Dear MeiGui;
My girlfriend continuously insists on me buying her presents. We work at the same company in HsinChu and started dating last January. Since then, she has found every excuse in the book to demand I buy her gifts. She has expected that I give her gifts on Western Valentine’s Day, Lunar Lovers Day, Dragon Boat Festival; and during Chinese New Year, she expected something new every day.

But the topper has been Christmas. She wouldn’t stop singing that ridiculous Christmas carol “The Twelve Days of Christmas” for the entire month of December. Let me tell you, I’m not even a Christian. My family originally came from Calcutta, and they are devote Hindus.

Now with New Year’s Eve only a few days away, my credit card and I are living in fear. What to do? Do banks give short-term loans to foreigner workers in Taiwan?
— Going Bankrupt in HsinChu

Dear Going Bankrupt;

I thought everything in HsinChu had to do with computers. What type of business does your company do? There aren’t scantily clad girls walking through the halls with trays of drinks, are there?

Chuck this chick before your credit card company chucks you.
— Material worlds create material girls, MeiGui