OFFICIAL Group Blog and Reminiscent Pics

Here's a link to our official group blog:

Group Blog


我們愛台灣！


We rotate blog responsibility, so there'll be a post on a weekly basis!


As I've been here, I've started taking pictures of things that remind me of home. Yesterday was awesome. Yesterday, I went to Costco. Even in Taiwan, there are still a ton of free samples at Costco. I bought a 3 lb bag of almonds, and there were so many foods that reminded me of home. 

me and mango juice

NUTS

Other Things That Remind Me of Home

Mrs. Dalloway 

Friday's in Chinese Class....星期五， 星期五 got to get down on 星期五

Model UN! Maybe USN can fly out for this conference ...

Sonnet From Sophomore English (I memorized this for Mr. Neely in 10th Grade.)

So delicious 

 海綿寶寶

This week, I gave a presentation on how Americans celebrate Halloween to an English class at Wenzao. On Friday, I dressed up as a giant carved pumpkin (jack o'lantern) and gave out chocolate to random members of my student body. It was pretty fun to yell WANSHENGJIEKUAILE! and then Happy Halloween! and ask if people wanted chocolate. After the initial shock, most people said yes. A lot of people's impression of America comes through McDonald's and Hollywood, so it's fun to promote US culture. 

Jubbie and I ate at MOS burger (Wiki Deets), a Japanese chain restaurant, while I sported stars & stripes.   

你好朋友們！

I've now been in Taiwan for two months, and these last few weeks at Wenzao have been really great. Jubbie and I celebrated Taiwan’s National Holiday (10/10) with her extended family at a seafood restaurant. The seafood here is super fresh; we’re in a huge Taiwanese port city.

 Food from 10/10 & Jubbie's cousin

Living in Kaohsiung makes me practice listening a lot. Even though I love to talk in English, I can’t communicate in the same way in Chinese, so I’m getting used to doing more listening. Letting other people make decisions for me sometime leads to pretty awesome experiences. This week, I ate lunch with Ben, Nora, two Korean girls, one Japanese guy, and my Korean guy classmate from my chess class. The Korean guy doesn’t speak much Chinese or English, but he’s really good at chess. Within our group, we could speak Japanese, Korean, English, and some Chinese, but there was a mutual language that everyone could understand.

Language skills were distributed as such:

Nora: English

Ben: English, pretty good Chinese-definitely the best of our group

Me: English, ok Chinese-can communicate some

Japanese classmate: Japanese, Korean (lived there for a year), pretty good Chinese

Korean guy: Korean (he’s really, really good at Chinese chess, but in class no one can talk to him because he doesn’t speak English or Chinese.)

Korean girl: Korean, pretty good Chinese-has been here a semester

Ester (other Korean girl): English, Korean (fluent in both, lived in Australia and US, also on the bellydancing team (WHICH BY THE WAY DID I MENTION NORA AND I MADE THE TEAM!?!??!?!?!)

It was so cool. Ester order us a bunch of Korean food; I tried my best to pronounce Korean dish names. If I want to talk to the Korean guy, my question went through Ester.

IEARN took us on another field trip this weekend! It was like being on a fourth grade field trip in a very pleasant way. We painted paper umbrellas and made clay pots in a pottery place in Meinong, and then visited a library where an American was reading little kids English stories (we may volunteer there next semester). Enjoy the snapshots!

Jubbie and her clay pot

Brandon and I represent the South.

Story Time (in english)

Nora's artistic. 

Jane (Taiwanese IEARN lady) watches over Ben.

Koi food machine

It was one of the best field trips so far.

Also, thank you to everyone who has sent mail recently!!! 謝謝 Chris, Gary, Melora, Carie Lee, and Kathy! Today, I got a package from home that really made my day. Special thanks to Christie for a super thoughtful package. Happy Halloween!!! Jubbie was really excited to get an authentic Halloween pumpkin, because she had only studied about it in school.

外國人's Field Trip

On October 8th and 9th, the Office of International Programs arranged a field trip for 35 foreign students at Wenzao! We traveled to the Bantaoyao Crafts studio, Singang Incense Artistic Culture Garden, Tao-Mi Paper Dome, Gwanhsing Paper Factory, and Sun Moon Lake. Crowds were out because Monday is Taiwan's National Day (10/10!). 10/10 is the equivalent of America's 4th of July. This year is particularly cool, because it's Taiwan's 100th anniversary of nationhood!!! 

Enjoy the weekend's snapshots. 

We made paper and printed on it. Guess who it is!

Nora the Explorer

Ben and I up in the air     

The NSLI-Y Crew

Excerpt from my NSLI-Y homework

Every day, I take a train for 20 minutes, and then a bus for another 15 to get to Wenzao with my host sister, Jubbie. The streets are filled with bikes, motorcycles, and cars, and there’s more fluidity between where people live (lots of apartments, we live on the 16^th floor of our building) and where people do their work/ buy their food and clothes. The shopping here is much cheaper than the United States; my host sister and I bought matching dresses for 12 dollars.

All of the NSLI-Y students take Chinese class for two hours a day at Wenzao. Though I studied Chinese for four years in high school, my class here is particularly conducive Chinese, because we hail from multiple nations. In my class, there are four American students, two Japanese students, one Mexican student, and one French student. Because not everyone speaks English, we use Chinese to communicate with each other and sharpen our language skills.

In the background, Ben and I are embracing. We’re celebrating Teacher Appreciation Day (September 28) with chocolate cake.

 


PS
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