World Collide is the podcast where I talk to people about their experiences abroad

>> Viktoria: Hey, welcome to a new episode of Worlds Collide. This is the podcast where I talk to people about their experiences abroad. And I am your host, Victoria. Before we start, I wanted to make sure that you follow this podcast on your podcast app. So push the button in the corner of your app so you will never miss an episode. And if you also want to help me out a little bit and like this podcast, then you could give it a five star rating on your podcast app. Or maybe even, if this is not too much to ask for, write a sentence or two on Apple podcast, and, yeah, that would be great. So thank you so much for that. That was that.

Doctor Joey Liu was born in Taiwan and currently lives in Taiwan

So now it's the time for this week's interview. Here it is. So my guest today is Doctor Joey Liu. Hi. How are you today?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: I'm great. Thank you so much for having me here.

>> Viktoria: Yeah, thank you for being here. so where are you right now?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: I am currently in Taiwan.

>> Viktoria: Okay, cool. And, I don't know even much about Taiwan. So where in Taiwan are you?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: So we're a smallish island off of, China. So, we have a long history with China. Our ancestors, many of our ancestors came from China, so we're right there, south of Japan and 2 hours north of the Philippines.

>> Viktoria: Okay. And which city are you in?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: I'm in a smaller city, so it's not well known, but it's Pingzhen. if you ever come to Taiwan, you'll fly into Taoyuan. That's where the airport is. And we're about 20 minutes away from the airport.

>> Viktoria: Okay. And so what. What brought you to Taiwan?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah, that's a good question. So I was actually born in Taiwan. Ah. And I lived here. Yes. So this is considered home for me. but, my mother is american, my father is Haka from Taiwan. And we ended up relocating to the US before I was three, just around the age of three. And I grew up there, met my husband there. My children were born in the US in California. But for me, I've always felt homesick for Taiwan. I actually ended up living here for a little bit, when I was 18, after high school, before college. And I've always just tried to get myself back to Taiwan, and that felt impossible after marrying an American. But he randomly said to me once, like, two years ago, he was like, maybe we can move to Taiwan. And I was like, really?

>> Viktoria: Let's do it right now.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Let's go. Yeah.

>> Viktoria: Okay.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That's kind of the beginning of the story.

Your husband said, hey, maybe we moved to Taiwan

>> Viktoria: Okay. So I guess your husband does not speak any Taiwanese no.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: And Taiwanese is a language. I don't speak Taiwanese. My culture is hakka. So that was my first language is Haka, and then the national language is Mandarin. So my children, I speak to them in Haka, and they came here to learn Mandarin in school, and my husband speaks none of those languages.

>> Viktoria: Okay. And did you grow up speaking haka?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes. So my father actually spoke almost no English when we moved to the US because he spoke Mandarin with my mom. She was fluent in Mandarin, and he spoke haka with me and my sisters in the house. And he was able to find a lot of, chinese speaking clientele when he moved to the US as well. He's a general contractor, builder. Ah. So he didn't actually learn English for most of my childhood. He speaks it now, but, yeah, I very much grew up trilingually in the US.

>> Viktoria: Oh, wow. Trilingual even. Yeah. do you. So what was the process like? so when your husband said, like, hey, maybe we moved to Taiwan. how. How soon after did she then finally move?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: I mean, it was pretty quick that we put everything into motion. Like, he mentioned it in September after we had made a trip to Asia. He also, I should mention, has family in the Philippines. He's half Filipino. so we visited his grandmother in the Philippines. We are so blessed. His grandmother. So my kid's great grandmother is still alive. She's 93. My two grandparents, my haka grandparents are still alive in Taiwan. So my children actually, they're blessed to have five great grandparents that they're still able to interact with. Oh, wow.

>> Viktoria: So they're, like, even close by now?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: yes. The Philippines is only 2 hours away, so we thought, like, you know, this is such a good opportunity just to be around family, especially, you know, my grandparents, we feel like with being haka and, having, a language that isn't taught in schools and it's an oral history. There's this feeling like, once my grandparents pass, a piece of our culture is also gonna be lost if we don't take the time now to really spend time with them and speak with them, listen to their stories, like, you know, really, like, preserve our culture. So my husband, when he asked the question, I was like, if we're gonna go, we need to go now, because time isn't on our side. And by January, we committed. We looked into renting our home. We owned a home in southern California. We looked into renting it in April. My husband goes, what if we just sold our house? Because it was sort of, like, at the top of the post pandemic housing market in the US, where prices were high, we could sell our home and, like, make a pretty good profit. And I was like, what? What about our fallback plan? Like, and he was like, no, let's do it. By may, we listed it. By June, we found a buyer, went into escrow, and by July, we were packed up and on a plane to Taiwan.

>> Viktoria: Oh, wow. And did you have a place where you could stay in Taiwan?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah, we're really, really lucky. we live in a small neighborhood, and my grandparents have a home on one corner. And we were very traditional, so we live multi generationally. My grandparents live with their youngest son and their two grown sons. And then my auntie lives across the street from us, around the corner from there. and then she had an empty house. So this is. We kind of moved into an abandoned house that was just an extra property in the family and that cleaned it up and, living a minimalist life here. But we're really blessed to not only contribute to, like, you know, supporting my auntie a little bit, but also have a house that we were able to just move into right away.

The decision to move to Taiwan was really centered on our family first

>> Viktoria: So you're a doctor. So were you just like, hey, we go to Taiwan and, I gonna work there as a doctor because I was just wondering, if your degree would be even accepted.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That's a great question because, you know.

>> Viktoria: Sometimes the degrees don't, like, whatever, are, ah, accepted in another country, for sure.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: And I should clarify, even though I have doctor as my title, it's a PhD in education, so I'm not a medical doctor, but I was, yes, I was a tenured educator at the high school level and had finished my PhD and was trying to go into academia in a way that I was, like, unsure because academia felt limiting to me in some ways. but I had this PhD, and I wanted to make a difference in the community and contribute to social change. But the decision to move to Taiwan was really centered on our family first, especially while my kids are young, while they can still learn the language, while my grandparents are still here. So it wasn't like a career based decision. Kind of made this bold decision to go and just trust that work was going to work out online. So my husband and I both walked away from stable six figure careers. He's in, he was in tech sales, so he also had a remote job. and we really just thought that there would be full time remote work from anywhere in the world. Jobs like we'd been seeing ever since the pandemic. You know, and we got here and found out that that whole pool was quickly dying up. And the jobs that were out there weren't as receptive to us being in Taiwan. Like, my husband was actually offered jobs, and then when they found out that he was located in Taiwan, it was walked back on because there may be security issues with proximity to China or different reasons.

>> Viktoria: Okay.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: So we actually didn't end up finding full time work. And that was the door that, sort of, like, had me go back to a creative vision I've had for years and years of starting my own online education business. And I was just like, okay, we have nothing to lose. Let me just go all in and figure that out.

>> Viktoria: Okay.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: And so I started freelancing, getting clients while I was sort of figuring out my niche. And then a couple months ago, I really went all in. I'm doing, I found a need in many of the clients I was working with for story coaching. So I had created a course that I taught in high school around narrative. My PhD is a narrative study. And then I found this need that I never anticipated. that in many professionals and creatives and entrepreneurs, folks need support with actually telling their founder story, their core story, even if something as simple as writing their about me page on a website can bring up a lot of blocks for people. Right. so I'm able to help my clients now tap into their narratives and connect with their audiences and build their community.

You do this remote and your clients are, I guess, in the US

>> Viktoria: Okay, and so you do this remote and your clients are, I guess, in the US or.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Oh, my gosh, all over the world, so all over the world? Yes. primarily English speaking, you know, countries. but I've had a few who are also, more English is not their first language. And so I've had clients in Australia, UK, the US, but then also some in like, the middle east and Europe as well.

>> Viktoria: Do you, work then with time zones?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah, it kind of works out because my morning is the evening in the US, so the east coast is a little bit harder to grab. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, like, with professionals who are like, okay, let me just do my sessions in the evening after my work day. Right. That works out. Australia is great because we are in the same time zone with Perth and then 2 hours behind and then 2 hours behind Sydney. So we're almost on the same work days there. Europe, it's their morning in my afternoon, so I get a few of the european clients, they start early in the morning, maybe before work, or just the beginning of their work day. And it's like, when I'm wrapping up my last few clients.

>> Viktoria: That's actually not so bad.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: It's not bad at all. I'm not working in the middle of.

>> Viktoria: The night here because I know, like, just for the podcast sometimes, like, for me, the hardest time zone is, like, Australia, New Zealand.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: New Zealand is a little. That's, like, in the middle of the ocean. So, yeah, it's trickier.

>> Viktoria: Like, I'm always even confused. It's like, you even have a different date, you know, it's like I had, like, hours or something.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah, exactly.

>> Viktoria: Yeah.

Rusty says his kids are completely fluent in Mandarin since moving to Taiwan

and so how old were your kids when you left?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: They were six and two. My daughter turned three ever since being here. So they're six and three now?

>> Viktoria: Mm Do they adapted super fast to the language as you hoped?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Oh, my gosh. They're already fluent. We've been here now for almost ten months, and they're completely fluent in Mandarin. It was harder for my six year old son at the beginning to adapt. My two year old, you know, she was so young that it just easy for her. but my son, he struggled at first, but I would say within the first couple months, he sort of hit his stride. And then at four months, he had this, like, language boom. And we were shocked. We were just like, oh, my gosh. We hear him at the playground talking to other kids, like, almost fluent. It was amazing.

>> Viktoria: And for you, was it, like, also, like, hard to get back into the language, or was this not a problem?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That's a great question.

>> Viktoria: Rusty.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes. I did find I was surprised because I had lived here, like I mentioned, when I was a teenager. So in between high school and college, I stayed in the city, in Taipei, it's the main city, and I was so dedicated to mastering Mandarin, which is my third language, because in the home, I really only spoke English and haka, for the most part. and I got to college level fluency at that time. At 18, I was able to. I passed all my tests and, was able to achieve college level fluency in Mandarin. And then I moved back to the US after that and kind of didn't use it very consistently for almost 20 years, 15 plus years. I was surprised coming back this time, that even though I speak haka, which is a similar language but mutually unintelligible, I speak it every single day. that's my native tongue. I'm fluent in it. I found it difficult to switch from Hakka to Mandarin this time. Now that I'm 36 and I think I've lost some brain cells after having two kids. So, yeah, it was kind of awkward. Like, oh, I'm not fluent. Like I thought I was.

>> Viktoria: Okay. but it came back to you.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: You know, because I work from home and I'm not. Like, the other thing was when I was younger, I was in the city and very social, right. So I was just surrounded every single day using Mandarin only. now I work from home, and my kids are in school, so they speak Mandarin, I would say, more fluently than I do right now. Like, it just comes to them very easily because they're socializing with it, whereas all my clients are English speaking. So I'm still kind of speaking English all day. And when I'm out of the house with my family, we still speak mostly haka. So Mandarin. I speak with my neighbors, and when I'm, you know, at the store and going out. But it's. I wouldn't. Some of it came back to me, but not to the level of fluency that I was when I was younger.

>> Viktoria: Okay, well, maybe I will come and wait. And how long are you now there?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: We've been here for 1010 months. Ten months. But we plan on staying longer. Yeah.

>> Viktoria: Okay. So you're still kind of fresh.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah, I guess in terms of, like, relocating, it's fresh. But, you know, for me, I've. This is home for me, and I've lived here before, so it feels like I've been here for a long time without as much improvement as I was used to in the past.

>> Viktoria: Yeah. And for your husband, does he also think, like, is it, like, easy for him, too?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Orlando? My husband refused to learn the language. He doesn't? Yeah. he said he claims that language isn't his thing, so that was actually a big caveat for us moving here. Like, he was resistant to it at first because he was so scared of having to interact in a second language. And when he came here, I think, we don't live in Taipei. We don't live in a big city. And so in Taipei, you can get around with just English quite easily because it's such a metropolitan city, but we live in a smaller town, you know, where my family lives. And there are a few people who do speak English, but it's not everywhere you go. So he took a while to sort of warm up to regular things, like picking up the kids from school and, you know, going grocery shopping and things like that and finding out there's so much communication that can happen without language. Right.

>> Viktoria: Yeah. But he refused to speak Mandarin.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: yeah, he doesn't want to learn it at all.

>> Viktoria: He's just.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: He tried for one semester. He said it was too hard.

>> Viktoria: Maybe, it will just come at one point.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: He picks up on words and phrases here and there, but I don't think he's dedicated to, like, ever establishing fluency. Yeah.

>> Viktoria: he's like, you're dead.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That's a good point. And my dad learned out of necessity. He learned English after being in the US for over 20 years when my mom and he actually divorced. And he was sort of squared.

As you watch political unrest unfold in many areas, Taiwan is no exception

>> Viktoria: Was, though, the political, trouble, not trouble, but you know what? When it was in the news, like lately, when all the Ukraine stuff happened, was that, like, a thing for you? Were you doubted to go?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That is a great question. I would say for sure. it's been a topic of conversation going anywhere in the world. As you watch sort of political unrest unfold in many areas, and particularly with Taiwan and its proximity and its relationship to China, I can feel like there's tension and strain. But for people who have only recently seen the news about China and Taiwan's, tensions, it's not new for us who are nationals of Taiwan. I grew up my whole life hearing that China's mad at Taiwan, and if they wanted to bomb us, they could. And my husband was scared of it at first. And then after moving here and realizing how. How constant it is, yet how nothing really changes in our day to day life, he started to feel the same way we do, which is just like, we feel like it's a lot of talk and, you know, there's no use in living in fear every single day. so we just live our day to day life. And honestly, I think it's kind of a misconception that living in countries like the us are any safer. Right. Like, we experienced sort of other. Yeah. Forms of, violence and lack of safety. And I feel much safer having my kids in school here than I did in the US with the issues that were happening in the US around school safety.

>> Viktoria: Right.

I just wanted to ask you if there's still some things that you miss

All right, let's change subjects a little bit. I just wanted to ask you if there's still some things that you miss.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: I don't miss much in the US. I feel much more at home here in Taiwan. I probably just miss people. But the beautiful thing about the Internet has been that we can stay connected so well with the people that we love. And one thing I found is that even, I think after the pandemic, our relationships back home shifted a lot. You know? I was, Maybe also, as we've transitioned into, like, you know, having kids and the age of life families, and that's kind of like our priority. I kind of feel like I wasn't seeing my friends as much as I was talking to them on the phone or facetiming them. And I can still do that even while I'm here. So I miss people, but we still connected.

>> Viktoria: Yeah. What. What is there that where you say, like, it makes you feel like home here in Taiwan? Besides that your family is there?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: I have really strong memories of being here as a child. And, the part of Taiwan that my family is from, it's more developed now than it was when I was young. But I can still walk down my road and walk past rice paddies and watch the rice grow and be in tune with the cycles of nature, and have cranes flying nearby and animals and just a sense of more connection to, like, a slower way of life, you know? and grounded to earth and community. I feel much m more of that here than I did in the US.

>> Viktoria: Okay. Is there, But is there still something where it's harder for you to get used to or, like, culturally?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Culturally.

>> Viktoria: M.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Again, maybe. Maybe different than some of your guests. For me, culturally, I feel at home because it feels like my culture. I can speak maybe on behalf of my husband, who had some culture shock coming here. he is not used to the way people drive here.

>> Viktoria: Oh, okay.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: When we were. Ah, it's gotten better than when I was younger. It used to be very crazy and lawless driving, and now there's a lot of laws implemented. But you'll still run into people who are driving the old way where it's kind of just like, there are no lights, there's no stop signs, there's no rules. And so it's kind of crazy. And the funniest thing is that there's a lot of elder folks who, like, we've now built sidewalks. It's much more developed than it ever was before. So there's sidewalks everywhere. But you'll see people in their, like, seventies, eighties, and nineties walking in the middle of the road. Oh, no. All the time. Yes. And Michael's like, why are they doing that? That's dangerous. And we have, like, they'll just stop traffic and they'll just walk with their carts. And, like, they're, like, living their old way of life in our, new modern society. And he's like, why are they doing that? And I'm like, they just haven't changed. Like, their town has changed around them, but they're just, you know, they. They're the way it's always been.

Everything is done by hand and on paper in Taiwan's immigration process

>> Viktoria: Yeah. And other things, where you say, like, it's hard for you to get used to, maybe. I don't know, like, bureaucracy is different.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes, that's a great example. so in doing the immigration process for my kids and my husband, it's still also very old fashioned. Like, everything is done by hand and on paper. down to. We were late filing a certain document one day. And, you know, in the US, it would either be, like, computerized, like, maybe there's an override. Maybe you restart the process, or you're just sorry, you're out of luck. Here in Taiwan, you wait for a particular person in the office to come talk with you. It's almost like you're sent to the principal's office, given a chastisement. Then you have to, by hand, write a letter of apology and explain why your document is late. You have to seal it with your family. Chop. Then you give this handwritten apology letter with the official form that you filled out in order to establish residency, or whatever the case may be. It's still very old fashioned in that way where a particular person has the authority to make the decision and override. And it's still very much face to face, person to person. it's not computerized. You're not a number in the system. so it's, like, beautiful in some ways, and in other ways, it's, like, very inefficient.

>> Viktoria: Right? Because I thought, like, it would be super modern. modern. It would be like, very, like, advanced and techie.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: There's that too. Michael, my husband, comments on it all the time. He's like, they had tat pay decades ago. Like, they are one of the earliest pioneers of tat pay. With your phone or having, like, you have a, an id card that you can tap and ride the bus. You can tap and pay for it at your 711. We can pay our bills and our taxes. We can pay our parking tickets at 711 by just tapping and paying everything. All of our bills are QR codes. You can pay online. You can pay at the convenience store. There are systems that are so modern and so automated. We have stores where you can go in and they're like, personless stores. And you just, like, you can get, I just saw one. It was completely instant noodles. It was an entire restaurant of instant noodles. You walk up to a kiosk, you pay for your noodles. It's somewhat on our system, but there's also cameras there.

>> Viktoria: Uh-huh.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: And then you make your instant noodles by yourself. So we have very modern systems, but government is, like, preserving ancient traditions, I guess.

I'm confused that you have to write an apology for this incident

>> Viktoria: All right. I mean, I'm just more confused that you have to write an apology.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That surprised me, too. That definitely surprised me. And, like, and talk to this particular government official in this whatever office. Like, talk to them, almost like begging them to give you a chance.

>> Viktoria: Oh, yeah. And what is if that person doesn't like you?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Exactly. We've had, like, decisions made based off of one single person, and it doesn't match up with anything that we read on their website. Like, we would try to prepare for the entire immigration process, and then we'd have one person tell us yes to this and then someone else tell us no. And it's like their word overrides everything. In that moment, it was frustrating, especially for my husband, who doesn't understand the culture. It was frustrating for me, coming from, like, a efficiency and procedural standpoint, but understanding our culture, I was able to, like, have a little bit more patience with it. But it's hard.

>> Viktoria: Yeah.

The hardest thing for me was embodying cultural expectations as a mom

was the switch, though, back to the culture difference, like, hard for you? I mean, because, like, you grew up in the US, but your family was probably, you had, like, the same traditions.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes. In the home, I grew up very traditionally haka. So in that sense, it wasn't hard. It was the first time I ever lived in Taiwan as a mother. So I think the hardest thing was embodying the cultural expectations of being a mom now, in a place where I'd always just gotten to come and be a child before, even as a teenager, I was sort of just always taken care of by family. And then this time, navigating, enrolling my kids in school and making sure that they're adjusted and doing well. And we did experience some hardship, at the beginning with our kids, like, not being socialized the same way as the kids here in Taiwan. So when we would be out in places, our kids would be the loudest kids and they'd be, like, running around like crazy, which maybe is more socially acceptable in the US, but here in Taiwan, it's a different custom, and kids aren't given. Kids are given lots of freedom, but they really respect, like, time and place. Like, on the playground. The playgrounds here are designed for kids to just go wild and play with one another and be kids. And even schools are designed with that, really, like, protecting childhood. They have play areas everywhere in their school, not just one playground, just like, outside of every classroom, there's play areas, but they design things like that with the intention that kids would learn. This is where you play, and then when you go, like, to a restaurant, for example, it's not an area to play, and you are expected to be able to sit quietly and eat your meal with your family. And my kids weren't really up to code when we first came here. And it was like, me trying to navigate, like, I don't want to project shame onto my children, but you feel, as a parent, a little embarrassed that your kids are the only ones that are, like, loud and out of order. So I had to navigate that tension and just sort of, like, educate my kids without, you know, shaming them.

>> Viktoria: I know, but it's hard when they're so little.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes.

>> Viktoria: It's like, probably also didn't understand.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes. And then with my kids being at the two different ages, too, like, especially my two, three year old, you know, she turned three while we were here. It was almost easier to have a little bit more grace with her then my six year old. You know, we're kind of like, come on, buddy. Like, we hope you're still young, but we hope that you would learn sort of, like, what we need from you quickly. And I, you know, some. I think looking back, it may have been a little bit too hard on him, especially because he's also adjusting to such a big move. So, like I said, that was probably the hardest thing for me was as a mom, trying m to support my kids in a healthy way while also sort of setting them up for success here and making sure that they weren't, you know, sort of ostracized while they're here.

>> Viktoria: Right.

Washington mom says her kids' learning has boomed without much pressure

Would you say there are also other aspects in, upbringing children that are different or that are now utterly expected of you?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes. one thing I was actually a little bit m more anxious about and ended up being, better than I expected. Washington. The sort of the pressure in school for kids to perform at a really young age at a high level. And, so I was anxious that maybe my kids would, you know, just have too much pressure on them and fall behind and be sort of, like, always reprimanded at school and that I was actually surprised. The teachers here have been so supportive of my kids, and their learning has really boomed without much pressure. Like, I don't do homework with the kids at all. M so when they come home, they're able to just relax. and they actually have help from their teachers getting their homework done. My son has homework. My three year old doesn't have any homework. She just gets to go to. We asked my three year old, when you go to school, what do you do? She goes, m. I eat, I sleep, I dance, I play. So she's living her best life.

>> Viktoria: I was also like, homework?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Wait, so that is a big difference. Like, there wasn't much homework given when my son was in kindergarten in the US. here they have homework and, you know, so I was nervous, like, is it gonna be too much pressure on him? But then he started telling me, he's like, mom, I actually love all of my hard classes. I don't like the easy ones because they're too boring. So he took to it really well, and he is now writing mandarin characters. Like, he's writing fluently, he's speaking fluently, he's reading fluently. Like, within ten months of being here. And I'm always checking in, like, is it still fun? He's like, yeah, it's fun, except for when it's boring if I already know everything. So he actually loves the challenge.

>> Viktoria: Nice. And you got a smart one.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: He loves to learn. Yes.

>> Viktoria: And is the school system different? I mean, I was wondering about the times.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes, yes. So, the times is actually the public schooling system. for my son in first grade, it only goes from 08:00 a.m. m to 1230. And then. Yeah, so, after 1230, you have to enroll them in an after school program if you're not able to pick them up and bring them home. So most students have to go to an after school program while their parents are working. and we were lucky enough to get into the after school program at the actual school site so he doesn't have to travel to another private, they call him, after school classes or cram schools. And that's where he gets support with his homework. But also we can sign him up for elective classes like Lego class and art class. And so actually, all of the instruction of the kids all happens between 08:00 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. m. So. And they have 50 minutes periods and ten minutes of play in between. So instead of just like one recess and one lunch in the US and then having to keep learning all the way until 02:30 p.m. they had, they learn more in less amount of time with more playtime. Okay, so it's been awesome. yeah.

>> Viktoria: When I grew up, I had also just school until twelve. And I think, like, later when I was in German, high school was not the same. When, I was a teenager. My school ended at one.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Wow. So you never had to stay in school until, let's say, 230 or three?

>> Viktoria: No, I mean, now they do it, but I guess, like, I mean, it's over 20 years ago, and I feel like then. I mean, for me, I never even, like, put my head around it. But there was always somebody at home, you know, for the people. But I think nowadays a lot of both parents are working, so a lot of kids go to, like, all day schools.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Right, right.

>> Viktoria: When I was little, that was not the case. Like, I. I didn't have, like, late afternoon classes until, like, maybe 11th or 12th grade.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That's awesome. I think I see the benefit in it. I think that they're actually able to learn better in these, like, shorter, concentrated time blocks and then have enough time to play and just be a kid and practice what they're learning instead of just, like, sitting in class all day long, you know?

Are you planning on visiting the US soon? Yes, actually

>> Viktoria: Okay, so you're just there ten months. But are you planning on visiting the US soon?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes, actually, we're gonna spend, the summer back in the US, but not in California, where we moved from. My husband's family is in Hawaii, and so we've typically always spent summer with them. Yeah, my husband grew up in Hawaii. That's where he's from. Okay, so, yeah, we'll be heading over there for the entire month of. And then we'll stop by California to see friends and family there for a very short trip. before we head back to the Taiwan, we can't complain. We're living the dream. Yeah.

Dr. Joe Lyu has a podcast called everyone needs a campfire

>> Viktoria: And I also wanted to ask you, about your podcast.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes. So I have a podcast called everyone needs a story for the campfire. And for me, I just. I've always loved stories, and now, you know, coincidentally, maybe not coincidentally, that's to become the focus of my work. It was the focus of my dissertation study. But this podcast is, a little bit on the lighter side, I would say. It's. Well, I don't know if my guests and audience would say it's a lighter side. I tried to make it a little bit lighter, but the concept behind it is that if you just ask people to prepare a couple of stories and bring it to the proverbial campfire, just like in the olden days, everyone would sit around a campfire and share their stories that no matter how different we are in our backgrounds or the experiences we've gone through in life, we're gonna find things that connect us in the lessons we've learned in the themes that we explore through our stories. And so it's been a huge experiment this first season, and the overarching theme is stories that reach. So I invited guests on who all have experience publicly sharing their stories. So from being, a tv news journalist to authors to, professional poets, and it was really interesting when I asked everyone to submit their stories prior to the season starting. which themes emerged this season? Guess what the strongest, the number one theme was or the top two themes?

>> Viktoria: I, don't know. Like, horror stories. Murder stories?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Not murder stories. That would be interesting if I just invited an entire season. These are, like, personal stories that they're exploring.

>> Viktoria: Oh, no. Like, what is it?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Grief and loss. So I was like, yeah, people are going. And it was. It was interesting for me to sit with these stories, and people are still very much, like, coming out of the pandemic and, like, losing senses of identity, like you would think, like, four years later. But I found that even people who are, like, on the surface, you know, performing at a high level, they're. When asked, which stories would you like to bring to the campfire? The themes that they've been exploring with me have been more on the deeper side or the, you know, the more introspective side, I would say, in processing some of these themes.

>> Viktoria: Okay, so it's not always, like, happy stories. It's also sometimes very serious.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah. It ended up being that way, sort of unprompted. You know, it was more of an experiment, like, what stories are asking to be told right now. And that's where this season of guests took it. I had a couple, you know, were like, love and resilience. But even the resilience story, it's like you're sharing about moving through tough times and then kind of getting out to the other side. So, yeah, it wasn't as much light hearted stories or friendship stories or adventure stories, not this season.

>> Viktoria: Okay. And you can listen to it wherever you listen to podcasts everywhere.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: we have YouTube. We're on Spotify. You can also access it from my website, drjoeyleu.com. that might be the easiest place to find it because the title everyone needs a campfire is kind of long, but you can find it easily if you type in just my name, drjoeylou.com, and hit the podcast page.

>> Viktoria: And I make sure that I, will put the link in the show notes for this.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Awesome.

>> Viktoria: and I,

Do you know the podcast Taiwanika? Taiwanika talks about cultural differences

So we're talking about podcasts, but do you know the podcast Taiwanika?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Taiwanika. No, I follow lots of Taiwan accounts, but I haven't heard that one.

>> Viktoria: so I guess, like, this is right up your alley, because, like, he's an american, she is from Taiwan. It's a couple. They live in the US, and he also speaks Mandarin. And, so they talk about cultural differences.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes.

>> Viktoria: And sometimes it's just, like, easy, funny stories, like online, shopping, or shopping in general, us versus Taiwan. And then something like, also, like, I'm, raising children or, like, friendships. So all these differences.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: That's beautiful. That's awesome. Thank you for putting me on that. I'll have to check that out.

>> Viktoria: Yeah, yeah, check it out. It's fun. And also, like, I know it because, Eric, the host, was our, guest on this podcast.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yes.

>> Viktoria: But I thought, I will tell you about it because I think it. I like it a lot, and I think you will like it, too.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah, for sure. I'll have to check it out. There's so many little things that are, like, funny little differences when you really, like, peel back culture. So, yeah, I'm sure I love it.

Most of our friends here are just in the neighborhood

>> Viktoria: And so I have one last question, and I haven't asked you yet. yes, how about. Or, like, how did you guys make friends?

>> Dr. Joey Liu: we have. Most of our friends here are just in the neighborhood. You know, I love the fact that we can just walk outside and have a community experience, go to the park. but I will say we also, we don't necessarily, like, have friends where we're like, hey, do you want to go out to dinner, or do you want to do this and that? my husband and I are both more introverted, and because I have so much family here, our weekends are kind of just filled with family. That's our social life here. I have cousins my age who all have kids, and my dad is one of seven, and we kind of just like to hang out at my grandparents house like old time. So our version of socializing here is quite different than, in the US. but it's nice, too, that we'll always just run into familiar faces with our neighbors and our kids socialize with their kids. And it's been easy. Like, as easy as walking outside and being a part of the community.

>> Viktoria: Yeah, no, I mean, socializing is fine as long as it's not like being by yourself.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Right? So, yeah, we're definitely not isolated.

>> Viktoria: Socializing with family. That's great.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Yeah.

>> Viktoria: And they put you probably, they make all the plans, and then you're never lonely again.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Never, never lonely. And my husband, too, because he's he's a, six foot four black man, so he stands out in the community, and people will come up to him and try younger people. They'll want to practice their English with him. He has people that come and talk to him all the time. And he's made a friend with one of the security guards at my kids school who will be like, help me read this word in the newspaper. And, it's been beautiful. We've had lots of little interactions, and people are very friendly, so we have no lack of social interactions.

>> Viktoria: Okay, that's great.

Victoria: Alright, that was my interview with Doctor Joey Liu

Okay, I think I got all my questions. Thank you very much for being on my podcast.

>> Dr. Joey Liu: Thank you so much for having me. I love talking to you, Victoria.

>> Viktoria: Oh, thank you.

>> Victoria: Yeah, that was my interview with Doctor Joey Liu. And you can find her podcast. Everyone needs a story for the campfire. you find it in the show notes, or of course, wherever you listen to podcasts. And you can also find another. Another link to her website on the show notes as well, and all my contact information as well in the podcast show notes. And, yeah, don't forget to check out the show notes, I guess. Alright, I hope you enjoyed this episode and you will tune in again for another one next week. Episodes are always out on Thursdays. And, yeah, that was it for this week. I'm your host, Victoria. Until then, bye.