I have to agree with the poster who said that you meet so many nutters in Taiwan that it’s hard to single out just one.
There is Sideways Steve, though. He probably takes the cake.
Sideways Steve was a hostelmate at the Formosa hostel for a very brief time, back in 1990, or so. A very antisocial guy, to say the least. Then he went totally underground. Gave up doing visa runs, and became homeless. Many of you have probably seen, or know of Sideways Steve. He’s that unbelievably crappy busker who sings (used to sing?) in Western Taipei, in the underpasses. From time to time you’d see him wandering the streets, with or without his banged up guitar, in short shorts, tattered T-shirt and decaying sneakers, muttering to himself, with a murderous look in his eyes. We called him Sideways Steve because - in his peculiar shuffle he seemed unable to walk a straight line, and because he was sort of cross eyed. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s still scratching out an existence for himself, somehow, on the street of Taipei.
Steve is an extreme example of the fairly common phenomenon of Westerners getting “lost” in Asia. Lost, as in lost souls. If they were home they’d probably be institutionalized, or at least medicated for their problems. In places like Taiwan, away from family support, and good mental healthcare, they just seem to spin out of control.
I also knew Stevie Rae quite well. I always found him to be a nice guy, quite funny, but a wee bit of a smartass when he was legless, which was quite often. I was shocked when I heard the news about his rampage in Oz. He never struck me as such a psycho, that’s for sure. He was a big hit in that ALE (Actual Living English) scam, as I recall, because he had such an outgoing personality.
I know a creepy teacher who insists on getting all of his students’ cell numbers during the first week of class, on some sort of pretense. He then singles out the hot women and starts sending them SMS messages, sometimes during class. Needless to say, the inappropriateness of the situation makes these women very uncomfortable.
The same guy once called me and told me that he had found God, and was therefore unable to sub a class for me that night. He needed to “get his life in order,” which apparently involved running out on his commitments. I tried to convince him that God probably wanted him to teach the class, as I sure wasn’t going to be able to return from a trip down south in time to take the class. He later sent me a series of e-mails asking me if I wanted to meet his standards for friendship (it was a rather long list). I decided not to be his friend. Not that I can’t keep standards. I just don’t enjoy being friends with crazy people.
I remember seeing him all the time. I was wondering who he was–thanks for the background info. It is true, there are too many nutters here it is hard to single out just one. I’ve often been accused of being one as well, have no idea why.
There was this other guy, a very violent person who would flip over the tiniest things, who used to go around telling everyone it was impossible that Keanu Reeves was ever David Geffen’s boyfriend, because he was David Geffen’s boyfriend at the time.
Do people come here crazy or does this place make them so?
I have witnessed quite a few people here “lose it”. I can count at least five people that I personally knew who have died from alchohol related incidents. One guy who liked to get completely blotto and then eat dog shit. Another guy passed himself off as a holder of a PhD and worked at a college down here. He was introuble back in the States for credit card fraud and the such. Vorkosigan…did you use to work with that guy?
I have seen a lot of folks become selfish and irresponsible here. It seems that in some instances all social and moral restraints are put on the shelf. Work, drink, work, drink, work, drink…this is a slippery slope.
It didn’t seem this way when I first got here. Most of us at the time were almost broke travellers. Sure, we partied, but all of us had a financial goal we wanted to meet. Most folks would stay for a year and then piss off back to Goa. Now there are a lot of people who come here for a longer duration and who don’t have the living overseas mentality in the first place. They don’t try to fit in and it goes downhill from there.
All the long timers remember Sideways Steve. He’s still seen time to time! Maybe he married a local…
I heard he used to wash and dry all of the change he made from busking. Hard to believe he made anything, but…
Hey! Likely he’s on here. Maybe he’s formosa/lane 119!
What about the guy who ran naked through the streets drunk after getting booted out of a whorehouse. Forget his name. He was once in Formosa II hostel. the bear should remember.
Or that french drug runner, Pierre. Remember him? He just up and disappeared one day. Most presume he’s dead.
Tony the queen from Atlanta was another wacko. He’s also presumed dead.
I remember Tony, and his weird old friend, another American. And his mom lived with him, right? There’s also that aptly-named high-profile banker who used to invite boys over for nude pool parties after shipping his wife off for the summer.
um i’m going to follow the wise saw “those who live in glasshouses shouldn’t throw stones” on this one or maybe “there but for the grace of God go I”)…ie we are all such crazy motherfuckers it’s prolly not a good idea to go on a witch hunt to out the wacko’s lest you find yourself being outted…in fact true story i have actually had people in pubs tell me a story about myself without knowing they are talking to me about me if you get my drift (and if you know me you’ll know the story in question; for obvious reasons it can’t be mentioned here!)…still that said sideways steve does have a special place in my heart having lived with him; if you sat him down and he was in the right mood he had some interesting stories to tell, claimed to have visited over 170 countries, was ex-british army and i think his condition was called lady macbeth syndrome altho’ now would come under post traumatic stress disorder…
He said I couldn’t smoke in front of him or offer him a cigarette, because he would want to smoke and cigarettes are evil. I asked him whether or not he thought he still had freedom of choice. I had offered him cigarettes out of politeness, not in an effort to force him to smoke.
He also said that drinking alchohol was now off limits around him. I like to have a glass of wine at dinner, or a beer or two after finishing a night class, but I’m no boozehound. Still, I find it ridiculous when people insist that friends not have a beer or two around them.
Yep, this guy is one of the weirder of the lost souls here in Taiwan. I know for a fact that following the “I’ve found God” episode the philandering continued. I think the finding God think has more to do with desperate unhappiness than with some spiritual epiphany. For that, I pity this guy.
Like I wrote earlier, I’ve also met some folks who seem to be extremely lost, until you start talking to them and realize how together they really are.
Wolf, are you the guy who tried to sue God a while back? The argument went that the plaintiff had fulfilled his side of the covenant by being a good christian and obeying the ten commandments, therefore the defendant owed him a good life.
I think the case was unsuccessful as they had difficulty serving papers.
When I first arrived in Taiwan, I stayed at a hostel downtown near Fushing MRT. I am very tolerant of eccentric people (I’m Irish) but one of the dudes in his 40s that was a permanent there was the creepiest person I have ever met. Would talk to himself all day and talk about his girlfriends. Felt sorry for the dude, but he was was so strange.
:bouncy: …haven’t aged a day’s right…aged a whole millenium…i went to chi-nan gong with my current squeeze the other day and this old guy thought she was my daughter!!
Went to Malibu west and some girl came and sat with me and two other guys I was there drinking with. She hit on the black guy I was there with, said she was Canadien, and really missed seeing black people. Said she wanted him to go home with her, and then left the table. She came back later with her husband, and they both tried to take him home. I was shocked, was like my first week here. That has been the strangest thing so far.
That’s weird. I knew this Canadian guy that used to always try to pick up local straight couples. I can’t believe the number of local men that like to watch a foreign guy bang their missus.
Another guy passed himself off as a holder of a PhD and worked at a college down here. He was introuble back in the States for credit card fraud and the such. Vorkosigan…did you use to work with that guy?
