Customs are usually considered a way of life or the culture that a particular group has followed for a long time. As a nearly 30-year-old Taiwanese, I am rightly familiar with the customs in Taiwan. I’d like to introduce some interesting ones below.
Firstly, you cannot help but refer to food in Taiwan because Taiwanese like to eat, and diet accounts for an important part of Taiwanese life. From childhood on during a meal, children are admonished by their mothers not to waste a grain of rice, or they will marry someone with a pockmarked face in the future. As a greeting, people use the sentence “Have you eaten?” which has the same meaning as “How do you do?” Moreover, no matter at school or work, Taiwanese always like to be seated at a table in order to talk and build up relationships with one another.
Secondly, there are some gift-giving customs in Taiwan. It deserves to be mentioned that you can’t give a clock because it signifies death. In addition, some common presents carry the meaning of separation, for example, “pear” sounds like severance and “shoes” are associated with drifting apart. If you’d like to give them as gifts, you can ask the recipient to give you one dollar to remove the jinx. Finally, when you are invited to a wedding, you are expected to bring a red envelop with money, and the number should be even (but avoid “four” which is supposed to bring bad luck), since even numbers represent “in pairs”, which conveys good fortune to the newlyweds. Bringing a red envelop with money rather than bringing a gift indicates that Taiwanese are very practical.
In summary, whether you like the customs or not, respecting local customs is a basic courtesy. “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”
