My Fulbright Year in Taiwan

A source of never-ending amusement for us when we are in the US is to see the Chinese characters that Americans have tattooed on their bodies. Some are accurate in that the Chinese actually reads like the person wants them to, but they almost never make sense to a Chinese person. For example, one guy had a phrase written on his leg which can mean “never give up,” but which really meant that he will never allow his leg to be chopped off. Not exactly what he meant, I think.

In a restaurant in Taipei last weekend, our Chinese waitress sported a tattoo. For a Chinese person to have a tattoo is unusual enough, but for a Chinese woman to have a tattoo is really unusual. We asked her about it, and she said that it is Arabic, and means something like “dreams and reality.” She seemed pretty proud of it, and agreed to let me photograph it.

She doesn’t speak Arabic, she just wanted some “cool” looking text for a tattoo. That sounds just like the reason that Americans give for wanting Chinese text tattooed on their bodies.