Face!!!!

Even though I have been living in Taiwan now for nearly 3 years.  Now I have been struggling with the concept of face more so than when I arrived!  

I think this has a lot to do with the fact that Taiwanese people think I should know more about it because i'm not a fresh off the boat newbie!  As I have said, after 3 years they assume this big hairy foreign ape looking white man knows all about face.  So we good!

Losing face is a no no for Taiwanese people

I don't actually mean people's real faces by the way.  Face is Taiwan is kind of like an abstract subject, its all about how other people see you in society.  Also how you act, what you do, who your friends are, what kind of work you do, and what you do when your not at work can all effect your face!    Anything along the lines of arguing, sleeping around, complaining, moaning, and fighting will help you lose face in an instant. 

Losing face is a massive thing, people often talk a lot about saving face, or how they have lost their face and they cannot go to that shop again, or see those people again in the street.  This kind of thing, and these kind of activities are really common back in good ole Newcastle.

What I find funny about Taiwanese people is they really care about face but there are a lot of situations where face is not thought of at all!  For example charging past you to get a seat on the MRT!  Chomping on food and talking at the same time, showing all the contents of your lunch, and mumbling some bizarre concoction of a word!  People walking at the pace of a man with no legs when your in a hurry and not moving out of the way for shit, because that's their goddamn piece of path, and their not letting you past at all.  Even if you say, "bu hao yi si" Excuse me/i'm sorry.  After uttering the magic polite words you get looked at like you have just shot the bastards in the back, or your neighbour braying on your door uttering some sort of chinese gibberish about you shouting "Webb you manc cunt, it was over the line.  She however, bangs the front door so loud every day like that don't matter!!!" as you watch Newcastle get thumped by Man Utd and that cheating fucker helps them!  The great final contradiction is gobbing up all your phlegm and beetle nuts all over the streets like its no ones business, and face don't mean shit to them.  Its all about the contradictions baby.

Polite or not polite...who is right?

Are you polite?  Are you impolite?

People here in Taiwan think quite differently about eating food together than they do back home.  They see it as really rude and not polite if you don't eat what your offered, regardless if you like it or not.  

There have been a lot of occasions so far when people think I am not polite just because I won't eat certain things I know I don't like.  I find this behaviour very odd.  For example I really don't eat a lot of sea food.  I like cod, tuna, a bit of salmon now and then other than that not much else.  In Taiwan they eat loads of seafood, especially prawns, shrimps and clams.  I hate prawns and shrimps in England so why would that change when I came to Taiwan, it does not.  It is still the same I don't like what I don't like and I cannot just decide to eat it because people will think I am not polite.  

If you kept trying to force people in England to eat food when they have told you so many times they don't want any or don't like it, then that would be seen as not polite.  People would also get very angry that you kept asking, and insisting that they should eat it, or try it.

A few months ago I went out with work to a beautiful place in the mountains for a meal with work.  I had a stinking hang over, and the place we went to had no menu, I was hoping they would have something I like.  They didn't have anything, actually it was mainly loads of raw fish.  As I have already told everyone I don't eat most fish to begin with because I don't like it.  So the fact this was not even cooked fish, and I had a stinking hangover made it all worse.  It was also boiling hot, and the air con didn't seem to be helping me one bit.  As we progressed through the meal, there was not one dish I could eat.  They did however keep insisting I should try it, even though I know I don't like it because I have tried it before.

I didn't think this would of been a great problem but when I went to work the next day I got politely informed that I was rude for not eating anything.  I really don't know how me not eating anything effects any one else's enjoyment of their food but that's really how it is here!

My girlfriend keeps telling me if I don't like anything I should tell them I am allergic to it, and this would make everything so much easier.  I think though why should I lie about something so trivial that really effects no one else but myself?  If I go out for a staff meal together and don't like the food I am gonna be the one losing out because I leave hungry not them!

Anyway, the point of this post is who is right?  Who is wrong? 

Back home it is not polite to force people to eat what they don't like, or make them feel like shit that they don't want to eat the food.  

Here in Taiwan it is the opposite, people see it as not polite if you don't eat anything because you don't like it.  They think your being rude by not trying some, and being too fussy about the food.  Also they think your not grateful!

Discuss...let me know your opinions!