Go shrimping

If you are fond of nature and enjoy the sunny day with ponds and lakes while fishing, it may be a different style for you to catch your own shrimps. In Taiwan, people go shrimping at the spacious indoor place and chat with friends while eating. You can enjoy your beer or any drinks and cook your shrimps after catching them. It is a kind of leisure activity here for friends to get together or kill your time.

Shampooing your hair at local salon

If you sweat a lot here or you would like to dress yourself decently with stylish hair, you can try the local salon for shampooing your hair. The hair stylists here shampoo your hair at the customer’s seat with lots of bubbles and rinse your hair after massaging your head.

The all you can have 7-11 or Family Mart

The convenience stores in Taiwan are not just selling drinks and snacks, people can pay their bills, buy the bento meals, print or fax anything you need, and even receive your packages from online shopping for you. Some stores even have public toilets for people to use with 24 hours service. So, if you don’t know where and what to eat at the first time, you can visit the convenience store. If they have seats for people, you can take a break for a while for your next stop.

Commercial and Residential mixed buildings

In Taiwan, the government separated the industrial area from other zones many years ago. But some people get used to living at the place where they work. Some people open their shops at the first floor and live at the second floor of the building in most cities as long as they own the building. In Taipei, most people live at the tiny apartment without owning the whole building.

The furious election culture and 2 country names

When everything turns to politics, it becomes heavy for each of us. If you understand some of history in Taiwan, you may also know that we are always fighting the identity problem. The local people of this island tend to be ruled by the occupied foreign power instead of overturning it with its own laws and systems. Though the aboriginal people had once dominated the island and eventually were invaded by Dutch people and killed by Chinese & Japanese, this part of history had faded away from the recent educational system. The official name for this island is Republic of China( ROC), which was the old China, to put it simply not the communist China now ( People of Republic of China). Some Taiwanese lost their lives to fight against ROC system in order to have freedom of speech, vote and anything else. People who are in abroad will come back home just for voting, because we all know that if we don’t vote now, one day we will really become part of communist China. The ROC party will even show their affection to locals by the Taiwanese languages, though they don’t speak that much after election and even banned them for almost half century.
For overseas Taiwanese, the official name makes a lot of problems for them and even confuses foreigners. But it takes a lot of efforts to confront with local Chinese and change it for all at once. So, there are 2 country names on our passport.

The recent visit from politicians of Cezech republic have encouraged some locals. The sentence ” I am Taiwanese” has become one of the popular slang and the symbol of democracy. It may mean little to others, but it means a lot to us especially our fragile democracy.

As Taiwanese, some things may be normal to us but new to others. If you think there are still some different things than your own country, you can leave messages to me so I could share with people. Hope the foreigners can enjoy their lives safe and sound in Taiwan with our hospitality and adapt to the humid weather.