I remember just arriving to Taipei not too long ago, struggling to read the Chinese street signs, learning to take the MRT, and trying to communicate with taxi drivers so they don't drop us off in the middle of nowhere. But now, our last day has come! We were finally veterans now when it comes to navigating from Howard Hotel to TMU!
We were treated to a farewell party by TMU, during which each of us presented feelings from the trip. Personally, this trip has touched me in a way that I could have never imagined! Because this was my first GM class, I not only got to experience the wonders of Taiwan, learn about the success and blunders of Taiwan's health care system, and enjoy the amazing Taiwan culture, but I also got to feel the love of the GM family and bond with many of my fellow students. This experience also reminded me why I chose global medicine in the first place. Hearing from doctors, patients, and administrators in a different country has opened my perspective of the world. I believe that this course truly embodied the global medicine program and has been such a memorable personal, academic, and cultural experience for me!
After all the warm speeches and the sad goodbyes, we were ready to begin our presentations!!! I haven't blogged about our presentations before... but basically, we designated our own groups and chose our own topics to present in front of the class. My group consisted of Barsegh and James and we were presenting on Chinese medicine and its affect on health, specifically depression. I focused mostly on the spiritual side of Chinese medicine, such as feng shui. Barsegh focused on the mental side of Chinese medicine, such as meditation and James focused on the more biomedical side of Chinese medicine, such as herbal medicine. Together, we evaluated how each of the different types of Chinese medicine was viewed by both Eastern and Western society and how each were believed to have positive health effects.
In addition to presenting, we also listened to other groups' presentations and evaluated them based off of which grade we believed that they deserved. I, personally, thought that everyone did a great job considering the small amount of time we had to actually meet and research! All of the topics were very interesting and all of them tied into the different lectures, meetings, and experiences that we had during this trip.
After the presentations, most students ventured out to buy gifts for families. I, however, met up with my grandmother and uncle to say goodbye to them! I rarely see my family in Taiwan, so this trip gave me a wonderful opportunity to reconnect with my family!!!
After visiting them, I returned to the hotel for a goodbye party hosted by our hotel's manager, C.K. Leong! What a character! We got to chat with C.K. and with his hospitality employees and learn a little more about their lives. This was such a relaxing and enjoyable social experience that I'm glad we got to experience. Afterwards, most of the group decided to hit up some Taiwan night life for the very last time! Let's just end it here by saying that it was a very good night, indeed!
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