The Japan–Taiwan Student Association started to cooperate with its counterpart in Taiwan, the Taiwan–Japan Student Association, in order to encourage exchanges between students from Taiwan and from Japan, by holding Japan–Taiwan Student Conferences.

The Japan–Taiwan Student Association held the 13^th Japan–Taiwan Student Conference in Osaka, from August 23 to 31, 2018, with 78 participants from Taiwan and Japan. Lin Shih-Yin, Director of the Education Division of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in Japan was invited to speak at the opening ceremony on August 24.

Director Lin began by welcoming the students from Taiwan and Japan who were participating in this meaningful event. He pointed out that it is very important for them to learn about the differences between Taiwan and Japan, and also to cultivate their insights about the nature of different cultures.

Director Lin gave an example of escalators in Japan. There’s no binding rule there about whether people should stand on the left or the right when taking an escalator. The people in the Kansai area are used to standing on the right side; in contrast, people in the Kanto area stand on the left side. There’s simply no set convention regarding taking escalators in Japan.

Director Lin said that although the time for interaction at the conference was rather short, he hoped that the students from Taiwan and Japan would be open-minded to getting to know each other well. The main objective of the conference was to learn to respect different cultures. And he said that he hoped that the students from Taiwan would observe how Japanese people keep on improving the quality of their work and their products, even if the change is only slight. This focus on improvement is a core value of Japanese culture.

Photo:Participants in the 13^th Japan-Taiwan Student Conference.