Home Blog SOFA Community Space Event Recaps 🌍 Navigating Freshers' Events in Taiwan: How 40+ International Arrivals Kickstarted Their Taipei Journey at SOFA
[ 5:00 PM: Free Eats, Drinks & Global Mingling ]
[ 7:00 PM: Taiwan-Themed Pictionary Icebreaker ]
[ 8:00 PM: Resident Panel: "Life in Taiwan" Honest Advice ]
[ 9:00 PM–Late: Free-Flow Drinks & International Karaoke ]Moving to a new country for university, exchange programs, or remote work is an exhilarating milestone. But ask any international newcomer during their first week in Taiwan, and they’ll tell you the same thing: finding your social circle in a foreign city can feel overwhelming.
Whether you are enrolling at top Taipei universities like NTU, NCCU, or NTUST, NTNU arriving as a Mandarin language student, or starting a new job, the beginning of the semester usually triggers a search for orientation events, language exchanges, and welcome parties across the city. We all know the first week is all about finding your footing and friends and while university welcome weeks provide essential administrative campus tours, finding a relaxed, genuine international community outside the classroom is where real friendships begin.
To kick off the new semester, we hosted our massive Newcomers Welcome Night at SOFA, our dedicated community event space in Taipei.
Here is what went down when nearly 40 foreign residents, students, and locals came together for food, games, insider life advice, and late-night karaoke!
The ground floor is the greeting station where we had our name tags and refreshments for icebreaker activities, and casual evening drinks, serves as the primary gathering hub.
Full Bar Setup: Outfitted with a complete bar counter for serving free-flow drinks, cocktails, and refreshments during events.
Open Social Flow: The open layout allows incoming guests to grab a drink, mingle easily, and break the ice naturally upon arrival.
Music & Party Atmosphere: Built to handle high-energy music, late-night DJ sets, and lively party crowds as events peak.
During the evening we traveled back and forth to the second floor, The second floor offers a expansive ,relaxed, multifunctional space built for comfort and community connection .We played our games here and use the projector to display many different things.
HD Projector & Big Screen Setup: Outfitted with a high-definition projector and audio system—ideal for movie nights, presentation slide decks, gaming tournaments, or live sports viewings.
"Chill Talk" Zone: Furnished with plush seating and flexible lounge arrangements where attendees can sit back, engage in meaningful conversations, trade travel tips, or hold small panel discussions.
Flexible Layout: Easily transforms from a cozy workshop room during the day into an interactive game room (like our famous Taiwan-themed Pictionary nights) in the evening.
The doors at SOFA opened at 5:00 PM as new arrivals began streaming in. Before launching into structured icebreakers, everyone grabbed free food and drinks to unwind after a long week of university registration, ARC paperwork, and apartment hunting.
Our community grows more diverse every single term. The room quickly turned into a vibrant melting pot of cultures, featuring:
A massive Spanish speaking group including Spanish and Argentine cohort bringing incredible energy and language learning practice for the rest of us.
International exchange students from Germany and across Europe
Local Taiwanese residents eager to help newcomers who wanted to do cultural exchange with foreigners
Expats, language learners, and digital nomads from around the world
For many attendees who just arrived in Taiwan in the week prior , this relaxed casual hour was their very first chance to meet people outside their specific university dorms or workplaces.
By 7:00 PM, with over 20+ people gathered and the lounge buzzing, we officially kicked off our main group icebreaker: Taiwan-Themed Pictionary!
To make it fun and educational for newcomers, all the drawing prompts revolved around iconic elements of Taiwanese culture and daily life:
Classic Essentials: Boba milk tea, 7-Eleven convenience store storefronts, and yellow YouBikes.
Local Sights & Food: Scooters in traffic, bento boxes (Biàndāng), night market stalls, and Taipei 101.
Nothing breaks language barriers faster than mixed-nationality teams trying to decipher frantic stick-figure drawings under a 60-second countdown timer!
During the course of the evening many Taiwan new comer foreigners were curious about different things so following the game, we held a short sharing panel where 3 current foreigners who lived here for close to a decade each took the mic to give new arrivals an honest look at what living on the island is really like.
They passed on practical, real-world insight:
learning Chinese: When coming to Taiwan most foreigners attempt to learn Chinese in some form or another , whether through school, tutors and just by living here , many of the foreigners were here on huayu enrichment scholarships of other school programs to learn Chinese so we invited a foreigner who has learn Chinese to the extent that he even created his own app.
Getting outside your comfort zone (the foreigner circle): The second person following one from the first guy talked about making friends and how he made friends inside school and outside school who introduce him to many events he would not had gone to if it wasn't for trying new things. For many foreigners from Europe, Australia , north america and Latin america, Taiwan (Asia ) and some people choose to try new things while others stay in their comfort zone with same friend or fellow countrymen and leave never doing new things.ultimately to truly experience new cultures you need to try to join a wide variety of community to experience taiwan.
Once the stories wrapped up, the lounge shifted into party mode as we brought out the karaoke setup which is on the Gound floor.
From Spanish pop anthems and Latin hits brought by our Argentine and Spanish group to classic international karaoke jams, everyone took turns on the mic until late into the night.
Moving to a foreign country can feel overwhelming, but you don't have to navigate it alone.
Events like our Welcome Night at SOFA are designed to give every resident an instant home base—a place where you can make lifelong international friends, share advice, and experience Taipei together from Day 1.
Missed this event? Keep an eye on our community calendar for upcoming weekend trips, culture nights, and lounge parties at SOFA!
