October 28 Court Hearing: I Survive A Little Longer

   After an opening statement by my lawyer and some more whining, complaining and objections by the nursing college attorney to start the hearing, it looked like we were headed toward closing the case and a decision against me by the judge. From the little bit I could understand, my attorney explained no settlement had been reached and I still maintained my right to testify in court with my evidence before the judge makes any decision.

  One thing I haven't pointed out yet is that all these hearings of the past 2 years have been conducted in Chinese, so much of what goes on in court I don't understand. There was an interpreter again this time, but she does not do simultaneous translation. By the time there is a pause for her to translate for me after often several minutes of discussion, she is reduced to just giving me some of the main points, leaving out potentially a lot of pertinent information. Prior to June of this year, nearly all the previous hearings were without any interpreter and I was forced to rely on an occasional translation from my lawyer during the hearings and/or his synopsis of the proceedings after the hearings. To try and fill in missing information I've had to request the court transcripts and ask friends to translate them to me. 
   Back to last Thursday's hearing, after the opening arguments, I pulled out what may have been my final hand and suggested to the judge that we get the accuser herself involved and let her write a document saying there was a "cultural misunderstanding" and admitting that I did not sexually harass her. This would be much more meaningful to my administrative appeal and I would be more agreeable to this kind of settlement in exchange for dropping my lawsuit.
   The judge liked this idea, but of course the nursing college (recently changed to the "university of health and nursing careers") lawyer tried to argue against it. First he whined that he didn't see any proposal from me since the previous hearing (probably because my lawyer was too busy quibbling with me about the conditions I requested) and now it was too late. Second, he said that the accuser probably was not in any "mood" for agreeing to this because recently someone or some people had written on her blog (in Chinese) blaming her for falsely accusing me. According to the nursing university lawyer, this had upset and angered her so much that she wouldn't possibly agree to my proposal.

  After another 15 or so minutes of bickering with the judge and my lawyer by the nursing college attorney, it was finally agreed that both lawyers will try to set up a meeting with the accuser to talk to her about this new settlement proposal. Meanwhile, I have to write a "friendly" letter to her saying this was an unfortunate happening between us and we should try to settle this amicably.

Note: As of sometime this year, the school changed its name to the National Taiwan University of Nursing & Health Sciences (國立臺北護理健康大學).