The next few months were very quiet. Not quite all work and no play, but there were fewer emails, and mostly these dealt with administrative matters. Michael appeared content with this lifestyle, especially with Michelle as a weekend companion. In the meantime Michael found time for more reading and studying Mandarin.
Michael (email 5 Jan 02): Greetings dearest parents. I don’t know if I told you but my friend Jarrad should be dropping off some CDs to you and if you could send them over to me I would be extremely grateful. I’ve also been trying to get hold of a good Chinese (Mandarin) language book to no avail. If you could find one I would sing a million praises unto you ’til God himself came down to tell me to shut up. Speaking of God, I recently read 2 books entitled “Conversations with God” and I can’t find the 3rd book in the series (not that I’ve been looking that hard) so if you could send that over too, then I will humbly devote the rest of my life to fulfilling your every wish.
Well, not much else has happened, the last few days at work have been great as I haven’t had to teach any classes, just hang in the office and help the kids and chat with the office girls. The girls at the kindergarten have kindly shown me a few more of the surrounding sights as well as a strange candlelight Buddhist ceremony that was a bit too sickly sweet for my liking, but still interesting.
I hope to send you some Chrissie stuff soon, but you’ll have to be patient! Love, Mike.
Michael’s father got the required books and tried to look up Michael’s bestowed name of “Chen Long”, to no avail. A Chinese speaking work colleague suggested it might mean “Blue Dragon”.
In an email to a friend Michael tells of how his travels have given him a new outlook on life . . .
Michael (email 8 Jan 02): . . . Travelling has taught me many things about myself and one of them is that anyone is capable of doing the most saintly act or the most fucked up despicable act. The truth is that we aren’t fucking anything dude. Labels and names don’t mean shit. Except if you believe in them and identify with them. We are constantly recreating ourselves every minute of every day. It’s only when we identify with what we have done in the past that we say ….. “Oh my god …. look what I’ve done, I am a …..”
Still, at the same time old habits die hard don’t they. When I landed in Taipei I decided to take some of my own advice, finally. India pretty much rocked my world as we both knew it would, and after a couple of months crazy touring in the north with a like minded mate, I decided to search out some ashrams while my mate went on to Rajasthan. Some of the shit I saw opened my eyes to a lot of things dude and it sounds a bit corny to say but we are so fuckin lucky living in Oz with all the shit we could possibly want at our fingertips. But on a deeper level, Aussies are the most well balanced and level headed people because we don’t have these fuckin issues about everything that everyone else seems to have. We’re not brainwashed into hating anything or anyone and we’re not out to get anything or convince anyone of anything. People know this and everyone fuckin loves Aussies and Australia.
Anyway, what I was saying was that in India I decided that yoga was the shit for me and that I wanted to take it as far as I could. I found one place where I can do a course for 6 months that qualifies me as a teacher and gives me a solid grounding in some pretty intense practices. The course costs about 6 grand though so that’s why I’m here so I can save the cash. I’ve decided that life is what you make it dude (to use another corny phrase) so that’s why I do yoga every morning and play piano at least an hour a day and try to go swimming at the local pool at least 4 times a week. I would be totally justified in saying Taiwan is pretty much a shithole for most westerners, but since coming here I’ve never been happier or more confident or more proud of myself because I’m finally doing what I wanna do and being what I wanna be. Where you are and who you’re with doesn’t mean shit, ol’ mate, (those things take care of themselves) when you find out what really makes you happy and you stick to that like shit to a blanket despite your old habits . . .
Another email to his parents . . .
Michael (email 14 Jan 02 titled “Behold the glory of the white foreign teacher”): Thanks for getting the books. As to my name . . . Chen is my boss’s surname, and Chen Long is also the name of Jackie Chan, the famous kung fu actor, so my boss has named me Jackie Chan, much to the amusement of my students!
Been reading a lot about Oz lately with our cricketers destroying all comers, and Lleyton Hewitt all set to kick arse, and the bushfires and radioactive leaks, etc.
I’m often surprised at the amount of attention Australia gets. I haven’t heard from young Peter since he left for cowland, so tell him to check his hotmail account as this is the only one I can send mail to. Had another great weekend, with locals taking me to some amazing places. I really am treated like a god here, sometimes you have no idea how disgustingly nice these people are to me! Mike.
A small cloud now appeared on the horizon . . .
Michael (email 17 Jan 02, titled “My sore bum”): Hey guys, I’ve been a bit sick lately with some sort of gut infection. I’ve almost completely recovered but I’m still waiting for the last tests to come back, which they should on Tuesday. The whole debacle has set me back a bit of cash though, so I’d be grateful if you could contact the insurance company for me and find out what I need to send back to claim on it. I’ll have to send all the paperwork to you, I presume. Don’t worry, I’m fine and I haven’t even had to take a day off work yet. Nothing else to say, really, except that could you possibly send over Pete’s “Doug Anthony All Stars” CD with the other stuff you are sending me? Hope you guys are well and Gabs is still spritely.
Michael (email 22 Jan 02): I got the final test results today for my little gut infection (last Thursday they very rudely inserted a large camera where the sun don’t shine). ‘Colitis’ was the name of the beast and he cometh from bad food apparently. Well, I’m all better now and have been given the all clear from the doc. Love you guys and thanks again.
Whether this episode had any connection with Michael’s final illness nine months later will never be known. His next email, meanwhile, showed no loss of enjoyment of the good things in life . . .
Michael (email 6 Feb 02, titled “Blue cheeseburgers”): Hey guys, had a fantastic birthday spent with me girlie at a posh hot spring hotel in the mountains just south of Taipei. Unbelievable scenery reminded me a lot of the Himalayas. The hot springs were just the ticket . . . I’ve become a bit of a hot springs junkie I’m afraid, and me and Michelle usually go once a week. Love, Mike.
Michelle also recalled this occasion later . . .
Michelle (email 8 Nov 03): . . . On his birthday we went to Wulai where with hundreds of cherry blossoms trees and great hot springs to celebrate for Michael. It wasn’t a holiday. So not many people were there. We took a long walk and found a tunnel that seemed to had already ruined for a long time. We went through the tunnel and another one which is behind it. And we seemed like being in Arcadia when we came out from the tunnels. Fresh air, singing birds and insects, falls … what an amazing adventure we were having. Michael said “Look this! it’s enough, I would die.”
Michael’s school also put on a birthday party for him. His students wrote birthday cards for him which he sent home in a parcel for his family. The English expression on these cards is quaint, but appealing.
The parcel contained late Christmas presents: a beautiful Chinese style silk jacket for his mother and an intricate wooden Ganesh carving for his father. Both greatly appreciated. He also enclosed photos and this wonderful letter (undated) . . .
The next few emails dealt only with family and administrative matters, mainly concerned with both of his grandfathers having heart surgery, with a parcel sent to Michael which went missing, and with the logistics of transferring his pay to his Australian account.
In an email to a friend Michael again talks about his day to day activities . . .
Michael (email 7 Mar 02): . . . Well…..been here about 4 months now. Doesn’t seem like its been that long, then again some days I feel like I been here for years. Still doing me yoga most mornings and I try to get to the local pool 3 times a week to swim laps (lookin sexy in the old speedos and bathing cap…lock up ya daughters) but haven’t been playing the piano like I was when I first got here. Ive been lucky I gotta admit. I pretty much grabbed the first job i was offered here and it turned out to be el primo cruisyoso. My main job is in the arvos teaching at an after school cram school for kids….I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m there pretty much “for display purposes only” and I think my boss likes to keep me where all can behold the glory of the white foreign teacher rather than have me teaching (god forbid!) where only the students would benefit. The lessons I do teach are fuckin great as I always play games and just have fun with the little tykes and generally act like a dickhead. I teach pretty much whatever I want and no one seems to care. I do though, funnily enough. Most of the time there, I just work on my Chinese, harass the office girls, read the paper for an hour or 2 and lately I’ve even started on “War and Peace”, (great book, I highly recommend it). My boss loves me, I love her and the co-workers are cool. Sometimes i have to check to see if my balls are still attached……fuckin Hello Kitty is everywhere dude. I also teach at a kindergarten (owned by the same boss) for 4 hours a week and I love that fuckin job man I really do, the little psychos have learned so much already. They’ll be debating the finer points of Shakespearean tragedy by the time I get outta here if they keep going at this rate. I’ve even started teaching yoga to the kids and teachers at the kindergarten every morning! (Have you ever seen a 2 year old doing Salute to the Sun? Fuckin hilarious.) My apartment is on the top floor of the same building and I’ve got it free of rent for however long I work here. Been saving a shitload of cash…should have about 12 thou when I leave in 3 months!
I’ve been seeing this chick who’s mother owns a vegetarian restaurant below where I work. It’s not serious but we have fun and she’s got the biggest heart of anyone I’ve met here. On Chinese New Years I got drunk with my boss and her husband.
Also had some great drunken nights in Taipei with a mate, Jimmy who I’ll tell you about later.
P.S. Get hold of a book called “Conversations with God” (book 1) but don’t read the first 15 pages, theyre shit. I think you’ll like it….seriously, get the fuckin book.
It was not only Jimmy with whom Michael shared “great drunken nights”. Another friend, Franklin Moore, an American, was also a regular companion. Here, he contributes his amusing account of a night from which Michael emerged on the losing side . . .
Franklin (email 22 Sep 03): . . . Michael, as you probably know, was not exactly at home in the club scene. However I was, and one evening we met up for an evening of pool and beer. We met in a dreadful establishment that was run by a seedy American. Michael had chosen the place because they had advertised an all-you-can-drink special online. Earlier I had teased him about being a lightweight. He assured me that he could hold his own. Well, two beers later he was losing at pool and bumming cigarettes off of me (I had never seen him smoke). Then my friend Meredith joined us and Michael suddenly lost his ability to speak. She suggested we move on to a dance club. I seconded and the three of us piled into a taxi. Soon after arriving at the club, I headed straight for the bar because I felt that I had been cheated at the previous place. Michael surprised me by ordering whiskey and soda. At least I think it was whiskey. He was clearly overwhelmed by the bright lights and I distinctly remember him standing near the stage, not dancing, but with the biggest grin on his face. I handed him another drink – something green, I think – and he took it without argument. Perhaps I should have exercised a little restraint because within minutes he disappeared into the toilet. Several hours later he was nowhere to be found. Around three in the morning I began receiving calls on my mobile. It was Michael, who had somehow found some secret passage out of the club. Inexplicably he had tried to go home, gotten lost and ended up wandering the empty streets of Taipei. He was calling from a payphone, using up all his change and reducing my phone’s battery to zero. On our last exchange I was finally able to pinpoint where he was. I went off with some people I had met at the club while Michael presumably waited for the subway to resume operating. At sunrise we met up again. He had completely forgotten all the phone calls and accused me of being the one who had gotten lost. When I tried to explain the events of the evening, he kept saying, “No, You!!”
We laughed for hours. All in all, it was a very memorable night.
Michael was a good sport. I miss him.
Michael’s father, meanwhile, had been looking up Jui Fang on the Internet and got the false impression that it was a large industrial city, similar to Wollongong in Australia.
Michael (email 11 Mar 02): Jui Fang is probably too small to get much of a mention anywhere but it’s definitely not anything resembling Wollongong! The nearest major town, Keelung, is a busy major seaport (fuckin ugly too) and vaguely resembles Wollongong except Wollongong is far nicer! The photos I sent you probably don’t paint too nice a picture of Jui Fang (that’s just from my apartment overlooking the main road that skirts it) but I only have to walk for 2 minutes and I’m in lush rainforested hills dotted with little Buddhist temples and nobody around. Very mellowing! In Taiwan there doesn’t seem to be any sort of suburbia, and in the north there’s no rural landscape, you go straight from congested little villages, all quite ugly, straight into beautiful tropical forest simply by crossing a hill. There’s a beautiful tourist town near me called Jo Fan that’s probably the closest place to me that would get any sort of mention on the Net.
“Jo Fan” is the phonetic pronunciation for Chiufen, a picturesque village set high in the hills. Michael’s parents took a tour to this place in December 2002. Because it was pouring with rain at the time they got to see little more than the Chishan Street market, which stretched for several hundred metres between close packed houses. Chiufen caters more for Chinese than western tourists. In the meantime, another parcel was sent off for Michael which included books he had requested.
Michael (email 1 Apr 02): Thankyou so much for all the stuff you guys sent me, I got the package today. It’s come just at the right time, I’m just finishing War and Peace. 2 big jars of vegemite should last me at least 2 lifetimes, maybe 3.
Dearest mother, I haven’t forgotten that it’s your birthday on Sunday, and hopefully the postman should be delivering that 12 foot jade buddha statue any time soon. Thank you once again, my dears, you really have brightened my day. Love, Mike.
Michael ‘s next email on 22 April requested his parents send a letter and bank draft to the ICYER ashram in Pondicherry to enrol in the teacher training course commencing in October. This was done. Now, with Peter and Krissy heading eastwards from India, his thoughts turned to a possible family get together on his way back to India . . .
Michael (email 25 Apr 02): Hey . . . why don’t you meet up with me and Petey in China . . . we can eat some dog and practice our Falun Gong,
. . . and then, a couple of days later . . .
Michael (email 27 Apr 02): Cambodia (Phnom Penh), 10th June. Be there or be square.
Michael’s parents thought long and hard about whether to take up this opportunity. . .
Next Chapter: Jui Fang to Phnom Penh
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Michael's Story 