A Day of Cultural Immersion in Bunun Village

 June 14, 2024

For the first half of the day we took a van to Bunun village. During the van ride we saw beautiful views of endless green mountains and rainy skies. The van ride was about 35 minutes and for the whole time I took pictures and enjoyed the view. When we arrived at the Bunun village, it was raining very heavily so we all had to get out our umbrellas. We took a tour around their village and saw their squash, mango, cucumber, and loofah plants. The weather was a nice balance because even though it was raining the temperature was still nice and humid. My personal favorite part of the hike was when we met a boy named Huang Shang, (Noted by Zhong Laoshi: sounds like “emperor” in Mandarin.) who went to Fazhi elementary school. Like my Chinese, his English was not perfect, but we were still able to communicate and become close as he was with us the whole hike. We went to a cafe with him and the whole group, and there we ate ice cream together and I ordered their passion fruit smoothie. At the cafe the girls and I connected very closely with Huang Shang, and he actually informed us that he does not have an English name and gave us the honor to choose a name for him. After the girls and I offered him a list of common English boy names, he decided to have the name James. He was very happy and when we got back to the school he told all his friends his new name was James! After our tour around the village, we were able to attend the second half of the Fazhi elementary school's graduation ceremony. The ceremony was very emotional, and I could see how close the teachers were to their students. The graduation was unlike Polys; the teachers as well as the students performed songs, gave each other hugs and presents. There were crying, dancing, speeches, and at the end they all shared a big meal with each other. The meal contained many traditional Bunun cuisine: noodles, rice, fish, pork with onions, green beans. The food that stuck out most to me was the aboriginal-style roasted wild boar. The boar was hung up on two sticks and roasted over a fire. In Bunun’s culture, people would roast a wild boar for celebrations or big events, and we were informed that the boar was actually hunted just for this graduation ceremony.

Following the delectable lunch provided by the school, our group proceeded to the library where we reunited with the kids we had played baseball with the day before. Bunun seniors awaited us there, eager to teach us the art of traditional Bunun weaving. They had set up seven weaving stations for us to use. After demonstrating the techniques, including our Fazhi partners, we were all eager to try our hand at weaving. Once everyone had practiced and become familiar with the techniques, we used pre-made

fabric provided by the seniors to create our own keychains. Afterwards, we played the music chair game with them, and there was a lot of laughter and giggling.

               

        

     

Following our interesting game, we had to leave the school, which was incredibly bittersweet. Although we had only known these kids for 2 days, we had developed a sweet connection with them, and seeing them run out to hug us and say goodbye was heartwarming, but made leaving them that much harder. After numerous selfies, multiple hugs, and waving beyond that, we finally left the school, hopefully having provided a valuable experience for these kids. Following a long, winding journey throughout the mountains which included a partial road blockage to return to our hotel, we proceeded to go to the Puli night market to eat dinner. We enjoyed multiple delectable dishes like spicy fried chicken, scallion pork skewers, and a hot plate steak dish, along with other things. This wonderful hour of eating went by rapidly, and before we knew it, it’s time to leave. On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at a 7-Eleven where Theo remarked, "We visited 7-Eleven on our first day of arrival and now we're here again before leaving Taiwan. It feels like a full circle of the trip!"

谢谢您，(Thank you)

谢美宁和潘誠亨 (Emma and Conner)