Easy your life.

Update History

13 January 2013

A Better Never Did Itself Sustain Upon A Soldier’s Thigh

People talk to me all the time. Too often, in fact. If I were an anonymous face in the crowd I could probably get away with walking to the local opium den without anyone bothering me. As a local celebrity, I cannot so much as throw my bag of garbagie in the middle of the road without some stranger straining to bask in the warmth of my international fame.

The most frequent comments I get from random admirers are “Why you so handsome? I wish me/mine son and/or husband will be making of so attactness” and “You blog is most greatest blog is ever was, but is needing more recipes”. There is little I can do about the former. Baby Jesus made me as stunning as I am and the men in your life as banal as they are for a reason. Ours is not to question why. I have complete control over the latter.

Starting today, I will intersperse amongst my indelibly perceptive observations my incontrovertible opinions on mankind’s greatest works of film and literature. I will also share my recipe for banana muffins.

I had intended to begin with what I have no doubt would have been such a brilliant review of William Shakespeare’s Othello that Coleridge himself would have ejaculated in his own grave were he able, but I simply cannot get over what a bitch Othello is. I do not mean that the play is difficult to read or ingest. I mean that the character Othello is a punk. He thinks his wife is the shit, but totally caps her ass just because Iago talked smack about her. When I first read it, I was like, dude. I read it again recently and if I ever find Othello’s Facebook page I am so spamming the shit out of him.

The Moor of Venice? More like the Douchemoor of Venice.

Instead, we have an e-book version of a blog. Same difference.

An American Teacher In Taiwan” by Ken Berglund is based on the famous blog of the same title and author. It is advertised as a guide to teaching English in Taiwan. I feel this part is misleading as much has changed since the author escaped to his homeland. Even if the labyrinth of Chinese bureaucracy was somehow the same today as it was five years ago, or even five months ago, no single person can give anyone a comprehensive view of the horrors that await them should they feel the need to follow in his footsteps. The arbitrary rules and regulations change from person to person and are enforced at whim.

However, this e-book is also advertised as “One writer’s experience about living, working, dating, finding love, and raising kids in a foreign country.” As a personal memoir, I cannot question its veracity. I can only confirm that many of the obstacles in adapting to life in a Chinese culture that the author experienced are universal to any American, or possibly even Canadian, in similar circumstances.

Mr Berglund relates an incident wherein he is induced to enter a “special” KTV by women of liberal morals and is only able to leave the establishment after forfeiting an unacceptably large sum of cash. Any robust red blooded male who has set foot in any Chinese country for more than twelve hours can relate to this situation.

If you want to know what kind of paperwork you must fill out and have stamped in triplicate to live in the Land of Scooter, this book will not help you. If you want to know what the people are like and how different their customs are from your own, this book covers a broad range of expatriate topics.

Some would say its range of topics is too broad. A guide to living in a foreign land or a travel guide should have a more narrow focus. But as a memoir, there is an even balance between personal insights (the part about his erectile dysfunction brought on by too many betel nuts) and general anecdotes (Chinamen be wacky). For this reason among others, I think this should be marketed as a memoir and not any kind of handbook.

While this e-book is probably more interesting to Americans who have lived or are now living in a foreign country, it is written in such a casual narrative that even a xenophobe who has never set foot outside of Itawamba, Mississippi might find it enjoyable.

I give it five muffins.


6 comments:

Anonymous said...

price to high

An American Teacher in Taiwan Fan said...

Only a cheap Asian bastard would say that $2.99 for a 356 page book is too high.

美國人 said...

Hold the phone. Where do you get $2.99? The Amazon page says $4.99.

Ken Berglund said...

The book is $2.99 here in the USA. It should be for sale at the equivalent price in India, England, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Japan, Canada, and Brazil. I guess if you don't live in those countries, the price will be more. I have no control over what Amazon charges in the countries where their empire hasn't reached.

That being said, it is definitely worth $4.99. The awesome photos are worth the price alone, since you can see pictures of me, random Asians, and the person who runs this blog.

美國人 said...

Not only are there pictures of the stunningly handsome person who runs this blog, but there are pictures by him as well. Did you give him any credit?

Ken Berglund said...

I think I mentioned that you took the wedding pictures in the "Wedding Day" chapter.

Most Frequently Used Labels

Most important for honor to making drive with eye close (7) How can it be an accident when they drive like assholes on purpose? (3) Let your family get their own dreams to the reality (3) Police don’t ask me how I feel – I feel fined (3) When you travel to a city with a rich culture and history try to visit its theme parks (3) And I ask myself why were there no strippers at my wedding (2) Get out the way old Dan Tucker (2) Holy Mother tramples the heads of the Earth fire dragon (2) I hate the fact that I need an electronic device in my life (2) I was tired of walking anyway (2) It is indeed like rain on your wedding cake (2) No colors were harmed in the taking of these photographs (2) What the Zagat guide doesn’t tell you (2) Why is not now if it fight? (2) And they don't even hold a grudge (1) Aucune couleur dans la fabrication de ces photgraphs n'a été blessée (1) Brother can you spare a thousand dimes (1) Castle Of The King Of The Birds (1) De Cultuur van Amsterdam is de belangrijkste van Nederland (1) Does one person really need 500 shoes? (1) Dorénavant je ne parlerai pas même Français (1) Everything I know about right and wrong I learned from M*A*S*H (1) From Genesis to Revelation in one run-on sentence (1) Hast du etwas Zeit für mich - Dann singe Ich ein Lied für dich von Wien und Österreich und das sowas von sowas kommt (1) He doesn't care too much for money since money can't buy him love (1) I am tired of typing tiny dirt farm village (1) I knew there was a reason I never go to Dallas (1) I participate in all your hostility to dogs and would readily join in any plan of exterminating the whole race. – Thomas Jefferson to Peter Minor 1811 (1) I think I saw Walt Disney’s frozen head in the popcorn line (1) If I were a half decent photographer anything I shot in Africa would make you say Great Mbleka - this place is awfuckingtastic (1) If Jesus exists then how come he never lived here (1) If Nelson Mandela exists then how come he never lived here? (1) If Rodney King lived here he’d still be alive today (1) If you wish to be starting some thing you have got to be starting some thing - I say if you wish to be starting some thing you have got to be starting some thing (1) If you’ve seen one crowded polluted stinking town… (1) It is make unluck to give a shit (1) It is super and strong to kill the wound dint (1) It’s actually a pretty enormous world after all (1) Keine Farben wurden im nehmen dieser Fotos geschädigt (1) Me no like (1) Most greatest blog post is ever was (1) NOT ALLOW (1) Never trust a man who can only spell a word one way (1) No humans were harmed in the taking of these photographs (1) Not counting the last one (1) Old people got no reason (1) Peace and easy feelings (1) Peter Brown never called me (1) Planes and trains and boats and buses characteristically evoke a common attitude of blue (1) Probably the best time I have ever had at one of my favorite places in the world (1) Red is the color that my baby wore and what's more it's true - yes it is (1) Slap tjips - jy maak my nou sommer lekker skraal mos (1) Strike up the band and make the fireflies dance (1) Suicide is Painless but booking trips at the last minute around here is a pain in the ass (1) The day the music died (1) The lingering acrid scent of $5 whores never impresses the little lady back home (1) The one about my first trip to Amsterdam which doesn’t really say anything about my first trip to Amsterdam (1) The woman who will be the mother of my illegitimate children just as soon as I get that time machine fixed (1) They might as well be dead when the rain comes (1) Think about how stupid the average person is and then realize that half of them are stupider than that (1) Those godless French bastards never once offered me any vodka (1) Tiny metal rods (1) To boldly be our guest a long long time ago where no man has gone before under the sea (1) Unfortunately to get to nature you have to go through civilization (1) We’ll kill the fatted calf tonight so stick around (1) What good is a used up world and how could it be worth having? (1) Who is this Red Rose that just walked in the she hot stuff (1) Why Julia Child never lived here (1) You make kill we make kill so all same ok (1) Your lateral cuneiform is full of eels (1) scenic Bali (1) spellcheck this (1)

All content © 2004-2013

myfreecopyright.com registered & protected






















I have no qualms about disseminating creative works for the public benefit when the author is duly credited, but if you use any of the writing or photography contained herein and try to pass it off as yours, that just shows you are a big pussy who is too lazy to come up with your own word usements or shoot your own digital paintings. You should be ashamed of your dipshittery.