My Taiwanese Family

I live with an English teacher who works at the school where I teach (Zhong Xin: Private Junior High and High School). Her name is Angela. She likes it when I use her English name. She is married and has two children. Her husband doesn't have an English name, but the very first day, Angela informed me that I can call him John. So, I simply call him John. It's really funny because he even refers to himself as John when he is talking to me. Think of it as the third-person perspective coming alive, an example of what not to do in English class. I kid because I think he is hilarious, and he know it himself! When I first started living at their house, I thought I couldn't speak a lick of English. Later that night at dinner, asked the parents what their majors were in college. Angela's was obviously English, but John wouldn't tell me his major; he was too embarrassed. I couldn't figure out what major would be embarrassing. Massage therapy? But then, I had a suspicion. The next day, his daughter confirmed that his major in college was indeed English. I should have known; he is always the first one to look up words in the dictionary. Don't worry, I still pretend that I have no idea what his major was. Note to self: use the skills that I have learned in college.

I speak mainly Chinese with the family because only Angela can speak English, but they love asking me weird questions. Examples: What is a freckle? filial piety? microcredit? financing? I get a gamut of them. The funniest thing is that I found a list of the words I had taught them: pimple, blister, wart, germ, cough, sty, puke. Hmmm....I think I should probably teach them some other words.

Angela works really hard, six days a week. Saturdays are half days, but she stays until 9pm on Friday nights. She teaches English and is also a homeroom advisor. John does business on the internet. It really cool because taking care of the children and house is the responsibility of both parents, not just the mother. Because John is home more often than Angela, he does most of the cleaning and spends more time with the daughters. He also packs everyone breakfast everyday. As a joke, Angela tells me to wear slippers around the apartment because John is a messy "house-husband."

Evette (14) is the oldest daughter and also goes to Zhong Xin. Winnie (12) will go to Zhong Xin next year. They are definitely teenagers. They read teenage romance stories, take pictures of themselves, and care about what their hair looks like. This weekend, I came home at around 10pm to find them watching the most nauseating teenage soap opera. Ooops, I meant to say quintessential teenage love story: Twilight. Yes, believe it or not, Twilight is an all too popular phenomenon around the world. They invited me to watch the rest of the movie with them. Because I didn't want to snub them, I stayed and endured 30 minutes of teenage angst. In those 30 minutes, Jacob serendipitously took off his shirt like 12 times.

The family is really nice to me. I hope that we can become close friends and that I can introduce them to the Gospel. I think they would like coming to church. I feel slightly guilty because I spend so much time away from home and don't really see them that much. I'm going to try to halt the activities this week so that I can get to know them better. You know me, I've always been crazy busy. Taiwan is the same way, but I'm really going to make an effort.