Good question! Tour of Taiwan (ToT) and Night Market are very similar, except for the fact that Night Market is outdoors and slightly more large-scale than ToT. These are our two largest jhuTASA-planned and run events, with ToT being held in the fall and Night Market being held in the spring!
Tour of Taiwan (ToT) is typically held in the fall semester, usually in the Glass Pavilion on campus. At ToT, jhuTASA members (that includes you!) help to cook and serve authentic and delicious Taiwanese foods such as popcorn chicken/tofu, scallion pancakes, stir-fried cabbage, and much more! You don't need a ton of prior cooking experience to help out at all, especially if you choose to serve food instead! Additionally, we set up games and other activities for students to enjoy during throughout the night, such as photo booths with a Tubs standee, balloon-popping for prizes, performances put on by some of Hopkins' most talented student organizations (like Lion Dance club, Baila, a capella groups, and more)! We have a limited number of people who can be in the Glass Pavilion at a time, so there's usually a line circulating around the room from the outside! That's how many people come! We understand that a large indoor group setting will not be possible given the ongoing COVID-19 situation, but we're planning a pretty cool outdoors alternative (hopefully still featuring a bunch of other student organizations, your favorite foods, and educational/trivia events) that we're super excited to get started on!
Night Market is basically ToT, but bigger! If you've ever heard of/been to an actual Taiwanese night market, jhuTASA's Night Market event looks a lot like that! For those who haven't, night markets are a great way to experience all of the amazing food, culture, and creativity that Taiwan has to offer! There are typically stalls lined up next to stores that go down the entire length of a number of streets selling all kinds of merchandise, from clothing to arcade games to fortune telling services! Unfortunately, due to university safety restrictions, it can't actually happen in the dark, but we get as close to it as we possibly can! Night Market is typically held in the spring semester, where we host all of the events that happen at ToT in addition to a sumo-wrestling competition and more student groups who come to serve food. We also have the opportunity to support UMD's (University of Maryland's) Night Market by attending theirs, just like how they attend ours! We're still not entirely sure how spring semester is going to work, but we're determined to make Night Market as big a part of campus culture as it has been in years past!
