Watch Out for Falling Lizards

By RSH

RSH was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He is the author of two books, Watch Out for Falling Lizards and 0 to 37 in 2 Seconds Flat. RSH wrote, "Watch Out for Falling Lizards" while living in the Mekong Delta region of Vietnam.
This book is intended for mature readers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AIE International LLC
• Release date: Jan 14, 2022
• ISBN: 9780990486718

RSH

RSH was born in 1869 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He was the first son born to Richard and Ginger Huntington. Richard was a cheese miner in the hills of northern Wisconsin, and RSH’s mother Ginger was a gold digger from Green Bay, Wisconsin.RSH was a top pupil in high school and was voted most likely to get bad breath. He is the author of two books, Watch Out for Falling Lizards and 0 to 37 in 2 Seconds Flat. RSH didn’t start writing until he was in his 30’s, mainly because he failed at everything else.RSH enjoyed being a storyteller in his spare time. He loved regaling untruthful stories down by the brothels and horse stables about his childhood and his family life to anyone who would listen.In his later years, RSH was institutionalized at the Mendota Hospital for the Insane in Madison, Wisconsin.

Book preview

WATCH OUT

for

FALLING LIZARDS

By RSH

For my family.

Watch Out For Falling Lizards

RSH, 2011

U.S. Copyright

Registration No. TXu 2-227-201

LCCN No. 2014943308

ISBN No. 978-0-9904867-0-1 Print

ISBN No. 978-0-9904867-1-8 Ebook

Published by AIE International LLC

Brookfield, Wisconsin USA

Cover illustration by Hoa Bich Huyen

Cover design concept RSH

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All rights reserved.

Without limiting the right under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication/book/cover/photos may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the author.

What is the indefinite continued progress of existence? Time. But is it indefinite? We only have so many minutes in life. Being young and reckless, I didn't pay much attention to those minutes.

I had a good childhood, not a fairytale upbringing, but compared to some of my classmates and buddies, I didn't have the right to bitch.

As a teenager and a young adult, I was confused and somewhat frustrated. I didn't understand the responsibility that was being thrust upon me going into adulthood. Not to mention the hormones that were oversaturating my brain, and of course, trying to understand my id.

I wanted to leave the U.S., so I did.

CONTENTS

1. They Don’t Speak English Here

2. Arms Wide Open

3. Paradise of the Indifferent

4. Religion

5. Taiwan

6. Vietnam

7. A Very Simple Piece of Advice to My Country

THEY DON'T SPEAK ENGISH HERE

On the long plane ride to Taiwan, I made a list of all the things I wanted to change in my life. This list I would always keep close to me to remind myself of my aspirations and goals. These are not in any particular order.

Be happy and grateful for my life

Forget the past and focus on the future

Learn about business structure in Asia

Meet new people and make business contacts

Learn Mandarin

Help people

Try to experience new things

Stay true to me

Adapt, learn, and conquer

Meet a lot of women! And then more!!

Taiwan

Hey, no one speaks English here! I arrived in Taiwan on June 17th. My brother Darb told me he would meet me at the airport when I arrived. When I got off the plane after two flights totaling 21 hours of air travel, a woman had a sign that had my name on it. I said, Hello, baby, what's up? I thought maybe she had heard of my awesome sexual abilities. Lol! She spoke very little English but enough to tell me to go to the bus station and take a bus to Taichung, Taiwan. I was like, WTF! Darb wasn't coming to get me. He was sick. I found the bus station with some help from this cute and friendly Taiwanese young lady. I got on a bus and went to this place named Taichung. It was a three-hour ride. When I arrived in Taichung, Taiwan, I called Darb, and his friend Rob answered the phone. Rob said that he would pick me up from where I was, but I didn't know where I was!

I just sat there looking at all the people and the way they dressed. Wow! I thought, this is going to be insane!! Rob finally found me two hours later and took me to his apartment where Darb was still passed out from drinking a bottle of tequila the night before. What a twat! I came from halfway around the world, and he couldn't be sober enough to meet me at the airport, not to mention he knew I knew nothing about Taiwan. If you knew Darb, you'd know he is a very irresponsible person, so it didn't really faze me. He is a great guy, though.

A Couple of Things Right Off the Bat

I found out that Taiwan was a tropical island, therefore pretty damn hot, and I liked that! I hated and still hate the U.S., Midwest winter. Especially Wisconsin! I'd rather you take me to the dentist and pull all my fricking teeth than live in the Midwest in the wintertime. I could never figure out why people would want to live in snow and cold weather; it sucks! Didn't I know that Taiwan was hot before I left for Taiwan? Yeah! I didn't know much more, though. I wanted to be a little surprised. I knew that Taiwan was near China, and the population was around 23 million people. That's really about all I knew. I didn't look at any websites because I wanted to be surprised. And I was!

Wow, look at all these beautiful women! All dressed in tight clothes and high heels. Their color coordination and style were quite different from the way women in America wore their clothes. For example, you might see a woman in Taiwan dressed in brown shorts, pink striped socks, and a green shirt. And don't forget the high heels! That's how a typical woman dressed in Taiwan. Very different, but very sexy!!! Darb and I stayed at Rob's apartment in Taichung for a couple of days and hung out and went to eat at different places. I found out real quickly Taiwanese do not eat the same food Americans eat. I had better get used to eating rice and noodles.

Darb didn't live in Taichung. He lived in a town named Douliou, Taiwan. Douliou was three hours south of Taichung. After staying at Rob's apartment, we got on a train and headed to Darb's apartment. Wow, what a shithole. I always knew Darb was a slob, but holy shit! The small apartment was trashed with half-eaten food containers, fast food wrappers, and empty plastic soda cups. I helped him clean it up, and things were a little better. The shower down the hall should have been declared a disaster area. The toilet flooded onto your feet and into the shower area, and there was black shit all over the floor and on the sides of the walls. Was this how all Taiwanese lived? No, just Darb! I look back now, and I think it's damn funny. The apartment was cheap, maybe $100 a month. Darb was always a very cheap person. He would rather live in a little place and save $50 a month than live in a decent place and spend the extra $50. I was just the opposite. I wanted and needed a suitable place to live, not a palace, but a clean showering area and a kitchen because I love to cook.

One night after soon arriving in Douliou, Darb came home and said that he wanted to have a few drinks. What a surprise. He said there was a place about 20 minutes away and the only place that resembled a bar in Douliou. Darb said that he knew the owner, and he was a cool Taiwanese guy. So, we drove our motorcycles about 20 minutes south, and there was this little shithole called Mike's. Yeah, a Mike's pub right in the middle of Taiwan, go figure. We went inside and sat down and ordered a beer. Everyone was singing karaoke, which just annoyed the heck out of me. I hated karaoke! Most people suck at singing, and I don't want to listen to their shitty voices!

Darb introduced me to the owner Mike. (Mike was his English name.) Mike sat down and had a drink with us, and surprisingly, he spoke good English. About 30 minutes later, Mike asked us if his two friends could join us. Darb and I said that would be fine. The guy who sat down on my left was covered in tattoos. The guy who sat down on my right was dressed in a yellow dress shirt and slacks. They said hello and seemed to be cool. Mr. Tattoo looked a little intimidating with the longish black hair, leather jacket, and face tats. Mike introduced them to us. Mike said the guy on my right was a police lieutenant on the Taiwan police force. Mike then said that the guy on my left was a gang member from China. He also mentioned that he was a High-up member. That's when I noticed the gang (I can't tell you the organization.) tattoo on his right forearm. Mr. Tattoo bought the table a bottle of Jack, so he was cool with me.

The lieutenant started to talk to me in broken English. He asked me if I liked Taiwan. I said that I did. He said that his buddy (pointing to the guy on my left) didn't speak any English. I said, That's fine. I don't speak any Mandarin. Everyone at the table started laughing. Then the cop asked me if I had a girlfriend in Taiwan. I said, I didn't. He said that he liked white women and wanted to have sex with one. I started laughing, and he laughed too. The lieutenant then said that if I got him a white woman to go on a date with him, he would get me an ARC (Alien Resident Certificate), and I could stay in Taiwan as long as I wanted with no hassles. I told him that I didn't know any white women in Taiwan. He said that if I ever find a white woman, his offer would still be good. I said that I'd keep that in mind. Yeah, right! That was the weirdest conversation I think I ever had in my life.

We all drank to closing time, and I was pretty hammered. The two guys we met invited Darb and me to a party somewhere in Taiwan, but we declined the invitation. I didn't want to get involved in any Taiwanese bullshit, and Darb was so shit-faced he couldn't even stand. He just wanted to go home and crash. Besides, the sun was coming up, and I could feel the brutal heat coming.

What was I going to do in Taiwan? I didn't have a degree, so supposedly, I couldn't teach. I did manage to acquire some college credits though. On the second day in Douliou, Darb took me to the school where he taught and introduced me to the school's owner. She was a gorgeous and incredibly sexy woman. Her name was Chia-Jung. I asked her if she was looking for a teacher. She said yes, and how much money did I want per hour? I didn't know, and I didn't care. She didn't ask if I had a degree, so that was cool. I think they were happy to have a native English speaker at the school to help the students. I taught a group of 10 students ages 12-14 with their reading and vocabulary. After my first week with the children, I had a great lead on what I wanted to do with my life. Education! I immediately fell in love with the children and the people of Taiwan, and most importantly, I really enjoyed teaching. My English grades in school were always good.

Always good? But I know what a verb, nouns, and adjectives are and how to use them properly. Maybe! When you've been drilled throughout your whole life on proper English, you pick up a few things. I don't mean to make teaching English sound easy because it's not. There are a lot of important things you need to know regarding the English language. And just because you know how to speak English doesn't mean you know how to teach it so that students can fully understand it. At most ESL schools in Taiwan, ESL teachers taught phonics, vocabulary, conversation, reading comprehension, and the Taiwanese teachers taught most of the grammar.

I loved helping students understand and learn all of it. This is where I took all the information I learned in high school and college and applied it to my students’ lessons―how not to teach!! Here's what I think is essential when it comes to being a good teacher.

First, always respect your students and their abilities. Second, you have some students that learn faster than others, which means you just need to spend a little more time with the students who are slower at picking up the concept of English. It doesn't mean the students who don't pick up English faster are stupid, no, no!!! Third, all children learn differently; you need to have patience, love, and understanding when teaching. Forth, you should always put your student's education before anything else. Fifth, you need to be creative. Use all the resources available. Sixth and most important, you really have to love teaching!

Also, keep in mind, a teacher is not only an educator but a role model for children. English isn't easy. It's a very hard and complicated language to learn. I had the knowledge of English and the love of teaching, but I had to learn more about teaching itself. I needed to discover how to write excellent lesson plans, control a classroom, and get the most out of each student. I went on a quest to learn more, and I did it by observing other teachers and their students. I spent countless hours in classrooms learning how different teachers taught, and I took a lot of notes! One thing I learned about foreign teachers in Taiwan, there weren't many good ones. Most foreign teachers seemed to only care about getting through the day.

Many foreigners come from different countries and get jobs teaching in Taiwan and other Asian countries. Did some foreign teachers care about the students? Yes. I found that most didn't care, though. It was just a way to make some money and go party every night at the bars, or they wanted money to keep traveling Asia. I found this to be very disturbing. The citizens of Taiwan deserved better!! I still loved and missed sales, and now I wanted to sell educational services. How can I combine the two? It will take a little time, but I'll figure that out.

I Felt Like an Animal

One afternoon in Douliou, Taiwan, I was sitting at a McDonald's, relaxing and having a burger. I noticed a family of four and a couple of other people outside looking at me through the big plated glass window. I think people in real small towns in Taiwan have never seen a foreigner before, and I found that to be funny most of the time. Most Taiwanese didn't stare long, so it didn't bother me much, but this group was looking at me for a while. I now knew what an animal felt like at a zoo. Well, me being the smart ass guy that I am, I put down my burger, hopped on the table, and started pounding on my chest like an ape! I even did the grunting. The people outside who were looking at me were initially shocked, and then they all started laughing. In McDonald's, I got a standing ovation from the patrons and the McDonald's staff. I love making people smile and laugh. That was an exciting afternoon!!

Still Proud Baby

One evening a week later, Darb and I met some foreigners, and they invited us to a bar/restaurant in town that we didn't know existed. There were foreigners from all over the world there, and I, of course, introduced myself to everyone. Darb and I had a few beers, and then the bar owner Neil from Canada, said that he was closing the bar, but we were welcome to stay for the after-bar party. Cool! Everyone went up to the second story of the bar and sat down. Darb and I sat there with people from South Africa, England, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and India.

We all sat there and drank, talked, smoked some killer shit, spoke about our homelands, Taiwan, and Asia. It was the most fascinating evening I had in a long time. Now here it came!! The conversation turned to America. Everyone wanted to know how such an idiot (forty-third president) could be elected president of the United States. Darb and I got a little shit that night because we were Americans, mostly because of the president. That wasn't the only thing they were asking. They all wanted to know why there was so much crime in the U.S.? I told them all that being an American was something I was very proud of, but America has a lot of problems. The drugs, guns, and crime were destroying America. They knew that. To be fair, there were also a lot of good things said about America that night! America helps a lot of countries and their people, and everyone surely acknowledged that.

Darb and I stayed in Douliou for a couple of months, and then we headed back to the big city of Taichung for a few days to interview and find jobs. We interviewed for some sales and teaching positions, and there were a lot of places interested in us. They didn't seem to care if I had a degree or not, and I didn't care either.

Before Darb and I moved to Taichung, I had to go on what's called a visa run. My visa for Taiwan was a three-year visa with multiple entries every 60 days. That meant I had to leave Taiwan every 60 days for three years. I could get an ARC (Alien Registered Certificate) if I opened a business or married a Taiwanese woman, but opening a business wasn't going to happen soon, and I wasn't looking to get married.

As a gift, my mom bought Darb and me a package deal that included airline tickets, hotel, and meals for Hong Kong that August. So we went to Hong Kong! Did I tell you traveling with Darb was a fricking joke? Darb is the most disorganized person I have ever met. Darb and I got to the airport a little late, about 45 minutes before the plane was scheduled to depart. The airline we were flying with let us check in late, but Darb lost his passport! He left it on the other side of the airport when we exchanged money.

Hong Kong

This is one of my favorite places on Earth.

We missed our flight and had to stay overnight at the airport until we could catch an early flight to Hong Kong the next day. That cost me a night in Hong Kong and a good night's sleep in a nice hotel. Was I pissed? At the airport, I told him to get the hell away from me until morning when we were supposed to leave for Hong Kong. I went to the 7-11 in the airport and bought all the beer I could drink and got hammered. Darb's an idiot!!

Hong Kong was awesome! Darb and I caught a 6:30 a.m. flight. We landed an hour later, got checked in at our hotel, and decided to go drinking. You should have seen that one coming! We decided to walk the streets of central Hong Kong and see what was happening. After grabbing a can of beer from a convenience store, we walked around and basically walked from convenience store to convenience store buying and drinking beer. In the late afternoon, we found a little bar/pub and sat upstairs. The women were beautiful, and the beer was cheap! Or was it the women were cheap, and the beer was beautiful? I don't remember because I was pissed up!! That's life!! After that bar, we hopped into a taxi and went to Wan Chai! That's where I fell in love!!! The bars, restaurants, and, of course, the cheap hookers!

I don't like prostitution, but I love dancing with beautiful women!! And doing the old bump and grind with beautiful hookers cost zero, baby!! I love it!! Especially when there are forty or fifty gorgeous women on the dance floor and only me! Well, unfortunately, it was time to go back to Taiwan and find work. The people of Hong Kong were great. The hustle and bustle of Hong Kong was exhilarating. I will be back!

When Darb and I arrived back in Taiwan, we ended up taking jobs at a chain school in Taichung. Most schools have apartments for foreign teachers to stay in, or they will find you decent accommodations. The school set us up in a house with a Taiwanese family. Darb and I shared a room in the lower part of the house. The mother of the family was an English teacher and good friends with the owner of the school, and she was a lovely lady. We moved on a Friday afternoon and were to start work on Saturday. Well, things got really screwed up quickly!

That night I stayed in, and Darb went out for a couple of drinks. I got up for work early Saturday morning, showered, and got ready for work. I couldn't find an exit to the area where my motorcycle was. I found a way to get to my bike, but I had to jump an 8-foot wall! I jumped the damn wall and landed badly on my ankle. I was screwed! I went to school with an awful-looking ankle the size of a grapefruit. I worked for three hours, and then the school said they would take me to the hospital. Cool!! Because I couldn't walk! The doctor at the hospital told me it was severely sprained. I was lucky because I'd broken that ankle once in the past.

Meanwhile, Darb hadn't shown up for work! What happened? Darb had gotten into a fight with some foreigner at a bar and got his ass kicked!! Two things about Darb. One, he can't fight. Two, when he drinks, he sometimes is a smart ass. You'd think he would have figured this out at his age, but apparently not. Darb had spent the night in the hospital, getting his face stitched up, and he was a mess! When I got back to the house we were staying at, Darb was sitting there with his head all bandaged up and stitches across his face!! I felt terrible for him. I wanted to beat the crap out of the asshole who did this to him, but I couldn't walk much less fight. There was no reason to screw Darb up that bad.

Well, we both couldn't work for at least two weeks, and the school was not happy with that. In fact, the school wanted me to return in a few days; I told them they were nuts! A few days later, the school fired us both, and that was cool with me. They did let us stay in the room for two weeks to recuperate, which was nice of them. It was a little funny; Darb and I were both sleeping in the same bed, all bandaged up. We just watched TV, smoked hash, and drank Jack all day. I wanted to move to a smaller city or town anyway. I kept on getting lost in Taichung. Taichung is a big city, and I had no idea where to go! Every street looked the same. Absolutely no English signs, and 99.1 percent of people spoke no English. It got very frustrating at times. After two weeks of swimming in Jack and hash, we decided to move to a small town named Hemei. Hemei is located in the middle of Taiwan on the west coast. Hemei was close to a bigger city named Chunghua. I liked smaller towns and towns not too far from a big city where I could get decent food and supplies. The closest restaurant in Taiwan that resembled American food was McDonald's. I hated McDonald's food, but I would learn to adjust. I started to try to enjoy some Taiwanese food, and that helped a lot. I had an open mind when it came to trying new food. If I didn't have an open mind, I would have been in big trouble.

Darb and I started work teaching the next week in Hemei. The school set us up in a house that they owned. The house had three floors with 6-7 bedrooms, a shared kitchen on the second floor, and private bathrooms. Only one person was living there at the time we moved in. His name was Matt, and he was from Ohio, USA. He was okay. Matt was the school's number one guy, which he kinda played out, but he was alright. The first day didn't go that well. The wife of the owner of the school took us on a tour of the facilities that morning. When I passed by a young cleaning lady, I said, Good morning to her. The owner's wife told me I was never to talk to the help, and she was serious! Well, right there, I was going to have a problem. No one was going to tell me who I can and can't say good morning to, especially a stupid racist bitch. I found out later the cleaning woman was from the Philippians.