fulbright Taiwan online journal

fulbright Taiwan online journal

Tag: travel

Brief Thoughts on Living and Travelling in Taiwan

My wife and I moved to Taipei with a certain amount of trepidation. The benefits were clear: she could take time off work to learn Chinese and all the materials that I would need to finish my dissertation were available. Yet it was a nerve-wracking prospect to spend nearly a year away from our dog, whom my father-in-law is looking after, in a place where only one of us spoke the language and neither of us had been. Now, ten months later, it was proven to be one of the best choices we could have made. We had heard Taiwan was an easy place to live, but had not realized it would be easier than anywhere we had lived before. Between the friendliness of the people, the ease of transportation, the cost of living, and the abundant access to work materials, it has been more pleasant than we could have imagined. Most of my time this year has been spent working on my dissertation. The wide-ranging and easily accessible materials at the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy at Academia Sinica allowed me to go from just two chapters to a full dissertation. The desk they provided and my extremely

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Fragments from a Taiwan Notebook

The flight to Taipei was a 13 hour-long tunnel through about a million movies, and Taipei was a glimmer of signs in the dark. We’ve woken up in a gorgeous hotel room. Outside the window it’s Times Square but with palm trees. Next, we drive south to Taichung. Maia: “I could get used to Taiwanese hospitality.” We’re in Taichung, in a house on campus, and it’s a little bit like living in Jungle Book. There are geckos walking across the ceiling and frogs in the kitchen. Outside there are cobras in the tall grass (we’re told) and bats at dusk, peacocks and weird butterflies. The main road is lined with banyan trees and their branches look like they’re dripping into the ground. Plus, it’s really steamy. But the people are incredibly hospitable in a completely informal way, and the food is just astounding. Papaya for breakfast, mangoes like poems, a kind of red candied tofu… At night any open space is utilized: lines of women shyly dancing to the music of a boom box, their exercise routine. Everyone in unison. Whenever you hear a tinny rendition of “Fur Elise,” it’s a garbage truck passing by. Food at the night market:

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fulbright taiwan online journal