GO IN WITH A FRESH MIND, HOLD NO EXPECTATIONS!
It’s been 4 days since I’ve arrived to Taipei and it has been hectic.
Taipei is the capital city of Taiwan. It’s situated at the northern tip of the island and has an additional area expanded called New Taipei. There are around 2, 686, 516 people in Taipei alone while the metropolitan area has a population of 7 028 583 people. The population of Taiwan is around 23 million people. Taipei is the political, educational, economic and cultural centre of Taiwan. It is a global city and has railways, high-speed rails, highways and airports that connect from Taipei to all the other parts of the island. It is famous to Taiwan national landmarks such as Taipei 101, Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, Longshan Temple, Presidential Office Building, Ximending, and many more.
I am not a big city girl. I come from Cambridge, Ontario and I consider London, Ontario; where I currently live a large city. I get terrified of Toronto Subway Station and I avoid visiting friends in Toronto as much as possible. I freaked out once at Yorkdale Mall (a popular shopping outlet in Toronto-one of the largest), because there were too many people. So-imagine me coming into Taipei, the largest and most populated area of Taiwan.
When we first arrived, the sight of Taipei 101 gave me such a gasp because seeing the building made me realize that I was going to become a Taipei local. Taipei 101 will become a regular sight for me. I was going to live in a big city, on my own for the first time!
I asked for accommodation with the University that I was with to make my living situation easier. In my past experience, I had lived in a dorm in Taichung, Taiwan before and there were four students in one room, the style was bunk bed/table style where the beds were on the top, the desks were on the bottom and there was limited room to move. This was with the OCAC Loveboat Camp. I decided to go on this trip with no expectations except to learn. I did not want to think about the quality of the living accommodation, or the costs that I would have to endure. I did not want to put a value to how much I was spending and how much I would gain for it. If I do so, I would have such high expectations because you always want what your dollar is worth yet your always left disappointed. I simply had one goal: to learn about health in Taiwan.
I believe that with my mindset- I was able to oversee our living conditions. We received an email during orientation week that we were going to be placed in temporary accommodation or we should ask our relatives to find somewhere for us to live for a week because my host institute (Taipei Medical University) realized too late that students in their program living in the dorms have not yet ended exams. There was an overlap of a week and they had no place for us to live on the campus dorm. As I have no relatives in Taipei, I agreed to the temporary accommodation with 15 other girls and one guy. What we didn’t realize that their definition of a temporary accommodation was an apartment that had 3 empty rooms. I don’t know if you can understand what I mean by empty, but I mean literally- it was an empty room. No furniture, no beds, no blankets. The other interns and I looked at each other and we had two choices; whine or make the best out of the situation. Obviously- we chose the latter. We split up into different rooms, and went out shopping. We bought mattress pads to sleep on, relatives from the other interns brought us pillows and blankets. My room had 7 girls and one guy in it. The biggest issue we had was our bathroom. You see- in Taiwan, they have very minimal space. The bathroom was on the balcony. On the right side was the toilet, the middle was a shower, the left side was the sink and to top it off- our curtain blinds did not do a good job of covering the view. The first couple days- we were all very nervous about showering outside, on a balcony and we came up with a system where people would leave the room to give the individual their privacy. But- foolish of us, we found out on the 2nd day that the third room had a real bathroom inside. In addition, our roommates in the 2nd room found a different place to live and moved out. Although that room has a balcony shower as well, we take turns using it instead of the one in our room because no one is in there and waiting for the “real bathroom” takes too long with 15 other girls.
Good news-? We are moving into new dorms in two days. Our dorm manager just told us but I’m not going to lie- in these 4 days, I find myself building a strong relationship with the people in my room. I guess- when your confined in such a small room that your bound to talk to each other and get close. I can’t wait to get a fridge though. You cannot drink the tap water here and it is very humid outside. It is very wasteful to purchase water every day but it is the only way at the moment to ensure I don’t get dehydrated.
Oh- I forgot to mention! We had the weekend off so we were sightseeing. Night Markets is a popular attraction in Taiwan. Essentially it’s like a flea market in Canada! They open around 5 pm and stay open until 2 am. It’s a huge shopping district with lots of vendors and street food! I haven’t gotten food poisoning yet and I’ve started practicing my bargaining skills in the Night Markets. Tong Hua Night Market is a 10 minute walk from our living accommodation so it’s pretty awesome!
We also had orientation on Monday with Taipei Medical University where they showed us around campus. I met my professor, Dr. Peter Chang there with the other two interns Priscilla and Josh who are from the USA. Priscilla is actually my roommate so it works perfectly that I can have someone wake me up in the morning! We have today off too because Peter has to go somewhere but we are going to Taipei Hospital tomorrow to meet the Asian Health Literacy Association team.
Super excited!
-T
