My appointment was cancelled. I made the appointment right before things got crazy. So my woulda, shouolda, coulda is not too bad. (Oh man, who am I kidding! Damn! If only I made the appointment one day sooner. One freakin’ day!)
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They aren’t missing anything.
Curious about the reason you delayed? I was in the same boat, btw.
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My mom was here visiting and I was waiting until she was almost gone. I also was in no big hurry. It seemed there were plenty of vaccines to go around and Taiwan seemed to be in good shape!
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Somewhere along the way they did something absolutely stupid. As for the vaccines, only 1% of Taiwanese have been vaccinated with only a single jab of the AZ vaccine.
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I would most certainly stay in Taiwan for the 110 school year if it had not been for my
job offer in Canada.
I flew from France to the UK for a WFH promotion in Dec 2020. Over 50,000 new cases a day at that time. I also had the stress of saying goodbye to family, moving into a new place and city, etc.
Still glad I did it as I am now double vaccinated.
I understand the stress people in Taiwan face as it is new.
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Haha. My mother keeps calling me asking if we are alright because she saw taipei is exploding. I keep reassuring her that they have more deaths in their province than we have total cases nation wide since the beginning. Im actually worried about guys, maybe try and find a way to come out to taiwan for safety, the government here isnt so corrupt and illogical (i love throwing that jab in there to canadians, makes their brains short circuit) Etc etc. So the conversation goes, on a weekly basis.
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I’ve made this comment before but I’ll make it again: you wouldn’t be floating to “Canada”. You’d be floating to a specific place in Canada. You should evaluate the risk for that specific place, not the entire (huge) country. Risk incorporates not just total cases, but cases per 100K, positive test rate, and vaccination rate.
For many expats, it is imminently possible to get to a place where COVID is on the wane and vaccine is readily available.
As an example, I flew into SFO. There were 19 cases in all of SF county yesterday. They’re still testing on average 4,000 people a day there for a population of 850,000 (compared to around 14,000 tests/day for all of Taiwan with a population of 23 million). The positive test rate is 0.58% (over 10x lower than some of the testing sites in Taipei according to recent reports). 65% of the population is fully vaxxed and 77% has at least one jab.
Taiwan is no longer the safe haven it was a few weeks ago. Things change. Fast.
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I’d be flying to the Golden Horseshoe where the Coronavirus continues to wreak havoc.
Where thousands of cases per day happen in a metro area, similarly sized to Greater Taipei, both in land and in population, though moreso in population where they gave up on contract tracing long long ago.
You could go somewhere else then. Just sayin.
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Not a very well thought out reply. Where, pray tell shall I go? One of Canada’s MANY depressed communities like Blind River that have nothing more than minimum wage jobs?
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How about Italy? 
Guy
Only you can figure that out for yourself but it’s a pandemic man. A lot of people have had to make difficult choices from a list of not ideal options.
If Taiwan goes full lockdown, there’s a lot of economic pain in store. I’m guessing it’s already being felt for a lot of people under lockdown lite.
It’s also possible to leave a place temporarily right?
Leaving Taiwan would be C$2000 round trip.
Hotel quarantine would be an extra C$4200 if in the full 14 days if I am being away from the Golden Horseshoe and away from family. $900 if I stay with family and then screw off to another place.
Going to a place far away from any family would be a $500-800/m expense renting.
Need a car, cause public transport is a swear word amongst city planners in Canada. God knows how much a car is gonna cost for what might be two months, three months max in Taiwan. Buying a used one $2000-4000 Maintenance, registration, plate stickers. etc…
So I’ve spent upwards of $10000 I don’t have. For what?
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In North America they think public transportation is communist or something, and buses take like 2 hours to drive a couple of miles!
You could rent a car but it’s still expensive to do so as rental companies have costs to pay too.
You have no idea how lack of public transportation in North America has hampered upward mobility. Guys work 3 jobs paycheck to paycheck because they must pay for a car and a house, and both are expensive. You’d have to find a job paying probably 20 dollars an hour to be able to live comfortably with a car and all that.
Did other people mention that jobs are hard to find in Canada and doing anything above minimum wage is hard there.
Finally, leaving is what gets people into a mess, as you unknowingly take the virus elsewhere. Sure you could probably find a rural community in Canada but then not only there are risks of COVID (or you bringing it there) but medical resources in rural area tends to be… rather unavailable.
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Not just that, but no work over minimum wage available.
I gotta start a new topic.
Is small town Canada a lingering third worldism?
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I guess the only positive about Canada is I don’t have to find workplace that is air conditioned as they are likely not needed.
In the states I seen so many people work at Walmart and have to go to another job when they were done with their shift. I can’t understand how people can do this.
Requiring a car and not having effective public transportation really drags people down. And laws over there do not like scooters. Plus theft is a big problem (this was one of the biggest reason why I dared not buy a scooter in Texas, as cars are much harder to steal since they are more easily traced and detected).
They leave the AC on in February. They’re nuts I tell you. I froze while writing exams.
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