October 14, 1998: Taiwan and China open up their highest level talks in five years, which is enough for CNN.com to run it as their top story in world headlines. The TCS web site is again linked from the CNN story, causing page hits to jump up from perhaps 15 per week to nearly 1000 each day.

Saturday, November 14, 1998: TCS hosts the first-ever BITSA Conference, BITSA '98. The conference is entitled "Fortune's Way: The Taiwanese-American Path to Success" and seeks to explore the different ways Taiwanese and Taiwanese Americans have found "success", whether by traditional or contemporary definitions, in today's society.

December 12, 1998: TCS holds a karaoke night.

Monday, January 11, 1999: TCS holds a reading-period study break and scallion pancake-making workshop in the common room in 20 DeWolfe Street. This event is also used as an opportunity to see Henry Hsieh off for the final time before his departure the following day for the South Pole.

February 12, 1999: TCS holds its annual elections. Minority Student Alliance representative Chanda Ho and former secretary Henry Hsieh (having returned from the Antarctic less than two weeks prior) are elected co-presidents, edging out the third co-presidential candidate, Harvard Foundation representative and treasurer Carey Hsu. First-year representative Helen Lo is elected treasurer. Current secretary Shelley Day is re-elected to the same position. Publicity co-chair Grace Kao is elected educational & cultural chair, while first-year representative Kenny Wang is elected to the newly created position of social chair. Having fallen short in the co-presidential contest, Carey Hsu is elected to the newly consolidated position of Harvard Foundation and MSA representative. Newcomers to the officer board are Sandy Chang and Lewis Shi who are elected to be TCS's new publicity co-chairs, and Kathy Chang who is elected public relations chair and BITSA representative.

Friday-Saturday, February 19-20, 1999: The newly elected TCS officers board holds a new officers retreat, reserving a room at the Copley Marriott Hotel for the night, to go over plans for the upcoming year and to bond. And of course, to toss pens.

Tuesday, February 23, 1999: TCS shifts its weekly Taiwanese Table to Quincy House Dining Hall's Griswold Room.

Friday, February 26, 1999: Led by first-year representative Helen Lo, TCS holds its second successful annual Winterfest.

Saturday, March 6, 1999: BITSA holds its second intercollegiate banquet and karaoke night, entitled "Super Saturday at Kashbox", at the TECO Cultural Center in Chinatown. As part of the karaoke competition, but in the absence of functional karaoke equipment, the TCS guys nevertheless deliver a stirring rendition of the Beach Boys' Kokomo, complete with 3-part harmony, beach garb, and plastic pineapple.

Sunday, March 7, 1999: The new TCS officers board holds its first open officers meeting of the semester. Despite efforts to attract members with soda and chips, the first open meeting gets off to a slow start, member-wise, attracting only immediately former co-president Yu-Han Chang, prompting secretary Shelley Day to remark "You're not an addition! You're like a leftover!" Well, the officers had fun anyway, at one point "bowling" with their unopened two-liter soda bottles.

March 12-14, 1999: The Harvard Film Archive presents a 3-day touring film exhibition in the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts. The exhibition is entitled Crossing Waves, and is the first-ever such major exhibition devoted to showcasing the ground-breaking documentaries of Taiwan. Through connections with the Harvard University Taiwan Study Club (HUTSC), TCS manages to acquire a number of free tickets to the event, which it distributes to interested members.

April 9, 1999: TCS kicks off Taiwan Awareness Week, affectionately dubbed "TAWk", with a screening of the award-winning WGBH documentary "Tug of War" in Harvard Hall. Co-sponsored by the Harvard University Taiwan Study Club (HUTSC), the screening of the documentary, a work that highlights the history of Taiwan, its people, and their relationships with mainland China, also features a discussion and question & answer session with the show's producer/director Judith Vecchione.

April 12, 1999: joint SAA/TCS study break.

April 13, 1999: TCS holds its first brunch run of the spring semester, heading out to Chinatown's Taiwan Cafe.

April 13, 1999: Taiwan Awareness Week continues with a Taiwanese puppetry workshop, presented by Harvard East Asian Studies department instructor Sue-Mei Wu and held in Weld Common Room.

2. Taiwan Awareness Week (TAWk) (4/9 - 4/16) - SAA/TCS study break, Monday 4/12

Wednesday, April 14, 1999: Premier Zhu Rongji of the People's Republic of China visits MIT.

Thursday, April 15, 1999: Taiwanese Awareness Week draws to a close as TCS co-hosts a discussion on Taiwanese women's issues with the Radcliffe Union of Students, held in Agassiz House's Lyman Common Room in Radcliffe Yard.

Sunday, April 18, 1999: brunch run to Taiwan Cafe

Sunday, April 18, 1999: The TCS ultimate frisbee team takes to the field against the Harvard Society of Physics Students (SPS). The two teams fight hard, battling nearly to a deadlock, but with TCS eventually coming out on top 10-9, extending its undefeated record to 3-0, despite operating without the services of regulars Liam McAllister and Kathy Chang (who defected to SPS), Lewis Shi (who was resting up for Monday's Boston Marathon), and Yu-Han Chang (who just failed to wake up by 4 in the afternoon). Members of the victorious TCS squad include Eric Hsu, Helen Lo, Dave Dinin, Carey Hsu, Kaiwen Kam, Yu Yasufuku, Henry Hsieh, and alumnus Eric Yeh.

Monday, April 19, 1999: After much discussion as to the propriety and value of a second BITSA conference held at Harvard, TCS puts out a call for applications for Harvard BITSA '99 committee chairs. At the same time, the TCS officer board (though mainly co-presidents Chanda Ho and Henry Hsieh, and BITSA '98 alumni social chair Kenny Wang and Harvard Foundation representative Carey Hsu) begins active recruiting for applicants, developing a list of former officers, current TCS members, and friends and roommates of TCS members, in an attempt to draw the bulk of the conference staff from outside the current officer board.

Saturday, April 24, 1999: As part of Harvard's prospective student weekend ("pre-frosh weekend"), TCS hosts a reception in Harvard Hall to greet potential members of the Harvard Class of 2003 and answer any questions they may have about TCS or Harvard in general. In addition to serving a variety of Taiwanese treats including chua bing and mua-ji, TCS compiles an informational packet for prospective students which contains, among other things, a contact list of current TCSers detailing home and school addresses and phone numbers and academic concentrations, and a list of "Things I Wish I Knew Before Coming to Harvard" compiled from TCS members. The reception is originally scheduled to be in Boylston Hall's Ticknor Lounge, but after booking the lounge over two months in advance, TCS is informed just days before pre-frosh weekend that the lounge was inadvertently double-booked. Rumors swirl briefly that as an academic department with supposedly higher priority than student groups, the Korean Studies department simply usurped the booking from TCS for a conference they were holding that day, but as there was nothing that could be done, TCS was left to go scrambling for an alternate location. The logistical snafu also forces the cancellation of a pan-Asian reception to be held immediately following the TCS event in the same location. The reception was to have involved representatives from the Harvard Asian American Association, Chinese Students Association, Hong Kong Club, Japan Society, Korean Association, Harvard Philippine Forum, and the Harvard Vietnamese Association. Later that evening, those same groups co-sponsor a pan-Asian pre-frosh dance entitled Dance Ascension, held in Eliot Dining Hall.

Sunday, April 25, 1999: The TCS ultimate frisbee team again defeats SPS in a rematch of their game from the previous weekend, this time by a score of 14-10, extending its record to 4-0. Players defending TCS honor on the field of battle this week include Kathy Chang, Yu-Han Chang, Henry Hsieh, Eric Hsu, Kaiwen Kam, Helen Lo, Lewis Shi, and Yu Yasufuku.

Tuesday, April 27, 1999: TCS hosts Ms. Hsun Chang of the Harvard East Asian Languages department at its weekly Taiwanese Table in Quincy Dining Hall's Griswold Room.

Friday, April 30, 1999: TCS co-sponsors a tea, karaoke, and mahjongg night with the Chinese Students Association, held in Loker Commons.

Thursday May 6, 1999: After much discussion and shuffling of positions by co-presidents Chanda Ho and Henry Hsieh, TCS announces the selection of the 1999 BITSA Conference staff. Former BITSA '98 publicity co-chair Emily Ko and former TCS publicity co-chair Charles Lin are selected co-directors. Former first-year representative Grace Liu and newcomer Angie Tseng are chosen to serve as programming co-chairs. All other positions are filled by newcomers to TCS officer boards and/or staffs, with William Lee and Karen Tseng chosen as business co-chairs, Pamela Peng and Alex Young chosen as publicity co-chairs, Vicki Chou chosen as social chair, Tannie Huang chosen as graphic design chair (due to lack of suitable applicants, the responsibilities of the operations chair position is largely left to the social chair), and William Lee chosen to double as conference webmaster, fulfilling the goal of filling the conference staff entirely with non-officers. While she was wavering prior to the announcement of positions, Karen Guo later indicates to Chanda and Henry that she would like to serve on the BITSA staff after all. After considering their options, Chanda and Henry find a solution amenable to all by switching Karen Tseng to the newly reconstituted operations chair position (which she had originally requested anyway) and re-assigning the vacant business co-chair position to Karen Guo.

Sunday, May 9, 1999: Co-presidents Chanda Ho and Henry Hsieh host the opening introductory BITSA '99 staff meeting, introducing staffers to each other and to the additionally designated staff "advisors" (former BITSA '98 staffers Carey Hsu and Kenny Wang, as well as Chanda and Henry themselves), handing out various informational packets to each staff member, and then turning over control to conference co-directors Emily Ko and Charles Lin. The rest of the meeting consists of initial brainstorming of a conference theme, a tentative date, and speaker and entertainment options.

Sunday, May 9, 1999: Carrying on the grand tradition of TCS athletics, TCS challenges the Harvard Chinese Students Association to a friendly soccer game, a challenge that is only partly answered as CSA fails to muster up enough attendance to field a complete team and is forced to concede the forfeit victory to the eager and raring-to-go TCS contingent. The TCS team is made up of Kathy Chang, Eric Dai, Henry Hsieh, Carey Hsu, Eric Hsu, Loretta Kim, Charles Lin, Crispin Ong, Lewis Shi, Jeff Tsai, and Jonathan Yang.

May 15, 1999: TCS holds its annual senior farewell picnic. Held again at JFK Park, the picnic features sandwiches, chips, and soda provided by Harvard Dining Services as usual. For the senior gifts, co-president Henry Hsieh designs, prints out, and frames personalized photo collages of each senior's most memorable TCS moments (or at least the ones that photos were available for).

August 6, 1999: summer wisteria house run