I find myself sitting with my wife and 3 of her friends at dinner. Nothing wrong with that but it’s awkward when they are all talking too fast in Mandarin and I can’t participate. At least there’s alcohol. Anyway, what should a guy do besides blowing his brains out?
Probably post in the ’ you know you’ve been in Taiwan too long when’ thread
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Tell them to be polite and speak in a language that everyone can understand. If they can’t speak English, go to the pub with your mates instead.
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Dude, I deal with this all the time. I imagine most western spouses do. I just mess around on my phone and get lost in my own head space, and wait for my wife to occasionally translate some juicy gossip. It’s boring, but it’s not the worst thing in the world.
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Yup, and I’m not gonna be an ass and deny her the time with friends in their mother tongue. I usually can see this coming and find a way out of it, but sometimes it’s unavoidable. I’ll inject myself once in a while, between phone time, and stir it up a bit. The drink specials are helping 
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One of her friends is from Kaohsiung and I just asked her if she voted for Korean fish. . I can tell she didn’t like that question. 
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Ditto. It’s just kind of routine for foreign spouses here, isn’t it? And my wife goes through something similar when I’m with English-speakers, or when she accompanies me to Canada.
Mind you, because this is how such gatherings usually play out, I figure we’re also entitled to bail on more occasions than I would in Canada. And my normal disapproval of spending time on my phone when with company goes completely out the window.
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Oh come on, you don’t need to shoot smack just to survive dinner…
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You know how long Taiwanese dinners are? C’mon man.
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I’m trying to figure out why you would want to participate.
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‘Want to’ and ‘willing to’. Biggus Differencsus.
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The weddings on the other hand…
I never, ever go out with my wife when she’s with her other female friends.
If their husbands come along and I know them, then men will hang out, drink, watch sports and the women will do their gossip thing and hang out in the kitchen. Same thing if we meet outside.
I might add that my wife wouldn’t dare ask or insist for me to come along to one of these dinners with her friends. One of her buddies has a husband who is such a frickin’ momma’s boy. He absolutely has no friends of his own, so he tags along with his wife every time she goes out. When my wife comes home from one of her lunch or dinner dates, I ask her, “So, was Momma Boy Gua-Hao there?!” And she says, “Of course, that crybaby couldn’t let his wife have even a little space!” So, I look at the pictures and there’s 6 women and this limp dick in the middle. What a chump!
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Yup, thats what I do. OPs mistake was going with them.
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Yeah really, what madness is this.
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what? people actually pull this shit and get away with it?
usually its the other way around for me. i get shit for not speaking chinese good enough.
as for the original question… yea it happens to me everytime i meet with my gfs friends. get better chinese is all you can do. and get wasted, thats always fun. and yeah if its a girly girly date with afternoon tea in some brunch place with constant selfies you might wanna avoid.
I look forward to these “girlie dinners” I get to stay home and murder the Irish Whiskey bottle. Encourage her to go out at least once a month.
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Nice
The trick I’ve gotten away with is that every girl’s night involves hotpot. Early in our courtin’ days I made it be known that I hate hotpot. And KTV, despise KTV.
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