By Lauren Mack

All my friends and I wanted this summer was to rent an apartment in Mucha. Our criteria were simple: two bedrooms, air conditioning, and a kitchen.

What we got? Well, that’s more interesting.

While reading the classified section of the Taipei Times on the first day of our search, I mentioned to my Taiwanese friend Charles that we were apartment hunting. He laughed and told us the story of his Polish friend Daniel.

Apparently Daniel had gone to see an apartment near ShiDa. When the landlord saw that he was a foreigner, he let him move in with one stipulation: a huge door-sized poster would be plastered on his front door that read “No Sex”.

story continued below...

We laughed.
"C'mon, you can't be serious. You're making that up," I said.
"You'll see," replied Charles.

Night and day we scoured the bulletin boards at ShiDa and TaiDa and perused the Tealit website. As soon as we found a listing, we called. A typical conversation between my friend Josh, who speaks fluent Chinese, and the landlord would go like this:

Landlord: Hello.
Josh: Hello. I am an American student and I am interested in your apartment.
Landlord: Oh. Uh-huh. (pause) The apartment is already rented.

We needed a new tactic. We made Charles call and innocently ask about the apartment before mentioning it was really for two American guys and one American girl. At first, it worked but there seemed to always be a problem with the place.

"There's a kitchen but you can't use it,” or "everyone has to have an Alien Resident Card," the landlords would say.

So, we intensified our search.

We started interrogating students at Cheng Chi University and the surrounding area near the Taipei Zoo. One day, we ran into Obed, a guy from the Soloman Islands who said he and his roommate had a room for rent. They lived up on the mountain overlooking the school. We followed them home and what we saw was depressing: a three-bedroom dilapidated bungalow without air conditioning filled with dozens of bags of trash. Overcome by the stench of months-old trash, we bolted. After three weeks of searching, was this really the best we could do?

Another week passed, we started getting desperate. We considered living in one of those illegal makeshift tinroof apartments located on top of shabby apartment buildings, but after typhoon Haitung we abandoned that idea.

Just when we were ready to give up and call Obed, Charles called to say he found a place for us to see. It was a three-bedroom apartment with a kitchen and two bathrooms.

"So, what's the catch?" we asked.
"Nothing. You just have to go see it tonight," he replied.

So we jumped in a cab and raced toward the Taipei Zoo. We met Mrs. Wong and her daughter in front of the 7-Eleven beneath the apartment. The place was a palatial palace: two living rooms, four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a huge kitchen, hardwood
floors, air conditioning, and utilities already installed.

"We'll take it!" we immediately exclaimed.
"Let me call my husband," she replied and walked into the next room.

This was too easy. We should have known better.

Mrs. Wong returned and said her husband was not picking up his phone and that she would call us later. She gave us an awkward smile and showed us the door.

Reluctantly, we left. As we walked down the stairs, the neighbors peered their heads out their doors and a husband and wife followed us to the first floor. No one said a word.

An hour later Mrs. Wong called to say we couldn’t have the apartment. She offered no explanation. We called Charles.

"Why does this keep happening?" I asked.
"Foreigners have a bad reputation," he replied.

It seems many lao wai (old outsiders) come here and don't pay the rent, have massive orgy parties, and trash their apartments before leaving town.

"Oh, and you're bald," Charles said, referring to Nick, my other male roommate.
"What does that have to do with getting an apartment?" I asked.
"We have a saying ‘Ten baldies, nine hornies,'" he said.

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"They're afraid you'll have an orgy party every night and ruin the neighborhood," Charles continued.

With that, we went to buy another newspaper. Minutes later, the phone rang. It was Charles.

"Mrs. Wong just called me. She said her husband has reconsidered. You can have the place if you agree to not have any women, other than you, enter the apartment."
"We can't have women over? Not just one time?" Nick asked.
"No. Never. Ever," said Charles. "The husband is a police officer and he has deported many foreigners before. He will be monitoring the place and your every move. The neighbors will also be watching. They saw you tonight and begged the Wongs not to rent the place to foreigners. Can you live under these conditions?"

Let me see. We're going to have a police officer and all the neighbors spying on us like Big Brother and we can't have women over ever. Hmmm.

“Hell no.”

Two weeks later, we found a posting on the website Chui Mama for a place around the corner from the “Big Brother apartment.” This time, we brought Charles along to vouch for us. He was the key to insuring the landlord we were not intending to turn the place into a brothel. The landlord was more than happy to rent the place to us.

Two days later, Josh and I were at the 7-Eleven buying milk when we ran into Mrs. Wong.

"Did you find an apartment?" she asked.
"Yes." we replied.
And we're not telling you where it is.