Recently Sinorama went to America's Silicon Valley to file a report on engineers from Taiwan and their search for spouses. At that time, several people mentioned to us that they had quite a few friends who had divorced. There were even those who unabashedly admitted that after seeing so many examples of divorced couples, they viewed married life with trepidation.
During our interviews, we caught wind of a story involving a husband and wife who developed a severe difference of opinion on whether they should stay in the United States. One of them focused on the virtues of America; the other felt the pull for the land of his birth. In the end they parted ways.
Throughout our interviews, we were able to record the events that took place according to only one of the principal parties. He is a father and a husband who has gone through the psychological process of becoming a "home wrecker."
Why would he and his wife choose the route of divorce? When this question was brought up, Mr. Chen corrected us by saying, "It was my ex-wife."
"I'm sorry," said the interviewer apologetically.
"That's all right," Mr. Chen replied. Temporarily staying at his younger sister's home in northern California, Mr. Chen spun a long yarn retelling the changes in his life during the last few years, the scissors in his hands still busy making stage props for a play to be put on by his ethnic Chinese social club.
Traveling halfway round the world
Mr. Chen had been an overseas student in Europe. He and his wife were classmates in university, and after they were married, they decided to pursue graduate studies together in Vienna, in order to see the wider world outside Taiwan.
He had written fiction, and he showed quite a talent for literature. His facility in the German language was not bad either. Active in the Chinese student association in Vienna, he came under the appreciative eye of the ROC government's representative in Vienna. Because of his recommendation, Mr. Chen was able to advance from overseas student to special assistant in a government bureau. Temporarily leaving the life of foreign studies, he fully welcomed the chance to take his wife and their three-month-old daughter and settle down back home.
The institution Mr. Chen worked for was a unit dealing with foreign affairs. During the six years of his employment there, he had many opportunities to be stationed abroad, but not once did he take so much as a single step outside the country. Always remembering that he was the only male in the third generation of his extended family, every week he returned to the family's home several times to help his paraplegic grandfather bathe. Such traditional filial responsibilities were his to shoulder.
Within those six years, his family suffered a succession of unexpected tragedies. His father and his grandfather passed away one after the other, and he also left his government position. The birth of his two sons only slightly ameliorated his sense of loss.
His new employment was as an upper-level manager for a private sector company. In order to explore and expand new opportunities, he was obliged to travel often, running all over the North America, Europe, Southeast Asia and mainland China.
Unwilling to abandon home
His only real wish was to be with his wife and children, and this was becoming increasingly difficult to achieve. During several summer holidays, his wife took the children to live long-term in the United States. When he got off work, he returned to an empty house.
"As to our points of view on how to live a peaceful and contented life, my wife and I never did strike the same chord," he says with regret.
His wife's family had early on immigrated to the US. She felt very critical of the ROC's harsh and punishment-oriented educational system. For the sake of the children, why not move the family to the United States as well? In the beginning she indicated that she did not necessarily have to immigrate to America. After she had gained residence status, she said that she only wanted to see how things worked out; she didn't necessarily want to stay.
Mr. Chen feels that step by step he was pushed into the snare of "having no option but following along." If from the beginning he had known that her desire to stay long term in the United States was so strong, he could have spent more time talking things over with her.
Hastily going to the US, he helped his wife arrange living quarters, then he returned to Taiwan to finish up his work, which was becoming more and more complicated and tiring. He temporarily transferred the responsibilities for taking care of his mother and grandmother into his elder sister's hands and went back to the US to reunite with his wife and children.
Full-time househusband
Mr. Chen sees himself as a "very Chinese person" who is happiest when living in a Chinese environment. There is nothing wrong at all with his foreign language skills, but as someone who uses the Chinese language to compose literature, once he is separated from the atmosphere of his mother tongue, he feels quite out of his element. He relied on rental proceeds from his house in Taiwan, inherited property and occasional translation work, and at first financial burdens were no problem. His principal job was in fact being a househusband, working full time to look after the children and help them adjust to the new school environment.
Taking care of the children was a joyful activity for him; he even views it as one of his greatest accomplishments.
He took charge of the multi-cultural activities for his daughter's school. He directed a dragon dance of more than 10 children, drawing outlines, doing the painting and design. The school teacher, in recognition of such an enthusiastic parent, invited him to participate as a voluntary bilingual teacher. He actively organized a Chinese parent association, and on weekends he taught at the Chinese school, to help the children maintain their mother tongue.
And because there was a full-time father at home cooking the meals, taking the children to school and back and helping them with homework, his wife was able to concentrate on her work and postgraduate studies.
No sense of belonging
"Isn't this a really lucky life we're leading?" Mr. Chen had asked himself. "A complete Chinese family, living less than an hour's drive from the wife's mother and father and some other relatives, in a big city in southern California, speaking in American English, taking American society as the universe in which we live and breathe, letting the next generation become American youths with all their work and study burdens light--isn't this the fairy-tale life that so many people in Taiwan have always dreamed of?"
"If I could have lived that kind of lifestyle at the expense of my principles, then I wouldn't be depressed and returning home all alone."
But thinking of his grandmother and mother who still lived in Taiwan, and still strongly identifying with his place of birth, he was unable to comfortably transform himself into an American. "I'm not that kind of person. I couldn't force myself to live that kind of life," he said.
His wife was not the sort of person who considered her husband's career to be the most important of things. She only felt that they should move to the US "for the good of the children." But Mr. Chen believed that whether the children should go to America is a decision made by adults, "because the kids just don't have the concept that America is better."
When in Taiwan, his wife was a lecturer at a technical institute, but she had no opportunity in California to use her expertise. Because of this she had no option but to study for a degree that would help her to stay permanently in the US. By that time computer science had already become less promising than it used to be, so she altered course and began to study ultrasound technology. "The information that she got hold of all came from her parents or friends. She had not been living there seeking information for very long, so by the time she got the information, it was always after the peak period for that field had already passed," he says.
For a full two years he helped his children adjust to their foreign environment. He never opposed their studying there for a few years and learning a foreign language and culture. But fundamentally he still felt the need to return to Taiwan, and he still identified with his own home country. In his heart he always felt that this was a transitory phase. "I was very opposed to wasting away my whole life staying over there."
The only recourse is divorce?
The two maintained a strong difference of opinion as to whether to settle permanently in the US, and the subject had long since become a touchy one. From the end of 1989 when they moved to the US to their divorce in the summer of 1992, hardly more than two years had elapsed. The couple's relationship became extremely fractious. "If the lawyer hadn't been brought in, maybe relations between the two of us could have been mended." Mr. Chen muses.
Psychologically, his wife had come to completely identify with American society. She sought the help of psychiatrists and lawyers. In their "professional" opinions, in this kind of situation, "the only recourse is divorce." "In her heart she had come to feel that she was receiving the support of that culture," says Mr. Chen.
His wife incessantly asked for a divorce, based on the reasoning that he was "too backward to accept new things, and the two were growing farther and farther apart." And according to California law, if only one side is willing to proceed with divorce, it goes into effect.
"We are both basically parents who love their children, but we were unable to give our kids a complete love. That is the greatest wound of all." What Mr. Chen finds hardest to part with are his three children.
In a letter he sent to his children, he wrote, "...A good papa will take part in the activities his children like; he will be their friend and help them to stabilize the direction of their lives and give them a tranquil and happy home. He will love the mother that they love.... When I examine myself, I have no qualms that I have diligently done what I should for 14 years. But I could never find the best way to love you. In the end all my efforts came to no avail in America.... In those hearts of yours that are growing up wounded, can you find room to accept your father who has no choice but to stay away from his sons and daughter?"
Embroiled in a grown-ups' legal battle
During the period when he had moved into a rented house, he drove 40 minutes every day to visit his kids. For a full two weeks he could not sleep a wink, and his children shed as many tears as he.
Alimony and property division were quickly settled, "but lawsuits over the children can go on interminably," Mr. Chen emphasized. The spirit of the relevant laws in the US is to ensure the children's welfare; nevertheless, it always renders the couple miserable after the divorce, for the lawsuit can grind on without resolution.
His wife put her faith in this aspect of American culture, still assuming the role of parent, conceding willingly to all her duties. "After the divorce, of course you're not going to neglect your parental responsibilities, but did she ever give thought as to how to act as both father and mother? Or how to be an American parent?" ponders Mr. Chen.
The settlement they finally arrived at allowed dual custody of the children; during holiday seasons, they could return with their father to Taiwan. Afterward, his wife sought to prevent the children from being able to be taken out of California. When Mr. Chen took the children to live at his sister's house in northern California to stay with all their cousins, she sought the further concession of their returning to Los Angeles once every two weeks. If he didn't promise, she would file a suit. But the law tends to favor compromise. If the dispute cannot be settled, then it must be argued back and forth in court. So it was best to appease his wife; and soon the summer vacation was finished.
Do you want to go back to Taiwan?
"I got taught a good lesson in the law," says Mr. Chen. Because he had to go to court, he diligently researched American common law. Even when he was back in Taiwan, he would visit the library. He says that the Central Library in Taipei has very comprehensive information on American law. In the US, lawyers' fees are counted according to time. He did not want to be dependent on his lawyer. Instead, he invested his own time doing homework, arranging his ideas in orderly lists, to save time.
"She knows that I have a strong influence on the children, and the only thing to do is to keep the kids from being with me." Nonetheless, Mr. Chen has a deep realization that when the children are with their mother, they have no pressure. When they are with their father, they have the pressure to return to Taiwan.
As for the children's point of view, Mr. Chen says a bit pessimistically that they tend to favor their mother's side. There has been some conflict in the relationship he has with his offspring.
"You are all still too little. In your innocent way of thinking, deciding whether to come back to Taiwan or stay in the States is undoubtedly almost like deciding to do your homework or go to Disneyland. Do I dare hope that you will recognize that the decisions you make today will have an impact on which society you will belong to in the future?" In a letter to his children, he remorsefully wrote, "From start to finish, I have felt hesitant to proceed in this grown-up's legal war because you were inclined to stay in America."
In order to minimize the hurt inflicted on his children, he is unwilling to continue with lawsuits. After all, children are innocent. In the end he told his children whenever they missed their papa they could go to visit at his place. Even when he was leaving, he told them not to go to the airport to send him off, making the whole event seem as if it were just "Papa has to leave the country because of work."
Mr. Chen has come to recognize that "I have forever left the family I raised for 14 years." And this time the ticket he has reserved is a one-way flight.
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