I fisrt took note of this turn during my church’s bible study for young adults (18-30). In trueth I wasn’t really paying atention to anything and was just drifting away, as I always do in most group settings (i sort of drift into myself, and close the world out around me). anyways i just remember hearing the group leader say “…. and some people are socially awkward…” As soon as he said this it was like a bell flicked on in my head, i knew he wasn’t talking about me, but I completly felt that way. So immediately, after he said this I pointed to myself in a self comidic sort of way (i did it without really thinking about it, was more like a reflex, sort of my way of breaking the ice when the conversation in a room gets to deap for my comfort). Anyways this caused a little much needed laughter in the room, with the group leader trying to asure me that i wasn’t socialy awkward. In truth, it dosn’t matter if he truely believed i wasn’t or if he did but was trying to be nice, the fact is, it was truely how i feal, every moment of the day when i have to interact with people of my age group, especially when in large groups.

I often find myself in situations like today, where i’m in a group of people my age (22ish), I’m kind of the outsider watching them interact. And one thing about Canadians, is they can be quite witty, and are in generally comedic people in my opinion (or atleast in comparision asians). So i’m watching interact, then they’d say somthing to me, and i rarly know how to reply. Theres a thing in Canada called sarcasim, it can be a wonderful thing, unless your like me, and have a hard time detecting it! And i’m not say i have no sence of humor, in trueth, when i’m with friends who i know really well (all of them also tcks) i’m often the life of the party. But with my “canadian” buddies, I just don’t know how to react to them, and often don’t really understand whats going on because of all the cultural refrenses they make. So i just become that idiot who laughs when they laugh, not because i think that the joke is funny, but because i don’t get it! Well my main problem is in group settings, when i’m with just one friend, I’m able to interact a little beter, perhaps it’s because i don’t feel as much social presure to impress when i’m only around one person.

Shaking hands

Other then my struggle in group settings, knowing what to say, and saying the right things so i don’t sound stupid, but I also struggle greatly with physical contact! To exsplain, my parents are Canadian, but I was raised in Taiwan, and learned Taiwanese rules of greatings, and departures. I remember when i was old enough to care about not seeming wierd, I actually did some self studying about how to interact with westreners. I had to teach myself how to shake hands properly (not to soft, not to hard) so that I come across as a confident young man. I also took note, not to offer my hand to a woman, unless she offerd first (I learned from some very conservitive southren baptist course on how to be a gentalmen). So now that i’v lived in canada i’ve had to really master how and when to “shake hands”. The problem, its a reflex for me, someone in church might reach their hand out to grabe a coffee, but my brain tells my arm to shakehands, when thats not what me not the other perosn plan on doing. It can be extreemly embaracing!

being asked “hows it going?”

for me it seems, it is never going well, which really sucks, since i find it extreemly hard to lie, even when it’s to be an answer to a redundant question. I know when people say “hows it going?” or “whatsup?” its just that their saying “hi” and the answer should be something like “good, how about you?” without actually wanting to know the answer, but i always take “hows it going?” as a starter to a conversation. And like I said, Its always going badly with me, so I end up sounding like that guy whos always complaining about everything. So i’ve learned, short answers like, “well…. its been better – (quickly followed by) hows it going with you?” so that they can answer my question without having to do the polite thing of asking me what wrong.

Hugging

dear lord, I’m still practicing at this. For those who don’t know, people don’t hug in Taiwan, even handshakes are much rarer. anyways, The fisrt time in my teen life (as a kid, i probably didn’t have such a probblem with hugging) that i remember giving someone a hug, was when my oldest sister, was leaving at the airport, on her way to repaitriate into canada (for unviesrity). So i sort of learned, to hug when it was a family member who I wasn’t going to see for a long time (more then a year), or when a family member I hadn’t seen for a long time, comes back. Then I went to canada in my mid teens and had to learn to hug my aunts, which seemed wierd, since i wasn’t really close to most of them at the time. So i learned to hug extened family members, or friends of my parents who where like family. Now after living in Canada a little more then 4 years (too long!) I’ve learned that hugs are like handshakes in many social circles, but i feel very uncomfortable at both! I remember being really surprised at when one of my coworkers who i hadn’t seen in a few weeks – when she saw me, she pritty much jumped into my arms, I was quite shocked, I had no idea that friends hugged like that. I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy it, we both had an unoffical “thing” for one anouther, and that hug, made me feel so close to her, It was a very intimate feeling for me. I don’t remember ever feeling so close to someone, its a shame I never asked her out (i always figured, I didn’t have enough in common with non-tck canadians). So anyways, the hug, for me, is something I don’t feel very comfortable with, unless it’s with a family member, or a girl i’m close with, so its very hard for me to hug. I usally just react to what the other person dose, if they open thier arms that means “hug”. kind of like a robot reaction, same as the “handshake”.

Kissing

I plan to go to spain next year and in the future LAmerica, and I hear that people kiss each other on the cheeks. I don’t know what i’ll do, since in the culture I was raised in, husbends and wives don’t even kiss in public, so this whole casual kissing for greeting people and saying good bye, is terifyingly foreign to me!

I often think my sociall problems are more then just the fact I’m a tck, but I see how growing up in no body contact sociaty, and then moving to body contact sociaty (perhaps Zoe can relate to the opposit of my situation! haha) can have a major affect on me, and tcks with similar exsperainaces. Its strange, I’ve very uncomfortable with bodycontact (i often flinch someone touches me, wether on acident or on purpose), but strangly, at the same time I feel starved for it and crave it. So i don’t know is this just a people thing, or is it a tck thing, or is it just me? haha.

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