I'm moving to Taipei next year. What are somethings I should know?
I am being a foreign exchange student in Taipei, Taiwan next year. I am from a small town and have never been anywhere near Asia before. What should I expect? and what cool things are there to do?
Taiwan - 5 Answers
Random Answers, Critics, Comments, Opinions :
1 :
Learn to feel comfortable taking public transportation admist a horde of people you can't understand and signs you can't read. Get a basic Chinese phrases book with audio CD, and develop some communication skills. Good luck to you! :^)
2 :
It is the capital city of a province of China
3 :
Chinese writing are simplify picture. Basic word look at it, you should able to guess its meaning.
4 :
Stick to the major roads, and for transportation, use mainly the Taipei city subway system, which is very convinient and have english signs. Also, make sure you know about what bus to ride to your university. um, for food, most major chain restaurants have english or numbers to order from. if you want some more local food, have a taiwanese friend take you. shopping for cloth is really easy, as there r clothing stores like everywhere. but market stalls might try to cheat u so only go to legit stores like Net or something. American clothing stores are all overpriced so dont go to them. if you need to go to church, there are english services at a couple of churches across the street from National Taiwan University (get off at Gonguan station in subway i believe) and if your a white person, dont be afraid to ask people directions in english because people will try their best to help you. You might wanna look for other nonasian foreigners or taiwanese american (you can tell by cloth and skin tone and hair style) to help you, as they probably speak english well. oh and drinking age is only 18 so that might be good. but dont expect many hot guys. not many hot guys the last time i went (though im a guy saying this so i might not be very accurate)
5 :
Keep an open mind. It's probably going to be a cultural shock at first. Taipei is a populated metropolitan with some real good mass transit system in place - lightrail/subway and buses are common. All of the MRT stations and signs will be in English so you shouldn't be too lost. Make lots of friends and explore Taipei. Don't be afraid to try different kind of food. :D
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