Christmas isn’t too far away when you finally have a community and a community is finally what I feel like I have here. Before coming to Taiwan, I was convinced I would be best friends with all of my cohort, all the other ETAs in Taitung. I am friends with them, but living in 關山definitely puts a strain on whatever friendship we could have because I tend to avoid driving long distances and the hour commute to the city after school and another hour back doesn’t draw me to the city. As a result, for the longest time Netflix was one of my better friends. There is only so much time you can hang out with the other 5 ETAs in my area without all getting claustrophobic and needing some sort of space. However, this past weekend I was brought in and included a small close-knit group of teachers and past teachers from one of my elementary schools, but also the larger Amis (aboriginal) community my school is made up of.
They had been setting up a rice field with hand-made huts of the dried husks of rice. I would repeatedly drive by it for a week and still had no idea what it was until my director brought it up to me. Like most events I really didn’t have a full idea of what it was. My director told me it was an Amis celebration of a fight in which my students would be performing and there was another performance as well. I was invited to attend and jumped at the opportunity. I had had other plans, but who would turn down an invitation to an Amis celebration, especially when I am trying to build a bigger network here. That’s how Sean and I found ourselves at an invite only Amis celebrations of the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty.
I hadn’t realized that the only people in attendance would be members of the Dian Guang Amis community. Not only were we the only foreigners, but also the only people not in the community and everyone knew it. I felt like I was imposing at times so when Sean wanted to sit in the front row I quickly declined and opted for the second row instead. I kept looking for a teacher or a student I knew so that I at least knew one person and the people around me knew why I was there, that I wasn’t just a tourist that happened by this festival. I was ecstatic when the woman the owns a Bakery in town recognized me and started talking to me. Her son is a kindergartener at 電光國小. Not only did she welcome me there and was happy I had come, but she even invited Sean and I to attend the dinner following the performance at 5pm. The dinner was going to be a shared meal with the entire Amis community at these long tables set up in front of their town center. As much as I really wanted to attend the dinner, I was disappointed to already have plans. The baker seemed completely understanding and told me she looked forward to seeing me at future Amis events.
Two of my second grade students I solo teach: Patrick and Kate
Seeing as I have never gone to this community’s events before I really didn’t know the etiquette for such a performance. I was taking pictures, only because I saw others doing the same. I was trying to mind my own business- staying out of the way of the people dressed in their performance costumes. Sean and I decided to take a seat and get something to eat while we waited for the presentations. As I have written about earlier, Roselle is a really common flower and ingredient in a lot of different forms of food. Roselle can be eaten off the plant, dried, cooked, made into tea- you name it someone has tried. I recently showed Sean the magical taste of Roselle and he loved it. He came back from the food stands with a bag of dried roselle. It looked a little different from how dried roselle usually looks (usually its almost the consistency of a craisin, but instead Sean’s bag looked more like potpourri). I didn’t really think much of it because like I said there are many ways to eat it. We bit into it and it was the most disgusting thing I have ever eaten. Sean bought it thinking it might have the texture of popcorn, but instead it was like eating crackly paper. After putting my half eaten roselle back in the bag we turned to each other and realized what we just did. We ate the equivalent of tea leaves in front of the entire Amis community. One of the most popular ways to consume roselle is in teas and juices. When Sean asked the shop owner if it was good to eat and pointed at the bag (很好吃嗎？) I think the shop owner thought he was kidding. Lo and behold the only foreigners – the sole representation of outsiders- ate tea leaves.
You think it couldn’t get worse than that? Then you don’t know me. After the performance a group of women walked around the audience handing out small paper cups of some sort of drink to every person. It isn’t uncommon for events such as these to give out “free samples” or encourage people to try foods. My cup was close to overflowing so my first reaction is to sip the brim, especially because my camera was on my lap and I don’t want an unknown liquid covering it. Sean took my action of drinking the drink approval for him to start to taste the liquid. Funny enough, Sean thought because I have been teaching at 電光國小for a couple months, that I should know the etiquette at their events. It was the woman seated next to Sean that looked at us with slight horror. We were told by the people surrounding us that the entire community is supposed to drink together following a brief speech. I am pretty sure my face was beet red as I sat waiting for the speech to finish, looking at my half-drunk cup of a lemon-honey tea.
Despite embarrassing myself twice it was an unparalleled experience. Not only was I able to show Sean my students and watch them perform outside of a school setting, but the depiction of the battle was equally interesting. The older members of the community along with professionals trekked across “river beds and mountains” wearing traditional clothing. The tribe was then shown creating their town and cultivating the land until the Qing soldiers arrived. It was then the production value of the performance increased exponentially as the Qing soldiers wheeled out a cannon. Instead of firing a cannon ball, this cannon is known as a bamboo cannon. It is popular amongst the Amis community and has been adapted into a welcoming tool. However, during the performance the soldiers utilized their cannon to “fire” towards the hiding villagers. With each boom of the cannon a man would run to the next hut made out of rice husks in the made-up village and set it on fire. Almost instantly a wave of heat washed over me and I was pretty far from the fire. It was probably the largest fire I had ever seen.
No Hollywood Pyrotechnics were used in the creation of this fire
As the Qing soldiers continued to fight the Amis villagers jumped their barricade, waving swords. Somehow after being surrounded and outnumbered, the Amis community was still able to overthrown the Qing occupancy. The actors went so far as to also “eat” the heart of one of their victims before getting rid of the bodies and rejoicing that they reclaimed their land.
I think Sean described the event the best, “There is a one in a million chance to be able to see this celebration. I can’t believe we got included in this.”
When the actors all took a bow, Sean and I prepared to leave. Racing back to my room I quickly wrapped my Christmas gift for the teacher gift exchange and drove my scooter (we originally planned to walk to the train, but ran out of time) to the train station. I obsessed way too much about what to give as my Christmas gift. I ended up going a little over the limit because I wanted to make sure I wasn’t embarrassed. I bought a mug with a little spoon, Nestle hot chocolate mix, marshmallows (some Asian kind), and some candy canes. When it was all tied with a ribbon, I was pretty happy with myself I am not going to lie.
The Teacher party was held at Pizza Factory, a restaurant in Taitung City. Crystal (who was invited by a friend she made at her school that used to work at 電光國小), Sean, and I all showed up on time for me to introduce them both to my Director, nurse, and both their families. I hadn’t known who was going to show up and I think my social anxiety has increased since I have been here. It is so much harder to read a situation and predict what will happen when you don’t have all the details of the event. In my case, I didn’t know where we should sit. We probably moved 4 times before everyone showed up to the party. We didn’t want to sit too close to a kids’ place setting because I didn’t know how many families were coming, and I didn’t want to sit on the end and make it seem like we were exclusive. We opted to sit by my director and the three seats that were not next to a kid. It proved to be a great choice in seating because we brought the life of the party.
Americans are always loud. Crystal’s teacher friends could’ve been mistaken as American for the amount they laughed and encouraged our raucous discussions about Taiwanese vs. English culture and language. In all nine other teachers were invited. Out of the group, Crystal, Sean, and my Chinese was collectively stronger than most of their English. For the most part we spoke Chinese the whole night, at times moving to Chinglish when we didn’t know the right word. Sean’s willingness to practice his Chinese actually helped me have a break through with the third-grade teacher at my school. She is really cool. Had I ever talked to her before the party—no. She is really shy and her English isn’t strong. As a result, we used to just smile at each other and leave it at that. During the party Sean completely turned around to the other part of the “L” of tables (we were at the corner of the L) and began to encourage the third-grade teacher to speak Chinese with him. I was then able to enter the conversation without it feeling weird and in no time I was talking cameras and photos with the third-grade teacher and looking at her Facebook pictures. I really hope I can continue this relationship with her. This next week is busy, but I plan to bring my camera to school next week and teach her how to use the different settings because she is interested in buying my camera!
After we finished eating, we began to open presents. All the other adults brought presents for the director’s and nurse’s children. I hadn’t known they were coming let alone that I should bring a present, but no one seemed to mind and was just excited to include ETAs this year (in the past they have never invited an ETA to this small Christmas party). When it came to giving out gifts, the number my gift was given was the first to be called. After each number was called the person who picked the number and whoever brought the gift would take a picture together. No one opens the presents there in front of people. That is one piece of etiquette we did know (or mainly Sean knew). Crystal’s teacher friend was nice enough to give us a ride back home. We got back at 11 pm exhausted. Only when I got to my room did I open my present. I am now the owner of an entire brick of Chishang rice (the best rice in Taiwan and the world), a bee venom anti-wrinkle mask, and a face moisturizer.
I wish there were more holidays that encouraged parties like this with friends because I had a lot more fun than I had bargained for.
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