Deep Thoughts at Yongkang Italian Restaurante

Tonight, I met a bunch of friends from school for pasta near Yongkang St. (永康街). One of my classmates is returning to Paris in a few weeks, so we wanted to get together to say goodbye.

One of the things I love about living in Taipei is that not only do I get to learn a lot about Taiwanese and Chinese culture from my Taiwanese friends, but I'm also able to make friends from all over the world. Tonight, we are nine--Austria, Chile, Japan, Germany, Indonesia, Taiwan, and the States are all represented.

The restaurant is small, on an alley off of Yongkang St., which is bustling with hungry Taiwanese, excited to taste the many good "small snacks" here. The famous shaved ice shop is open, and even in this freezing weather (well, freezing for Taiwan), it is packed. I guess they never took Zhong Yi (中醫; Chinese Medicine) 101.

We all chat and order, and slowly, our dishes come out. Very slowly. Our Austrian friend begins the evening's eating event, but he eats alone while we wait for our dishes. Slowly, a couple of plates come out. A fettucine alfredo, and then five minutes later a pesto linguine. I get mine, and almost all of us, except two, are eating. Another dish comes out, but it still leaves one of the Japanese girls pasta-less. As most Japanese girls would be doing at this point, she is smiling politely, doing her best to hide her discomfort.

The group begins to crack jokes. You can have dessert with us. Maybe we can run to 7-11 to get you a snack.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a white guy walk to the back of the restaurant and then behind the counter. Bingo. He's the laoban, the owner. He happens to walk to the front of the restaurant where we are sitting.

"Excuse me," I say to him. "We're almost finished our meals, but our friend still hasn't received her pasta. Do you mind checking to see if they haven't forgotten her order?" I ask politely.

He immediately shows concern and agrees to check on it. In less than a minute, her meal arrives and the owner arrives at our table to tell us, in his Italian accent, that her dish is on the house.

This incident gives me a chance to elucidate and expound my thoughts about the differences between Chinese and Western culture with my Chilean dining partner to my right. I tell him that Taiwanese people will never complain at a restaurant. This is something I've asked my Taiwanese friends before.

"You mean even if you hate the food, you'll never complain?" I ask them.

"Right. We don't want to cause a loss of face," they reply.

If you, a foreigner, are with them and find a problem with the food or service at a restaurant, they will do their utmost to persuade you to let it go and not complain. To accept the problem.

My Chilean friend, who has lived in Taiwan for over a year knows what I am talking about. He tells me about the time a waiter brought him the wrong dish and he didn't want to eat it, that he actually wanted the dish he ordered. The waiter told him that this was not possible and just as he was about to protest, his friends came down on him hard to just accept the dish and not make a big fuss of it. He ended up eating the random dish that was served to him.

This type of theme is always coming up in Taiwan for us Westerners. Where we are taught from a young age that it is important to be direct, even aggressive in asserting ourselves ("the squeaky wheel gets the grease"), here in the East, children are taught to be aware of a larger picture, to be humble, to sacrifice for the greater good, and even ignore their own needs ("the nail that sticks out gets hammered").

For someone who has grown up in the West, especially in the States, the Confucian way is refreshing and enlightening, and there are many ways that I have been changed forever by it. I've learned that we in the West can learn a lot from the East, and that the East also needs to learn a lot from the West.

Culture can give us a key to open doors, and sometimes can be a prison in which we are held captive. Hopefully we can be present in each moment, and like a good martial artist, respond appropriately, using all the tools we've been given. And sometimes we can let them all go and let our Buddha-nature, our Essential self, emerge.