On Nov. 5, the Taiwanese High School, HSNU or High School of Taiwan Normal University, sophomore class visited ARHS campus from Second Block to Lunch.

Initially, at the start of third block, ARHS students participating in this event were situated at the back of the lecture hall. While waiting, Mandarin Language teacher YinShan Yang talked to the students about the mannerisms and reminders of the meetings, which were held every week at lunch leading up to the day of the event.

Mandarin students freshened up on their Mandarin, topics of speech, and information about themselves. Many students were nervous, the hard work and preparation of entertaining guests from a foreign country was fairly intimidating.

Additionally, the small accumulation of journalists and photographers seated at the back of the room didn’t help settle the nerves.

Then it began. A flood of students in white and blue uniforms, each individualized by unique articles of clothing, filled the room with laughter and smiles.

While walking in, Taiwanese students were greeted by ARHS faculty and a long train of food reaching from the entrance of the room to the back. Taiwanese students were seated and the speeches started.

While the journalists moved to the front, representatives of both schools spoke about their gratitude towards the opportunity. Once the speeches were over, an exchange of gifts was made. Riordan gave each faculty member a gift bag of ARHS merchandise, while HSNU gave a gift bag full of their school own merchandise as well their school merchandise as well as numerous boxes of Taiwanese pastries intended for every faculty in the school.

The kind gesture was relentlessly recorded as countless reporters and photographers rushed to the front to snag a picture and ask questions.

Once this was over, students were assigned a partner to shadow, and during the entirety of third block, Taiwanese students were guests of Riordan students, following them to assigned classes.

Throughout the period, each student was given an activity while class was in session. In the middle of the block, the Taiwanese students surprised their assigned partners with gift bags full of snacks, pictures, postcards, letters, and HSNU merchandise.

Once the gift giving was done, students socialized with one another. Through this, many students found the line of differences between each other to be very minimal. One student from HSNU welcomed to the pleasant aromas of food. Now sitting in a mingled room, students’ voices filled the air, and chatter amongst the two schools’ students remained very apparent. Finally, the bell rang, and saddened to depart, students exchanged numbers and social media handles to continue to keep in contact with one another. named Sabina, mentioned, “I feel like before, I thought American students would be blond and blue eyes, but there is a great amount of diversity in your school.”

After socializing with Taiwanese students for an entire period, many were sad to be sent back to the lecture hall for the final moments together with their newly made friends. Upon re-entrance, students were