Most foreign spouses originally come to Taiwan quite by chance, and getting married here is generally the last thing they expect to happen. This wasn't in the plans
According to Jonathan Barnard, who came to Taiwan in 1987, "I had never imagined I would be getting married in Taiwan. I thought I would only be here for a year or two." His family in the United States does not have any objection to his marrying someone from another country, but they do feel disappointed that he is living on the other side of the world. However, he suspects they might feel the same way even if he were living somewhere in the United States far from home.
Brent Heinrich came to Taiwan 12 years ago as a history major with few job prospects. The original plan was just to teach English and travel for a little while. He confides, "I had heard that you could teach English and have a good time in Taiwan." He had never figured on staying in Taiwan for long, but he met the woman he would marry, and the rest is history.
R.J. has been in Taiwan for 12 years, the last eight of them married to a local woman. Like many others, he had not originally intended to come here. "I had read a lot of Chinese historical novels and books on Daoist religion, and had always wanted to go to mainland China to see firsthand the things I had read about." After traveling for four months in the mainland, he decided to stop over in Taiwan on his way back to the United States. Little did he know that his "brief look around" would extend to 12 years and include marriage and children. His elder daughter Manwen is now five years old, and his second daughter Manyun is two-and-a-half. Both of his girls are quite Western in appearance, but they speak Taiwanese and Mandarin, and Manwen is learning to read Chinese.
James Murray hails from Scotland and has resided in Taiwan since 1986. Except for an odd twist of fate, however, he would never have come here at all. Before coming, he didn't even know where Taiwan was, but the happy-go-lucky young man jumped on a plane with his girlfriend, who came to study Chinese. Within a year the relationship with his girlfriend had ended. She learned Chinese to her satisfaction and left, but Murray stayed on. He married Chen Chiu-ping after a ten-year relationship, and the two had their first child this year.
Says Hu Chen-ni, who married Eric two-and-a-half years ago, "Foreigners who come to Taiwan don't intend to stay for long, and marrying someone from another country is definitely an unexpected turn of events." Very few foreigners come here with the express purpose of marrying a local woman, although there are quite a few Taiwanese women who do set their sights on marrying a foreigner. "Some people end up being pressured into marriage by the woman's family," says Chen-ni. In fact, this is exactly what happened in her own case. After she and Eric had spent a half-year traveling together in India, her family felt that they should get married.
In-law troubles
Marriage between people from different countries is extremely commonplace in today's world, where international society is rapidly turning into a global village. The older generation, however, is not always totally prepared to accept such marriages.
When Jonathan Barnard was preparing to marry, his future father-in-law demanded that his parents come over from the United States to give proof that Barnard had not been married previously abroad.
Mrs. MacDonald, a former physical education instructor at the Taipei American School who now lives with her husband in America, recalls with a laugh the apocalyptic warning her father delivered when her boyfriend approached her parents to ask for her hand in marriage: "We Chinese don't like divorce. If you ever abandon our daughter, our family will kill you!"
Hu Chen-ni's parents, on the other hand, did not have much objection to her marrying a foreigner. "In fact," says Hu, "they felt that I would have fared very badly had I married a Taiwanese man because I'm a total klutz with household chores." The biggest problem in her marriage has stemmed from differing Western and Chinese attitudes toward family affairs. Eric often complains that he and his wife spend too much time with her parents, and that they have very little time to themselves. "I must admit," laughs Hu, "I did pull the wool over his eyes. I had told him that there were only three holidays a year when the whole family absolutely has to get together. It wasn't until later that he found out that my family gets together every month."
Says Brent Heinrich, "My mother- and father-in-law are used to me not paying any attention to their wishes." He recently let his hair grow to shoulder length, and the new look displeased his father-in-law, who asked his wife to call their daughter and get her husband to have a haircut. Heinrich pretended he never got the message, and there was nothing his father-in-law could do.
"The most distinctive characteristic about Westerners," says Heinrich, "is that once we grow up we become independent entities." When his in-laws "suggest" that he buy a house, buy a car, or have children, he always answers bluntly, "I don't want to right now, and even if I want to at some point in the future, it'll be to please myself, not you."
Chen Su-yen's husband gets along very well with her family these days, but there had initially been opposition to their "Sino-Thai" marriage. Says Chen, "My family was really worried about me marrying a foreigner from a place so far away." Several years of marriage have put their fears to rest, however. "Besides," laughs Chen, "although he has a slightly darker complexion than the Taiwanese, no one can tell when he walks down the street that he's a foreigner."
When East meets West
Except for some fundamental differences, such as concepts concerning the rights of the individual, foreign spouses are usually quite willing to go along with local customs in Taiwan, but it is easy to trip up in the effort.
Richard Hartzell says that he often infuriates his wife with his gaffes. When the phone rings during dinner, for example, he often plants his chopsticks in his rice bowl before jumping up to answer the phone. For the Chinese, it is totally taboo to do this with chopsticks because it brings to mind the incense sticks that are planted in a bowl of rice and burned at the grave of a loved one. And then there was the time he and his wife invited a group of friends over for the evening. Everyone was informed that dinner would be served at 6:00, yet no one had shown up by dinnertime, so he started eating by himself. Says Hartzell, "My home is my castle, and I'm the master."
Even people who share a common linguistic and cultural background have problems getting adjusting to married life, so wouldn't people from East and West have even more problems? That is what most people generally think.
Tom J. feels that his marriage hit the rocks due to purely personal factors rather than cultural differences. In his opinion, the biggest hurdle facing spouses from different cultures is linguistic. Even though he speaks Mandarin so well that one cannot detect any hint of a foreign accent, he confides that when tempers flared, he and his wife still had problems with communication.
Anita Yu has been married for ten years to an English-speaker from South Africa, and together the two have managed to build a trading company of considerable size. Yu serves as general manager. Her husband is very much a partner both at home and in business, and the couple enjoys a very strong relationship. Yu feels that different cultural backgrounds have enabled her and her husband to grow that much more. Her husband is ten years older than her, and she has nothing but respect for the way he deals with people, treats his wife, and handles family matters. Describing herself as very temperamental, she feels that she has changed a lot over the course of her marriage. Showing deep feeling and a strong sense of gratitude, Yu says, "Being married to my husband has made me a better person." Putting down roots
"Why should a foreigner want to stay in Taiwan?" This is a question that puzzles many.
Says Brent Heinrich, "We often talk about whether to go to the United States, but we never come to a definite decision. If we went back, it would be more difficult for me to get a good job, and my wife would also have fewer job opportunities there." His hometown is in rural Louisiana, so even if they went back, it wouldn't be to his hometown. They would have to start all over in a new city. Says Heinrich, "That would be no different than staying in Taiwan as far as I'm concerned." After much thought, it appears that they will most likely stay in Taiwan. As Heinrich attests, "The food's great, shopping is convenient, and there are mountains and sea. It's a very fun place. I really like life in Taiwan, and I'm in no hurry to leave."
Like Heinrich, Richard Hartzell cannot go back home because he comes from a rural area of the United States. Says Hartzell, "Americans may have big yards, but your neighbor will tell you: 'Keep off my property.' In rural Taiwan, by contrast, the neighbors still enjoy very warm relations. When you pass by someone's home in a rural area, they'll invite you in for tea."
Hartzell also relishes the diversity of Taiwanese culture. "On my way home every day, I run across all kinds of restaurants, from the economical to the high-class, serving every kind of Chinese and Western cuisine. It's great having so many types of restaurants all on a single street. And it's the same with religion-the Chinese and Western exist side-by-side in complete harmony."
Joining "the new Taiwanese"
Once they've had children, though, many foreign spouses begin to think about going back home.
Says Jonathan Barnard, whose daughters are five and three years old, "I worry that Taiwan's education system, with its emphasis on rote memorization and its pressure-cooker tests, would cast a gloom over their lives. I would like to have my kids go to the American School, but it's extremely expensive in Taiwan, so we may move to the States in a few years."
R.J. and Chen Chin-fang plan to either send their children to the American School or move to the United States. "Since they'll eventually have to go to the United States," says Chin-fang, "English proficiency is very important for them."
L.J. Lamb, a former lawyer who now serves as an English-language consultant for the Government Information Office, first came to Taiwan in 1973. His two sons are now 24 and 25. Both took their schooling at the Taipei American School before returning to the United States for university. The older son now works at an architectural firm, and the second son is still in school studying finance and Chinese.
Regardless of whether foreigners opt to stay in Taiwan or return to their home countries, the passage of the Entry, Exit and Immigration Law has changed their lives by giving them a choice in the matter.
Richard Hartzell has lived in Taiwan for 24 years, and married here ten years ago. He now has a son in elementary school. He points out that locally born Taiwanese can leave the country for 15 or 20 years and still come back without anyone regarding them as anything other than Taiwanese, while foreigners who marry in Taiwan and stay here for years are still seen as outsiders. However, says Hartzell, now that the Entry, Exit and Immigration Law has taken effect, foreigners who decide to stay in Taiwan "have a chance to become one of 'the new Taiwanese.'"