I’ve been here a month now, not counting a week last April. Twice now, old or agin men have paid me respect. The first guy bowed to me repeatedly while I was eating ice cream. He didn’t say a word. Later it occured to me, I was wearing a T shirt with the American flag on it. He seemed sane, and very respectful.
Just today, an old guy who seems not right in the head comes up to me in a Taoyuan Wellcome. He tells me you American, American good, like American. Then he starts grabbing items off the shelves and stuffing them into my pockets.
There seem to be a lot of old, down and out guys in Taiwan. Some of them are obviously mentally impaired, some of them seem normal. There was an old guy in the Taoyuan train station yelling angrily, something about bicycle bags.
[quote=“rowland”]I’ve been here a month now, not counting a week last April. Twice now, old or agin men have paid me respect. The first guy bowed to me repeatedly while I was eating ice cream. He didn’t say a word. Later it occured to me, I was wearing a T shirt with the American flag on it. He seemed sane, and very respectful.
Just today, an old guy who seems not right in the head comes up to me in a Taoyuan Wellcome. He tells me you American, American good, like American. Then he starts grabbing items off the shelves and stuffing them into my pockets.
There seem to be a lot of old, down and out guys in Taiwan. Some of them are obviously mentally impaired, some of them seem normal. There was an old guy in the Taoyuan train station yelling angrily, something about bicycle bags.[/quote]
How well you can distinguish between the sane and the insane is quite unsettling.
[quote=“rowland”]I’ve been here a month now, not counting a week last April. Twice now, old or agin men have paid me respect. The first guy bowed to me repeatedly while I was eating ice cream. He didn’t say a word. Later it occured to me, I was wearing a T shirt with the American flag on it. He seemed sane, and very respectful.
Just today, an old guy who seems not right in the head comes up to me in a Taoyuan Wellcome. He tells me you American, American good, like American. Then he starts grabbing items off the shelves and stuffing them into my pockets.
There seem to be a lot of old, down and out guys in Taiwan. Some of them are obviously mentally impaired, some of them seem normal. There was an old guy in the Taoyuan train station yelling angrily, something about bicycle bags.[/quote]
I’ve had a couple of old timers who trained with U.S. military back in the day start a friendly conversation with me. Most of the old people that talk or refer to me mention something about wanting me to go die
There it is.
Best not, though. No one knows how it will all turn out in the end.
As if that was a striving point to with begin
I say, drive on, on drive.
In this mode:
One is never too old to groove on what went down all before, but then again in this modern age, one must maintain a perimetre.
We is Rams, Yo!
I dare say, that is so much better than a ewe.
Though one in the hand beats two in the bush.
Where some sheep may not fear to, tread.
I don’t blame 'em.
Mighty Way, Down Dark.
Where any light at all
farks up,
one’s prism.
We need Darkness,
to bask
unto
that
Slice
of
Light.
Haha I get all these diverse reactions and I’m not even American.
There is an old retired guy I know who used to work with US military personnel, loves to chat (with everybody) and very comfortable with foreigners, unlike a lot of younger people who can be quite stiff.
Some of the vets like Americans (you can often guess by their love of baseball caps) and some don’t, last week I was told in one sentence ‘you like Taiwan Chinese wife, your kids look like Chinese, Taiwan is China’… Lol.
Someday I’ll be an angry old man who isn’t afraid to overreact and give random wild tongue lashings to all and anybody because society taught me it’s socially inconsequential.
[quote=“louisfriend”][quote=“TheGingerMan”]
Best not, though. No one knows how it will all turn out in the end.
As if that was a striving point to with begin
I say, drive on, on drive.
[/quote]
Someday I’ll be an angry old man who isn’t afraid to overreact and give random wild tongue lashings to all and anybody because society taught me it’s socially inconsequential.[/quote]
Ha!
Random it is then!
Only the good die young?
That just leaves the evil…
Am I evil?
Damn!
And here I was hoping you would say:
“Why, yes, now that you mention it, TGM, you are quite evil!”
I do have a reputation to uphold, as well as a severe kink in the medula to warrant more than some serious disdain from those affected unto my foul array of spells and potions.
Everyone looking at this post wave the screen back and forth and repeat after me: I am a cool guy, I am clever fellow, I am one hip dude!..say it three times…you should all look like this now —> When you wake up you will lavish unsolicited praise upon TGM…tomorrow I will snap my fingers and bring everyone back to reality
Just last night got a couple of data points on this topic, at a Hakka restaurant in Longtan.
The proprietor gave me a baseball cap made out of cigarette boxes as a reward for being American, or maybe because there was an important baseball game on the TV. Also, the food was pretty good.
While I was there, i showed a friend a note that an old guy had written for me in Taoyuan. He (the old guy) was going on about “fei xiang… ZOOM!” and “Obama king, I am king!” He wrote me a note in Chinese, which I had tried to decipher back at the hotel. Something about warships in outer space, as far as I could make out. So last night, I showed it to a local friend. He told me it was about warships in outer space. Also, the government is going to give the guy a million dollars.
My assessment: baseball cap guy is sane, in a colorful way. Star Wars guy is crazy. Maybe only a little crazy. This North Korea nuke thing has me a little nervous too.
When you wake up you will lavish unsolicited praise upon TGM…tomorrow I will snap my fingers and bring everyone back to reality