Hello All,
I’m trying to gather some information about foreigners with families who have decided to make their lives here in Taiwan. I’m looking for people who are not living on expat packages and are raising their families in the area. Personally, I’ve been here for five years, have a daughter, a husband and a job. We enjoy our lives here and haven’t any immediate plans to return to the west. My daughter goes to a local school and is fluent in Chinese. I would like to connect with other parents or even singles who feel that Taiwan is an all right place to live. Any thoughts on your experiences here as foreigners living on the economy would be appreciated.
JC
Hey JC, welcome to Forumosa! You picked the right website - a lot of us here (including me) fit that description. COme to our Happy Hour tonight, and you can meet a bunch of us. 
GET OUT NOW WHILE YOU STILL CAN!
LEAVE NOW!
JC,
Plenty of us long-termers around! I’ve been here 5 years now [not exactly a long-termer yet] and have absolutely no plans to return to my native country. It took me quite a long time to adjust to life here in Taiwan - 3 years to be exact. A long 36-month love-hate relationship with the traffic, the landlord, my colleagues, gosh…with just about everybody and everything…even my cat! Don’t know what happened, just woke up one morning with this awareness that I’m here to stay. I have since accepted many things I previously found ‘unacceptable’, ‘stupid’, etc. about life here in Taiwan. It’s actually quite a nice feeling knowing that I’m here to stay long-term, or should I say indefinitely. It took the edge off me, and cured the itch to find something [don’t know what] better somewhere else…who knows where?
I’m also still fairly new on this forum. Got to add that a day doesn’t pass without me browsing the forum for advice, entertainment, laughs, insanity, stupidity, brilliance, or whatever is posted. 
Stan
15 years and not getting any shorter, no regrets.
I think wayoutsolution just wants to hear from expats who moved here with their spouse and kid(s) - is that right?
[quote=“wayoutsolution”]Hello All,
I’m trying to gather some information about foreigners with families who have decided to make their lives here in Taiwan. I’m looking for people who are not living on expat packages and are raising their families in the area. … I would like to connect with other parents or even singles who feel that Taiwan is an all right place to live.
JC[/quote]
Umm…Families, parents, even singles. Guess that covers almost about everybody in the stay here class. My only observation is if you want to contact people you should make yourself available for contact. Fill out your profile. Add a location. Add an email. Be more than a first time poster. Make the first REAL move to communicate. Meanwhile, good luck. We (my family) like it here.
OOC
I missed the ‘parents, even singles’ part. In that case, I’ll chip in my two cents.
I’m married, have a four-year-old son and I’ve been here over ten years. Taiwan is a wonderful warts and all kind of place… Living in Taiwan
I’ve been here 16 years and have no regrets.
My son who is now 13 went to local primary school here and also in Australia.
Nothing wrong with your children being educated in Taiwan and speaking a second language at home, perhaps English? German, Italian? Tongan? Maori? or whatever.
I know a few foreign families who live here with their children in local schools. The kids do well, and the families are mostly happy.
I believe that most of the forum members are not here on expat packages. We learn to make do with what we can.
The good things in life are free… some things you just have to pay for.
Hands up here, coming up on 6 years.
Thank you to everyone that has responded to my post. I’m sorry I didn’t fill out my profile, but I’ll try to give a bit of info on myself here and put up a profile later.
I’m a 33 year old female from the States. I’ve been here for almost 5 years and I work as a writer at an English magazine. I met and married my husband here, also a foreigner, and we have a daughter who will be four in January. My daughter goes to a local preschool and loves it. She sits and plays with her toys and speaks Chinese and just as quickly, switches to English. Her little brain is like a sponge and watching her learn Chinese and grow in this culture is amazine. She’s only been off of Taiwan for two weeks of her life. I think the worst part is when she says, “Bye, bye,” in this super annoying high-pitched I’m a fifteen year old Hello Kitty wearing nighmarket loving girly voice. Oh, that was a mouthful.
My husband and I have been living in the hills of Hsintien for four years and it is interesting. However, we’re thinking of making the move to “da bit city” soon. Being out in the country has many benefits, but as our daughter gets older and we’re considering primary school, we think a move in would be best. While she does attend activities at the American School, I would prefer that she go to local schools.
Thanks so much,
JC
You have managed to elicit my first post. My Taiwan-born husband and I are moving to Taiwan in February, and I’ve been perusing this site for a few months, trying to get a feel for the expat community there (and an idea of what I’m getting myself into).
From reading so many bitter and resentful posts, I had about decided that I would have to avoid fellow expats like the plague; although I’ve lived abroad, been a minority in many situations, and often felt baffled and amazed by cultures other than my own,I was beginning to think that Taiwan must be some kind of special hell for expats. It’s good to know there are some people out there who like living in Taiwan and feel well adjusted and content.
Actually, I think avoiding other expats would be a big mistake. Despite a number of rather vocal whiners on this site, I think if you read carefully you’ll find that a lot of people here enjoy living in Taiwan and think it is a great place.
If you do avoid other expats here, you’ll be missing out on a lot of support and isolating yourself either with your husband or your husband and his family.
I have to warn you that I believe that people in your position–people who are moving to Taiwan to be with their Taiwan-born spouse, often have the hardest time adjusting. You probably would have never come here if it wasn’t for your spouse, and being put in a position where you have to learn Mandarin (and possiby also Taiwanese) can cause a lot of resentment. This is especially true if your husband has a family here.
But I think with help from your husband and the community, you can learn to have a wonderful life here. You’ll just need to be patient and keep your sense of humor (you’re gonna need it).
Good luck!
That’s very true - people often come to this site to whine and get things off their chest so if you’re reading this forum to gauge things then you’re getting a skewed picture…
The whingers tend to drown out those of us who are, by and large, quite happy with our lives in Taiwan.
I was hoping that the unhappy weren’t representative… I suppose if you’re totally content with your lot, you haven’t much incentive to vent. When I was living in Japan, everybody I knew had one or two things that really drove them nuts, but we were all having so much fun that we never dwelled on it for very long.
Feiren, I’m curious… do you know a lot of folks who have transplanted for a relationship? I’m not at all worried about myself; moving to Taiwan was my idea, actually, and I can’t imagine moving someplace and not learning the language. I’m not even worried about family pressures, since my father- and mother-in-law are in San Francisco, and I’ve already spent lots and lots of time with them (it’s all the aunts and uncles and cousins whose names I have to learn that worries me!). It would be good to talk to some others who’ve done it, though. (maybe I should post this in the “relationships” forum).
I am an American girl married to a Taiwanese man that I met here. Such an impossible achievement! But there ARE gems out there, you just have to look hard enough. I’ve been in Taiwan 6 years, and we plan to stay here for many more. I feel the longer I stay here, the deeper I look, the more I learn to ignore the negatives and discover more nice things about living here. I am also seeking long termers here, in order to develop frienships that would otherwise deteriorate as people move on from this place. If anyone else agrees, feel free to contanct me!
I’m not very long-term here…only been in Taiwan for 3-1/2 years, but I can tell you that even though it looks like I am finally heading for the place I had intended to go (and for which Taiwan was supposed to be a short pitstop to gain teaching experience), it’s going to be very hard for me to leave this little island. I’m already working out how much it will cost to come back and visit Taiwan from Europe. 
Where in Europe are you going, ImaniOU?
Just to clarify, I believe wayoutsolution is doing research on the reasons expats or mixed (Foreign/Taiwanese) families choose to educate their children in local schools rather than the international schools. Wayout, it might be a good idea to set up a separate email address if you want to keep your anonymity but allow people who are willing to be interviewed to contact you.