Taiwan Day 4: Red Pocket Singing

Day Four

After breakfast we met with a local volunteer for Wanhua district at 9:30AM. She was a history teacher at a high school and currently is a volunteer of a group that hopes to revamp Wanhua's image. We spent more than an hour talking about the history of Wanhua, history of Taiwan and its politics. It was interesting to me about how their self identity changed over the centuries.

Map of Wanhua

The teacher brought us to the Taipei City New Immigrant's Hall. Many new immigrants are from South Asia and Southeast Asia because the women marry over to Taiwan.

This big bowl is actually a map of the Wanhua district from an aerial view. I thought it was pretty neat and helped me visualize the area better.

Afterward the three of us, Hui Chee, Olivia and I walked to the Presidential Office Building to have a look but the tours stop letting people in at 11:00AM so we couldn't go inside to look around.

For lunch we tried this oyster noodle from this well known store. The oysters were fresh!

In the afternoon, the homestay uncle brought us out to Ximending to experience a part of Taiwanese culture. It is called Red Pocket Tea in Chinese where many elderly people sit, drink tea, and listen to middle-aged women sing old songs. Each cup of tea is NT$300 but uncle received an invitation so we didn't have to pay.

The event is called Red Pocket Tea because while the singers are singing, people will go up to them and give them red pockets as support.

One woman was so popular that she kept receiving red pockets throughout her three songs and even a money necklace made of NT$1000 bills!

For dinner I tried the braised pork with rice and it was yummy but had too much pork fat. Finished off by sharing shaved ice dessert with my friends! 

In the evening we joined AIESEC SCU's Local Committee Meeting at Soochow University. In the photo below, their previous MCVP talked about his entrepreneur experience.

Until tomorrow!

Take care,