哈台班 第二個星期 (Harvard Taipei Academy Week 2)

During Week 2, I began participating in more of HTA’s extracurricular events. During Week 1, there were also activities, but I was already so exhausted by preparing for class that I decided to skip out. I’m really glad I didn’t do the same for Week 2, because I loved going to the Lin Family Mansion and Garden and learning more about Japanese influences on Taiwanese architecture, the history of the Lin family itself, and the symbolism of different fruits (e.g. peaches) in Chinese culture. During Week 2, I prepared a presentation about the lack of a unified national primary education curriculum in the United States (yes, we have Common Core, but it’s not actually mandatory for states to follow it and many do not) and contrasted it with Taiwan’s national curriculum. While I needed to read off a script (as always, since I physically cannot memorize over a few lines in Chinese at a time), I had a blast doing research, preparing, and giving the presentation. I will say, despite me ragging on HTA, I really did enjoy this assessment because it was related to a personal interest of mine, education. This week was one of the few times this summer that I felt like what I was being assessed on actually mattered to my life; one of my largest gripes with advanced Chinese at HTA is that I honestly found a lot of what we were studying irrelevant to my life, overly formal (my local friends said I started speaking like a robot this summer), and taking up time from studying expressions and vocabulary used in daily speech. However, this week, I felt the teachers really nailed our assessments. I also REALLY loved the Week 1 oral exam/口試 for advanced Chinese, which was roleplaying as different characters discussing the state of education in Taiwan. Pretty much the only time I was actively engaged in class this summer was when we did roleplay exercises because students actually had an uninterrupted chance to speak with and learn from each other (outside of these roleplays, the teachers would cut us off constantly). When I have a chance to learn aurally, I do very well, which is why this week was one of the best weeks for me academically in HTA. Week 2 was also a a very fun week because I went on a Friday afternoon HTA-sponsored outing with a local 台大 student, and because the other student meant to be in our group never showed up, we ended up chatting so much that we became friends by the end of the afternoon! It was incredible finally being able to see the Chiang Kai-Shek (or, as my 二年級 friends and I call him, The Man of Many Names) memorial in real life, and even more special for my 台大 friend to time our visit so that we got to see the performance by the guards. I really love learning about Taiwanese culture and tradition, which is why I really enjoyed the activities this week. I think one of the biggest areas HTA shines in is activities — they really excel at running extracurricular events, like the Friday and Saturday outings and the host family system, because we’re so busy that we don’t have time to enjoy Taipei (let alone Taiwan) on our own. For that, I was really grateful to HTA this summer.