the revision of Taiwan story-The Different Sunshine

Sonny Ding （981002902 丁潔瓊）
The Different Sunshine
Derived from the same Chinese cultural background, the hospitality that Taiwanese display is different from what the mainland people do. In fact, the overwhelming kindness and hospitality of Taiwanese have enabled many newcomers to better identify with this place and feel the sunshine of the island and its people.
This is what I have experienced in the street. One day when my friend and I were about to leave the sightseeing place, it was noon. Hot and hungry, we wanted to get into a nearby restaurant as soon as possible. Just as we were wandering along the street and looking for an eating place, three mid-aged women sitting under a big tree saw us and one of them came towards us with a bag in her hand. Approaching us, she filled her hands with candies and Taiwan Jujube and then handed them to each of us. “You must be from the mainland for your accents are not local, come and enjoy some of our sweet fruits in this hot weather.” she said.
Under the same situation, the mainland people are not likely to act in the same hospitable way. They might greet the people they meet in the streets and kindly give the directions if asked, but they won’t demonstrate themselves in such an instantly intimate way. As what one Taiwan student, who had been in mainland for a year, said in an interview: “being in an island which has been continuously receiving this kind of outside culture along its growing path from its youth, Taiwan, compared to mainland, China, is more quickly and ready to recognize the outsideness and embrace it with their unique hospitability.
Small as it is in terms of land area, Taiwan is more diverse than mainland China in a town of similar scale. It’s a small world with open-minded and hospitality-ready people, which has much room for outsiders like foreign tourists seen everywhere, from Japan, Korea, India, and so on.
Under the small culture that Taiwanese embrace, the people here tend to view the people they meet on the street not part of them, belonging to other cultures, more willing and eager to share their native culture with the people they meet. In mainland, China, people tend to identify everyone on the streets as part of them, thus they won’t be so quick and ready as Taiwanese, without the motivation to acknowledge the other culture, which they may not know belonging to other cultural backgrounds.


Thanks for the advice of Emma~