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 11. To Tainan, NCKU Intro, NCKU Tour

First thing in the morning we hopped on the bus to our final destination, Tainan! I was really excited because Celine, Alisa, Tracy, Lexi, and many of the others had been talking about places they wanted to take us over the next week and half. I wanted to sleep on the bus but unfortunately it was September 1^st in Seattle, and my roommates were all moving into our new place. The whole ride was a big scramble to remotely pick rooms and arrange stuff being moved in.

Right after dropping off our bags at the hotel, we headed on to campus to do our intros. I enjoyed seeing the UW slides again because now I know everyone a lot better, and the NCKU students were so helpful with all their recommendations on where to go and what to do.

We had seen a little bit of the campus while walking over to the classroom, but the NCKU students tour was really fun because we got to hear all about what each space was used for. I love their design buildings and studio spaces, and it was cool to see that each grade gets a classroom area with their own desks. I wish we had the space in the art building because having a place to work like that would be awesome. There were a lot of parallels between their campus and UW’s; this is definitely a school I would want to go to.

Celine showing me around campus

Tracy, Celine, and Alisa took us to a delicious noodle place for dinner, I am so thankful to have made friends so early on who are willing to show us all the best spots of Tainan. We also talked earlier in the day about forming a team, so we were all getting excited to start our project.

12. Circular Economy Workshop, Lecture, Project Kickoff

Day two in Tainan we spent a lot of time in the classroom learning about circular economy and design. I liked the way that the workshop was set up to be immersive with many worksheets and activities that got us thinking. The end activity of Craig’s workshop where we picked something that was happening in the image and came up with a service that could help stimulate a circular economy was my personal favorite. I think the idea that he was getting at was something that I know and use in my everyday life, I just didn’t have a word for it before. I’ve always been a fan of being thrifty and turning old things into new ones I like more, so I enjoyed getting to learn about the bigger impact.

After lunch Meichun gave a lecture about the design progress, followed by Wynnie talking about circular design. We did an ideation activity with sustainability cards that got us thinking about different ways to incorporate circular design in our project that turned out to be very difficult. I had gotten used to ideating in a different way, but I did enjoy switching it up despite the challenge. Our group hadn’t come up with any perfect ideas yet, but we talked about many things that could potentially connect Taiwanese culture with the US market.

We ended the day with group hotpot and bowling! Our spirits high for the coming days.

Alexa and I bowling hard

13. Free Day!

After getting some extra sleep, Ai, Alexa, and I headed to a nearby café for lunch. Alisa had suggested we got to Shennong street afterwards and met us there to walk around for the afternoon. Coincidentally, another one of our friends from our VCD cohort was also in the area with his family so he met up with us too, not even knowing he walked in the door right in front of Alisa. I loved how colorful the lanterns on the street were, it gave the area such a welcoming atmosphere, aided by the many toy stores that lined the street. Alisa took us to a dessert stand where we got mango and red bean shaved ice that was the perfect thing to cool us down for the rest of our time walking around.

Shennong street

Friends!

After saying goodbye to the two of them we walked to a beef noodle spot Tracy wanted to take us to where we met up with the rest of our group as well as Elden, Helen, Kristin, and Erin. We all agreed it was some of the best food we had tasted yet on our trip.

The seven of us walked back to the hotel, enjoying the temperature at night and talking about the many things we had each seen and done over the past many days. So far I have loved everything that our NCKU friends have shown us, and I’m so pumped for our final week here in Taiwan.