Twelve junior-abroad students from Dept. of Russian have already stayed in cold Russia for half a year for learning language and the local cultures. During the chilly winter, most of the students make use of the long winter vacation to tour southward to France.

TKU administrators and teachers keep caring for all the junior-abroad students. According to Dept. of Russian, though the dormitories in Russian university are not equipped with internet facilities, their students quite adapt to the environment and achieve well in their study. Professor Leonid Krasilnikov, Associate Professor of Dept. of Russian, who comes from St. Petersburg, visited these students often when he returned to his country.

One of the students, Chen Chih-ying indicates, “There are only three hours classes in a day in St. Petersburg State University. So we have much time to walk around and chat with local people in Russian, which is a very convenient way to practice our language, and we make progress quickly.” Shih Li-chuan, another junior-abroad student in St. Petersburg, points out the fun of nourishing friendship by cooking, “Because presently it is snowing all day long and very very cold, we often cook together with Japanese and Russian students.” During the Chinese Lunar New Year, they invite the foreign friend to practice the Chinese custom of “gathering around a stove.”

In addition, during the long vacation, eight of them, including Chen Chih-ying, Lee Chung-ju, Wei Yu-feng, Shih Li-chuan, Wang Wei-chun, Sun Wei-lian, Huang Yi-shan, and Lin Chih-wen, toured across the ocean to visit Finland, France, and other European countries. There is only half a year left for their abroad study. When they start to count down the remaining days, they feel ambivalent—“On the one hand, I miss everything back in Taiwan; on the other hand, I feel reluctant to leave the new friends here.” (~ Chi-szu Chen )