Taiwan -- where does one get started?
 

Someone has offered me a business opportunity that would involve spending considerable time in Taiwan over the next year, and possibly a relocation. I've been to mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore but never Taiwan (not counting the airport!). I have a reasonable understanding of Taiwanese history, politics, economy, etc., but little knowledge about what life is like in Taiwan -- much less as it would impact an "ex-pat." In short, I want to figure out whether Taiwan would be a good place to spend a year, and whether I should be expecting something remotely familiar to Hong Kong or the mainland -- or something more different than familiar.

If anyone could steer me in the right direction for an overview (heck, I don't think most guidebook series even cover Taiwan) so I could at least know whether I should even consider this opportunity, I'd greatly appreciate it. Thanks.

Japan + Shanghai - Communism = Taiwan

I've spent a year in Taipei and just moved back.

Taiwan is great. Taipei is great. Minor outlying areas aren't so great. Great infastructure, great food, great people. Did I mention it's a great country to live for a year. I seriously want to move back. PM me if you'd like to discuss particulars. There simply is too much to say about it.

Taiwan, in my opinion, is the best place, in the Chinese speaking world, to spend a year as an expat.

It is clean, modern, and cosmopolitan while still possessing the charm of a more relaxed pace of life than H.K. or Singapore. Compared to mainland China it is 180 degrees different. The only thing similar about the two places is the language they speak and often times that is different as well.

Levels of English in Taipei are usually pretty good, especially amongst younger people. The food is extremely good and fresh and clean (unlike the mainland on all 3 counts) and the people are usually very friendly and more outgoing when compared to their H.K. or mainland counterparts.

Air connections will get you everywhere in the world conveniently (except the mainland).

I'd go for it, you will not regret a year in Taiwan!

Thanks for the great responses. I've been reading the online "wikis" too. Taiwan certainly seems like a more than decent place to live for a year. I've spent some time in Japan, too, so I guess that would probably also lessen the "culture shock" a bit.

Before I spend more time on "life in Taiwan," I'll now investigate whether the business opportunity is worth pursuing. Thanks again.

The city of Taipei, at least, or in particular, is simply a very easy place to live. Ugly, but convenient. Transportation and food (counting supermarkets and hypermarkets, food of nearly all types) are particularly convenient, cheap, and good. Housing a bit less so. But if you don't insist on American standards of size and luxury for housing, it's fine (or if you're on a large budget).

It does help to know some--not necessarily a lot of--Chinese, e.g. with taxis. But as someone remarked above, most people know some English, including store clerks. Taiwanese are also very hospitable and friendly.

Taipei vs. HK
 

I respectfully disagree. Depending on what your objectives/goals are, I think HK is comparable if not better in many ways.

FYI, my wife is Taipei homegrown, I've done three tours there in '70s, '80's, and late '90s. We both have family and many friends there, and luv the place. But my oldest son (just graduated from college) recently had a choice btw spending 1-2 yrs learning Chinese and working - Taipei vs. HK, and both my wife/I strongly recommended HK. And after 4 months, our son (who obviously lived in Taiwan as youngster) agreed it was the right choice.

Taipei is great as noted above. But HK is by far more international (as well as maintaining it's 'chinese' identity), much more networking and growth opportunities for any enterprising individual. Taiwan economically is 'dead' compared to it's heydays, and all the money has long been channeled to the mainland. Taiwan's current political situation is at best a disaster with no solution in sight.

I'd be happy to continue this via pm. No flames, please, just my POV :)

Most expats in Taipei tend to live in the Tian Mu area, on the northern edge of the city, close to Yangminshan. It's a nice area, a little less hectic than other parts of Taipei, and home to the American School, British school and others like that. Zhongshan N Rd is the main N/S artery there...and has good bus connections. The biggest drawback to Tian Mu is the less than great access to the MRT (subway) - there is a station to the west, but it requires a bus ride to get there.

There's also a fair amount of development in the government center area around Taipei 101 and the convention center. A lot of new highrises, and actually some green space, which is unusual. Only in recent years has Taipei become more of a "permanent city", and the infrastructure is still catching up.

Still, love the street life in Taipei. Food, shopping and people watching are enough to keep me occupied for a long time.

Thanks for the additional tips -- very useful!

We love Taiwan.

Outside of Taipei it is less developed but it is a great blend of Chinese life and westernization.

The adjustment from Vancouver to Tainan, (where we are) was quite easy.
Great food, friendly people and enough infrastructure to be comfortable. Language is tough to learn but if you are in Taipei, it probably won't be too much of a problem. Just come with an open mind to new experiences and you will love it.

Real estate prices
 

Tien Mu is for western expats, not necessarily asian expats.

High rises by 101 is one of the the most expensive real estate (traffic is congested)

A third area is Neihu and MRT under construction for better connections from here. And there are other 'suburbs' other than the traditional tien mu area to consider.

Well as a Japanese American ex pat from California, the big growth area and new area in HsiNi area (101 or Taipei city Hall area) with high end stores and restaurants. TienMu has many nice residences for ex-pats but I but is bit north from main new business areas. Me I live in Banchaio city, across the river, 10-15 min subway from central areas. About English, well in HK , S'pore and Chinese big cities (Shanghai, ect), you will find more English info, signs ect. In Taipei, most people speak Chinese/Taiwanese with some speaking English. I think in Taiwan, there is more of a culture shock for Westerners, as the tourisum infrastructure for tourists is not very well written in English, and city is designed more for local people needs and customs. If you can it would very helpful to learn Chinese. One thing that I do like about Taiwan, is in general most people are very, very kind and polite compared to other big Asian cities. Taiwan has its own style, I hope you do come and see it.

The Taipei subway is about as easy as it gets for non-Chinese speakers. It's basically a clone of the DC Metro, and a great way to get around. Bus service, while plentiful, is a bit more challenging.

My wife, who is caucasian and speaks no Chinese at all, loves Taipei. She's not as crazy about HK. We're going to Beijing and Shanghai for the first time next summer, so we'll see what she thinks there.

[/QUOTE: But my oldest son (just graduated from college) recently had a choice btw spending 1-2 yrs learning Chinese and working - Taipei vs. HK, and both my wife/I strongly recommended HK. And after 4 months, our son (who obviously lived in Taiwan as youngster) agreed it was the right choice.

Taipei is great as noted above. But HK is by far more international (as well as maintaining it's 'chinese' identity), much more networking and growth opportunities for any enterprising individual. Taiwan economically is 'dead' compared to it's heydays, and all the money has long been channeled to the mainland. Taiwan's current political situation is at best a disaster with no solution in sight.]

At the risk of turning this into one of those interminable and un-resolvable NYC vs SF vs LA debates that just come down to individual taste and options, I have to say that if your goal is to learn Mandarin/putonghua, Taipei is vastly superior to Hong Kong, where of course the street language is Cantonese.

And while the Taiwanese economy is not flourishing like in the old days (neither is HK's), "dead" is an exaggeration. Finally, while many Taiwanese are deeply worred, upset, frustrated, disillusioned, cynical, and occasionally hopeful about the political situation, it seems to me (an outsider) far from a "disaster". You have a split government, highly partisan and personalized politics, and street demonstrations. So what? The civil service continues to function, and local elections are coming up at the end of the year.

And just as a matter of personal taste, while HK is magnificent and much, much, much more beautiful as a city, Taipei is more fun.

You're right re learning mandarin - Taiwan and NTUH (Tai-da U) remains the best, except for maybe Tsinghua on mainland. But the OP was asking about job oppty and working for one year.

Most expats, if polled for job assignments would put China n HK well ahead of Taiwan.

FYI, i am ABC and personally would prefer to live in Taiwan due to friends, family. But if I was objective and giving advice to third party, my recommendation for HK remains.

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.

Perhaps this explains the high level of video and software piracy on the mainland. [ducking] :D

I spent most of my years in Taiwan in the southern part of the island, and I speak Mandarin with a distinct "Taiwanese" accent. When I go to the mainland, the natives have little trouble detecting where I learned Chinese. But I can also affect a decent Beijing accent when appropriate. I can also really turn up the "Tawian Goyu" for dramatic effect when needed. ;)

I agree with Taiwaned that if your goal is to immerse yourself in the language, it is easier to do in the south than in Taipei where foreigners abound, and one does not need to speak Mandarin to get by. It is tougher to get by without Mandarin in the south, though not as tough as it was 20 years ago. There are a lot more a-toh-gah's (big noses = foreigners) in the south now.

You can live in Taipei and get the same effect if you just don't hang out with the foreign crowds. They tend to gather in specific places--just avoid those places if your goal is language immersion. I spent six months in Taipei, and I managed to avoid foreigners just fine.

When I lived in So California, and would go to palces in the Chinese enclaves, they would all ask me how I learned to speak Chinese so well. They would always follow up with a self deprecating comment about how they've been in the US for 10 years, and can't learn English. Part of that is just Chinese humility--they can speak English better than they'll admit. But part of it is true in that they can easily get by in some areas of California without ever learning English. They go to Chinese supermarkets and restaurants, read Chinese newspapers, watch Chinese TV and movies and hang out with Chinese friends.

If your goal is to learn Chinese, don't make the same mistake by hanging around foreigners in Taiwan/China. Jump in the deep end and struggle through it.

The OPs original question was not to compare whether or not to base out of Hong Kong versus Taipei, but whether Taipei was a good city to spend a year in...

I would say that Taipei is a very good city to spend a year in. Taipei definitely has a chinese flavor and english is not widely widely spoken, but its not hard to get around at all.

I was making two points, one re putonghua instruction, second re whether south was better than north for studying.

Re latter, if we adopt your logic, then best place to learn would be outside of any urban setting, whether Taiwan or China. You will always find people who speak english, if you take the easy way out. My only point was in terms of best places to 'learn' - I think you're saying which is best place to 'practice'.

IMHO, learning to speak mandarin is not difficult, it's the reading and writing. Therefore, classroom instruction as well as one's own discipline to practice characters, read local papers, etc. is key.

Easy for an ABC to say. ;)

My son is finishing his third year of Mandarin and he's getting quite good at reading and writing. However even though he has a great "ear" he struggles with oral comprehension.

The tones can be very difficult for Westerners. He can make his way through one-on-one conversations with a little back and forth to confirm his understanding. But he says listening to a native speaker at full-speed everyday conversational rate drives him crazy. For his oral comprehension tests, the teacher often reads a moderately-long passage and then the students have to write two or three paragraphs responding to what was read. This is the part of the test where he gets his lowest grades.

What I am about to write is opinion only, based on my anecdotal experience of having learned the language, and having been around a lot of other Westerners trying to learn Mandarin.

People who have some vocal musical talent seem to do much better learning to speak Chinese well. The ability to control your voice in singing seems to have a crossover benefit to learning to speak in tones.

Of all the Americans I worked with in Taiwan, there were a few that really struggled with the language. And I noticed that these same people were often really awful singers--totally tone deaf. And in general terms, the people who did exceptionally well with the language were often quite gifted, musically.

Chinese is actually a very simple language structure to learn. It has a very simple, almost exception-free grammar system--no verb tenses, gender, conjugation, etc. And there are a finite number of syllables used in the language (I think the number is something like 408 available sound combinations). So imagine if you were learning English (or any language) and only needed to learn to pronounce 408 words, and you would be able to say anything in the language.

Of course, what makes Chinese difficult for most people are the tones, extensive use of idioms, and the writing system.

In regard to reading/writing Chinese, if you are a visual learner, you will have a great advantage in learning to read and write Chinese. People are generally grouped into three main camps with regard to how they absorb information: visual, tactile and auditory. If you happen to fall into the "Visual" camp, you may find that Chinese characters are easier for you to learn than for other people. I am rather good at remembering visual patterns, and so Chinese characters came relatively easy to me--after countless hours with flashcards. ;)

When I said my son had a good "ear" I was referring to another sort of perhaps related talent. He's an incredible mimic. His French teacher said he spoke French like a Frenchman. His friends on campus often ask him to mimic being an Aussie, Italian, Russian, etc. and ask people questions. He once talked to a Russian student while mimicking and the kid thought he was Russian! This abillity has helped him a lot with speaking and listening.


My son's teachers say his calligraphy is very good (he's said to have good, strong strokes). He has some drawing ability (cartoons mostly but also some portraits) and very nice penmanship. He also has a nearly-photographic memory. I think these traits have helped him quite a bit with reading and writing Chinese. Oh, and he spends countless hours with flashcards as well. :)

Missed my point...he he.

Certain languages easier to learn because no or little grammar, tenses, etc. For instance, bahasa malay/indo fits into tht group. Spoken chinese is same, except for the tones but as foreigner, you can get away with it.

A hard language to speak: eg russian because of conjugations, singular vs plural, tenses, etc. etc.

Thank you so much as that explains nearly everything to me. I have been going to Taiwan for 10 years and just cannot get the hang of the language, no matter how much I try, and the friends I have made there are glad, and even tell me so now, when I give up the Karaoke microphone after only one song, when in the early days they insisted I sing another (and another and . . . ) song.