Taiwan Day 2

Tuesday May 12th

Day 2’s agenda will have us visit the NTPU campus in Tapei City, visit the American Chamber of Commerce in Tapei (AmCham), and finally Tamkang Univeristy in Dansui. This morning finally had a chance to eat some traditional Taiwan breakfast of sweet soy milk and shāobǐng (unleavened pocket-bread with sesame) and yóutiáo. I’ve been looking forward to that since landing in Taiwan as I’ve really grown to love it. It certainly is nice to be able to speak Chinese. Being able to go out and not worry about how to communicate is nice. Then it was off to the subway and bus. The bus ride was crazy as we were trying to pack our group of 15 people onto an already full public bus but luckily it was only a short ride. At NTPU our lecture talked about the economic development in Taiwan. Again, just amazed at how such a small country with very little natural resources has transformed itself. Next we visited AmCham and learned more about the business climate in Taiwan. AmCham’s mission is to help the government and people by offering practical assistance in improving the business climate in Taiwan. The more I learn about Taiwan, the more I’m convinced Taiwan is in great need of a marketing campaign to tell the world who they are and to tap into the full potential they possess. Next, lunch at McDonalds (only because it was convenient) and then off to Tamkang University. The experience there was quite unique. Instead of a special lecture for our group, we joined an existing undergraduate management class and joined different groups in the class to discuss a case study. It was quite chaotic and a little awkward at first but once we started interacting, it was a lot of fun to get to know the students. After class, they arranged to have students show us around their campus and take us into Dansui. I actually left early to get back and have dinner with Jo’s family as our schedule is so packed I wanted to make sure we could spend some time together. Having been to Taiwan before, it’s not a completely new experience but it’s been a lot of fun hearing about the experiences of my classmates as everything is new to them. They had a blast with the Tamkang students. This ends the academic portion of our Taiwan trip and the next 3 days will be a tour of Taiwan’s beautiful scenic Taroko park and east coast.