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Okay, so MAYBE you thought that I died in Taiwan. I really apologize for not posting in two weeks. The truth was, I was too busy ENJOYING myself. Not to say that blogging isn’t enjoyable. Trust me, it is. But sometimes we have to take a break from writing everything down to actually enjoy it. I can’t recall every single moment for you because then those moments wouldn’t be mine.
As much as I enjoy sharing my adventures with you lovely readers who have faithfully followed this picky princess throughout a Taiwanese adventure, somethings should be kept for yourself. I will share a selection of memories that I BELIEVE SHOULD BE RECORDED for future reference.
So what exactly do I mean by YOLO? “You Only Live Once”. I have always found myself hating that term until recently. I used to hate this term so much because it was just so annoying! Like, thank you Drake for this annoying accronym. But in the last 2 weeks I have learned to really live by this. It is SO TRUE. You only live once! I have been sick for like 3 weeks or at least coughing for 3 weeks and I still trudged through everything. Originally we were supposed to go to training Tuesday night but AIESEC had planned a super awesome party for us. But guess what? I got a fever. Yeah. a fever. So I stayed home all day and ran a fever. Yes. I missed out n all of the 70’s night fun. I EVEN BOUGHT A DRESS AND I HAD A FEVER.
The last 2 weeks were really hard. We didn’t really do much until we went o the ICONTACT THE WORLD CAMP. Okay, so this post will probably get super emotional and you will probably be bored. So just a heads up. I really didn’t want to go to this camp at first. It was the only weekend that my sister and aunt would be coming in from Singapore and HK and I wouldn’t be able to spend it with them. It was also my last weekend in Taiwan and I would have to spend it working. However, I learned that my AIESEC buddy helped plan/run a lot of it so I was kind of stuck doing it. I mean, we should really be supportive of our friends. So, of course The EPs trudged their way across Taipei all the way to the ends of the Earth FOR A THURSDAY NIGHT TRAINING.
This was the first night that I met KaiLin, Amy and Gaya. WHAT THE HECK. Why did we not meet these beautiful ladies sooner? A Malaysian, a Canadian, and a Singaporean. They are so amazing. You know, it’s amazing how just 2 full days and one night can make you so close. We met up with the girls and were lucky enough that KaiLin and Amy could read/speak Chinese so we had one of our first REAL MEALS in a long while. So good! Daro and I could not possibly eat any more bread. We needed to eat something real…you know. like RICE. And to be honest, we bonded. Like we made automatic friends by complaining about having to travel so far and for so late for a training session and how none of us wanted to come back the next day HAHAHA. <3
But when we finally got to the training session and finally met the AIESEC OC team. like. oh my goodness. They were all just so amazing! We got to meet all of the other team supporters who would be our partners and who would be hanging out with us! But of course, we got to meet ROGER! One of THE most awesometastic people I have ever met. At first he was the mysterious person who e-mailed all of us and politely asked us to help out with the camp. But then he became the BEST AIESEC DANCER EVER! We learned such fun and awesome dances and learned how to use our “faces”!
However, Roger DID A FAKE OUT! Originally my partner was Daisy, but then I found out that DARO HAD ANKY! So we got Roger to switch us so that I could be Team Awesome with my AIESEC buddy <3 Then THE NEXT DAY! ROGER EMAILED ME AND TOLD ME HE LIED! I was no longer able to partner with Anky because Anky was “too important” to the operation. I felt very sad, but decidded I would share him. </3
On the bright side, because Anky is my AIESEC buddy, I promptly abused my AIESEC buddy privaleges and pushed him into asking Roger if we could not come in Friday! I wanted to have dinner with my family and most of us live ridiculously far from the University. SUCESS! Anky sweet talked Roger into letting us cram the session in all on Thursday! YAY US!
When Friday finally rolled around, I got to eat a sucessful late night dinner with my family at a yummy sushi restaurant! I do not remember the name right now but I do prompt you to try it if you are not feling too stingy with your wallets. I believe that sushi dinner would have cost $500 in Canada but it was about $150. My aunt let me know that Taiwan is the cheapest place to have sushi. It was so good and yummy and fresh. YAY PRICEY RAW FISH.
Saturday I was so tired since Daro and I HAD TO MEET UP AT 7:00 AM TO EVEN GET TO THE MRT STATION. The place is an hour away. and the girls wanted to meet at 8:00 for a quick breakfast. and then we had to meet at the university at 8:30 am. Sighs. No sleep for the sick right?
So as I mentioned beacuse I couldn’t be team Awesome with Anky, I got to be TEAM AWESOME WITH FRED!!! I met this super tall and sweet Taiwanese at the LC Party! YAY! Our goal was to be so awesome that Anky would be jealous he wasn’t part of Team Awesome! (That’s what I named our team haha). Although I had to take a moment to sneak off during one of the games because I got so dizzy and didn’t want to worry Roger or Anky so the other OC members hid me for a while so that I could take a sick nap!
So as Team Supporters we get to lead a team of highschoolers who have signed up for this camp event thing and we lead games and such. And since we are Trainees we did sharing about our cultures and stuff. Since we have 3 Canadian Trainees and the girls are LAZY. I did all three presentations with my own presentation that I use at work. It was super fun the first day though! I even got to listen in on the Returning trip ones! They were so cool to hear all of these funny stories about the other people my age who have travelled around the world on AIESEC exchanges and through backpacking. It really opens you up to Travelling. Like how you shouldn’t be afraid to go outside o these four walls. I had a painful conversation with my best friend one day about how important it is to get out of where you are from. If we only ever face these 4 walls we can’t learn anything about ourselves. I have learned so much about myself within these past 5 weeks. I think that was the point of the sharings right? To learn about our cultures to interest you but to hear from people who have ACTUALLY DONE IT. There are people who are not that much older than those high schoolers who were listening that have DONE IT. They have emeresed themselves into the culture and YOLOED. These Returnees are my heros. I want to be someone’s hero too.
One of the best things about AIESEC is the one thing that brings us together the most. AIESEC DANCES. There is nothing like feeling disgustingly hot after dancing your butt off because I mean no matter what language you speak, we can all emabressingly “Feel that RHYTHM”
We ran a series of games and had a debrief and by the time I got home it was like 10:30 pm at night. So as you can probaby tell, I was running sick on like 6 hours of sleep. So I hope that you can forgive me for not blogging about it.
The next day was even more fun for us. We MADE IT A LAZY DAY! We were actualy so bad, we ducked out so many times to just chill and nap. There wer alot of speaches and let’s be honest. We were all so tired! But you want to know what was so awesome? So the night before, I had texted Roger explaining how I felt really sick and wasn’t sure if I would be able to go the next day. But then I remembered what my beautiful EP manager told me before I left. If we don’t emerse ourselves into the AIESEC expereinces we won’t be able to make the most out of our exachange. So I did it, I sucked it up and I bussed at 7:00 am to meet them. And it was the best expereince of my life. I did not feel any better. I felt much worse the next day. But do you know how much these people care about me? They went out and bought me medicine for my coughing. Like. because they cared. They made sure I was super hydrated, and got me to make sure I was drinking warm water all day. When we were outside running our stations for the big game, Roger biked to every station carrying bottles of water for everyone. Like, can you get any more caring?
I also forgot to mention our GOSSIP BOX! So the gossip box is HILARIOUS. We get to put in gossip into the box at the end of the day our “FUN team” reads them out and gives people punishments and makes fun of them HAHAHA. SOO CUTE. Some of them are totally made up though. </3
Okay, so at the end of these two days I BASICALLY made a bunch of new friends who changed my life. And I really emersed myself into the AIESEC WAY. I could name everyone out and how they changed my life. But I have already posted for them a video of me basically crying and thanking them. They later took us out two days later even though Antonio had 4 finals the next day, he still planned a dinner and a bar night for Min’s birthday, and Daro, Gaya and My Farewell party. I called it the Super Party. Like; thes people are actually so loving that they did this for us. A bunch of them attended. Even Anky, Glynis and Shihui attended just beacuse they were our AIESEC buddies and had to leave before the bar because they were late for a meeting. That is AIESEC LOVE.
These people changed my life. I expereinced so many “new” things that I wouldn’t have done in Toronto. They made me go outside of my comfort zone because I was in the company of people who made me feel comfortable all of the time. They really are my friends for life. My international AIESECERS.
There wer a lot of goodbyes in the past 2 weeks. Daro and I had to say goodbye to the school, the teachers and the students. That was pretty hard. But he hardest thing was saying goodbye to Daro.
I went with her to the airport because I had to do something there since I was leaving the next day. We cried. We tried not to and right before Daro went through the Gates she told me “HAPPY MEMORIES” and “DO NOT GET LOST! REMEMBER! YOU ARE TAKING THE BUS TO SONSHAN AIRPORT!” I love you Daro. You know me so well beause the first week I totally got lost. <3 Omg. NO. I AM NOT GOING TO SAY ANYMORE BECAUSE I WILL CRY.
But guess what? I did. I called my best friend immediately after who had to listen to me cry on skype. Was it stupid? Of course. I cried because I felt so sad. There will always be friends who walk in and out of your life. But these friends that I have made here, these are freaking international friends. Almost every single one with the exception of my Canadian EPs are 12 hours away from me. It’s like you will always and forever be chasing after them. It would be like the moon and the sun. How people say that the moon and the sun are in love and they are always chasing each other but they always miss each other and always separated. That’s how I felt. I felt this super deep sorrow because I did not want this to happen to me and my friends. So yeah, it sound stupid because I know that people walk in and out al of the time. So why was I so sad? It was beacuase I had made relationships with these people in such a short amount of time. These people actually cared so much that on my last day they came out to have brunch with us to say goodbye. You know what my best friend said to me though? She told me that If I had not gotten out of our city and experienced life outside of these four walls, I wouldn’t have grown so much. If I hadn’t met all of these people my life would have been the same. But the most important thing was that even though she and I were 12 hours apart and on the other side of the world, studying in different cities, we manage to somehow talk almost every other day. Because if someone is worth it, you will put in the time and effort. And I realized, every single one of these people are worth it.
So what are forever moments? Forever moments are those moments that you always remember. Like, those small little moments that you always seem to quote for the rest of your life. Those moments where you hear your parents or grandparents talk about ALL THE TIME. So much that even you know the details. But listen. Those moments are forever moments because out of all of the blurry things in your head, you seem to always remember those ones right? I had realized that I had made forever moments in Taipei. With this AIESEC Internship. Those little things that happened, those big feelings. You even remember the smells, the feel of it under your finger tips and the way it makes your heart grow. I have had too many forever moments. So I realize that it would be selfish to keep these to myself. But, these really are for myself and for the verabl sharing. AIESEC speaks the language of love, and I have learned to love more than anything on this trip. That Love comes and goes and dies sometimes. But, maybe it has to in order for us to plant more seeds of love for other people and other things in our hearts. I had 2 years worth of a pot hole to fill, and I filled it with amazing forever moments and amazing forever friendships.
The hardest goodbye, was my goodbye with my AIESEC buddy. I truly believe he almost cried at the airport. It was my goal to make him cry, but touche to you sir, you managed to hold it in. I would say more about our goodbye, but I think it should be kept as a memory. That way, we will be forced to remember it as clearly as possible. This means that one day we can hopefully meet up again and remember it together.
I really do hope that all of my friends will come visit me in Toronto. I mean I am so fortunate. I was so fortunate I was even on the same plane to Singapore as Gaya who was returning home! I am currently writing this in SG right now while visiting my sister here. I wasn’t even going to come or go to HK afterwards until halfway through my internship when I realized that we Only Do Live ONCE. You should grab every opportunity that you have. I am so blessed to have friends in Ben and Gaya while I am here to bring me around. AIESEC gives you international friendships. But it most importantly teaches you how universal the language of love is.
On my last day in Taipei, coming home from that brunch, I couldn’t hep but tear up as I passed the many places I had been. I passed SOGO in which Anky had pointed out to me on the first day on our car ride and that I had promptly visited soon after. I passed by my school and the parks I was so familiar with and even took a video of me walking home because I would never be able to walk home again. I took pictures with my homestay, wrote millions of letters for everyone and my family. I took a moment to cry in the car as Anky drove me to the airport. I told him how sad it felt because he had driven me into the Taipei city center, and now he was driving me out. It felt like the past 5 weeks were not long enough. That I should have stayed longer, but I couldn’t. My job was done, and the exchange was over.
Most people say that they did so much for the world on their Exchange. But I was so fortunate. I had such a lazy job in a school that let me fb, sleep and eat when I wasn’t in class. I had a beautiful homestay family who loved me so much like a daughter, and I loved them back as a real family. How could I ever feel homesick for my home in Toronto when these people had given me a home here? How can you miss home when you are already there? I know that we are suposed to be changing the world on an AIESEC exchange, but the world changed me. AIESEC changed my life.
So I thank you, and every one that I met. I hope to meet you all at an AIESEC international conference one day. Or maybe we can stop by and hang out. The world is such a big place, and I felt so little in it before. But now, I feel like I can backpack, slum it out, and YOLO.
So goodbye, and thank you for these forever moments.
