Happy, happier, happiest!

Wauw – so much has happened these past four days, and I am indescribable happy! Where to begin… Well:

Friday I really got to speak Danish for the first time since I came here. Well I’ve been skyping my family twice and my Rotary counsellor once, but this time I got visits from Denmark. A guy from my Rotary Club in Denmark and his wife were here because of business, so we decided to meet and do something together. We went and ate dumplings and steamed buns, took a look and Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, and went to the beautiful part of Taipei called Danshui. Finally we made it to a Rotary meeting, and I think my Danish guests found it interesting to participate in a Taiwanese Rotary meeting!

Saturday I went shopping with one of my host sisters. I bought a lot of stuff, which makes me feel a little bit bad, but I actually need it, as it is getting colder here, and I only brought summer clothing (yeah I know, that you probably wouldn’t find 28°C cold, but here people are were jeans and jackets now…). We also went to Taipei 101 (once the tallest building in the world), but here we only did window shopping, as the stuff here was way to expensive for my monthly allowance :D It was interesting to go there though, partly because we found a Georg Jensen (danish design) in there – I am so proud that Denmark has a shop at such a place!

    When we returned home my host mom was making dumplings, so I decided to join her. My first one was really ugly, but after folding a few, I finally got it! I can ensure you that I am going to cook dumplings when I go back to Denmark, cause they are sooooooooo delicious!

Sunday I went to see a dance performance together with a bunch of Rotary Exchange Students at Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall performance theatre. The theatre was beautiful as well as the performance made by an Arabic dance team. It included a lot of improvisation, which was really interesting!

And now to the best part: Monday. Today at language school my teacher gave me a diploma saying: CERTIFICATE OF OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE. I am so proud, and the fact, that the diploma came with a little ugly dish mat, made it worth the hard work! Furthermore my Rotary Club here in Taiwan today said “go” for a Japan trip with my senior High School, which means that I in January 2011 am going 6 days to Tokio, Japan! How amazing is that? I am so happy to be here in Taiwan, but getting the opportunity of seeing even more of Asia is fantastic! But don’t misunderstand me: Taiwan is still my first choise!

Love it here!

Julia

Double ten day

As foreseen, a video from the parade is now on Youtube. It shows us exchange students from Taipei and the neighbour district in the parade! Click here to see it!

Julia :)

10-10-10

Taiwanese people have something with numbers. The 23^rd of January (123 day) is a vacation day, and so is the 10^th of October – Double Ten Day. The day is used to celebrate Taiwan’s independence and is considered Taiwan’s national day. As we now happen to be in year 2010, this year’s national day was celebrated more than normally. The other Rotary exchange students and I were a part of the celebration too, joining a 4.8 km long parade with big balloon figures, music, lot of costumes, 35 floats and about 20 troupes. Incredibly many people watched this huge parade – attendance estimates ranged from 100,000 to 500,000! Everybody were happy, both participants and audience, and the other exchange students and I totally ruined our voices by screaming 我們愛臺灣(Wo men ai Taiwan = We love Taiwan) to the applauding audience. My camera unfortunately ran out of battery, but here is an article about the parade. In some days I will probably be able to find something about it on Youtube as well, as the parade was followed by all of Taiwan on the television!

Love it!

Julia :)

School and hiking

My High School is not big compared to other High Schools here in Taipei, cause it has only got 2000 students disturbed over three years. On other High Schools you might find 3000 or 4000 students. Anyway, I find 2000 students a lot as there is only about the half on my school in Denmark, and last Monday I actually held a speech in front of all of them – in Chinese! A bit of an experience as the circumstances where very formal: it was Teacher’s Day (se my article below) so the school choir sang some songs in honour of the teachers, the school’s big band was playing as the two other exchange students and I got on the stage, and some of the boys where doing military gestures! Well I did my speech as good as possible and I guess that the students understood about 70-80% - which is GOOD :p

    Underneath are some pictures from a sunny day at school. The temperature is falling but it is still about 30°C at day, which I find very hot!

This building is only 5 stores. Another one is 7 stores - and we have to walk the stairs...

My class and classroom

Even though it is hot, I actually went hiking with my rotary club. We met at 9 o’clock Sunday morning to avoid the worst heat – ready for going to the top of one of Taiwan’s many mountains. The way up was steep but led us through a multitude of beautiful forest – as made for my camera.

I love Taiwan!

Julia