Second weekend!

My weekends in Taiwan were interesting~
There are so many places in Taiwan for you to explore!
Taiwan has many night markets, clubs, awesome shopping places, beautiful scenery!

On my second Saturday in Taiwan, I went on a "road trip" with Adeline and her school teachers/friends. They are very friendly and nice! Adeline is also doing an AIESEC exchange. Same project as me but different school. I think the school that Adeline went to is triple the size of Nei Ding Elementary School (內定國小). Also, the school that she went to is a 20 minutes bus ride from Shilin Night Market. So jelly ^^

We stopped by at a famous Chinese sausages shop on the way to Xiong Kong!

 

I had a great time! Thank you~

On Sunday, my host fmaily Mr and Mrs Lim brought me to my favourite place!

Shen Keng Tofu Street! I like stinky tofu! :)

My favourite tofu ice cream! If only Perth sells them~














Thank you Mr and Mrs Lin! Hope you guys are doing well~

Next post; Taipei 101!

http://aiesecaustralia.org/curtin

Jingle bells

Hello~ Sorry for the lack of updates. 私は最近本当に忙しいです。ごめんね ~
来月, 私は東京にいきます! 私は日本語を一生懸命勉強しています。

It was almost Christmas time when I went to Taiwan!
I talked about Aussie Christmas in all of the 4 to 6 graders' English classes.

They were very surprised to find out Aussie's weather/season is different from Taiwan/USA.

No snowy white Christmas for us~
Christmas = Beach's day!

I taught them how to sing Jingle bells~
We sang this song for Nei Ding Elementary School's Christmas Day's performance.

The brave kids who volunteered to sing in front of their classmates.
& ohhhh, Ukelele (mini guitar) is very popular in Taiwan now.
Wish I had the time to learn :)

My favourite class! This class loves singing and they were so eager to learn Jingle bells...
which made me less nervous to sing in front of them!

Caught their attention with this video too!
Perth's Christmas display lights (Gangnam style)


Tip
Find out what the kids are interested in so that they were be interested to listen to you ^^
English classes can be quite daunting to them because they find English difficult.

Prepare different presentations for the same tpic because every class is different.
Some classes prefer to sing, some classes prefer to dance etc :)
Good luck! 頑張ってください !


Next post; Weekend!

http://aiesecaustralia.org/curtin

After School

Charlene teacher brought me to Zhongli :) Zhongli is probably about 15 - 20 minutes minutes drive from Taoyuan/Neili. I reckon Zhongli is quite similar to Xi Men Ding. (Maybe a little bit smaller)

Charlene teacher's main mode of transport = scooter. In Taiwan, riding a scooter (smaller version of a motorbike) is very common.  It was my first time travelling on a scooter... I'm not a very adventurous person so I was actually very very very scared. There were so many scooters on the road and some parents had 2 children on their scooter...!! Amazing skills.

Charlene teacher brought me to at a very nice BBT cafe. I think it was a 10 minutes ride from Nei Ding Elementary School (內定國小) which is also 10 minutes away from Zhongli. I was glad we stopped halfway to grab a drink :)

After chatting and finishing up our BBT, we went to Zhongli. Shopping at Zhongli was awesome!!! The things there were quite similar to Xi Men Ding and they are cheaper too! In Taiwan (items with no price tag on), you have to haggle/bargain with the sales person. I was terrible at haggling because everything in Zhongli was already very cheap to me (as compared to things in Perth)... So Charlene teacher helped me to get a better deal haha. I bought 6 shoes on that day! I think it was less than AUD$10 for a pair?

Thank you Charlene teacher for shopping with me :)

Mr Lin (my host father) was going to pick me up from Neili train station at 9:30pm but I arrived at 10:30pm! Zhongli is only 1 train station from Neili but I took the wrong train and my train was going towards Hsin Chu. Glad that I got off in time. I was so tired the next morning tho... I have to wake up 6:30am every morning as school starts at 7:30am.

Next post; Jingle bells!

http://aiesecaustralia.org/curtin

Second week

The first week was an "introduction/induction" week. I conducted some basic English lessons on my second week of exchange (with the help of Charlene teacher)

Taught some Aussie slang such as G'day mate, no worries, see ya later etc.

"Aussie version of You're welcome = No worries"

As you can see from the picture below, I was actually quite nervous. hahaha

I'm glad that the kids were interested to listen to me... Thank you! :)

I needed to prepare two 20 minutes presentations. 

The topics were not difficult, they were Australia & Christmas Day.

I did some storytelling in the library. (Usually to the younger kids)

I helped out in Charlene teacher's English class too. I did not have to worry about what to teach. I followed the syllabus and Charlene teacher was very helpful so it wasn't stressful at all :)

The kids at Nei Ding Elementary School (內定國小)  LOVE Kpop. 
There's a lot of graffiti on their table... mainly about Korea and Kpop groups. 

I think they know more Korean songs that I do and they even know the dance moves. 
Look at how awesome they are! so jelly!!!!!!!

 '

They are all 12 years old; 6 Graders.


They performed at their graduation 2 months ago.
Damn, how I wish I could fly to Taiwan to see them before they graduate :(


The guys are good too...!! DAEBAK!



Next post; Shopping with Charlene Teacher!

http://aiesecaustralia.org/curtin

My first weekend in Taiwan!

I arrived in Taiwan on a Wednesday afternoon (5th of Dec 2012). I spent the next 2 days (Thursday and Friday) introducing myself and getting to know everyone at Nei Ding Elementary School (內定國小).

Nei Ding Elementary School (內定國小) is located in Neili/Zhongli... which is really close to Taoyuan Airport. It takes about 45 minutes to an hour to get to Taipei Main Train Station by the normal train (台鐵） http://twtraffic.tra.gov.tw/twrail/English/e_index.aspx It takes about 15 to 20 minutes via the high speed rail/bullet train (高鐵)  http://www.thsrc.com.tw/en/ However, it is very expensive... it cost around AUD $10 by bullet train (return tickets) whereas the normal train only cost around AUD $2 (return tickets).

Nei Li is really similar to where I am living now; Perth. Without a car, you cannot go anywhere because there's only a couple of public buses in Neili. So after school, I couldn't get to Xi Men Ding, Shi Lin Night Market etc as I had no public transport from Nei Ding Elementary School (內定國小). However, I guess that's why I miss my host families a lot because we spent a lot of time together.

If you are someone who wants to explore Taipei everyday and go clubbing on the weekends, it would be better if you choose a school that is located in New Taipei City; 新北市. If you are someone who wants to spend more time with your host families, choose Taiyuan/Hsin Chu. I was given a choice to choose but I didn't know the difference between these two areas ^^ Please take note that New Taipei City Area is huge too, you can use google map to check whether there's public transport from the school to Xi Men Ding.

My friend Adeline's host family house is only a 20 minutes bus ride away from Shilin Night Market! I wish I could go to Shilin Night Market everyday hahaha but luckily I did not (It takes me an hour and a half to get there from Nei Ding Elementary School)... If not, I will probably have 200kg of clothes to post back to Perth.

My first weekend in Taiwan was fun. On Saturday, Ming Chuan University's AIESECers planned an outing for us (interns). We went to Dan Shui. After Dan Shui, a few of us went to Xi Men Ding to shop :) I love shopping in Taiwan and Korea!

Group photo; AIESEC-ers

On Sunday, my host family brought me to Daxi Lao Jie. Daxi is famous for their Dried Tofu Dou Gan 豆干. There's a lot of old streets/markets that are famous in Taiwan. For example, Shen Keng Lao Jie is famous for their stinky tofu, Ying Ge Lao Jie is famous for ceramics. San Xia old street is famous for their bull horn crossiants etc.

The guy behind me is looking into the camera. haha

We went to a love story museum too. I enjoyed my day with my host family. 謝謝！

I hope this post is helpful to people who want to Taiwan for an AIESEC exchange.


This is unrelated to my AIESEC exchange...
Meet my new boss; Simon Leunig (Dean of Curtin International)
Change something today (Join Curtin University) and make tomorrow better :)

Next post; Second week; Teaching

http://aiesecaustralia.org/curtin