If you’re out and about during Chinese New Year in Taiwan, chances are you’re probably going to notice an unusually greater amount of non-Taiwanese guys out and about trying to keep themselves occupied, but still looking like they’ve got nothing better to do.

For hundreds (thousands?) of Taiwanese girls every Chinese New Year heralds the difficult decision of being split between spending time with their boyfriends and family.

With the Chinese New Year banquets ranking as the most important family time on the Chinese lunar calendar, the decision on how to spend CNY weekend often boils down to

  • do I spend it with my family and worry in the back of my mind that my boyfriend might get a bit lonely and have nothing to do… or

  • do I spend it with my boyfriend, totally piss off my family and just deal with the repercussions later?


It’s not an easy choice any way you cut it and inherently stems from a culture that largely refuses to acknowledge or just flat out ignore the fact that young Taiwanese females have a social life.

One of the darker aspects of Taiwanese society is also the torrential undercurrent of racism, in that for some families it’s not so much that their daughter is seeing someone – but rather that they’re not Taiwanese.

‘My daughter? Together with some foreign white dog who’s only here to bang her brains out? What a slut, get out!’

Sexism also plays its part too in that almost universally should any sons of the family bring partners home (Taiwanese or otherwise), this is perfectly acceptable and nobody bats an eyelid.

In this sense it’s hard to relate the ‘foreigner boyfriend’ experience to ‘foreigner girlfriends’. They simply don’t have to jump through the same hoops we do.

No doubt there are Taiwanese couples who themselves go through something similar (albeit without the racial prejudice undertones) but the primary difference here is that both parties, barring any unusual circumstances, have families to go home to and enjoy that sense of belonging.

That’s where the species of “foreigner boyfriend” are at a complete loss.

Most of us are out here flying solo and for those first few days of Chinese New Year we can either abandon ship and go for a holiday overseas (which just makes our girlfriends feel worse), or stick around Taiwan and visit the deserted local tourist attractions (usually impossible due to the traditional rain Taiwan gets during Chinese New Year), or just bum around locally with nothing much to do (read: hang out with other temporarily dumped foreign boyfriends).

However staying in Taiwan during Chinese New Year only drives home the loneliness feeling as you get to walk around and see families everywhere spending the time together.

And if you really want it rubbed in just walk around during the evening and see everybody enjoying nice lavish family dinners together.

The smells of these feasts wafting in from the streets is intoxicatingly torturous.

There is of course one loophole, a backdoor if you will if you want to gain acceptance and experience a true family orientated Chinese New Year:

Marry your girlfriend.

For those only here for the short-term this usually isn’t an option and for those of us trying to make it for the long haul, getting married just so your girlfriend’s family decided to acknowledge you exist seems kinda silly.

Especially when you’re talking full grown adults who have well and truly left their teenage years behind them.

Still, chances are this is the game you’ll play every Chinese New Year should you find yourself dating a Taiwanese girl.

Me personally? I refuse to play the game and instead suck it up and compromise. I don’t want to be the reason (scapegoat) my girlfriend’s family decide to get pissed off at her for, nor do I let them interfere with our plans for the rest of the week.

Usually it’s the first three days that are most important to Taiwanese people (Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights) so if I don’t have plans I just try to occupy myself during this time.

The tradeoff is that after Sunday we’ve then got the whole week to do stuff together.

It is overwhelmingly tempting to kick up a big fuss and challenge the status quo, and Lord knows when you’re sitting at home eating McDonalds infront of the TV hearing all the families living around you partying it up, you often wonder why you didn’t – but ultimately (and as hard as it can be to accept) it’s out of your hands.

Unless of course you’re the ‘ultimatum giving’ type of guy – in which case you might be in for a rude sense of shock when you attempt to go up against thousands of years of cultural tradition all guns blazing.

With it currently pouring down with rain I’m seriously doubting we’ll even get to go ahead with our later in the week plans, but for now I’m busy writing up a few articles to schedule during the week so that I’m not tied up worrying about the blog while I’m out exploring.

So long as you’ve felt your voice is heard (and I do) the rest pretty much is up to your girlfriend and their family. If you’re one of the lucky ones to be going out with a girl whose family isn’t stuck in the dark ages then more power to you.

For the rest of us foreign boyfriends well, I guess there’s always next year.

Happy Chinese New Year, I guess.



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