“Wow! What a beautiful key chain and bookmark, I want to take them home as souvenirs!”. It is the first time having 11 Japanese students from TKU sister university,Waseda University at Japan, including Igarashi Yu, to learn Chinese in TKU. This summer, they not only experienced Chinese culture, learned calligraphy, ink painting, stamping art, ceramics, flower flattening, but also brought their handmade art works or crafts back to Japan. They said “we’ll come back again!”
Waseda University sent out 13 studying groups to several famous universities in the world this summer. One group with 11 students came to Taiwan for a 3-week studying from Aug 6 to Aug 27. They all have different majors; for example, Sugiyama Yukio from Electrical Information, Kurano Erina from International Education, Watanabe Tetsuya also from Political Science, Kobayashi Toshiki from Law school. They had great time here.
During the time of studying in TKU, students took Prof. Mei-lun Tsung’s daily Chinese class in the morning and had field trips to historical sites at Tamsui or went bird-watching. They also went to National Palace Museum and Shin-Lin night market. After experiencing local culture from ceramics class, they got their handmade crafts. They all agreed that “the trip was excellent and worthwhile although it only lasted for 3 weeks.”
In Carrie Chang Fine Arts Center, they made candles, soaps, notebooks with Miss Ching-yi Yang’s instructions. Yang stated “students fromWaseda University are smart, and can make good use of what they learn.” In Japan, they also have the art of flower flattening. However, teacher Yang’s creations are more delicate and practical. They would not give these artworks away.
Professor Young-cheng Ho introduced various special wine bottles with different animal shapes when they visited “Previous Bottles Studio” wine culture and research lab in TKU. One particular wine bottle presented by teacher Ho is a Japanese style bottle with famous Japanese warrior Masamune on it. Students stated that “we never seen this in Japan, and it’s very surprising to see such a meaningful wine bottle in Taiwan. Professor Ho invited them for a sip of Tachu wine, which they felt “almost drunk!” (~Shen-chian Chu)
