There I was sitting on my barstool drinking a properly drawn Guinness at my favorite watering hole on O'ahu, resting my sixty-three year old bones, when into the pub strolls my old buddy Nathan, who has been sequestered at a college in Taiwan teaching English for the past two and a half years.  After several Guinnesses and catching up, the conversation turns to teaching English in Taiwan. “You should come over and find a job.  It’s real easy work and there are plenty of jobs to be had.”  Famous last words! The next thing I know I’m checking through customs at Chiang Kai-Shek International airport in northern Taoyuan County, Taiwan ROC.  My first mistake…not doing the proper research.  Had I been less impulsive I might have deduced from the reading material that to be outside of the desired age group greatly reduces the viable prospects for securing employment there as intimated in websites providing excellent insight to the world of teaching ESL. www.Buxiban.com is probably the most detailed site addressing the ABCs of spending time in Taiwan.  www.Forumosa.com fits the bill for chatting and receiving the 411 written by people directly involved in diverse aspects of the ESL game.  To actually get a feel for what’s being offered by various schools and check the range of perks, try www.Tealit.com. In the mornings I watched live Yankees baseball due to the fact that Chien Ming Wang hails from Taiwan and carries the status of a god there.  He happens to be, arguably, the number one pitcher on the Yanks roster.  The games play at a rate of six or so a week, all live feeds.  So if you’re a Bronx Bomber’s fan you’re in dog heaven!!  The downside is that the games are aired in Chinese.

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After the game I’d work through my e-mail correspondence, check the various sites for new postings for teachers, send off cover letters and resumes, and wait for the responses.  I sent over sixty cover letter/resumes to schools of my interest and some I considered borderline meaning, I’d need to attend training classes, some paid but most not.  From the resumes sent, I received three phone calls. Two of these actually resulted in setting an interview/teaching demonstration, the next step in the hiring phase.  I’ve taught ESL in various parts of the world for over ten years (Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Hawaii). 

Nothing…Nada…Zilch!!  If your personality tends toward anal retentive you might want to find some soothing alternative to sitting around trying to rationalize what part of the ozone your e-mail messages were shot into never to be heard of again.

Now here’s the catch 22 situation.  While it is technically illegal to discriminate on the basis of age one still encountered online ads for positions citing “under thirty-five”.  Parents of the school children are generally of the belief that it’s better for their children to align with young adults (pseudo siblings if you will) closer to their children’s age than older adults which would take on perhaps a more authoritarian tone and feel quite at ease expressing this desire to the schools.  Once again the pursuit of the dollar and plausible deniability rears its ugly head.  If the schools won’t acquiesce to the demands of the parents then it’s entirely possible they would enroll their children in a school more tolerant to their desires so, unfortunately, more times than not, principle is forced into the back seat.  The reason for putting the children in “cram schools” is to get a jump on others of lesser fortune to secure high scores on national tests which directly quantify the quality of employment they may pursue upon their entrance into the business world.

Take your own maps.  As with almost everything else in Taiwan the maps are printed in Chinese (even if one is fortunate to find so called English maps most are still of the local script).  If you don’t speak Chinese or Taiwanese be prepared for a major culture shock. 

I think as an experiment to test whether ageism exists, as I suspect, I might spend some time applying to the ads as a bright eyed, just out of college student with appropriate photo and see how many hits I receive on my applications.  Granted it’s not an empirical study but, I suspect I’ll hear from more than half, requesting to schedule and interview/teaching demo if in fact the need for ESL teachers is as high as one is led to believe.  I might even forward the results to the proper Taiwanese government agency and why not?  Someone has to speak up in defense of us old duffers!
 

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