The international students studying at TKU were wrapped up in a warm festive atmosphere last week as the Office of International Exchanges and International Education (IEIE) and the Reitaku International House organized a Winter Solstice Dinner and Christmas Party respectively.

The Solstice Dinner was held on Wednesday at the lobby of the Foreign Languages and Literatures Building where traditional sticky rice balls were prepared. The organizer, the Director of IEIE, Prof. Chen Hwei-mei, was pleased to provide this opportunity for students of various nationalities to celebrate a typical Chinese tradition by sampling this particular food. These sticky rice balls usually come with many flavors with sweet red bean paste filling being the most popular one. Lim Pierre-Mong, a post-grad exchange student from the Universite of Jean Moulin, Lyon 3 of France at the Institute of International Trade, for instance, was captivated by this very flavor. He said that he would always remember this evening as he had never had it before, and most probably he would have stayed ignorant of this custom had he not come to Taiwan.

As for the Christmas Party organized by the Reitaku International House on Thursday, delicious food and colorful wrapped presents were all carefully prepared. After a great big dinner and delightful conversations surrounding food, students began to exchange presents. People burst into roars of laughter when the party was briefly intercepted by a surprise appearance of Father Christmas who came with bags of candies.

Christmas spent away from home is not easy for some of the students. Yet, according to Sebastian from the University of Cologne, Germany, that he deeply appreciated this wonderful feeling of celebrating Taiwanese Christmas with other international friends. Kim from Kyungnam University of Korea expressed the similar sentiment but added that the best part was to enjoy the great hospitality imparted by Taiwanese people. ( ~Ying-hsueh Hu )

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