertalk siding with China's stand that Taiwan is part of China? :p
Shouldn't it be in the other asia forum?

In case it helps to update this thread... I can specify that Burt Wolf did a very good two-part series (approx. 50 minutes run time) for his most recent tv/pbs series.

You can find a link to materials related to the program at his website at: http://www.burtwolf.com/travels2.htm

One might also be able to gain a copy of the episodes through your local public library.

The more-recent-practice of FT shows, at least, that Taiwan threads are not "part of the China domain."

This same problem presents itself when looking in bookstores or libraries for guide books (i.e., whether Taiwan is part of guidebooks on "China" or not).

Taiwan is still the best place to learn mandarin. We speak the same langugage as China. Though we are using complicated chinese, it is not so different. HK is modern and good to live but u get less exposed to mandarin there. Most of hk people are learning more or less mandarin in recent years but certainly we found their mandarin are difficult to undersand

Totally agree. With limited mandarin, when comparing Beijing, Shanghai and Taipei, I understand lots more in Taipei than the other two cities. They just speak mandarin 'clearer'. Less slurs, and 'ar's.

I'm still trying to find a learning conversational chinese audio cd that's made from Taiwan. All the ones I can get in the states are from China and use the Beijing mandarin.

and just to be on topic, Taipei reminds me of HK in the 80s. It's just not as modern as HK today.

I know what you are getting at but most of the Universities and Mandrin languages classes teach "Beijing hwa". Most of the universities use one of two textbooks "Practical Audio Visual Chinese" and / or "Far East Mandarin" Both are of Taiwan orgin. If speaking and listening is more important to you then Far East Mandrin is a better bet but if you want a comprehensive understanding of grammar, sentence structure, tones and vocab "Practical Audio" is great.

If you actually go to the Mandrin schools here, they all teach "Beijing hua" but good teachers actually diferentiate the difference between Mandrin in N China, South China and Taiwan. You are right that Beijing hua sounds harsher but all is acceptable in the end.

Personally, I prefer to learn Mandrin in southern Taiwan only because there are significantly less English speakers here. You can get away with speaking English in Taipei I have found but in the south, you can't. You must learn. However there is a Taiwanese language element that is not as prevelant in the north.

Sorry, but disagree. It 'putonghua' which is taught in both Taiwan and China, and they don't differentiate betw N, S or Taiwan. Both in Taiwan and Mainland, they still teach the rolling 'r' but on the streets where you practice, depends on your location. If you're in beijing, it will definitely be more accentuated then if you're in say shanghai or taipei (and definitely in kaohsiung).

Southern taiwan is a lousy place to study because major dialect spoken is actually taiwanese. Best place, imho, remains National Taiwan University, site of the former 'stanford' program (which has since moved to mainland, tsinghua u). My former classmates in grad school all went through there, and many of them are lao wai who are tenured Asian Lit and Lang professors stateside. And they still believe NTU remains tops....

Actually there are differing opinons on this.

First of all, most universities use "Practial Audio Visual Chinese" curriculum developed by National Taiwan Normal University including NTU in the North and NCKU in the South.

I was a student at both NTU and NCKU in the Mandrin program. In background, I am native English and Japanese speaker. At NTU the class sizes are about 20-30 per class (2005) and after class there was no need to speak / practise chinese. Most students were Japanese, American, Canadian and British with a few other nationalities represented. In Taipei, you can get by not speaking Chinese. Go to movies, resturants, clubs and most businesses you can communicate using English/japanese or they can find someone who can speak english/japanese readily.

In the south, different circumstance.
NCKU uses the SAME program your friends used at NTU. Class sizes as of 2007 is limited to a max of 10. There is less foreign influence in the south. More south Asians and Europeans. You must use the chinese you are learning. It is more difficult to order food, call a taxi and negotiate a price without Chinese.

You are correct that in the south there is a Taiwanese dialect spoken frequently by the older population but a vast majority of the younger / university crowd speaks Mandrin.

Personally I feel that instruction at a school is important but constant pressure to use what you are learning is what helps you to learn faster. I have learned as much outside the school as in.