Deaf Chihuahua and Dancing Queen

The year 2008 ended in a dive in Nankan (if someone would've told me that 12 months ago...). I didn't want to brave the madhouse in downtown Taipei. So instead watched Taipei 101, the world's tallest building, explode into a column of fireworks on a projector screen in a narrow, smoky bar up the street from my apartment.

I rang in 2009 holding a Heineken in one hand and a deaf chihuahua wearing a pink tracksuit in the other. I guess he was the bar dog, but he looked like the father time canine incarnate. Old and frail, he smelled like cologne and cigarettes, not dog.

After midnight, I began the new year right by winning a popularity contest - a lifetime first for me.

The Radiohead cover band that played before midnight packed off its gear and the dance contest began. Asian girls, like white girls, are bad dancers. So I was completely in my element. And I managed not to blacken anyone's eye with a rogue elbow. After one Flo Rida and some DMX, I got the loudest claps.

"Yay! Dancing Queen, Dancing Queen! You are dancing queen!" The bartender handed me my prize, a bottle of peach wine cooler. Then the host announced Dancing King, and the guy's friends - unsuccessfully - attempted to depants him. The two of us danced a victory number together.

Some guy at the bar, who introduced himself as "Willy," shook my hand half a dozen times.

A beefy gentleman wearing a wifebeater handed me a shirley temple and managed to talk the bottle out of my hands (who drinks that stuff anyways?).

Several minutes later he brought it back.

"My brother say you dancing queen! This only for you!"

At 2 a.m., James and I trundled home and fell into bed. I got up the next morning and called my family. Reactions were as follows:

Me: "I won a dance contest!"
Dad: "Wow, sweetie! That's great!"

Me: "I won a dance contest!"
Mom: "Really."
Me: "That would've never happened in the U.S."
Mom: "Noooooo. No it wouldn't have."

Me: "I won a dance contest!"
Brother: "REALLY? Were there just Chinese guys or guys like you there too?"
Me: "Umm, just Chinese guys."
Brother: "Oh you probably won because you're not Chinese."
Me: "WHAT?"
Brother: "They're probably trying to be nice because you're new and you're not Chinese and you're a teacher and stuff."

Clearly, my father loves me best. But my brother takes home the prize for brutal honesty.