Homework time!

I started an online graduate class through WSC and we have to do weekly discussion postings on certain subjects from our book and this weeks had to do with the organizational culture in our workplace. You may not know anything about organizational culture, but I talk about work (I actually vent a bit), so I thought you might be interested in reading :D


My workplace currently consists of 8 'foreign' teachers (America, Canada, and South Africa) teaching English in Taiwan, a Chinese culture. This causes many issues to answer these questions. Reading about Wal-Mart stores in Germany on page 82 and understanding the attention needed to cultural differences around the globe is something I definitely relate to. What is "normal" to me in businesses and in schools in the US is very different from here. I'm at a small privately owned school that tries to follow American customs and include Chinese traditions, which honestly doesn't always make for an easy work day. Another problem is that this isn't a job that has much long term potential. Most of the employees (Chinese and Foreign) are on one-year contracts and few continue after that year. At the moment the organizational culture whether compared to other Chinese or other American businesses is not very stable. There have been a lot of recent issues mainly involving communication between owners/supervisors and subordinates which concluded often with toes being stepped on and misinformation. As for it being effective right now, I would have to say not really. Americans focus on the product and the customers. Our product is education and to me the customer is the student, but at school the main focus is making the kids look good for the parents since the parents pay the money. That entails re-writing students homework and making art projects with the kids name on it. I understand it's a private school and the parents pay a lot of money to send their children there and I also understand that most of the kids are between the ages of 2 and 7, which makes me wonder why they even have a school just so the kids can look good. And I apologize if this is more of a rant, it's been a long day!

I am following most of the steps to be socialized into the school. There is a organization called Reach-To-Teach that finds teachers for a specific school and it was through them that I applied and then had a long phone interview. After RTT accepted me I had a few options for schools and then the school I like called and interviewed me to make sure I would fit into their company. After I arrived in Taiwan I had three days of training and then was just thrown into teaching (no previous experience necessary). There wasn't a humiliation step since I just went straight into my normal teaching schedule. I have the job mastered to the point where I can understand my class and the best way to get the information across that I need to for that day. And after 6 months of work you are evaluated with the possibility of a raise. One thing I do like about the school for rewarding performance is you get a set performance incentive every month that is only decreased if you miss days of work or are repeatedly tardy, it's not much but it makes a difference each month. Adhering to values is tricky because the owners I think are still trying to figure out what their core values are, they try to say it's about the kids and education, but sometimes it tends to focus a lot on the parents. A biggest concern is punishment since hitting the students (slap on the hand specifically) is still allowed in Chinese culture. Some parents want their child to be punished this way and some are completely against it. The school won't make a stand one way or the other, so we end up with "special cases" of kids that can't be punished in any way and others that are supposed to be punished. It's hard to work for people when they don't take a stand on their values, or even tell you what those values are. And don't worry, foreign teachers, like me, are not the ones that do the punishing, we're not allowed (not that any of us would). Stories and folklore mainly follow past teachers experiences and ideas passed down.

I would definitely work better in a more structured environment. I agree with Lois on working in a place that is well-established and has a dominant culture. I don't mind a changing organization and this one is always changing. An organization should know it's values and tell their employees what they are so that they can be carried out. This school is not specific on what it wants and is not very good at keeping the lines of communication open. There is always someone to talk to about specific situations or issues, but you don't always know whether or not anything will come from the talk and eventually you just stop communicating altogether. It makes me sad because this could be a good school, it has a total of 300 wonderful students, but because of management decisions, no one is planning on continuing work once their initial contract is over and that's more upsetting to the kids than anyone else.

Instructions for Life

I have a book of quotes a friend gave me a long time ago, and I continually add to it. I love quotes and sayings and things and there's a list she pasted in here called "Instructions for Life" with 45 rules? guidelines? suggestions? You decide and see how many you've accomplished or follow :D

1. Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully. (check - I work with kids..I'm ALWAYS cheerful!)

2. Memorize your favorite poem. (check - Emily Dickinson)

3. Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have, or loaf all you want.

4. When you say "I love you," mean it.

5. When you say "I'm sorry," look the person in the eye.

6. Be engaged at least six months before you get married. (I definitely understand this one lol)

7. Believe in love at first sight.

8. Never laugh at any one's dreams. People who don't have dreams don't have much.

9. Love deeply and passionately. You may get hurt, but it's the only way to live life completely. (I believe that 100%)

10. In disagreements, fight fairly. No name-calling.

11. Don't judge people by their relatives, or by the life they were born into.

12. Teach yourself to speak slowly but to think quickly.

13. When someone asks you a question you don't' want to answer, smile.

14. Take into account that great love and great achievement involve great risk.

15. Call your mother. (Definitely a check on this one, right mom?)

16. Say "bless you" when you hear someone sneeze. (Check)

17. When you lose, don't lose the lesson. (I'm a sore loser, so that's sometimes hard)

18. Follow the three R's: Respect for self, Respect for others, Responsibility for all your actions.

19. Don't' let a little dispute injure a great friendship.

20. When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

21. Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice. (Another one I truly believe)

22. Marry a person you love to talk to. As you get older, his/her conversation skills will be even more important.

23. Spend some time alone. (Check)

24. Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.

25. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.

26. Read more books. Television is not a substitute. (I think we all know this is a big CHECK for me!)

27. Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll be able to enjoy it a second time.

28. Trust in God, but lock your car.

29. A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life. Do all you can to create a tranquil, harmonious home.

30. In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don't bring up the past.

31. Don't just listen to what someone is saying. Listen to why they are saying it.

32. Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality. (Somewhat of a check, not finished yet obviously :))

33. Be gentle with the earth.

34. Pray or meditate. There's immeasurable power in it. (Something I need to work on)

35. Never interrupt when you are being flattered.

36. Mind your own business. (Something I'm sure everyone needs to work on a bit)

37. Don't' trust anyone who doesn't close his/her eyes when you kiss. (So true)

38. Once a year, go some place you've never been before. (Think that's a pretty good check so far)

39. If you make a lot of money, put it to use helping others while you are living. It is wealth's greatest satisfaction.

40. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.

41. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly. (:D:D)

42. Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each other.

43. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

44. Live with the knowledge that your character is your destiny.

45. Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon.

I'M SORRY!! and kiva.org

I'm bad at writing letters, I'm bad at making phone calls, I'm very bad at responding to e-mails, I'm usually not this bad at writing down my thoughts. This should be easy, I think a lot so blogging should be a piece of cake. But then of course you get busy and tired and it's easy to make excuses....but NO!! Not any more!! I am going to start blogging regularly, at least once a week I promise and if I don't I will apologize profusely and you can all yell at me.

Anyways, I will update on past events like thanksgiving, Xmas, school activities, random activities. And I do have some pictures, so don't worry, it's coming. But right now I just want to talk about me in general.

I have been in Taiwan for 150 days (I have a count up on Facebook hehe) and I like to think about how much I've changed in such a short time. I realize every event in a person's life can potentially change them, even the little things, but moving across the world was a bit of a monumental event in my life, especially since it happened right after college graduation when I was thrown out into the real world. Obviously thinking of being 'thrown' into the real world was a scary thought, so I thought of the one place I would be most happiest, and here I am, and I don't regret my decision.

I love working with kids, I couldn't ask for a better job. Despite my complaints, tiredness, and occasional anger and the kids that choose not to listen to me or anyone I love them so much. I already know how sad I'm going to be when I leave, whether I'm going home or going to a different school in Taiwan, it will be hard. But having this job has taught me how to figure things out for myself, be resourceful and be more creative, along with probably many other positive traits that I cannot think of right now. Just being in Taiwan has helped me to grow up, yes I still call Mommy often, but it's more just to talk about things going on and ask a general question or two rather than for her to solve all my problems :) Being here has also allowed me to explore more about myself. Not that I couldn't have possibly figured these things out in Wayne, but it's like a friend said to me before I moved: she knew how right this was for me and that Wayne was just to small, she told me how I was meant to travel and see the world and be in a city where I would have room to grow. And I think she's right, although I have learned that I like to be very lazy on the weekends!!

I feel like I'm figuring myself out all over again, which I actually do often. I like to evaluate me and see what I can do to improve. And recently I think I've been doing pretty good. I teach Monday - Friday 9-4 (or 9-9 on Thursdays and Fridays), I have private Chinese lessons for two hours every week and I started my first Graduate class online through WSC. I have an extremely productive life at the moment, so when people ask what I did over the weekend and I either say "slept" or "as little as possible" for once I don't feel ashamed or embarrassed of those responses :D

Recently I have been "youtubbing" a lot. Just watching random videos for fun. I have some favorites right now. There are two brothers that started a project last year where they made a deal to communicate without any text, so no e-mails, online chats or letters. They mainly do video blogs (on YouTube) or phone calls. Now, this project ended once 2008 began, but their still doing videos and I've started watching all their past videos. These are to very passionate guys and...very nerdy! So I love them, being a fellow nerd! They actually call themselves Nerdfighters and have a website for fellow nerdfighters :) One of the brothers, Hank, is very eco-friendly, he runs a website (ecogeek.org) and discusses environmental issues often. The older brother, John, is a young adult writer.

Anyways, in some recent videos I watched the brothers had a family reunion in the Dominican Republic where the experienced some of the poverty there. Afterwards the brothers were trying to think of ways to make a difference. One of them came across this website: http://www.kiva.org/, which is a place where you can give money, but unlike charity, it's more like a loan. You pick the specific entrepreneur to lend money to and how much money, and after 6 to 12 months you get your money back. During that time you get updates on the progress of this person(s) business. I am very interested in this project, and although I'm saving as much money as I can, I don't mind sparing some temporarily to help out other people. I like the idea of giving money knowing it's going for a specific purpose, like starting a business. I challenge everyone who reads this to go to kiva.org and lend money, then let me know about it :D

Linkin Park Concert

My sister was travelling through the Internet world one day about a month or two ago, specifically Myspace.com, looking at a band's page, specifically Linkin Park, when she just happened to skim through the tour dates and see Taipei listed. Normally this would not cause any sort of notice at all except for the fact that I happen to live quite close to Taipei. So she informed me of this and I went into research mode right away. I confirmed the date on their website and contacted my friend and old classmate, Ping Jia, because I knew she was also a huge fan of the group, they are actually very popular in Taiwan considering they are California based, but it's because two of the members are Asian. Ping Jia also confirmed the concert and I asked her to get tickets for me. They were pretty much sold out of course, but she found someone online who had numerous sets of tickets, and I said get 'em!!

So November 16th with Gretchen, Alida, and Leon, we headed into Taipei to a huge soccer stadium where the concert was being held. I'm not even going to go into detail of me forgetting the tickets in the apartment because I'm still upset over that little hang up, I'm just glad I realized it in the first 20 minutes on the bus, rather then standing outside the stadium. Luckily the band started 45 minutes late so I didn't miss much. It was standing room only, which is fine because we were all jumping and rocking out, it was packed though and completely awesome!!!

Here are video snippets from two of my favorite Linkin Park songs, both of them you can hear me singing along, sometimes I don't really sound that good!!:

Chester, one of the main singers of the group, on the big screen right in front of us:

We actually weren't that far from the stage, although a lot of the shots are fuzzy from the crowd moving so much:

Chester and Mike, lead singers:

Trying to see the stage again:

I thought this was a cool shot, I just happend to snap a pic right when the were changing angles on the screen:

Rocking out:
Enjoying all the pretty lights:
Only good shot I could get of the crowd, it was huge: Nice finale picture :) :

Our after party at Roxy 99:

Gretchen enjoying herself:

First, second, or maybe third round of Tequila shots:
I don't really remember this picture, but I guess I was trying to take it myself and that's why I'm not smiling because I'm to busy making sure we're all in it:

I'm a Taiwan Resident!!

I finally recieved my "ROC (Taiwan) Resident Certificate" I have an ID card with all my info on it, basically it says I'm allowed to be here for a year :D Good enough for me! By getting this lovely little card I was able to open a bank account, so now on payday they don't have to hand me a huge wad of cash anymore, I love direct diposit. It was a bit of a difficulty finding time to get to the bank though. They are only open from 9-4:30 Monday-Friday. Gretchen and I went during a lunch break, we usually get two hours. It took two hours and we were 5 minutes late for class :P It's cool though, I feel like I belong more now.

Really bad picture because I have horrible lighting in my room. But I wanted everyone to see it :D It has all the basics of any ID except most of it's in Chinese obviously. It even has my English name translated in Chinese. Because the bank is an offical establishment, it's usually recommended that you get a name stamp or chop, which I also have now. It only cost 50NT ($1.50) and he made it while I waited in his shop. Very cool, now I don't have to sign my name a million times to papers, I can just hand them my stamp and it's like a signature.

Taipei 101

I've finally been able to do some shopping....for books of course! November 9th, Gretchen and I ventured into Taipei to Taipei 101. A building with 101 floors obviously, that was under construction when I was first here and finished the summer after I came home. For awhile it was the tallest building in the world, but was quickly beaten out in the world race to be the best :P We only ventured through the first 5 floors this time, but there is an observatory on the 91st floor that I plan to get to sometime. The layout though, goes like this:

B1 - Grand Market - has an international grocery store called Jasons Market Place, which is where everyone goes to get cheese :P and there is a huge food court with everything from Mcdonalds and KFC to Japanese and Thai high-quality restaurants

1F - Avenue 101 - International popular fashion brands including Kenneth Cole, DKNY, Tommy Hilfiger, Roots and swatch

2F - Designer Walk - International designer brands like Coach and Ralph Lauren, along with SOGO 101 which is a huge Taiwan department store, there's at least 3 others throughout Taipie

3F - Galleries Couture - Couture brand flagship stores like Dior, Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Prada, Versace and Tiffanys

4F - City Square - Restaurants and Page One, which is a huge bookstore that likes to have sales on English books ;)

5F - Financial Center - Banking and VIP services, didn't really go here much except there is a Bose and Sony store with new hi-tech electronics

It was just weird how it was very much like a shopping mall that you'd see in the US, which is not common here at all.

New News

Well the greatest thing that's happened recently -- I finally figured out how to view my blog and this whole website in English (which is really really great news)! It was so frustrating navigating around Blogger with all the buttons and tools in Chinese, which is probably why I've started blogging less and less.

I've been wanting to blog for awhile because there's been so much going on, but it's been difficult....because there's been so much going on! Last week was super busy.

Tuesday evening was spent creating a haunted house in the school basement. Although I didn't get to help during the time it was going on and it was for the older kids that I don't teach, I still wanted to help out ahead of time.

Wednesday was Halloween obviously, and all the teachers and kids were required to wear costumes because in the afternoon we went trick or treating. The previous Sunday I went shopping with Angela and her mom and sisters for a costume. I was a bit discouraged because I knew I wouldn't find any clothing to fit, so I ended up just buying a ton of random little things. I turned into a "Funky Fairy" as I call it, which also turned into the "Uncle Sam Fairy" and a "raver" by some :P It was fun and the kids were so cute.

Thursday I ended up going home early in the afternoon because I was not feeling well...I think it was a combo of the sort of flu season Taiwan is in right now and exhaustion from the long days. I came home and slept all evening and night and was feeling better on Friday.

Saturday, Gretchen had plans to meet with a Chinese teacher from school, Franny. Franny wants Gretchen to help her with her English, although she already has really excelent language skills, she still wants to improve. They met here at the apartment and I was in the living room just wanted to say hi and then get out of the way, but I ended up staying and it turned into the three of us doing a language exchange sort of thing. We're going to meet every Saturday from 2-4. The first hour will be English and the second will be Chinese. I'm excited because I already feel like I've learned a lot from her and she's a very aggressive teacher which will make me practice more.

Sunday morning Franny took us into Taipei to her church because Gretchen mentioned wanting to find a place with English services. We ended up visiting a Morman church. It was very beautiful, but a little awkward for us since we didn't really belong. We didn't go to a service, just toured the church. It looked exactly like a Morman church I went to in California when I was visiting my friend Steven. Franny also took us to a clothing store in that area that has larger sizes, which was totally awesome...I'm going shopping this weekend!!!! And she took us out to lunch to a pretty popular place that serves beef noodles...very yummy! And all of these places were in the same area as my Chinese lessons. Gretchen and Franny walked with me to see where my classes were at and then Franny made me practice my vocabulary before class (I told you she was aggressive!!) It's all good though :D