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Saturday, June 7th, 2025

Day 16 in Taiwan

Day 16 was mostly spent at Dharma Drum Mountain, one of the largest Buddhist Monasteries in the world. We spent our day at the attached University doing a variety of activities that included many different types of mediation, two different tea events, lecture events, and a discussion with a Monk and two Nuns. The first part of the day consisted of a long session of meditation. We started with seated meditation like what we had previously practiced with Professor Young in our lecture sessions. I noticed that it gets easier to relax, sit still, and focus on breathing the more […]

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Saturday, June 7th, 2025

Day Sixteen – Taipei

This day was wholly focused on our visit to Dharma Drum Mountain, which we stayed at for about seven hours. I felt like this was going to be one of the biggest stretches out of our comfort zone, as the day would be filled primarily with meditation and lecture. However, I was looking forward to taking a break from furiously taking notes and having the excuse to put my phone away for a day. I also was excited to see even such a small glimpse into what a Buddhist monastic’s life is like at Dharma Drum Mountain and compare it […]

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Saturday, June 7th, 2025

Day 15 in Taiwan

We started our day off with a cooking class!! I have been looking forward to this excursion throughout the whole trip and it definitely met my expectations! We made Zongzi, a traditional food that is a part of the dragon boat fesitival. The unique story behind it is linked to Qu Yuan, the famous poet that committed suicide by jumping into the Miluo river. It is said that people threw Zongzi into the river to keep the fish from eating his body and as a way to honor him. Due to the significance of this food and the fact that […]

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Saturday, June 7th, 2025

Taiwan: Day 16 – Dharma Drum Mountain

Day 16 of our program in Taiwan entailed a 6 hour visit to Dharma Drum Mountain β€” a monastery nestled in the hills of northern Taiwan. We started our visit by receiving an introduction to the monastery, and then proceeded to engage in several meditative activities. Previously we had only meditated the way most people would imagine it β€” sitting, eyes closed, and letting your thoughts and feelings wash away. We did this too, however we were introduced to several other techniques. One of these involved slow walking in nature, where we walked in a slow pace while taking in […]

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Friday, June 6th, 2025

Day Fifteen – Taipei

Today our only official engagement was a cooking class! In honor of the Dragon Boat Festival, we made zongzi. I mentioned zongzi in my post from a few days ago, and it’s so fortuitous that we ended up making some today since I hadn’t gotten to try it!! Turns out it is a lot more labor intensive than I had thought; I’m not the greatest cook, but luckily we were working in teams of five and my teammates were all very skilled. I also got a lot of help from our teacher, and when she complimented my zongzi at the […]

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Friday, June 6th, 2025

Day Fourteen – Taipei

In the morning, we visited a movie and TV show production company called Studio76, which was founded by Dennis Yang. This company has a lot of influence in both Taiwan and also neighboring countries, both in movie production and in the sourcing of their scripts. They host an annual competition called RisingStories that receives scripts from all over Asia and even the United States. Their main focus is the acquisition of stories and investment into their production. They have since expanded to have other branches that help generate either more stable or more innovative sources of revenue. These branches both […]

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