What is TAF? TAF stands for Taiwanese American Foundation and it gathered younger generation Taiwanese American people from all over the United States annually. It is a camp which allows the Taiwanese American people to share their past experiences as well as opinions while learn more about the theme of each year. The themes of TAF revolved around four topics: Identity, ethics & values, leadership, and communication. This year, the theme was IDENTITY.
I like Eric's way of dividing his blog, so I will also do the same. Honestly, I would absolutely love to do a play-by-play reflection, but that would take forever and I don't have that much time because of my workload. With that said, let's get started!
POST TAF THOUGHTS
I honestly think that this past week was the best week of my life. Being a first year camper at TAF, I was very nervous that I would be left out. I felt very uneasy on the bus and started to worry about the image and dominant impression that I wanted to give to people. However, these immature thoughts got obliterated in my mind almost instantaneously when I stepped into the Youth dorm. I saw a group of Taiwanese American stood in a gigantic circle playing some sort of shouting game which consists of WHAT, OK, and YEAH. The point of the game being to be able to say those three words in the most exaggerated way possible. My first thought was, "What the hell? This is stupid."
However, as time passed, I gradually understand why people acted the way they did at TAF, and eventually conformed myself to follow the way of the TAF community. After all, TAF is a place for us to relax rather than another source of external pressure. By doing so, I feel like this past week of bliss went by almost too fast. The schedule consisted of a series of serious speaker sessions and physical activities all the way from 8:30 am to around 10:00 pm. With the curfew at 11:00pm, that allowed only one hour of free time. However, usually I would be so tired at the end of the day to care too much about free time anyhow. Nonetheless, the exhausted feeling was refreshing and satisfying. Why? Because I know that the exhaustion that I felt was because I had too much fun.
SPEAKER SESSIONS/WORKSHOPS
This year, the speaker was Vivian Hsu. To be honest, the speaker session turned out to be a little bit disappointing because I learned little about myself from her. One would expect that an hour and a half each day from Tuesday to Friday would be acquainted with some, if not more, understanding of oneself. But I didn't. The speaker basically was simply imposing her own believes on us rather than attempting to help us reveal our own identities. Nonetheless, I don't see her as a bad person. Just that she is teaching the wrong crowd.
SMALL GROUP
So, this is something new. Each year, campers at TAF would be divided into several small groups which will be led by two counselors. My small group consists of Eric Kao, Andrew Kuo, Alison Yang, Chelsea Liu, Jessica Shen, Travis Overton, myself, and two awesome counselors: Godwin Chen and Jing Wang.
As a first group camper, I went in without knowing what I had gotten myself into. I only expected that small group time would be spending into reinforcing the speaker's daily lessons. O boy, I had never been so wrong in my life.
Yes, we did discuss a lot about the lessons that the speaker had to offer, but most of the time we played games and shared our life experiences while creating a group name and group representation. Interestingly enough, our group this year is named “Zodemon in the time of Opium War”. How we got to that point? I forgot. All I remember was the fun time we had thinking of a skit for it. Special thanks to the baby powder which Godwin owns…without it, the skit would be incomplete….lololololololo
It was also like a baggage dumpster. And I have to say, it felt good to let it out. I honestly don't think I can ask for a better group!
ROOMMATE
This was another thing I was nervous about. I feared the possible awkwardness which may occur, but never did. I was roomed with Jason Lai from Ohio. He was an outgoing person with many personality traits which resemble my own. We would often talk to each other about our days at TAF and our lives back at home. It was quite a mind-opening experience.
Just a side note. On the very first day we arrived at Manchester College, it was tradition for people to be tied with random people for the first meal. I think it was to force you to learn teamwork and force you to be acquainted with new people. Coincidentally, Jason and I were tied together
Ever since the Tea House party on Wednesday, Jason was dying to learn how to rave after seeing Mark Chen and I rocked the house that night. So, as a token of friendship, I decided to teach him what I know. I have to say I was shocked by his potential. In the a few hours, he learned butterfly, weave, and almost a complete set of arm-wraps. Quite good if you ask me.
LITTLE SIB
Some background information is needed before I can go any further for this. So basically, people in the Youth and College programs will each be assigned to one or two "little siblings" from the Junior or Junior High programs. Throughout the week, the siblings will interact with each other in several programs and have time to bond with each other to establish a good “sibling-like” relationship.
My very first sib is Kyleen Jan. She is very sweet and was very patient with me when I had to take care of some stuff. She expressed intense interest in raving after the demonstration given by Mark Chen and me. So I spent about 90% of the time of Wednesday night’s party teaching her like Alex Sun taught me. Although the music and the atmosphere were calling for me to join the rest of the crowd, the simple smile of self-satisfaction on Kyleen’s face was enough for me that night. It was time well-invested. We also had a blast during the annual water fight, which was a massive free-for-all, anything-goes water festival and it was simply the most wonderful thing ever. If there was one regret, it would be that I wore a white shirt to that….anyhow; I hope that she had a good time with me because I was very scared to have a little sib….
SWING CHOIR and CHOIR
So each program, except for the college program, had to dance a choreographed routine each year in TAF Night. TAF Night was basically a mini talent show for the parents and other programs. Although the dance was definitely weird, it was really fun to learn and dance along with the peers. I do have to say that the routine demonstrated by the staff members were definitely the BEST lololololol…goodness how many times did I lololololol? Lololololol is my small group’s group chant =P
As for Choir, every program will choose a song to sing while modify the lyrics to make it somehow related to TAF. This year, the Youth program chose “The World’s Greatest” by R. Kelly. I am not really a big fan of R. Kelly, but this song was extremely touching and very very very good. It’s one of my favorite songs now. With many musical talents in the Youth program, the song was implemented with extra-crispy melodious sensation that is very hard to describe. Joshua Lin, perhaps the most talented musician I have ever met in my life yet, grasped the tunes of the song on piano without a music sheet by simply hearing it a few times; Kevin Tang and Bronson’s finger-breaking guitar skills never ceased to amaze me; and Alison’s solid beat boxing skills guided the rest of the crew with well-timed beat and gave a formidable taste of modern touch definitely made the song the world’s best.
OTHER FUN STUFF
TAF also has two or three parties each year. Those parties took place in the Union Room, or the cafeteria of Manchester College. With Jason Hsu, my stepbrother-in-law as DJ, Mark Chen and I raved our hearts out while having a blast with other bboys at TAF. It felt great to rave next to Mark Chen because it reminded me of all the good times we had when he was still part of Midnight Rave. He still is and always will be, even though he won’t be physically performing with us in the Hinsdale Central Variety Show.
So there are several other traditions of TAF that I have not mentioned until now. I will start with the last day of TAF. Apparently if anyone dares to sleep on the night before departure, be prepared for a ton of scrubbing on your face the moment u wake up. Because people will doodle on you if you sleep! On the very last night of TAF, my small group moved our own bad mattresses into a small staff resident room. Although not the entire group was there because Alison had to leave that night for softball tryouts, we had a great time discussing about TCs and other stuff and were definitely stuffed with pizzas and other junk food.
Oh right, I haven’t explained what TCs are. TC stands for TAF crush. It’s another one of those traditions of TAF. Basically you are expected to have a crush on someone at TAF. Yes, even if you don’t have one, you WILL have one by last night of TAF. Interestingly enough, I turn out to be my TC’s TC. As for who, I won’t tell. If you really wanna know, make me.
FINAL THOUGHTS
At long last, this blog has come to an end. I really don’t have a final thoughts or wrap-ups for this blog simply because I don’t want this memory to have a period mark at the end of it. To me, this TAF experience is very valuable and will always be treasured deep in my memory bank. And I want it to continue to flow back to me until TAF 2009. From now on, I will always be labeled as TAFer, and I am damn proud of it.
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