I completed this week my first round of the course 1 characters. It was quite a lot of work to make all of them but I'm now able to concentrate every week on one chapter. I had my first two chapters' test on Wednesday and tomorrow is the chapter 3. I was able to get back to schedule even if I was lazy at first week.
It's a funny thing to be able to recognize some of the characters in real when walking around the city. Of course it's right now just a character here and there but still some practising all the time. Using the Chinese language, understanding others is getting better. My skills and vocabulary is limited but with small steps it's possible to achieve the final goal.
I would say this week was almost all learning. I actually left the campus only on Thursday to go to a shopping mall and on Saturday and Sunday to meet my friends, have a lunch and a dinner. I hope we can find an apartment with the help of my friend next week, it's been quite complicated to live on the mountain, climbing daily many times a lot of stairs to get back to my room. I try to find an apartment in a central location so that everything would be next to me. In Taipei there are a lot of possibilities but a little bit bad thing is that renting an apartment is usually at least for one year. It's a bit stagnating, especially when you're hunting a job almost anywhere in Taiwan and other Asian countries.
I found some nice restaurants already in Shilin area. I have my ”favorite” steak place which isn't because of the super good taste but big portions and Taiwanese style service (drinks, starters included the price except beer; steak is served with an egg and noodles). Today I tried a nice Vietnamese restaurant.
Food is normally inexpensive but I have to say almost every time it's with a Taiwanese ”twist”, for example pasta is usually over-cooked and sauces are probably made of the canned stuff. I must say that Taiwanese sausages are very nice, meat is rough but that works well for me. Also the small pies (like Finnish meat-loaf pie, here not deep fried) are nice, especially the one with oysters inside. 
Here at the campus I ate several times egg-wrapped rice which is originally from Japan but popular in Taiwan, too. I have no idea if it's something else than just rice and tomate sauce but that's what it look likes. You can add a steak or other meat aside to this one if you like.