Some stay for fun
Some stay for money
Some stay like bees
Hive and make honey.
But then what’s next?
Where do we go from here?
What do we do when we get back from Taiwan? I mean, not everyone wants to be here forever.
I’m curious. What the hell do people do when they go back home? How hard is it to return to “normal” life?
Bassman. Calling Bassman. Ironlady. Calling Ironlady.
jdserious
i have gone ‘home’ and come back. my family there my wifes here… so i am lucky to have 2 homes i suppose. my academic and career background allow me to shuffle between the 2 countries so i guess i am lucky.
cultural shock wise… well i get it more when i go home. taiwanese seem to be more travelled and understand whats its like to either a) live overseas or b) at least desire to see other parts of the world. folk back home seem content to stay put, get old and fat and cruise. this is fine but it makes it hard for them to understand how and why your horizons are (seemingly) broader…
After my first extended time traveling (1997/98), I returned to Australia and found it very hard to fit into “normal” life there. I felt alienated from the “normal” life, and never really got into the “normal” life. I worked a series of boring jobs, and hated most of them. Eventually, I realised that the only cure was to leave Aust. So I worked for an IT company for almost a year, didn’t go out and party, didn’t buy things, just saved. Took off traveling to Asia again. A friends wedding saw me back in Aust after 8 months on the road, and I stayed there for a further 6 months. Worked a bit (great job for Amnesty Intl), but the lifestyle at “home” still didn’t suit me. So did a TEFL course and took off again. Traveled for 6 months or so, then started to look for teaching work. Tried Vietnam, but all the schools I looked at seemed to be more concerned with making money than educating people. Came to Taiwan, and found a great school in Changhua that really cares about teaching, as opposed to getting rich.
And, I like my life here. Much more than I liked my life in Australia. But I don’t think I want to be here forever. I can’t see myself returning permanently to Aust, and if I did, I’m pretty sure that I’d have to return to school for another degree if I wanted to get any kind of meaningful work. So for me, Taiwan will do until something better comes along - although something better will probably still be in Asia, and not “home” in Australia.
So, for me, returning home after a short time away (up to a year) was hard enough. I’ve been in Taiwan for 3 years now (and away from Aust for 3 1/2), so I think returning home is probably not an option that I’d choose.
I think many people feel like this, especially if they have kids.
I LUV the freedom my life here allows me, to be a disconnected dreamer in charge (as a lao ban), but I worry not so much about my son’s education (as I’ve seen Tigerman’s offspring and he is smart as a whip and completely human), but about his relaxation time in Taiwan, which is far too little to far in between schools, and studying and home. I want my son to slack more.
During college I tutored English at a local community college, where lots of my students were foreigners. I was pleasantly surprised one day when one of my students, a Taiwanese woman, told me that she and her husband had moved the family to America so their children could lead more relaxed lives. She still made sure her kids got good grades, but she let them choose their own extracurricular activities, and didn’t pressure them into anything they didn’t want to do.
I also tutored the rich children of a Taiwanese family who did everything they could to bring the stress of Taiwan over with them. I tutored the children (two girls) in every subject, and often would work with them until late at night. But no matter how late it was when I left, they weren’t allowed to sleep until they’d spent at least a half hour practising the piano each. On the weekends they were even more busy, and weren’t allowed to go outside to play, go to sleepovers with their frients, etc. They had no lives whatsoever beyond study. On the other side of that coin, I guess they’ll grow up to be very educated and talented women.
[quote=“jdsmith”]
Where do we go from here?[/quote]
Down to the lake, I fear.
China, most likely. Out west. I’ll wait and see if Ma becomes president. If not then probably leave in 2008. In the meantime… more of the same.
This issue is always on my mind. Man, when we leave here, I want to be able to take it easy. I want to buy a piece of land back home, maybe around 20 acres, and convert a big old barn into a house… maybe operate a dog kennel… have a garden… chop fire wood… sit out on the front porch, listen to the Grateful Dead and sip liquid refreshment… take care of my sister, who suffers badly with MS.
Meanwhile, my wife dreams of getting back to her artwork. When we lived back in the States, she used to get invited to all sorts of juried art festivals for her painting and pottery… now she wants to learn to make glass and also tinker with hand made jewelry.
We’re both so caught up in trying to make money here in Taiwan that we have got quite far from who we really are… I’m just a farmer at heart (its what I did growing up), and now I wear a fucking suit and tie every day and my wife just wants to create things with her hands and travel around to art festivals like wandering gypsies… instead she runs a couple of stores that keep her constantly on-call dealing with the business.
Can’t wait for it all to wind down. We don’t talk about our retirement or old age time… we refer to our future as our “barn years”. Looking forward to then.
[quote=“Joni Mitchell”]
We are stardust
We are golden
And we
I hope, in the industry that I am currently working in, that I am in the right place at the right time, and that I can be financially secure and semiretired in the next ten years. I then plan to sell our apartment in Taipei and buy something small in the mountains in Taiwan. I will also live for a few years in rural England and rural Canada, so my wife can gain citizenship in both countries…and her kids can learn to appreciate how to sail, play baseball and ice hockey, ride horses, and get involved in team sports. One day I want to enter provincial politics in BC and be one loudmouthed SOB. I have no desire to live in Ottawa, so provincial will do me just fine…Then I plan to agitate and stir shit up…I will alternate between Taiwan and Europe during vacation time.
I have no doubt you will be a great success… 
We are currently in the final stages of our planned jump back home. My training is as an acupuncturist and I’m not legal to practice here. It is my dream to open a small clinic, find a humble abode somewhere on Vancouver Island and spend my days helping people get healthy. Raise a couple of kids, and grow old with my lovely wife.
I want to go back and resurrect my career as an educator. I have spent my time in Taiwan shuffling between being a toy, a pawn, and a tool. In England I used to teach children with special educational needs, and I miss how rewarding that job was. Also how mentally stimulating it was. Here it is all politics, power and money, nothing about learning. If I felt for one second that I wasn’t being viewed here by the colour of my skin, and not for my abilities as an educator, I might be able to cope with the fact that my career is, so to speak, in the litter bin right now. Getting told to your face that you are being overlooked for promotion, again, because you aren’t Taiwanese really makes me wish I had the power to destroy people with my thoughts. You know, like Justin on Carnivale!
Go Team Prejudice!
Well, when you grow up, you can always move to HK. 
Sadly my native country, Australia, just isn’t an option anymore. I suspect Thailand, eventually.
HG
This thread looks like it might be a “sticky”
We just got a place on the harbour in Nanaimo…you’ll have to stop by once in a while…for Taiwan and Forumosa chats. 
Become a senator and you can live in Mexico.
I’ve no intention of going “home”. Canada is a poverty trap for me, twice as many hours for half as much pay. No thank you. From now until retirement it’s work and travel. The closer I get to retirement the less work and more travelling I’ll be doing.
This is frighteningly similar to what I want.
I want the house close to Albany NY, rural, but 30 minutes away. Neighbors a few stones throws away. Garden and greenhouse and a sloping back hill that I can landscape into a terrance flower and tree garden over the years, full of apple trees and white birch, all going down to State owned forever wild land. I want to sit back there with my wife and watch the sun go down and breathe; and be on deck coming off the house watching it come up with a smoking cup of coffee.
So, this leads to the next question: how much do I need? What is the price of this move? House, car(s), insurance, the move itself, all the little things? The hidden costs?
Coming to Taiwan was easy, I had two backpacks. Leaving is not so easy. How much money will it take to get this dream? 50-100K? 150k? 200? More? Getting set up to have the money work for me is not the problem; living off dividends and having a bond ladder is easy enough to figure out, BUT, how much to get started? I have a very lucky friend whose Dad made a great deal of money and gave all 3 kids 500k when they were 30. He doesn’t work, has a 250K home and two kids (now divorced-money can’t buy love). I don’t need a 250k home and I except to do SOME kind of work just to keep sane, although it could be growing hydroponic tomatoes and strawberries…
Come on number crunchers! Figure this out. 
jdscratcheschin
JD,
Preliminary facts: I have a wife and two kids. We have a 3,000sq ft house in the Great San Jaoquin Valley in California. Our mortgage payments run about $1,500 a month. We have not paid off the house because of the tax benefits, though my instinct tells me to get out of debt.
I have budgeted $100,000USD for seed money. This budget covers buying a nice car, furniture, insurance, and mortgage payments for a year. This amount will also hopefully cover any misc. expences such as continuing education. Always plan for what you can’t see.
I think the questions that need to be answered is not “What to do back home” but rather “How to make a smooth transition”. That is especially so if children are a factor.
After March 18th I will try to start a thread about what steps I am going through right now.
This topic was hotly discussed at the weekly piss-up at Norman’s last night and I think this thread, or some mutation of it (not the “I wish” stuff but cold hard facts and opinions) might be very valuable.
[quote=“Huang Guang Chen”]
Sadly my native country, Australia, just isn’t an option anymore. I suspect Thailand, eventually.
HG[/quote]Same, same. Thailand sounds good to me. Not that I see it as a “move forward” but it would be nice to spend a few years down there working as a dive master on some pristine island. The money isn’t great but the lifestyle is grand.
bobepine
[quote=“jdsmith”]
This is frighteningly similar to what I want.
I want the house close to Albany NY, rural, but 30 minutes away. Neighbors a few stones throws away. Garden and greenhouse and a sloping back hill that I can landscape into a terrance flower and tree garden over the years, full of apple trees and white birch, all going down to State owned forever wild land. I want to sit back there with my wife and watch the sun go down and breathe; and be on deck coming off the house watching it come up with a smoking cup of coffee.
So, this leads to the next question: how much do I need? What is the price of this move? House, car(s), insurance, the move itself, all the little things? The hidden costs?
Coming to Taiwan was easy, I had two backpacks. Leaving is not so easy. How much money will it take to get this dream? 50-100K? 150k? 200? More? Getting set up to have the money work for me is not the problem; living off dividends and having a bond ladder is easy enough to figure out, BUT, how much to get started? I have a very lucky friend whose Dad made a great deal of money and gave all 3 kids 500k when they were 30. He doesn’t work, has a 250K home and two kids (now divorced-money can’t buy love). I don’t need a 250k home and I except to do SOME kind of work just to keep sane, although it could be growing hydroponic tomatoes and strawberries…
Come on number crunchers! Figure this out. 
jdscratcheschin[/quote]
I am always shocked at how cheap houses are in upstate NY. My husband and I were checking out prices on the net last year, and saw an awesome old Victorian home complete with a river in the back, about 4 acres of land, and a pricetag of less than $100,000.
I would say that to go back to that area and buy a home, two cars, and other necessities like furniture, you would need about $250,000, assuming that you and your wife can both get decent work in a reasonable amount of time.
Housing prices have been on the rise recently though, even upstate, so act fast! You could buy something now and employ someone to take care of the property in your absence…there are certainly companies that do that, and will even rent it out for you for a small(ish) fee. I think that’s a great way to go. Something I have certainly been looking into.