I’m trying to find if there are any aid organizations in Taipei that deal with people with mental problems and pose a threat to those around them.
You see, though I’ve been here for about a month (in Taipei), I met the neighbors today in the strangest of ways. I was in my appartment working, and I heard a series of very loud thuds. I kept thinking that someone (who was quite clumsy) was doing some renovation work in the appartment above me and kept dropping something. Then I heard a couple more loud thuds on the other side of the building, as though someone was dropping something from high up. I went out on the balcony, but I didn’t hear anything.
About ten minutes later, I started hearing noises again. I went outside, and I saw my neighbor from the floor below me, on the roof of the first floor of the building. He, in maybe his late 30s, wasn’t wearing anything but his boxers, and he had a deranged look on his face. Just as I saw him, I saw two police rolling up on mopeds. I watched for a little while, as they talked to the man. I thought at one point the man was antagonizing the police, and that there was going to be a struggle, but then they got him back in his appartment.
All’s well that ends well…
Well, an hour later, I heard shouting again, so I opened the door to the balcony, and looked down. Didn’t see anything. As I leaned to peak around the door to my stoop, I was shocked to see that the mans mother was standing up against my door. The back of her head was only inches from me. I jumped down, went inside and called my girlfriend, who’s Taiwanese, since I don’t speak a lick of Chinese (at least nothing that would have been of use). I cracked the door, trying not to freak the lady out, and I handed the phone to her. She wouldn’t take it at first, because, well, she had no idea why this occidental, bearded redhead was shoving a phone in her face, but she finally understood that I had someone that could talk to her.
Sitting on the step outside my appartment was her retarded daughter (the mans sister, obviously). They were hiding from the man, and I (through my girlfriend) offered for them to come and wait in my appartment, but she refused, saying they weren’t scared of being hurt, they were just waiting for her son to finish ruining their appartment.
Our landlord had told us about him, and aparently he does this a lot more often than he has in the month since we’ve lived here.
Now, the lady told my girlfriend that the man was in a mental institution, but they didn’t have the money to keep paying for it. Moreover, he’s the breadwinner for his aged mother and his severely retarded, hunchbacked sister.
Does anyone know if there are any organizations here in Taiwan that would help this family? I feel like in the US, there would be some sort of program for people like this, but I don’t know.
Anyone got any insight?