Who should or shouldn’t come to Taiwan ? ❌ 🇹🇼 🚫 誰不應該來台灣？

Who should and who shouldn't come to Taiwan. Yes, hello everybody, welcome back to the channel. My name is Alan. This is my life in Taiwan. And welcome to Shenzhen, here in Taichung City. No particular reason for being here, other than it provides a beautiful backdrop for me to present today's video from. In which I'm going to be giving you my opinion on what kind of person I think should or perhaps should not come to Taiwan. And by that, I'm talking about people who are looking to come here long term. Not so much talking about tourists today. All tourists are welcome. COVID regulations permitting, of course. So whether you're a backpacker on a budget or you're a millionaire looking to come here and donate thousands to Taiwan's economy on your travels, all tourists are welcome in Taiwan, of course. And one other thing I have to say that this video is 100% just my opinion. And if your opinion differs from mine, then please feel free to start an argument with me in the comment section. Otherwise, if you do agree with everything I say, then we can be friends and you're no doubt going to enjoy all of my future videos. So why not show me some love, help me out, hit that subscribe button and get me to 250,000 subscribers as soon as we can. But anyway, why am I talking about this topic? Well, as a foreigner who is fast approaching my 13th Taiwan-iversary here in Taiwan, coming up on the 18th of March. So happy Taiwanese birthday to me. But yes, as a 13-year resident of this country, I feel I have seen every different type of foreigner come and go from this amazing country. Some with amazing success stories, some with epic failures and many, many in between. So today I'll be sharing some of their stories with you, as well as giving you my opinion on what constitutes a good match for making a success of yourself here in Taiwan. Okay, right. So what types of foreigner would actually consider a move to Taiwan? And the reason I'm asking that is because surprisingly, not every foreigner around the world desires a life in Taiwan. And more surprisingly, there are actually some foreigners that don't even know Taiwan exists. There are still some people that believe it's the same place as Thailand and there are even some dumber ones who think that it's just a province in China. And one other thing I should clarify here is that when I'm talking about foreigners, I am aware that the vast majority of foreigners living in Taiwan are those from other Southeast Asian countries that come here to work as laborers, caregivers, factory workers, and they do an absolutely amazing job for Taiwan. But as I'm not really in that circle, I can't comment too much on their situation. So here in this video, I'm talking more about the Western foreigners such as myself that come here. Nothing against the Southeast Asian expats. I just don't want to speak out of turn. But of the foreigners that come here that I know, they generally fall into several different categories. Firstly, there are the younger backpackers that are maybe exploring the world, traveling around, come to Taiwan to explore for a week, maybe a month or so. And then there are the backpackers that have maybe run out of money, come to Taiwan for a year or more to top up their finances with a year of teaching. These kind of people are absolutely the kind of people that should come to Taiwan. If you like adventures, whether that's adventures in nature, adventurous food, or just an adventure of putting yourself out of your comfort zone, then Taiwan is definitely the place for you. And some people will say that these short-term teachers shouldn't come here and take advantage of Taiwanese English teaching system if they aren't serious about a full-time career in teaching. But I have to say, I completely disagree. These backpackers are usually young and full of enough energy to teach. And of course, by their nature, have an adventurous spirit and lots of stories to share of the world and inspire the kids of Taiwan to open their minds and go out and explore the world in future. I have one friend who came here for a week back in 2005 to visit a friend in the middle of a backpacking trip, and he just never left. Fell in love with the place, got married, had kids, started a business, and is now on the road to becoming a fully-fledged Taiwanese citizen. So if you are a backpacker traveling the world, traveling around Asia, and you're considering making a trip to Taiwan, then 100% you should come and visit. Of course, once all of the COVID regulations allow it. Okay, so outside of backpackers and adventurers, there's another category of foreigners that often come to Taiwan, and this is the one that I probably fit into the most. And that's the people that have come to Taiwan because of some problem or some failure or something that's gone wrong back in their own country. And it's a little bit more difficult for me to say whether or not these foreigners would make a success of themselves here in Taiwan. Now, when I say failure back in their home country, I just mean that there's been some event that has led to them making a decision to want to leave and come find a life here in Taiwan. For me, it was my South African ex-wife being refused entry into the UK, then me being unable to find work in South Africa and looking for a country to come and teach English in, which just happened to be Taiwan. For other people, it might be a boring, monotonous lifestyle. They may have been fired from a job, broken up from a long-term relationship, but I really think that there's nobody back in their home countries living a great, wonderful, perfect life that suddenly thinks, oh, I know what I'll do. I'll go start a life in Taiwan. It just doesn't happen. And I feel like I have to be a little bit careful when I talk about whether or not Taiwan is a good match for these kind of people. Yes, Taiwan is a very welcoming country. And even if your life from back home is a little bit fucked up, Taiwanese people will take care of you. They will welcome you and look after you. And they'll make you feel special and loved, just as they have done with me. And especially if you're going to come here and teach English, being surrounded by the energy and love of 20 grade three Taiwanese students Mondays and Friday will do wonders for lifting your spirit. But if you are truly in a very dark place mentally, then I would really strongly advise trying to fix that before making the move here. I'm not attempting to give psychological advice at all, just sharing my experience. But there are many, many sad stories about foreigners committing suicide here in Taiwan, which just shows you how bad it can get for some people. Taiwan certainly isn't going to magically fix all of your problems if you're in a bad place and can probably make them much worse if talking to a professional is actually what you need. But as I mentioned earlier, if you are just bored with the monotony of your nine to five and you want to change, you want some adventure, then Taiwan is certainly the place for you. I have met lawyers, bankers and other professionals that were earning huge salaries back in the UK or Hong Kong that are now working as ESL teachers, earning much lower salaries than they were before, but are absolutely loving their life here in Taiwan because of the energetic, fun, stress-free environments that a teaching job in Taiwan can provide. Now, for the first part of the video, I have focused mainly on people looking to come to Taiwan to teach. But one type of foreigner I often meet here are the engineers that have been sent by their company. I've specifically met a lot of engineers working on Jianghua's wind farm project, and usually through a second language drunken conversation in a bar at 2 a.m., they tell me that Taiwan is an absolutely amazing place for them and they only wish that their short-term contracts could become lifetime contracts. They are some of the best people to listen to in order to get a foreigner's perspective on Taiwan because their views are so fresh and energetic and even some of the annoying things in Taiwan are still new and fresh and exciting to them. So if you're an engineer overseas and your company offers you the chance to come and work here in Taiwan, you should jump at the chance and come spend your super high salaries here in Taiwan and give our economy a bit of a boost. Now, there is, of course, one type of foreigner that I think 100% should not come to Taiwan and that's the kind of foreigner that thinks they can come here and do whatever they want. The kind of person, as I mentioned earlier, that confuses the place with Thailand, treats it as a holiday resort, and just disrespects the country on a regular basis. That's not to say that Taiwan isn't a fun country where people can drink and have fun and sometimes make mistakes. I, for one, can confirm that sometimes people do drink too much, get themselves into a little bit of trouble on occasion, but if that's something you are specifically looking for when coming here, then perhaps Taiwan isn't for you. Foreigners sometimes get a really bad reputation here and the media love nothing more than an example that they can take advantage of and promote this negative image of us. So if you're thinking of coming here to take advantage of the relatively high teaching pay, whilst also disrespecting the place every weekend when you go out, I think it's probably best for you to either stay at home, do that in your home country, or go find another country in which to start your new life. Okay, so there's one other type of foreigner that would come here and that's the foreigner that comes to Taiwan for love. And the perfect example of this would be everybody's favorite Jianghua resident, Logan Beck Xiaobei. He came here because of his love for his Taiwanese wife and I have to say his recent videos where they team up together and do couples things here in Taiwan are some of my favorites because I really think they show the side of Taiwan that somebody who marries into Taiwanese life will face. Of course, it really helps that his Chinese is pretty good but I've met several foreigners here that have met Taiwanese girls or Taiwanese guys while the Taiwanese people were traveling overseas and then once the Taiwanese person has come back to Taiwan, they simply couldn't bear to be apart and the foreigner has made the move from their home country here to Taiwan to settle down with their new Taiwanese love. And of course the Taiwanese family will usually welcome you with open arms. I even know one British guy who was on a night out in the UK, met a Taiwanese girl and then a few months later found himself waking up at 4am every day to work in the family breakfast shop here in Taiwan even though he couldn't speak a word of Chinese or Taiwanese. It must have been quite the adventure for him but now everything's worked out well for him. He speaks beautiful Chinese, has a beautiful family and I think managed to get himself a job outside of the family breakfast shop. So if that's you and you've fallen in love with a Taiwanese person as it's quite easy to do I might add and you're separated and you're thinking of making the move here to Taiwan but you're a little bit scared of the culture or the foods or everything involved with making such a big move, my advice is just go for it. Life is too short to be separated from those that you love and once you arrive Taiwan will embrace you, look after you and feed you bubble milk tea and other amazing Taiwanese foods until you're ready to explode again just like they have done with me. But I think that's pretty much everything I wanted to say in this video. I hope I haven't offended anybody and I really hope I've given you an insight into what I think makes a good fit for somebody coming to Taiwan. Basically if you can handle things a little bit outside of your comfort zone and you're willing to embrace things being done in a slightly different way than you're used to then Taiwan is for you. Even if things aren't really going your way back in your home country then Taiwan will take care of you. As I said if you're in a really negative situation then do your best to try to leave that behind before making the move here and if you are a complete dick who just wants to take advantage of the place then don't bother coming, find somewhere else. If you are still watching to the end of the video then I've got a little bit of an extra surprise for you. I'm going to share my secret new channel with you. Life in Taiwan Clips and Shorts is only at a few hundred subscribers at the moment. I'm keeping it a little bit DDL until I can see whether or not it's a good idea but it's perfect for this attention span deficit generation who only like videos of one to two minutes and on that channel I put some of the highlights some of the funniest most interesting parts of each video for you to quickly check out when you've got a minute or two to spare. Go check out the link in the description below subscribe, show me some love, send me a comment and we'll have a little bit of a chat about your favourite Life in Taiwan Clips. But that's enough time to say goodbye so as for now and as always I'll see you next time in my life in Taiwan.