Experiencing Taiwan: My Project

晚安!
*) Read: Wǎn'ān,which means 'good night'.

Well, hello people! I am so glad to finally be able to write another post tonight :D

If you read my previous post (about a month ago), you will have known that I am currently involving in an Exchange Program offered by AIESEC. Perhaps some of you are not familiar with this organization. Well, AIESEC is an international student organization that is located in many countries. They provide several programs which are volunteering progam for students and global internship program for professionals. They basically sending their local participants to AIESEC in another countries and also recieving as well as hosting a project in their own countries for the foreign exchange participants.

Back to my story, I applied for their volunteering project and permited to choose a project abroad. After a long consideration and discussion, I finally chose to do a project in Taiwan. The name of the project is 'Embrace Taiwan - Tuscany Restaurant'. The main reason I chose this is because the period of the project is quite flexible and fits my holiday period. The default duration of volunteering project  is 6 weeks depends on the project requirement. Unfortunately, I only got 30 days of VISA. So I will only be here for a month. But, the positive side is that I do not need to miss classes because my winter holiday is only a month.

 I went to Taiwan on Sunday, Dec. 21st 2014. I considered myself brave enough to do this because firstly there is no other Indonesian student joining this project. Secondly, I cannot speak their language. I think I only knew around 15 words plus numbers and it was not helping at all! And lastly, I did not even know who will pick me up in the airport.. During the journey, I kept on convincing myself that everything is going to be alright, don't think too much, and just enjoy every second of it. When I finally arrived at the airport, there was no one holding a board/paper with my name in it. I already passed those people twice or three times but still cannot find anyone. At that point I was like "Okay..... Nothing to be worry.... Keep it cool..." And after a while, there was a girl who looked confuse and lost approached me, and she said "Is it you???" while showing my Facebook profile in her phone. I was so thankful and reliefed then said "YES! YES! That's meeee!" and I hugged her.I think that was a reflex LOL. 

The next day, another girl named Jenny took me to High Speed Railway Station to meet the owner of the Tuscany Restaurant where my project takes place. Tuscany is located in Hsinchu. It is a region in the north of Taiwan, approximately 1.5 hours to Taipei. Before going to Taiwan, it was not so clear for me about how the project will be like. It turns out, Tuscany is basically a hostel (in the second story) and a restaurant (first story). But the restaurant only serves people who booked, so it is not a daily open restaurant. Beside this, they also have a farm, where they plant stroberries and several types of vegetables, and a  terrain which they rent for the campers. Every morning in the so called factory, just across the hostel building which they also own, they make and deliver a fresh juice. So yes, they own a big land and operating an integrated business.

There are 5 people who live here. They are the owner (husband and wife) whom I call Mr. Lo and Ai (means aunty in English), their 13 y.o son named Lo En, Ai's daughter named Meng Xue (I don't know how to write it correctly), and her 3 y.o daughter called Ah Pi. Anyway, there is also another student from Malaysia here. His name is Adrian, but we call him with his chinese name Yu Sheng. Obviously he is chinese and he can speak Mandarin! So, it's my luck to have him here.

Now the question is what do we do here?

Basically, we just do what they need us to help. For example, packing dried vegetable to be sold in the market, harvest and pack the stroberries, clean up the building if there will be guests coming, sweep the (large) garden the day before campers come, planting new seeds, etc. But when there is nothing to help, Yu Sheng regularly go to the farm to take care of the plant and I usually remake the old albums by retake the pictures and crop it one by one. Those albums belong to the church (the family is chatolic and they are quite active in the church actvities) who wants to make a digital documentation of the old albums. We do not work on the weekend, but Ai usually go to the market to join their product on Saturday. So, Yu Sheng and I usually go with her. 

Well, what else can I say... The Taiwanese are so friendly and warm to the foreigner. I really feel welcome not only by the family, but also by the people around their community. This family is very health-conscious, especially Ai. Their home cook are mostly vegetable and I can hardly find a deep fried food. They also prefer the natural taste and not adding much spices in their food. If you are not familiar with this, you will probably think their food are quite plain. Every breakfast (on the weekday), they always give us the juice they make. It's always a mixed juice, sometimes vegetables, fruits, or pumpkin. Honestly, I enjoy their diet a lot! Everything is healthy and mostly homemade (for example kimchi). I really want to continue this lifestyle when I go back to Indonesia.

FYI, I will be going back on Monday, Jan 19th 2015. It's the day after tomorrow! I don't know whether to feel sad to leave Taiwan or happy to be back home. After all, this has been an incredible experience I will not forget :). Anyway, I will also post another story about the trip to Taipei. So, just wait for my next post ;) ;)

Here are some photos for you, my faithful readers!

This is Ai- Lo En - and little Ah Pi

This is my sweet cozy room. I never expected that it will be this nice.

The room I live is one of the hostel room.

When there is no guest booking for the room, the owner will live 

here. So, that's why the room are so beautiful :)

Left: These are the green houses (2 for vegetable, 1 for tomato, 

3 for strawberry, 1 for new seed, and 1 for the chicken and goose). Yes, they own them.

Right: This is the hostel and restaurant building. The building is beautiful, 

but the decoration inside it are even more cozy and nice

These is the strawberry green house. We harvest the strawberry every 2-3 days.

Selfie inside the vegetable green house.

#sleepyface 

Left: Our stand in the market. That's Yu Sheng and Ai.

Right: The market takes plece in an open space. 

Packing the strawberriesss

There are the organic baby vegetables that we just bought.

We then plant and grow them in our farm.

 

These are our typical meal. So healthy, isn't it?

These are the typical lunch box they usually buy if they don't cook.

If you don't eat pork, you have to be careful because they use pork a lot here

(include the oil and broth)

We are eating Vietnamese food here. It's a sandwich (L) and a seafood rice noodle (R)

Here, we were eating in some kind of ramen house.

I order beef noodle (L) and the other one (R), 

I would say it's like martabak but thiner and crunchier

Thank you for reading.

Kiss and hug,




Delicia

Bandung: Tempat Makan Berkesan

1. Belle Vue

                                                                                     

    Escargot au Vent

This place is actually a hotel in Setiabudhi. The building is so beautiful. It was designed by the owner, which is shocking because he is not an architect. The architecture itself has a ghotic elements and marvelous views from the top. The restaurant is on the 5th floor of the building. It offers you varieties of food, starts from french cuisine, italian dishes, wine, desserts, and many more. The uniqueness of this restaurant is they have an everyday promo, it can be a 50% discount for selected dishes, free dessert, buy 1 get 2, etc. -FYI, it opens 24 hours/day- The place is beautiful, the view is stunning, the decoration is superb, what else can can I say.. My most favourite dish is the escargot. Escargot is actually a snail. This is an original French dish, which is also their signature dish. The thing I like about their escargo is that the escargot is covered with pastry so that it has a balance texture between the pastry and the escargo within it. However, you have to spend quite a costly price, but it is all worth a try. This is a place where I said "Yes" when he asked me :).

2. Mujigae

3rd: Bibimap, you have to mix the sauce and the rice all together in the bowl

4th: this is the drink! You have to lift the upside-down bottle, and mix it with the salty cream

I have just visited this resto twice. It is located at Cihampelas Walk or what so called as CiWalk. This is definitely a place for the K-Lover. The decoration and lay out are so creative. I was amased when I first went here because I've never visited such a restaurant with Korean elements all over place. Here, you can make you order trough the iPad that is available in every table. You can also request a video that will be played in a big screen inside the resto. It offers you Korean cuisine obviously. The food is delicious, but personally I don't think that the dishes are stand-out. The beverages are pretty unique, I hardly explain it to you but you'll understand as soon as you visit this place ;)

3. Braga Permai

This is an old restaurant who has so many variations on their menu list. It has a chinese cuisine, western, Indonesian, Italian, and cakes&chocolates! The special thing about this place is their delicious food and not expensive price. My boyfriend and I are a money spender for food. But here, we can spend less than Rp100.000,00 and yet felt so full already. For a restaurant class dish, this one is pretty affordable and of course with a good quality.

4. Takigawa - Meat Bar In The Sky

Left: Volcano sushi; Right: Wakame Salad

I love hanging out with my Dad and grab some food. Our favourite place to eat is Takigawa. He usually orders Kamameshi; a baked rice with toppings (scallop, shrimp, ell, etc). And my all time favourite dish is wakame salad and also volcano sushi. As I know, there are only 2 Takigawa restaurant in Bandung; at Trans Studio Mall and Dago Atas. Takigawa - Meat Bar In The Sky is located at Dago Atas. There, you'll be giver 2 menu books, the Takigawa menu which is Japanese cuisine and the meat bar menu which are mostly western cuisine with varieties of steaks. The place itself is beautiful, the price is in the similar range with the other restaurant in Dago Atas. 



Hug&Kiss,



Delicia
pictures are taken from various sources in the internet

Lumbung Rasa

Lunch time ! :D


This past few days, I'm staying in Bandung. Somehow, Bandung is such a lovely town. I love to be here; spending time at the gym, going nowhere, or doing the things I love. Anything but going to campus..

On this holiday, I'm having a pretty similar schedule every single day. I usually start the day by going to the gym and get sweat. And then, I'll be looking for a place for lunch. Most of the time, I go to a random resto which I find from the internet (usually foursquare). After that, I'll go home and doing stuff like watching TV, playing games, reading, knitting, or any other time consuming activities.

Now, what I'm about to tell you is about a resto which I've known for a quite long time but I never tried. This resto is located not far from home. Here's the story; So that day, it was rainning at noon and I decided to wait until the rain stopped. The rain finally stopped at about 2pm. It's already passed my lunch time. I was about to go to Dapur Eyang, before I accidentaly passed in front of this resto. The name of this resto is Lumbung Rasa, it is located at Ir. H. Juanda Street No. 299, Dago (near Alfa Mart).

When I first walked in, I just loved the atmosphere. It's simple and traditional. They serve the food in a buffet. There are varieties of Indonesian food that you can choose. Beside the buffet, they also offer you the fresh seafood which they'll cook based on your order. Haven't enough? There is kinda coffee corner (warung kopi) at the front of the resto where you can order the light meals and drinks like toast and cappuccino.

The thing I love about this resto is they have it all in one package! They have the buffet, fresh seafood, and coffee corner. Something that make it more interesting is they serve so many kinds of traditional food in a modern concept of restaurant. You can find es goyobod, peuyeum, and even roti balok here! -Roti balok is a kind of bread that shaped like a balock which I first found at Pasar Lembang- And for me, there are one more added value and that's because they offer you 3 different kind of rice, white rice, brown rice, and nasi liwet. So, for you guys who prefer to eat the brown rice, you better go here because brown rice is kinda hard to find in other place..

Me? I definitely will go here again!

Choose the fresh seafood

for yourself

the buffet

very friendly waiters :")

free water for everyone :D

Hugs & Kisses,

Delicia

Coffee Shop - Me 'n You Coffee Pantry

Coffee, anyone?

Well.. I gotta admit that I like coffee. 
FYI, the word coffee comes from an Arabic word "qahwah". Coffee has many good impacts to your body -as long as you drink it in the right portion- like lighten your teeth :D But do not drink coffee too much because it contains caffein which is not good in the high level. In general, coffee divided into 2 main categories which are Arabica and Rhobusta. 

Unfortunately, I am not a coffee expert and am not going to tell you the theory of coffee LOL.

About one or two weeks ago, I found this petite cafe in Dipati Ukur (Bandung). How often do you go there? If you stay not far from this area, do you realize that there are small alleys along the main street? Yes, if you take a better look, you'll realize that there are alleys along the main street. And this small coffee shop is located just right beside one of the alley.

The name of this coffee shop is pretty unique, Me 'n You Coffee Pantry. Cute isn't it? :3
This coffee shop is not a big one. I can say this is pretty small, only one room, a pantry, and of course the tables and chairs. It is located at Dipati Ukur Street No. 68; right accros Citi Trans Travel. It is not hard to find this cafe if you really pay attention at the poster / name board.

The place is cozy enough for those who want to go out but don't know where to go, or people who are waiting for the travel. There's always music and they also have a TV, so it won't feel lonely. Like another coffee shop, Me 'n You Coffee Pantry offer you a variety of coffee drinks. Beside the drink, they also have sort of cakes / cup cakes, pancakes, and pasta. Unfortunately, this coffee shop is a smoking area. For those who are not smoking or are alergic to the smoke, this might be a huge annoyance. And they only have one air conditioner, so sometimes it feels hot inside (especially in the back rows with many customers). A tip for me is to sit near the pantry or near the AC ;) 

Wanna know more, check this out!

Unique promo 

Right when you open the door,

you'll see the pantry.

Cupcake with the view of the room

Hugs & Kisses,

Delicia