Trivia #1

It has been three years now since I last updated my journal in October 2014. A lot has happened during these years.

A good way that might have accurately summed up what had happened to me was: a drastic turn on my career path.

But even that sounded like an understatement.

For about ten years I thought my outlet was art. And my attempts to become an art creator concluded in a year-long commitment to fully engage myself in making/writing about what was then to me the core of everything. I tried my hardest and wrote about the most uncomfortable things. And I took a long trip to Europe after I finished, wanting to take my writings with me and see where it could all go. I was like those street performers, who carried their boxes, put on makeup, and showed what they believed to the fullest, having prepared for the most indifferent passers-by.

And then I saw it all. People who wanted to be noticed. People who gave it all but were only categorized as marginal. All the things pass through the windows like a dream. I came to realize my ambitions were too costly to be sustained. The most difficult thing I have to deal with is my personal antipathy to limits. If it all went my way, I would probably have committed to writing for a year, and then taken another three months off for international travel, possibly to be continued by plans of reading, researching, signing up for classes, meeting people in different realms, before I decide I want to go back to writing again. I would have touched the realms of music engineering, painting, multimedia art, writing, and possibly many more, with the conceivable result of knowing a little bit of everything and being an expert of nothing.

It was difficult to admit. But I cared too much about arts to know how to work within limits. And after my trip to Europe, I came to realize the world was a lot bigger. And what I previously considered to be my ultimate calling may not have been the only option. I learned the history of the Berlin Wall, the DDR, the Holocaust Memorial, along with the consummate experience of being a part of Festival d’Avignon and witnessing a play at the headquarter of Le Théâtre du Soleil.

For reasons I couldn’t explain at that time, I decided I wanted to take a break for some years.

I knew this break will be long, and that I had to support myself during these years. So I found myself a secure place: I spent two years working as an administrative assistant in a private university while using the spare time to educate myself on journalism and international affairs. I then took the civil service examination in Taiwan, which consisted of written tests in eight subjects, passed it, and began serving in the government from late 2016.

It was an unexpected move to many people. And I have, despite many attempts, failed to sum up for the warm inquiries of my friends concerning what motivated the change. People who knew me well knew that I don’t compromise. They have seen the exuberance in my eyes that can be vaguely recognized as the kind of passion that wouldn’t allow itself to be doused by the wrong kind of surroundings. I have been defiant to rules since I was a child, and on some occasions, I felt like I was genetically programmed to process either very profound sadness or very high ideals and was never quite comfortable with mediocrity.

So what motivated the change? Why take this step into a world that so many intellectuals found stifling? I couldn’t understand it at first either. People I knew with a similar temperament hated tests, couldn’t bear military service or anything hierarchical, and detested any system of education that felt even just a little limiting. But for some reason, I knew a very inner part of myself would be most liberated if I work from a secure place. I once wrote when I was working as an university administrator, “please don’t take away all the banality and injustice around me as they are the source of my unending anger on which my creativity is fed.” Part of me knew that freedom was most palpably felt with shackles on.

But I didn’t speak about how I got into this line of work very much – that is, the preparation process for the exam. It was one of the weirdest things I had to go through in my life. On many occasions, I felt like I had to squeeze my thoughts into containers that conformed to the definitions of the theorists whom I hadn’t yet completely decided to agree with. But I found ways to entertain myself nonetheless. I enjoyed the big terms that came up in my daily BBC radio hour. These people who are out there saving lives and resolving international conundrums using their expertise in economic analysis, international relations and global politics, and what’s most captivating of all, a very streamlined and codified set of rules known as journalistic standards, which were all to me, a literary person by training, completely from a different realm, and therefore, fascinating.

I began to be watchful of global affairs, domestic politics, and many in-depth journalistic analysis or panel discussions on economic issues. I watched global leaders lay out their visions in UNGAs, state of the union addresses, COP 21 agreement, and many more. I began listening to OECD strategists explain why they make their rules the way they do. I began listening to why civil wars happen. And I quietly reflect on these issues and come back to them from time to time.

I fully enjoyed everything I was learning. I want to get better at it. I have very high expectations for myself, but I never knew when I will get the chance to practically apply and hone my skills in this new realm. I never knew if one day these self-imposed training could ever amount to anything beyond sheer knowledge-acquisition.

But a week ago I was assigned to chair a model international conference during a training session. To my great relief, the model conference went okay. I never knew I could chair a small-scale international conference. And I want to get better at it. I have very little doubt I want to be more well-trained to be able to represent Taiwan one day on global events or on the negotiating table.

And now, I’m learning the basics. I had previously enjoyed (faithfully) all the Justice Harvard classes. Now I’m learning all I want to know about the prerequisites of due process. I am learning how the US government operates. I’m studying and comparing the Constitution of the United States, China, and Taiwan. I’m looking at Taiwan’s Government Procurement and Acquisition Rules. And at work, I’m battling it out every day, going through the process of briefing and drafting inter-office and intra-office letters, preparing for tendering documents, and learning how democracy was implemented.

I know that one day it will be all worth it. I want to be able to go through documents meticulously and tell the public what an issue is all about. I want to be able to know the rules of the government and tell the people why or whether we are getting the best deal out of the taxes we paid. And I hope with all those experience I have learned through the years as a government staff, I will be more well-versed when I get to fulfill one of my wishes: being capable of representing Taiwan on the international negotiating table someday.