The Doyle Engaging Difference Program - Georgetown University

When I first told my friends and family that I decided to study abroad in Taiwan, I was met with equal parts concern and confusion. It was an unlikely choice for someone of my background. I hail from a small town that fits every suburban stereotype. I’m the first in my family to travel as far as Asia, and I didn’t know how to hold chopsticks properly until age 20. Not to mention there was also the most glaring observation that I’m not a native or heritage Chinese speaker. Unsurprisingly, telling people about my study abroad plans always sparked the same line of questioning: "Is your Chinese good enough to get by?"

With only a year and a half of Mandarin under my belt, I often caught myself asking that very same question—then promptly brushing it aside. I’d figure out the how once I got there, I decided. I chose Taiwan because I wanted to improve my Mandarin by immersing myself in the language. Conventional wisdom has it that a big part of traveling is engaging with the culture, and who better to learn it from than the people who live there? Therefore, I made it a priority of mine to step outside my comfort zone, outside the comfortable American bubble the program coordinators created for us, and challenge myself to speak with the Taiwanese in their own language. I came to realize that by the end of the semester, it was the little moments with locals that enriched my understanding of Taiwan’s cultural intricacies, social dynamics, and political landscape.

From my curly hair to my visibly American fashion sense, I stook out like a sore thumb in Taiwan’s relatively homogenous society. Children would point at me, tugging at the hem of their mother’s blouse to get her attention, and announce “外国人” (foreigner). The word “foreigner” seemed to be ingrained in daily vernacular, tossed around quite loosely, even by the adults. Coming from the United States, it was a strange feeling being perceived as different when I was used to being surrounded by ethnic, religious, and linguistic diversity all my life. “Foreigner” was a term that generally came with heavy political undertones and an unsettling sense of “otherness”—just one step above “alien.” When I first arrived in Taipei, I was worried that it would be difficult to find kids my age to relate to and that the discomfort would force me to mingle exclusively with other American students in the program.

To facilitate language exchange and help us international students integrate into life in Taipei, we were paired with Taiwanese university students. Week after week, my language partner Lauren and I would meet at temples, night markets, and dessert hotspots around the city. She taught me the stories behind certain cultural taboos, walked me through the prayer ritual temple-goers perform at Longshan Temple, and introduced me to foods I had never heard of. It turns out, while I wasn’t a fan of stinky tofu, I couldn’t get enough of the scallion pancakes, yuanxiao, and douhua. At first, I heavily relied on Lauren to help me order at restaurants and boba tea shops. But as the semester progressed, I found myself being able to order confidently when she wasn’t around, and soon enough, I was able to chat about how our days were, share funny stories from my classes, and even gossip—all in Chinese (though admittedly, with spurts of Chinglish in between).

Fortunately, I found that being called a 外国人 wasn’t the “kick me” sign I had originally thought it to be. Rather, it came from a place of curiosity and was an open invitation for strangers to approach and strike up conversation with me. One day after class, I decided to hop on a bus to Wulai, a mountainous region known for its hot springs just  45 minutes south of Taipei. It is also home to the indigenous Atayal people and local volunteers who help maintain the Nanshi River. 

As I headed down the steps leading to the river, two elderly volunteers joined me in the hot spring. Not expecting me to speak Chinese, they asked about my studies, where I’m from, and what I was doing in Taiwan. They were excited to learn that I’m studying Chinese, but they were even more excited to learn that I speak Spanish and that my mom is from the Dominican Republic. Whenever one of the volunteers, Terry, would introduce me to her volunteer friends, she’d never fail to remark, “And her mom is from the Dominican Republic!” In Chinese, they taught me about their work, specifically how they protect and clean both the river and hot springs, and pointed out that they were the ones who built the steps I descended to reach the river. Terry took me around the different hot springs around the river, and afterwards, treated me to tea with the other volunteers. That day, I learned a lot about tea culture and Taiwanese hospitality after experiencing it for myself. But most of all, I was surprised at how eager they were to learn about people who come from different walks of life and realized then how much I took the United States’ melting pot for granted.

After living in Taipei and traveling to numerous cities along the west coast for three months, I walked away with more than just extensive vocabulary lists and new grammar patterns in my arsenal. I’ve made new friendships, found new favorite foods, and significantly expanded my comfort zone. If you ever get the chance to visit Taiwan, I’d implore you to strike up conversations with strangers. Even if you must resort to Chinglish, Google Translate, or miming, I’m certain you’ll leave feeling more enriched than if you were to isolate yourself to your own nationality.