Hey guys it’s me, Cole. It has been a long long time since I’ve uploaded a new post, sorry for the delay. I got some tech problem while I wanted to update the blog. Anyways, I’ve got so many new photos and stories to share with people in “World voice”.
So I went back to Taiwan to have a good vacation. At the same time, since my father is a landscaper in Taiwan, with his help (thanks dad!) I got a chance to pick up two new projects. One is to design a new office for a gardener and the other one is to design a mansion for a lady who likes Japanese housing very much. Before giving more information about the new projects, let me tell you guys about what I did in Taiwan during my vacation.
Kenting(墾丁) is located in the southern part of Taiwan. It is most famous for its beach and sunshine. I’ve been longing to go back there for 4 years, and it still looks as beautiful as it was in my memory. Kenting is the first National Park created after the war. If you arrive at the airport in Taiwan (no matter if it’s 桃園 or 松山), you need to take the HSR (High speed railway) to Kao-hsiung (高雄) and then change to TRA (Taiwan Railway Administration), bus, or you can even rent a car (about 8000¥ 24hr). After arriving in Kenting, there are few places you can’t miss. There is the Kenting main street where shops sell many night market(夜市) foods and beach goods.
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I also recommend you to go to the 小灣 during daytime. The sea is the by far the most beautiful I have seen in Taiwan. At night, you can even see the Milky Way in the sky. (最高
If it’s noon or for sunset, I recommend the 白沙灣. The sunset is too beautiful to be real and if you like surfing, 白沙灣 is famous for surfing, too.
In the next blog post I will introduce you to another southern part of Taiwan called Tainan (台南). I really recommend to people reading this blog, if you do come to Taiwan, please don’t only visit 九分 and 台北. If you want to feel more the Taiwanese life, go to 台南. If you want to know why, I will talk about it in the next blog.
I have been in Y-GSA now for 1 semester. I really need to talk about what are the ressemblances and differences between schools in Taiwan and Japan. Actually, there are so many things that are at the same time similar and different. The thing that surprised my Japanese friends is that in Taiwan, educational system-length of schooling for architecture students is five years. You have to study for 4 years (8 semesters) and then finish with a graduate design.
In Taiwan, professors will try to push everyone to their limit. For example, they will give us tasks that are impossible to finish, or bully us with harsh language during our presentation. Having class from 4p.m. to 4 a.m. Threaten us that we will all fail. At the beginning of my first grade semester, there were 90 or more students. By doing our so-called training, 3 years later into my fourth grade, there were only 42 students left in our class. Come to think about it, it was just like D-Days in WWII. Another thing is that most of us live near the school, but as for people in Y-GSA, most of them don’t live near school. Some of them even need to take the train for 1 hour. For us, even if you live in Taipei, you will still move near school. I don’t really understand why we do it. Maybe riding a motor bike when you have stayed up for 3 days is like suicide.
I’m the one in the middle back with the red hair.
Another interesting thing in Tamkang is that we have many events held by students, such as ミニ四駆 race where we turn our architect department into a ghost house, or even have a concert in which not only students will perform, but also professors.
Here are some event pictures I took while I was in Tamkang.
Trust me, I want to share more. Let’s just say I will keep from sharing my life while I was in Tamkang until the upcoming post. Hope you guys like the things I am sharing, I will see you guys soon.
