There is a story I tell to at least half of all the classes I teach. I just wish it were as true as I make it sound. I’ll start here by telling the truth, and then I’ll explain how I change the story for my students. I arrived in Taiwan for the first time on a Thursday in the Summer of 2004. I was met at the airport by a representative of the company that hired me and taken to a hotel in Taichung to wait. There would be several interviews, four in Taipei and one in Miaoli, to determine which school I would teach at.
As I waited at the hotel though, I became bored rather quickly. I was in Taiwan for the first time and all I was doing was watching American movies on the television in a cheap hotel room. I decided that I needed to get out and see the city. I wanted to be able to attend church on Sunday, but I wasn’t sure how to get there. I hadn’t known exactly where I would be once I arrived in Taiwan and so I hadn’t been able to look beforehand. Somehow though, I was able to find out the address of the mission home. I don’t remember how I managed that feat now.
With the address in my pocket, I walked down to the hotel lobby. There were maps available and as I saw it was raining lightly outside, I also bought a cheap umbrella. I studied the map for a while, and was able to find the street. As I wasn’t familiar with Taiwan in the slightest, I had no idea how far away it actually was. The map may have shown distances, but I don’t think I cared too much. I like walking anyway.
As I started walking the rain was still fairly light, but the wind kept picking up suddenly and then dying down just as fast. I had a difficult time figuring out which direction to hold the umbrella in as rain would hit me from the side at times. The day was warm though and I had nothing that couldn’t get wet, so I walked on and didn’t worry about the strange weather. After some time had passed though, the rain really started to come down hard while the wind continued to blow strongly from this direction or that. It didn’t take long before I became completely drenched.
I don’t remember how far I had gotten when I discovered that what I was beginning to experience was actually a typhoon. Welcome to Taiwan! I didn’t feel that this storm was dangerous though, so I went ahead and walked the whole hour or so to the mission home. I was glad to discover that the door was open and I was welcomed inside. As I poured out the water from my shoes and wiped the water from my face, I chatted for a while with the missionaries that served there. I learned that the church building was right beside the mission home. I can’t remember much more of what we discussed while I was there, but I believe I spent at least 10 or more minutes recovering from an hour of walking through a typhoon. Eventually though, there was nothing more to do there and I felt like I was distracting people from their work, so I left, grateful that I had managed to find the building at all.
I vaguely remember my walk home that day. I remember that the rain would go from being very heavy to very light and the wind varied drastically as well from one moment to the next. My umbrella blew out a few times and I decided that it was easier to just close it and walk in the rain than to try and hold it open. It was a great adventure, but I was alone, and I didn’t speak any Chinese to anyone.
When Sunday came around, the typhoon had passed and the walk was much easier. I enjoyed church services and met many friendly people. I was invited by some of the young singles there to join in an activity that evening, but as my hotel was an hour away, I wasn’t sure what to do until then. Among the people I met was a young guy named Kevin. I remember him being about the same age as most of my students now, maybe 19 or 20. He invited me to come to his house until the activity would start several hours later.
I accepted his invitation and went with Kevin to his home. I remember that that was my first opportunity to ride on a scooter, and I was a bit scared, though I tried not to show it. Traffic in Taiwan can be pretty crazy, and riding on the back of a scooter behind someone I really didn’t know at all didn’t make me feel much better. Kevin assured me though that I would be safe, and so I was.
For at least several hours, I stayed with Kevin in his home. I think he probably lived there with his parents or others because I remember someone supplying snacks and drinks. I can’t remember those details though. What I do remember though is the joy of trying to communicate with my very limited Chinese. I don’t think Kevin’s English was even as good as my terrible Chinese, so we used Chinese for the most part, or at least that’s how I’ve chosen to remember it. We used a notebook and we both drew a lot of pictures as we struggled to communicate with one another. I think my Chinese made some improvement during that time, and my confidence in my ability to speak Chinese certainly went up. (For a similar experience, see The Most Effective Language Teacher)
That’s basically the end of the story that involves the part I tell students. Of course, life went on and I had my several interviews and ended up being able to choose Miaoli where my boyfriend lived. It seemed like a miracle, but I don’t tell that part to my students. In fact, the version I tell my students is much simpler, leaving out all sorts of details.
In the story I tell my students, I’m not trying to walk to the mission home, I’m just bored and felt like going for a walk, which is at least part of the truth actually. I definitely mention the typhoon though. They always find that entertaining. The reason I share the story at all though is to talk about my experience with Kevin, so I usually skip to that part as quickly as I can. I’m walking in the typhoon and Kevin sees me and invites me in out of the rain. That is certainly not true, but it allows me to go from walking in a typhoon to having a great language learning experience in the shortest possible time.
From there, I tell the truth about how Kevin and I communicated using Chinese with English words mixed in. I mention drawing pictures and using gestures. I talk about how we talked together for several hours despite my very low level of spoken Chinese. This is the point of the story. I want my students to make the same effort to practice their English. I want them to stop using their low English proficiency as an excuse to keep their mouths closed and to instead realize that they already have a high enough level to communicate if they are only willing to try hard enough. All of my students, because of the way the students are sorted into my classes, already have a higher level than I did when I had my experience with Kevin, and I had a very enjoyable time despite my low level.
The truth is still an interesting story, but it just takes too long to tell. If I cut directly to my experience with Kevin, it lacks the power to grab students’ attention. The typhoon makes such a great opening that I can’t see leaving that out, but then I want to get to my conversation with Kevin as soon as possible .. and so I lie. Although I am generally for telling the truth, I have never really felt guilty about this particular lie. What do you think? Is this kind of lie wrong? Maybe I should make a disclaimer at the start of each telling that some details may be manipulated for a better experience. Oh well. I’ve told the modified version so many times that I have started to see that version in my memories. I wanted to write the truth here before it is completely taken over by the story. I guess I could direct my students here to read the true story, at least as far as I’ve remembered it correctly. But then, what if I’ve remembered it wrong in the first place? Could this all be wrong altogether? Or maybe the short version is the true version, and I’ve only imagined the longer version? Telling the truth can sure be complicated sometimes.
taysonjay 