Want a taste of all the delicious food from all over Taiwan? Here comes your chance this week. A 2004 United Cultural Week, hosted by eight alumni associations from various regions, opens this week on the Poster Street and the University Commons. Over there, you will be able to taste the ambrosia from places such as Wanruan, Taichung, Penghu Islands and Hualien. The mouth-watering foods on offer include pork feet, chicken claws, traditional Chinese pastry, and sticky cakes.
Such a gathering is first of its kind to have eight alumni associations from Kaohsiung, Pingtung, Taichung, Hsinchu, Changhua, Hualien, Penghu Islands and Kingmen Islands to be in on location. The open ceremony is at 10:00 p.m. on Monday and President Chang Horng-jinh, and Lin Yao-wen, who is a graduate of TKU’s Department of Public Administration and presently the Director of Government Information Office in Kaohsiung will give a speech. This event highlights the fruitful results of concerted efforts and team spirit of these associations.
Following the successful beauty pageant of Miss Kaohsiung last year, the Kaohsiung Alumni Association will not disappoint the students this year, in particular the ladies. They are going to put on a contest of “Sunny Boy” on Monday noon, which models on a famous Taiwanese reality show on T.V. known as “I guess, I guess, and I guess again and again”. That means, the winner will be decided by the vote taken place live among the audience. The chief secretary of the association, Lin En-ying, a sophomore of the Electrical Engineering Department, revealed secretively that there would be a very ‘handsome’, Chinese-Dutch boy as one of the contestants – all the girls would be certainly thrilled, he smiled knowingly.
Beauty contest aside, of course, don’t forget the foods. Every noon on Poster Street and the University Commons there will be various food and drinks contests, such as competing the speed of shuffling down egg pan-cakes, capacity of stuffing hot food, gobbling down beer and Chinese-style shredded ice. Whoever wants to test his/her limit is welcome to join.
Those who do not have the stomach for such thrills are welcome to ‘taste’ various foods at their leisure. All the associations have conjured up some various ways of attracting passers-by to sample their specialty such as tea, dumplings, pork feet, chicken claws, and sticky cakes by distributing coupons, freebies and tickets for a tombola. Once their appetite has been aroused, there are desks where bigger quantity can be ordered and delivered.
In parallel to all these challenge to one’s oral senses, there is an exhibition at the Exhibition Hall of the Business and Management Building that will appease to one’s visual and intellectual senses. The exhibition deals with some key aspects regarding Taiwan such as its foods, landscape, nature, culture, and customs by displaying maps and books so that all TKU students and faculty will learn to appreciate the beauty this island has to offer.
