Cynthia, i don’t hear any ignorance in your voice at all. but I understand our feeling the need to clarify your tone of voice as it is often easy to misunderstand good intending people on forums.
Language, especially when written, is a very tricky art forum. I often accidentally start WW? on line because something I wrote was taken the wrong way. but like i said, i sense nothing negative in your response and I take no offense.

Wow #1: I think out of my none ??(btw that word would sound so offensive in english!) tck friends. My family has probably spend the most time in Taiwan, true there are other missionary families that spent more time then us, but I didn’t know there kids as they where older, and mostly just friends of my parents. In truth I often felt that my family was different then most of the missionary families, there kids seemed to be so Americanized (or northamericanized), often visiting their passport countries. My family would only visit Canada once very 4 years and always for less then 4 months, we owned no property in Canada, and always had to stay with relatives, so to us kids it was always like visiting a foreign country. My parents where also supported almost solely by their church in Taiwan, so we didn’t really feel like missionary kids, but pastors kids.

In truth deciding to be Taiwanese came very clear to me one day around the age of 9(?). I was thinking to myself how I was born, raised, and influence by being in Taiwan, I always new Taiwan was my home, yet at the same time I have always been treated like a foreigner. So i told my self that people will probably never accept me, my mandarin not perfect, I’m illiterate, and i get sum burn, but as long as I consider myself Taiwanese, I am Taiwanese, and I will love Taiwan as my native country, and not just my home country. So in truth my definition of Taiwanese is very differant from the majority of Taiwanese. To me it’s not an ethnic group or a culture or a language, but people who identify themselves with Taiwan as their home. In truth it’s more of a northamerican (or New World) idea of nationality then the traditional Old World mentality (like I said, my definitions of Taiwanese is very different from the majority and is perhaps influenced my the ideals of my parents home country.) I believe in diversity! And i hope that one day Taiwan will be accepting of multiculturalism, and multiethnicitism (think I just made up a word).

here’s a phrase I made up a long time ago. “I define my on reality” I only hope my reality gains acceptance with more people, but if not, it doesn’t mater as long as I hold true to myself.

I like the term “New Taiwanese” as I believe the future is going to have a lot of mixing of societies.

anyways i got really off topic, and perhaps said much more then necessary, but I like writing down my ideas, as it helps me clarify to myself what my beliefs are. What I just wrote was probably more for myself to clarify to myself then it was for anyone else. haha.

btw, i really don’t feel white, Caucasian, Canadian, or whatever people think I am, but i do feel Asian, and Taiwanese, most often I’m really just “other”

Wow #2: I find this very interesting, I take it as a compliment although it could mean that my English isn’t like a native. I think its a combination of both from linguistic influences and tckness. Perhaps being a TCK makes people write more diplomatically (i’m not sure if my easy was diplomatic, but often in my writing I try to be diplomatic. But anyways, I often find my thinking is very different from the average westerner. When i speak i often use strange sentence patterns or concepts from mandarin. Also to add, i struggled with spelling all my life, and have learned to sort of limite my vocabulary in order to avoid words to hard to spell.

an interesting thing happened to me when i was in grade 8. I was homeschooled my whole life (besides a year of Taiwanese kinder garden) and my parents wanted to send me to Morrison Taichung (for those not from Taiwan, It’s a American boarding School). So to get in to the school i had to take a placement test to see what grade they could put me in. WELL… it was my first placement test, and I was used to the leisure past, no pressure homeschool life, and when the lady said relax and take your time, i was stupid enough to believe her. So the results was that they thought I was 2 years behind and that they would have to put me back a grade (or 2, can’t remember), it was one of the worst days of my life (i felt like what Harry Potter would have felt if he had gotten exspelled from Hogwarts or if when he put on the sorting hat, the school had realized that he wasn’t supposed to be there even after he had hyped himself up to attending the school) and my parents thought they had failed in education me properly, BUT the results from the tests said that i had a grade 13 (i guess some countries have a 13th grade) ability to understand/guess vocabulary. Anyways my family decided to keep me homeschooled till grade 11 until i moved back to canada to finish off highschool (were i found out that having a teacher, made learning every easy, i almost did no studying and could get good marks, just because i paid attention in class and did all the assignments. I’m just a little sad, i never attended that school, since i know, if i had, it would have pushed me a lot farther ahead and i would have figured out my own potential sooner.

sorry I’m like a old man who keeps reminiscing about the past, and going off topic.

but as i’m trying to say is, I feel i have a much greater understanding of English then native speakers, but I often feel like i’m writing and speaking with a handicap, and that i sound like a non-native speaker.

anyways this topic of language, really interests me, and perhaps after a good nights rest i will open a new post about it.

Wow 3#: Perhaps i should re word that, lol. I used to speak with a Taiwanese accent, and everyone in a while i get it back. But I’ve been living in Canada for the last 4 years so my mandarin is getting fairly horrible. My tones are still almost always correct, but my vocabulary is starting to sound like a foreigner’s again. I hope to go back to Taiwan after university and take some extensive classes in mandarin, and Taiwanese, but until then my mandarin is suffering. BTW, i wish you could hear my sister’s mandarin, it is so perfect and Taiwanese, there’s no hint of a foreign accent (i guess that’s because she’s the most talkative member of my family).

btw I have a Taiwanese friend who now works in Shanghai as an architect. She’s only been there for 2 years, so she still has her Taiwanese accent, but i hear her using a lot of words only used in China and not in Taiwan, it’s kind of funny. I kind of want to move to the UK or Australia so that i can adapt a different English accent, although for mandarin, i much prefer the Taiwan accent (it reminds me of home).

and to answer your question “do you want my passport” i say YES!!!
infact I’ve been doing tons of studying into how I can become a Taiwanese citizen, and I am seriously considering going through with it in a few years (I’ll have to give up my Canadian passport unfortunately, but like they say, “if you don’t love it, leave it!”)

i have this strange romantic idea of dieing as a Taiwanese Citizen!
To be finally acknowledge as a citizen would mean so much to me.

WOW, I wrote a lot, and went a lot off topic, thanks Cynthia. I love hearing feedback, and it has given me an idea for another topic to post later after i get some sleep!

First of all, apologies for the lack of user-friendly navigation on this website as there’s a lot of work being done in the background and hopefully it will be up and running with better navigation. But you managed to make a great post! Woot!

Second of all, just “wow” at this entry. And that comes with a lot of meanings. But all in a good way At least I hope it is to you Please if I do sound ignorant (because sometimes I can be) I don’t mean to and I don’t want to offend you in any way.

Wow #1: 18 years in Taiwan?! That’s amazing, I have yet to meet a non-Asian TCK (basically anyone who is completely different from the majority of the population) who has lived in Taiwan that long (I know there are a lot out there but I have never met anyone in person, those that I know from Taiwan are overseas Taiwanese, dual-citizenship Taiwanese or just Asian and they are different perspectives as well). The reason why I’m saying this is because I am really curious as to how a non-Asian TCK who calls Taiwan home see Taiwan. I myself am a Taiwanese-born TCK, still holds the passport to the country but have no emotional ties to it. I call myself “Taiwanese” but I don’t feel anything from it. Taiwan is completely foreign to me – I feel detached. You are probably…in fact I think you ARE more Taiwanese than me. My “home” country that I consider is anywhere in Southeast Asia and the culture is just so different there. It’s so hard for me to relate myself to a Chinese culture even though I look and talk like one.

Wow #2: I have to say you definitely sound Taiwanese (I hope that’s a good thing!) in your post Just the way you use words and the way you express yourself, it just seems very Taiwanese to me. That’s kind of how I talk too haha but I don’t know if it’s a Taiwanese thing or just a TCK thing :p

Wow 3#: You speak Mandarin with a Taiwanese accent! I’ve lost mine Now I speak Mandarin with a Mainland China accent (after being in Shanghai for so long).

I’d say you definitely are more Taiwanese than me, do you want my passport?

And welcome to TCKid.com if it’s not too late for that