NSLI-Y 2024 Taiwan – Week 2
This week’s blog writers: Haben and Calvin
Hello everyone! As we settle into our second week in Taipei, much of the initial chaos of the first week has worn off — though things are still pretty crazy! Coming home from last week’s weekend of beach swimming and climbing hundreds of stairs in Jiufen, many of us settled in for a restful Sunday at home with our host families — or, well, some of us. Here are some of the fun things that we did on our first free day in Taiwan!
Shivani, David, and Sparda with a host family getting ready to have some fun!
Juan and his host family getting ready to watch a movie
Elim with her two younger host siblings
Jennifer getting ready for a bike ride with her host siblings
After the weekend, we had another very full week of classes; some of us had to stay at school until 4:30 every day! But all of our class time has much to show — every one of us has already had huge improvement in our Mandarin abilities, and we’ve all really begun connecting with our teachers, interns, and language partners.
Calvin asking a question to the American Institute in Taiwan during our virtual meeting
Elim, Raffaella, and Owen make a tower at our first RD meeting
Raffaela, David, Sparda, Lucy, and Juan study during office hours
Raffaella gets ready to do a worksheet with her language partner
Many adventures were had following our busy days of classes, from shopping in busy Ximending, exploring the Chiang Kai Shek memorial plaza, hiking local mountains, checking out the National Revolutionary Martyrs Shrine, or relaxing in one of Taipei’s dozens of parks.
Haben, Scott, and Owen explore the National Revolutionary Martyrs Shrine
David, Sparda, Katherine, and Kalliane enjoy some sweet drinks
Elim, Gabe, Haben, and Calvin prepare to eat a famous Taiwanese dish: beef noodles
Jacob, Owen, Scott, and Sparda visit a temple
Raffaella, Shivani, Jeniffer, Chloe, and Philip dine out
Jennifer, Chloe, Shivani, Raffaella, and David go for a 7-11 pit stop
Elim, Scott, and Owen at the famous Raohe night market
In the middle of our week, sandwiched between many tests, we had a group afternoon excursion to Taipei’s art and handcraft district, Dadaocheng. There, we dyed canvas bags using a traditional bluegrass dye.
Us with our Taiwan coordinators getting ready to start!
Elim wringing out excess water from her bag during the dying process
A seasoned Taiwanese craftsman teaches us how to dye our bags
Following this very busy week of classes, we are all relieved to have a totally unscheduled weekend with our host families, with only a little homework waiting for us on Monday. Now that we’ve had a chance to cool off, we asked our classmates, and our interns, for one word to sum up our two weeks so far.
Many chose to comment on Taipei’s tropical weather, with numerous responses being ‘hot.’ However, other responses focused on all of the experiences we’ve had, with ‘busy’ and ‘fast-paced’ being said a few times. Our classmates have found Taiwan ‘delicious,’ ‘wonderful,’ ‘lovely,’ ‘surreal,’ and ‘fulfilling,’ or, put simply, ‘sweet!’
Our teaching interns who are spending their summer vacations with us have thankfully found their experiences to be, translated from mandarin, ‘worth it,’ ‘interesting,’ and, overall, a ‘good experience.’
Some specific points of our experience stood out enough to characterize our entire two weeks so far, such as Taipei’s ubiquitous and extremely convenient ‘MRT’ metro system, the refreshing ‘Zhenzhunaicha’ (It’s one word — I promise; it means bubble tea) on every street corner, or the delicious ‘Baozi’ sold seconds from our classrooms.
Overall, though, we are all ‘reflective’ that our ‘transformative’ time in Taiwan is already one third done, and before we know it, we’ll be back in the states. So, it’s time to use our new skills to do some of what language is built to do — communication! Next week, many of us will be beginning to interview our teachers, our host families, and even strangers on the street to inform our capstone research projects and build the cross-cultural connections that exchange is for.
This has been Calvin and Haben, looking forward to an exciting and insightful next four weeks!