The Sins of the Grandfather

During my time here in Taiwan, I have had the opportunity to really bond with members of my dad's family.  I love that  I've had the chance to learn about this other part of my identity and now that I'm older, I can have mature conversations about my family's past, no matter how upsetting the information might be.


I've posted about my mom's side of the family before and also the fracture that happened when my mom and dad decided to divorce.  When the divorce happened, I really didn't realize how much everyone on both sides were invested in trying to keep my parents together or split my parents apart.


Over the years, I've been able to dig up more and more information, mostly through my grandmother (mom's mom) who in her last couple of months of her life decided it was important for me to know some truths about the divorce.  The news was shocking to hear (that my grandfather, my mom's dad, really wanted my parents to divorce) and that my grandmother's regret was not standing up to him and encouraging my parents to stay together. 


This was confirmed by my other grandmother last night at dinner.  She and my father's family was always a big fan of my mom's mom, but never of my mom's dad.  There's a bit of an unspoken hatred between Mainlanders and the Taiwanese, not just because of the civil war stuff, but more of a status attitude.  Since my grandfather was from Shanghai, he had a hard time equating the Taiwanese Chinese (my dad's family) were the same level as him and his family.  How sad that this causes such family drama.


But the bigger shock was the revelation that my grandfather was an informant for the government.  The only thing that helped lighten this shocker was the fact that my grandmother thought "tattletale" was the correct English term for it.  God bless her, she was so close.  When she revealed the news, my mind started spinning with questions - who did he work for (I'm assuming it was for the Kuomingtan against the Communists since he had to flee China in 1949), how long was he an informant, why was he an informant and (shudder) did his actions lead to anyone's imprisonment or death.


My mother's side of the family had never explained what my grandfather did and to be fair, I doubt his children would know anything about this either.  The only people that know the truth have both passed, and I only have the account of my dad's mom.


I've always had fond memories of my grandfather.  He took a lead role in raising myself and my brother before he passed in 1997.  It's hard to believe that the man I used to watch hockey with would have a past as dark as this.  The times were much different back then.  Living through the 2nd world war must not have been easy and my grandfather was an orphan.  By passing on information and collaborating, was this the only he could survive?  On the one hand, it is hard to judge him for trying to survive, but the thought of how many people were impacted by his actions causes some internal conflict.


When the conversation with my dad's mom ended, we agreed, that the past is the past, but that it was important for me to know and absorb this information.  Family histories are never pretty, and plenty of people make mistakes.  In the end, you love your family members no matter what and forgiveness comes with time.  But knowing what I know now, it's hard to forget the sins of my grandfather and how much sadness his actions created for an unknown number of people and their families.

Drunk Laundry

When you're funemployed, the everyday mundane activities around the house need that extra kick.  That extra kick really means +1 on the alcohol.  Let's all agree - drinking while doing housework just makes the time pass by faster, it's like you weren't doing any work at all.  And it isn't until the next morning that you realized you actually didn't do any housework because you've passed out while Swiffering the floor and actually made more of a mess because you spilled wine everywhere.  Oh well, the maid will get that spot out.


So after swinging by Costco tonight and picking up two fuel can containers of Tide (with Actilift...ohhhhh, fancy!), four boxes of Bounce (static cling really irks my family) and a vat of Margarita mixer, the stage was set for drunk laundry night.


First, it was whites.  Now, whites (the clothes, not the people) are quite delicate and they can become dull quickly if not treated with care (we're still talking about the clothes right?)  Drunk laundry is quite counterproductive when it comes to keeping your whites their brightest.  Trying to hold the wine goblet with one hand while trying to throw in the load of laundry with the other, you're bound to spill a little.  The Hindu Gods got it right, multiple arms really do come in handy.  No worries about that wine, a shot glass full of bleach should get that nasty stain out.  WARNING - DO NOT DRINK FROM THAT SHOTGLASS AFTER.


While waiting for the whites, it was time to open up that Margarita mixer.  Due to the fact that my family is a bunch of alcoholics, a bottle of Jose Cuervo was hiding right behind the the columns of whisky bottles in the "alcohol pit" behind the dining room table.  With a healthy serving of tequila (cough) *half-glass* (cough), some ice and then the mix, the first swig nearly knocked me out.  Apparently, after a month in Taiwan, I've forgotten how to read English - the mix already had tequila in it.  Fuck it.  There were two other loads to get through, I can sip it, right?


After cleaning up after Margarita Madness, the whites were done.  Well, thank god for that Actilift shit and bleach, not one wine stain to be found.  Light colours were next - and as I lifted all of the light colours into the machine, I silently cursed myself for my fondness of light coloured clothing and made a mental note to only buy whites or dark coloured clothing to avoid three loads.  That mental note was quickly wiped away with the next chug of my drink - which I nicknamed Amnesia (no explanation required).


With the whites rolling around in the dryer, and the other load in the washer, it was time for some drunken Draw Something, this great new game I was talked into adding.  It didn't help that I could likely now light a fire with my breath, but my drawings grew progressively worse and worse with each sip of Amnesia.


So it's midnight, and it has taken me about an hour to try to type this entry without massive amounts of spelling or grammar mistakes.  I can barely stand and I doubt I'll get to the darks before I pass out.  Three things I pray for tonight:


1) That the dryer doesn't blow up because I forget to remove the lint from the lint trap before pressing START.
2) That the wet clothes in the washer won't smell like wet rags tomorrow (it happens a lot here).
3) That I'll remember I was doing laundry last night tomorrow morning.


(hiccup) Time to hit PUBLISH.  G'night.

Funemployment Joys #1: Lazy Monday.

It's been a while since I've blogged and I have nothing but laziness to blame the lack of posting.  Laziness reared its ugly head again today as I did absolutely nothing.  I have a semi-excuse for my Lazy Monday and it was that I felt under the weather when I woke up (likely due to the 3 servings of fried rice I had at dinner last night), but by lunchtime, the queasiness had left the station, and rather than being a productive member of society, I just decided it was a do-nothing kind of afternoon.  It wasn't that hard to clear my afternoon either, unlike my life two months ago, my schedule is pretty open.

I quite enjoyed my Lazy Monday, I zoomed through two episodes of Band of Brothers, looked for airline tickets to Vietnam while The Da Vinci Code was playing on the TV in the background and when typing letters into a Google search bar became just too much work, a nap was needed to get me through such a trying experience.  I was abruptly awoken from my slumber by a phone call from my dad telling me where we were going out for dinner, otherwise, I would have slept through that too.

Everyone deserves a lazy day once in a while, and I highly recommend everyone to take one, for inspiration, listen to Bruno Mars' The Lazy Song if you have to.  But one shouldn't make it a habit, which is easy to do if you take too many Lazy Days in a row.  My A-Type personality will likely kick my lazy side out of bed tomorrow to at least go to the gym and take a walk around the city or to finish that short story I've been having some trouble finishing.

Sigh, too much thinking.  Time for another nap.

Ask, Try, Fail and Learn.

So a couple of humbling experiences this week.  It's lead me to a new motto - Ask, Try, Fail, and Learn.  It's something that we do so infrequently, perhaps pride or fear gets in the way.

Experience #1: Learning a hobby in a different language.
Learning photography from someone who only speaks Mandarin (or any other language foreign to you, for that matter) can be the most frustrating and fascinating experiences of your life.  It happened to me yesterday.  A friend of my dad's owns and operates a chain of photography studios in Taipei.  One of his main photographers was kind enough to help me with a one hour lesson on portrait photography.  Now my Mandarin is not terrible, but it's not up to the level where I could understand everything he was saying to me.  Though he was patient, I could see some frustration from the instructor.  Frustration was brewing on my end too, not towards him, but anger towards myself for not being able to understand better.  


Experience #2: Navigating a new city.
Taiwan is a small city in comparison to a New York or a London.  It has one of the best transportation systems in the world in my opinion with an expansive underground transit network that rivals even those cities.  And even though the system is multi-lingual, it is still easy to get lost.  For someone who is pretty good with directions, I've found myself in a couple of situations here now with missing stops, asking for directions and just looking plain foolish each time I exit the wrong gate.


Experience #3: Making friends.
Having no friends in the city, it's been tough meeting people and finding people that can speak English.  Don't get me wrong, I want to practice Mandarin, but there's nothing more comforting than being able to converse with like minded people.  On a few occasions I've tried to strike up conversations with people in coffee shops or restaurants, and they have failed.  It's probably because I never had to do that when I was back in Toronto with friends accompanying me everywhere.


All of these three experiences have humbled me.  Failing at something isn't the end of it, it's an opportunity to learn and to improve.  I've been either too proud or too scared of asking people for help before that it feels even more awkward when it doesn't work out.  Confidence bruised, I've got to keep reminding myself of what you were told as a child - try, try again.


I also have to remind myself that it's only been a week and a half since I've been here.  Patience is something I've always struggled with, so I need to remind myself that these things take time.  This cycle of Asking, Trying, Failing and Learning is not an instantaneous action.  


As a matter of inspiration, Ask, Try, Fail, Learn is my March 13th entry in my one line a day journal.  Bookmarked.

When Criticism Turns into Cynicism - Hating on Cause Campaigns

Well, a lot has happened in a week - a video of a Ugandan warlord who enslaves children to become his soldiers becomes viral and he is a household name for 48 hours, Japan remembers the earthquake and tsunami that took so many lives a year ago, and Austin, Texas had it's biggest influx of people ignoring other people in person while communicating with them on their mobile devices for it's annual SxSW (South by Southwest) conference. There is a common thread through these three events, each are attached in someways to a cause related campaign and those campaigns have gathered a lot or very few controversies in the news.

So for those who haven't been able to catch up with the news, here's a quick synopsis on all three:

- Kony2012 is a campaign by Invisible Children to arrest Joseph Kony, a Ugandan warlord, to prevent him from recruiting child soldiers. The campaign garnered global praise and criticism, the latter focused on the organization itself and how a social media campaign won't really change the larger situation that Africa faces that result in people like Kony being able to get away with his actions

- BBH launched a cause campaign to equip the homeless people of Austin with wifi access. All the wifi they sell, they keep the proceeds. Critics slam this as using the poor to serve the rich.

- A year after the Japanese earthquake and tsunami and the rebuilding continues. Thousands are still in government housing and many have wondered why the aid money hasn't gone further. (Pretty similar to what happened with Haiti after their earthquake in Jan 2010.)

Having worked on Cause campaigns through my previous line of work and through volunteering in school, let's just say it's fucking hard to put any charity or charitable work activity together. Those who are smart enough, tough enough and dedicated enough to put a charitable work organization together should receive kudos for their efforts. But like all things that take off and garner attention for good work, the critics sit back and start to evaluate what is not so great about the work. This is fine, constructive criticism will help to improve things, it is when people turn criticism into cynicism that really doesn't help the situation.

From what I've learned from any cause campaign, there are three things you want to achieve (even if you achieve one or two should be considered a success):

1) Awareness - make people understand why they should care about the issue you care about.

2) Educate - make those who care learn more and form their own opinions about the issue and how they can help

3) Action - make those who have formed their opinions take action and participate in the cause by donating, volunteering or paying the information forward.

Critics will still find fault with all of these campaigns and while some do a good job at keeping their evaluations objective, many dive into cynicism. The cynics will have you believe a couple of things:

- fancy films and marketing of issues are poor use of charitable funds

- too many people just read one article and take that position, not really educating themselves on the issue

- LIKE-ing a status or SHARE-ing an article on social media does not make you an activist

- that there are more things to do than an isolated issue (in the example of KONY, it's not about just removing KONY, it's about stopping the crisis that is child abuse and enslavement in Africa)

But let's get real here, there's only so much one can do in a short period of time. Issues cannot be solved overnight, but what causes like KONY does is help show those who have little to no understanding of the issues happening in Africa a small, digestible piece of the overall puzzle and let them investigate for themselves. There's no mistaking the impact that campaign has made in the past week - it has everyone talking. Even by sharing the story via the web, I argue that people have become activists by making people in their network aware of the story that was being told.

I'm also a fan of the work done by BBH to bringing a fresh approach to looking at the issues of homelessness. Sure, it's not helping to solve the issue right there and then, but it brings the faces of those that are homeless to people's attention. People looking for wifi had to go an interact with the homeless people selling it - a situation which would never happen if this transaction never presented itself. It gives the homeless people a voice and an opportunity for others to hear their stories.

Even the most reputable of charitable organizations have trouble with cynics. There will always be those who will try to bring down those who are trying to make a difference in the world. There will always be those that say that the smallest of actions are not what makes the difference. There will always be those that hold a holier than thou attitude when it comes to what causes deserve attention and which ones don't.

So choose to be an optimist when it comes to causes. Yes, there are many out there and you'll be bombarded. Yes, you should always be informed before you donate your money or time. And yes, baby steps have to be taken as you can't solve the entire problem all at once. But when there are people putting their time, energy and passion into trying to make a difference, don't be that asshole who rains on their parade.

One month of Funemployment

So it was one month ago that I spent my last day at work. A month has passed since I've had to send a work related email, fill out a status document, count revenue towards my jobs, and attend meetings, meetings about meetings, and meetings to discuss meetings about meetings. It certainly is a weird feeling to not have any responsibilities and the associated stress and anxiety that comes along with said duties. Then I realized that the weird feeling is a sense of happiness.

Don't get me wrong, I miss the daily interaction with people - shooting the shit about the day's latest celebrity gossip, sharing the latest viral video, or just being outright inappropriate. The people I worked with were great and I miss them dearly. But at this point, I can never picture myself stepping into an office again. Too much confinement, too structured, too routine.

It's also another anniversary - a shorter one this time, it's been a full week since I've been away from Toronto. Spending time with my family has been a blast, but there's something to be said about being able to hang out and have fun with people your own age. I miss my friends, especially when trying to find new friends in a new city is not the easiest of tasks. The language barrier and the nuances of my tone and jokes are a bit lost on people here, something that would garner many laughs at home. It can't be homesickness - that can't kick in this early, but I have to make more of an effort to put myself out there and take chances and risks to meet new people. Hopefully it'll start with St. Patty's Day next Saturday - still on a quest to find an Irish pub in the city.

Anyway, just a quick note to mark an important date - March 10th - in my year of travels.

Glass half empty - why people are people so cynical about life?

KONY2012 - it's taken off. Thanks to social media and a little button called SHARE, the video that was launched 72 hours ago, has become a worldwide phenomenon. Putting on my old advertising hat - what an incredible amount of unearned media coverage it's received!

A little known Ugandan warlord has now achieved international recognition all thanks to a charity called Invisible Children and within three days, they knocked off one of the goals off of their list - make him famous. Celebrities, politicians, ordinary citizens have all jumped on the bandwagon and watched a 30 minute video, told their friends to watch and many have pledged to take action, either by just sharing the information, buying a $30 action kit or taking part on April 20th in the Cover the Night movement.

Well, with every successful campaign, those that are critical of its success come out of the woodwork to point out all the lies propagated by Invisible Children and how shady they are. There have been blogs, articles in VICE, and hundreds, if not thousands of response videos to KONY on Youtube all questioning the motivations that Invisible Children has or the goals and expectations they have set out.

The debate is great - discourse has always served to help enlighten and educate. What's funny is that the majority of the anti-KONY2012 (which is totally inappropriately named as it makes it seem that they are pro-KONY), is doing the exactly the same thing they are accusing those that support the KONY2012 movement are doing - jumping on the bandwagon.

To use the 99%/1% analogy (because it's been so popular this year, cough, bandwagon), it seems that 99% of the people raging against the KONY2012 video is doing the exact same thing - they are just SHARE-ing articles of thought pieces put forth by critics of KONY2012. They add their microblog thought to it - i.e. "before everyone jumps on the bandwagon, they better read this first" but not any true thought or an opinion on the piece themselves. It's truly the 1% that's having the discourse here about KONY, whether they be pro or con. Everyone else is just drifting to those with the microphones.

What gets even worse is when the critics come out to play, they arm themselves with "I don't mean to be negative but..." and then do nothing but be negative and cynical. It's like when someone says to you, "with all due respect" what they really mean is "fuck you." That negativity then starts an emotional counter attack from the pro-KONY2012 side, and everything turns into a FOX News Bill O'Reilly segment. Let's be honest, neither side can claim they have a 100% lock on all of their facts, and it will take more action than just clicking SHARE or buying a kit to make a difference in that part of the world, but let's look on the bright side folks.

What Invisible Children and the group of filmmakers have done has been an extraordinary thing that only once in a while manifests itself. In my opinion, it's been over five years since we've seen a campaign like this, and the Obama election campaign didn't have the same amount of global impact as KONY2012 has within even the same time period. It's storytelling at it's best - making people care about a topic and taking them through a journey that is both interesting and educational. Of course this success would bring out jealousy in people - and a lot of the criticism is rooted in just that. And the majority of the criticism here is rooted in the organization, not the issue, which is an important point to differentiate. If anything, Invisible Children has put this issue in the minds of millions around the globe.

What this campaign has done well is making a bunch of people aware and care about an issue that they knew nothing about 72 hours ago, to start looking into it and having a discussion with their friends, and take some sort of action - either by sharing or participating in the movement. It's motivated young people to say that they can make a difference - and who knows, could inspire and influence those young people to choose a life of activism over some silly corporate job.

Anyway, that's just my view of things.