As beautiful as the ringworm on her body: a review of Sorceress Diguwan

Sorceress Diguwan by Badai

I'm a blockhead.

I don't do stream of consciousness, and I'm not a fan of I like novels with intentionally beguiling names like Autumn of the Sixteenth Nephrologist. Novels that your white mom would read in her book club that the gals winkingly called "Prosé" because they meet to discuss books and drink rosé. I like novels that are creative, but also follow a novel structure predictable enough that when it's subverted, you go "oh so like Arundhati Roy did that one time." 

I'm also sucker for a surprising line. I don't mean those postmodern writerly affectations where being out of place or saying something shocking just makes you sound like all the other writers who've already done that. 

A novel doesn't actually have to be perfectly paced or structured or even particularly surprising, if it's different enough to keep my attention. Give me enough of an undercurrent and I'll happily float down even the longest roman fleuves.

So, did I like Badai's Sorceress Diguwan? I did. 

It was not a perfectly constructed novel. It begins with an intriguing premise; in 1917, the wife of the youngest son of a Hoklo family living on Puyuma Indigenous land commits suicide, and the sorceresses of Damalagaw springs into action to ensure her choice doesn't bring evil spirits to the tribe. The most powerful among these sorceresses is the playful Diguwan, who happens to be drunk on homemade wine when we first meet her.

As the villagers deal with the patriarch of the family, Japanese authorities in nearby Taitung grow suspicious and vow to keep an eye on their activities. 

Then there's a middle section describing a long training excursion for young Indigenous men. I didn't really see how this was connected to the previous plot: was it simply describing the events of one year without concern for whether they were connected or not? I never did figure this out. Many of the same characters are featured, but they're not doing anything that seems particularly related to everything that had just transpired.

The events from the beginning of the novel do come back around to affect the third act. By then, however, I was struggling to remember who some of the characters were. Certainly the Japanese officials had not been mentioned for so long that I couldn't really remember who was whom. When one of them appeared in the village, I had to flip back to the beginning to figure out why it was relevant. It didn't help that most of the characters were underdeveloped; I had nothing specific to remember them by.  All the middle section did (for me) was illustrate that Diguwan had powers most sorceresses did not. I don't know that this point required one-third of a novel to make.

The last part of the novel centered around Indigenous-Japanese and inter-tribal conflicts regarding homemade guns. Those final scenes were indeed riveting, and I was glad I pushed through the novel to get there. The Hoklo family showed up again too, but the suicide -- a key event in the beginning -- seemed to play no significant role. After some discussion in the beginning of how the women of Damalagaw were treated better by the men than Hoklo women were treated in their society, I still felt that sexism was an accepted norm. There was even a young, beautiful female character who was having trouble finding love because she was considered too 'smart, intelligent, capable and somehow powerful'! (I'm spoiling it a bit, but it was hinted that she did, in fact, find a mate, but at least for me, it's left unclear. The story simply moves on). 

Other plot threads are left hanging; the main inter-village conflict is settled, but another one looms with Naibeluk, which is deeper in the mountains. That never quite comes to fruition.

The translation is littered with mistakes and oddities; it was edited, but even accounting for the notion that an award-winning manuscript should retain as much of the author's voice as possible in translation, it needed another run-through. 

But then the titular sorceress is said to appreciate the marks on a tree that were "as beautiful as the ringworm on her body." 

That ringworm lives rent-free in my head...

...wait, that sounds wrong. Anyway. I love a great line. It was weird, it was unexpected, and -- I suppose rather like a parasitic worm -- I was hooked. 

So far, I've made it sound like I came to appreciate a deeply flawed novel. I suppose that's true. After all, it is flawed, and I appreciate it. Frankly, I appreciate that it's a novel at all. There is a fair amount of Indigenous Taiwanese writing available in English translation. Not enough, but perhaps more than you'd expect if you didn't go looking for it. Most of it is not in novel form. There are many short stories available, and at least one book that's purely stream-of-consciousness. I chose not to purchase that one at eslite when I read that it was praised for having essentially no punctuation. Like, two periods in the whole thing. 

Innovation is great and all, but I like punctuation, and I like novels. I'm a blockhead, remember? Perhaps that's a me problem, but it doesn't make it any less true. 

There's more to like about Sorceress Diguwan than some fun prose and the fact that it exists, though. If you want insight into what Taitung-area Indigenous life was like in the Japanese colonial era, you probably can't do better. Badai was born in the 1960s and so isn't writing an eyewitness account, but the story is drawn from interviews with tribal elders. 

Badai presents a world that is certainly culturally different to the West, but also quite different from Hoklo and Hakka settler society. It's not just that the story is about Puyuma people living in Puyuma villages. Everything from the treatment of women to the use of sorcery to methods of conflict resolution and pathways to adulthood are different. The ways in which Indigenous villages selectively adopted ideas from other groups -- from farming techniques to straw shoes -- was fascinating in its intentionality, at least as described in the novel. 

Some of it did challenge my Western sensibilities. There's a scene where Mawneb, the gun manufacturer, insists that the person suspected of stealing his favorite gun should prove their innocence, rather than insist Mawneb must prove them guilty (as the latter is impossible to do...or so it seems). I'm not sure if that's how society in those villages truly functioned, or just a conceit of Mawneb, but I'll admit I'm still a fan of innocent until proven guilty. 

The scene along the trail, however, was excellent reading. I might be annoyed that the initial catalyst -- the suicide of the abused Hoklo woman -- ceased to play an important role in the story so early on. But ringworm and all, Sorceress Diguwan is worth reading.

What Asian Americans think of their ancestral homelands, other Asian countries, and the US

Bit of a ponderous title, I know, but I'm writing this quickly. Lots of cool data just dropped from Pew on how Asian Americans feel about their homeland, other countries in Asia, and the US. 

You can read all of the data here, including some interesting parts on whether Asian Americans would move (or move back) to their homelands -- most wouldn't -- what immigrants vs. those born in the US think, and who different groups think will be the leading economic power in the coming decade (most still posit that it will be the US, China is a distant second.)

I want to focus on the things I find interesting. Pew, of course, won't speculate on reasons for the data unless they're direct responses from those surveyed. I, however, can do what I like! Just be aware that this is my opinion, and I'm just as capable of being wrong as any other person.

Some of the data is unsurprising: just about every group views their ancestral homeland more favorably than any other group. Taiwanese, South Koreans and Japanese view their own homeland more favorably than anywhere else listed, but that's not necessarily true for every group, with (for instance) Chinese Americans viewing the US, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan more favorably than China. This doesn't shock me: I could imagine viewing democratic nations with advanced economies favorably if you or your ancestors came from China -- famously unevenly developed, and certainly not free and democratic. 

Taiwanese have very highly favorable ratings of Taiwan, which is fantastic to see. There's a narrative about that Taiwanese are running away from the "ghost island" because life is getting harder for the middle class, real estate prices are skyrocketing, wages stagnating, and career opportunities curtailed. Perhaps -- Taiwan is hardly perfect -- but that's not reflected in how Taiwanese Americans feel about Taiwan. 

There is data on how Chinese Americans view China and Taiwan broken down by whether they're immigrants or US-born, but not Taiwanese Americans. That data is interesting, and I'll show it here, but not really what I want to focus on. 

Also unsurprising is the overall negative view of China, even among Chinese Americans. No other group shows this. Even Vietnam, the Philippines and India are favorably looked upon by those with that ancestry....but not China! China is not only widely disliked by Chinese Americans, but Asian Americans in general. 

It's also interesting to me that Chinese Americans view Taiwan more favorably than China (62% vs 41%). With all the influence operations coming out of China, backed by massive amounts of money and government support, it must be a blow to the CCP that Chinese Americans still don't like China very much, and in fact Taiwan -- which isn't even trying to court them! -- ranks higher than their own ancestral homeland. 

What's more, despite the CCP's attempt to portray the US as well as Asian democracies, especially those with advanced economies, as cesspools of crime, divisiveness and misery, Chinese Americans not only view them more favorably than China, but also think the US will continue to be the leading economic power in the next decade. Although Chinese Americans rank China's potential to be the world's top economy higher than any other group, it's still not a great result for China. 

Again, The Media has already created my reaction for me.

While Chinese Americans view China more favorably than any other group does, it's still just 41%. That's quite a bit lower than their favorability towards those aforementioned democracies with advanced economies. 

All I can say about this has already been expressed in song. (I prefer the cover, even though I've heard Radiohead hates it). 

In addition, as my glee is unbridled, please enjoy this gif of China disseminating non-stop hate at the US, Japan and Taiwan and then getting their comeuppance:

Also unsurprising is how unfavorably Taiwanese Americans view China: although other groups' favorability toward China is quite low, Taiwanese Americans really round out the pessimism at 2%. 

Gee, I wonder why. 

South Koreans being the only group to view Japan unfavorably was predictable. I'm more interested in how Japanese and Taiwanese view each others' countries. Again unsurprisingly despite the history of Japanese colonialism in Taiwan, Japanese and Taiwanese show an affinity for each other. 

Taiwanese rate Japan better than the US, and comparably with Taiwan. After the US and Japan, Japanese view Taiwan most favorably. Living in Taiwan this doesn't really shock me: Taiwanese generally seem to be very into Japan, much more so than Korea despite modern South Korean soft power. I do still hear Taiwanese in Taiwan say they like the refinement of Japanese culture and the cleanliness of Japan, but find Koreans "arrogant" or "hot-tempered". I don't particularly agree with that -- in general I enjoy visiting South Korea -- I'm just reporting what locals have said to me. It's not surprising that it would spill out into an immigrant population. 

Basically, Taiwanese like K-pop, Korean dramas and Korean fashion. But as a country to visit, they overwhelmingly seem to prefer Japan. I have been told outright that this is a cultural affinity thing (plus, in general, kanji is readable to Taiwanese whereas Korean is not.)

There's a popular deep blue-red (KMT/Chinese) narrative that Taiwanese love Japan because of some sort of colonized mindset. You know, the dog trained by its master loves its master or something. This also pops up in far left Taiwanese discourse, though perhaps not as much. I don't think it's true: ask just about any Taiwanese if they think Japanese colonialism was a good thing, and they'll say no -- colonization is never "good". But, a lot of Japanese culture seeped into Taiwan in those 50 years, and I can understand a certain perspective that Japanese colonialism, while not "good", was better than the Qing colonialism that came before, and the KMT colonizers that came after. 

Yes, the Qing and the Nationalists were/are both colonizing entities on Taiwan. That they came from China and most Taiwanese can trace some or all of their ancestry to China does not matter (and when the Qing arrived, most Taiwanese actually could not say their ancestors were Chinese. Qing settler colonialism changed that). Their mentality was -- and in the case of the KMT, is -- that of the colonizer, and they treated Taiwan like a colony. Some deep blues still do. 

Here's something I wonder about: of the three "favorable" Asian countries -- Japan, South Korea and Taiwan -- views of Taiwan are the least favorable, though still clearly over 50%. I would have expected more dislike for Japan overall given their history of colonialism across Asia, but it doesn't play out here. China, the contemporary aggressor, gets a lot more hate (ha ha!) than the historical Japanese empire. South Korea makes sense as they've become a soft power powerhouse. 

That could be the same of Japan -- it's easy to forget the atrocities of the Japanese empire when there's a new villain in town, and when post-war Japan has been a major exporter of soft power. 

This might also have something to do with Chinese influence operations spewing disinformation about Taiwan that other Asian Americans are picking up on, but given their overall negative view of China, I'm not sure I can support that notion. However, it might play a role, given that positive views of China go up as educational attainment goes down: 

Asian Americans with higher levels of educational attainment often feel more positively about the places they were asked about than those with lower levels of formal schooling:

When it comes to views of India, 42% of those with a postgraduate degree have favorable views of the country, compared with 35% of those with a bachelor’s degree and 27% of those with less formal schooling.

The pattern is reversed, though, when it comes to China. Asian Americans with lower levels of education tend to feel more positively about China than those with more education. [Emphasis mine]. For example, 17% of those with at least a bachelor’s degree have positive views of China, compared with 23% of those who did not complete college.

For India, I can see this. To many, it may look like just a "poor country" (again, not a reflection of my opinion, just a common one I've heard). Get a bit more educated about the world and you'll see that it does have a real, if flawed, democracy and a pretty vibrant progressive/left movement. And it's simplistic to call it "poor". Like China, it's complicated.

Honestly, having lived in both countries, I enjoyed India far more, and happily return every few years for a visit. There's a vibrancy to India that China lacks. If I never go to China again, I'll be fine with it. 

There is a persistent narrative that Taiwan is less successful than the other Asian Tigers and not quite as nice as Japan. This could have something to do with it -- it doesn't look as shiny as South Korea or Japan for sure (Japan was not an "Asian Tiger" but, given similar levels of development, I'm counting them here). 

I don't agree with this: Taiwan has better universal health insurance, solid purchasing power and better wealth equality. Although other countries do outstrip Taiwan in some indicators, all that really tells me given the wealth equality gaps in those countries is that the rich have more, and can do more. I still think there's an argument to be made that despite its faults and imperfections, Taiwan might just be the most successful of the advanced Asian democracies where it really matters. 

I don't have much else to say, and I know this is an abrupt conclusion, but I suggest you go read all the data for yourself. It's pretty interesting! 

 

In Taiwan and Hong Kong, subversion is contextual

I read an interesting piece in Hong Kong Free Press today, about Hong Kong residents mourning the death of Queen Elizabeth II. The pull quote did indeed pull:

A business executive who gave her surname So admitted that Elizabeth II’s death had made her nostalgic and that she felt “less of a connection” with China’s Communist Party leaders in Beijing. “I only realised how good it was after I lost it,” she said, referring to the city since its handover.

An 80-year-old retiree, who gave his surname Poon, was holding a bunch of red lilies and spoke bluntly. “In the past we had human rights, equality before the law, and protections in many aspects,” he said.

“But now, I would not comment on the present, I dare not.”

This sort of thing catches my eye, because in my echo chamber, it's socially acceptable to mock, criticize and deride the royal family and feel nothing -- except perhaps pleasure -- at the death of a queen. I don't particularly disagree: I'm no monarchist and I do not believe some people are naturally born to higher stations than others. 

What would likely be less well-received is expressing sadness, condolences or fondness for a dead monarch and her family. I haven't expressed anything like this because I'm neither sad nor fond, but it feels like subversion to consider saying anything like it around my own friends. I know I sound like a "conservatism is the real subversion!" right-wing shock jock here, but bear with me. 

Of course, I'm aware that there are other social circles and echo chambers where the opposite is true, and there are people who suffered under British imperialism, and who don't appreciate being tone-policed for their lack of solemnity or grief.

I know in my gut, however, that there is a whole range of possible feeling about some events that don't boil down neatly to "White Supremacy and Exploitation" or "God Bless the Noble Queen".

How do I know this? 

Because I live in Taiwan, where people sometimes express nostalgia for the Japanese colonial era, even though it was exactly what the name implies: colonial. Taiwanese as second-class citizens, no human rights to speak of, cultural brainwashing disguised as "education", freedom of speech allowed to a degree or banned depending on whether the central government was feeling benevolent that year. 

One only feels "nostalgic" for an era like that if the era that came after it was even worse. 

You can see it in Hong Kong now: who would mourn the end of a foreign colonial power on your land, which did not grant Hong Kong anything like democracy? Who would have complex feelings about the death of that foreign colonizer's queen? 

Anyone who realizes that the current era is worse, it turns out. Which is to say many, if not most, Hong Kongers. Beyond news about absurd prosecutions under the National Security Law, you can see it in the demographics: just about anyone who can leave is doing so, or trying.

To the rest of the world, this might look like colonizer bootlicking. In fact, more than once I've seen it called that: Hong Kongers who miss the old British system and imply they do not care for their new, more local masters are called all sorts of names. Taiwanese who point out that the Japanese era looks pleasant in comparison to the KMT brutality that followed are similarly called brainwashed, colonizer-loving, kissing their own chains.

I assure you the opposite is true. Just because a new colonial master is more local (say, the CCP or KMT) does not make them better. In fact, they're likely to be worse, as few around the world want to call this colonialism what it is, when the colonizers and colonized "look the same". The international community mostly looking the other way -- "hooray, they're decolonized now, China will definitely be better for Hong Kong because they're all Chinese, so good luck"? This opens up whole new horizons for brutality! 

The same thing happens when either Taiwan or Hong Kong express more hope in countries like the United States, or want more connections with the international community (including the US and UK) than China. Don't they know these countries are the Great Satans, the Imperializers Supreme, the Bad Guys? Hong Kongers and Taiwanese are mocked for turning to the 'evil' West rather than embracing Chinese regional hegemony. 

Yes, it's leftists who do the most mocking. And when you tune out all the obviously paid trolls, a rather large proportion of them are Westerners (some white, some not) mocking Asians for being realistic about the horrors of CCP rule. 

In the end, this produces a set of opinions that look like bootlicking to your average Western leftist (or even progressive or naive liberal), but are actually subversive, hewing to the principles of the non-tankie left -- freedom, justice, human rights -- if not their most common modes of expression.

Indeed, I have friends who are not white and not monarchists, yet currently have complicated feelings about the death of Queen Elizabeth II, likely for exactly these reasons.

I think it's better to recognize and understand that, rather than dismiss any sort of sentimentality, say, the British monarchy, as an exercise in White supremacy or Medieval notions of nobles and subjects. It runs at times a little too close to Western liberals and leftists once again telling some Asians how to feel. 

"If you're anti-imperialist, you should oppose this" isn't wrong, per se; it is actually how I feel about the monarchy and a great deal of US and UK foreign policy. To someone in Hong Kong or Taiwan, however, it might sound rather like how the CCP wants them to feel. It's not the same as "you are obligated to hate those foreigners and their colonial structures in order to prove you are a true Chinese and embrace our colonial structures instead!" But on the surface, it's not far off. Refusing to buy into it at all is, in that sense, a form of subversion.

Taiwanese who express an interest in Japanese culture aren't brainwashed colonial subjects. It's part of Taiwanese history, and frankly a somewhat brighter part than the KMT's White Terror, if only in comparison. Hong Kongers who express nostalgia for the British colonial years aren't Western bootlickers. Neither is right-wing, "CIA", a "color revolution", "imperialist" or "colonizer-loving" for wanting the same access to human rights and democratic norms that Westerners, including the leftists who mock them, enjoy. That's true however imperfectly they are applied or accessed in the West.

Here, too, I understand the impulse of those Western leftists. I was raised in a liberal home (90s liberal, so still pretty problematic by today's standards), went to college and only really saw "colonialism and exploitation" through models of what we had done to the rest of the world. Imperialism was something white people did, colonizers were always "foreign" and you could tell because they looked different. "Decolonization" looked a lot like handing Hong Kong "back" to China or the US getting its nose out of Asian affairs. I had only a vague concept of the CCP's evils (I was young during Tiananmen Square, but I remember), and no concept of Taiwanese pro-democracy activism.

I had absolutely no context for someone saying "mourning the past is not a crime" as a way of pointing out that in their supposedly "decolonized" current society, mourning the past is absolutely a crime -- and shouldn't be.

In other words, Queen Elizabeth II is just one tableau onto which people, including Hong Kongers, expressing our own perspectives and emotions, but the result is a kind of funhouse mirror because that canvas is not remotely blank. It's not even flat. Whatever is expressed is about the queen, but also not about her at all. 

To us, the monarchy looks like a big fat cog in a system of class-based oppression. It's hard to wrap one's head around it taking on another quite opposite meaning in a different context: a yearning for freedom, or at least the simulacrum of it that was lost.

It would have been easy to fall into that same "America always bad, China must be better" trap, because I lacked context. There is a pre-2006 me who simply had no frame of reference for this particular type of subversion: for mourning a dead queen not because you love being a subject, but because the current government is so much worse. For looking further afield because your regional neighbor is a huge asshole who wants to subjugate and slaughter you. For nostalgia as resistance against a narrative pushed on society by more recent colonizers. 

Now, that context is clear. I hope you see it too.

The Restored Taipei Heritage Building Megapost

First, a quick life update: I have COVID! So, depending on how that turns out, you can either expect lots of posts as I don't have much to do, or nothing because I don't feel well (right now I'm doing alright). 

Now, on to the actual post.

In recent years, Taipei has been working practically in overdrive not just to preserve the heritage architecture that remains, but (for the most part) turn these old buildings into useful or interesting public spaces. 

You surely know some of these already -- Huashan and Songyan Creative Parks, Bopiliao, Dihua Street and -- well, so many that it'd be impossible to list them all. A few are privately owned: Leputing is housed in a Japanese-era dormitory for government officials, built in the 1920s and renovated with government subsidies. Fireweeds offers more traditionally Japanese fare, in a smaller-scale building. I used to frequent Cafe Monument when I had a reason to be in that area. Nobody who knows a thing about Taiwanese history is unaware of Wistaria House (though it can be hard to get a table). 

Others have been more recently renovated. As such, they're less well-known. 

I've been spending a lot of time these past few years writing about these places (among other topics) for Taipei Magazine. That's not a plug -- the point is, I spend a lot of time visiting these places because the city government wants to get the word out. It's been an enjoyable enough series of assignments that I thought I'd summarize some of my favorites, with a few picks of my own. 

Some of the links lead back to my own writing, some to other sites -- I wanted to offer a list of my favorites (including places I've visited on assignment) rather than just hawk my own work. Not every item comes with photographs: I simply can't find all of my own pictures. I'm not sure it matters much -- I'm not the best photographer.

This is by no means a definitive list. I'm giving the places above the short shrift, and leaving out Beitou and Shezi completely. Old favorites, like the Xiahai City God Temple, Bao'an Temple and Qingshan Temple didn't make it in. There are enough Japanese-era residences around NTU and Shi-da alone to create an entire post. I didn't include the 228 Museum because I wanted to add at least one picture to that, but I don't have any (it will feature in an upcoming post on all the museums you can visit if you don't want to go to the National Palace Museum again). 

That's okay -- I can't cover everything, so let's focus on what I can do! 

Kishu An

Also called the "Literature Forest", this renovated section of a 1917 Japanese riverside banquet hall -- much of which was destroyed in a fire decades ago -- offers a calm spot for relaxation, a shop, cafe and event space. The massive banyan trees lend themselves to the 'forest' part of the site's name, and novelist Wang Wen-hsing lived here for a time, hence the connection to literature. In fact, much of the Taiwanese novel Family Catastrophe was set here.

Taiwan Literature Base and surrounding neighborhood (same link as above)

Near Huashan Creative Park, the Taiwan Literature Base is housed in a series of dormitories once occupied by Japanese civil servants, first in the Japanese era and for a period, ROC government workers as well. It was left abandoned for some time before being designated as a historic site and renovated. Qidong (Chitung) Street is much older, however: it was used as a transit route for goods headed to the port of Keelung during the Qing Dynasty and Japanese colonial era. Now, the dormitories house exhibits, spots for reading -- including one filled with books in Taiwanese and Hakka -- or just places to hang out, in a quiet complex with plenty of outdoor seating. 

There's more to this neighborhood than just the dormitories, however. Other renovated Japanese era buildings house the Taipei Qin Hall (also called Taipei Calligraphy Academy) the residence of Li Gwoh-ting. Both of these host events, exhibits and activities.

Tip: for this and Kishu An, bring bug spray. It turns out that shady banyans attract mosquitoes.

Railway Department Park

This has gotten quite a bit of press since opening in 2020, but I wanted to include it as not only a recent renovation, but also one of my favorite visits. With an Art Deco entrance, cypress from Alishan, a Beaux Arts conference room, and exhibits on railway history, there's a lot to see here. Buildings outside have a lot of history to explore as well. It's become one of my top recommendations for very hot or rainy days, if you want to get out of the house, explore a historic site, and have enough to keep you engaged for the day. 

Futai Street Mansion

Walking down Yanping Street one day, I passed this smallish historical building and found, to my surprise, that it was open to the public. This simple European-style commercial building (it was built in 1910 to house the offices of a Japanese construction company) holds a place in my memory in part because I found it on my own; no guidebook or brochure mentioned it, and I wasn't asked to go there to write about it.  Constructed of stone from Qili'an in northern Taipei with a ceiling of Taiwanese cypress, it's the only commercial building left on Yanping Road, which was once lined with them. It houses a gift shop and as of my last visit, a small cafe as well. Renovation and management was conducted by the same person who manages the Taipei Story House near the Fine Arts Museum. I appreciate the warm cypress scent that wafts through the building; you'd hardly think that this was used as accommodations for high-level ROC officials -- it looks like it was always meant to be a commercial building on a commercial street.


Nishihonganji

Built in the early 1900s, was originally a Buddhist monastery and temple that served as a Taiwan-based chapter of a Japanese Shin (or Pure Land) Buddhist order. When I first moved to Taiwan in 2006, I remember coming across it in disrepair, but in the years since it's been renovated and turned into a popular attraction. The bell tower is especially nice, though I remember it most fondly as one of the first historic sites I came across in Taiwan that was later renovated. The architectural designs are eclectic, and the head priest's residence (the rinbansho or rinbansyo)

is now a teahouse called, predictably, Rinbansyo and is built and decorated in a thoroughly traditional Japanese style. I've been, and I recommend it! 

(On a personal note, Rinbansyo holds a lot of sad and nostalgic memory for me, as the one time I went, I was with a friend who later passed away of a heart condition. It was the last time I saw her. I should go back, but I haven't yet.) 

North Gate

In my first years in Taiwan, North Gate was that incongruous little square building with the traditional-style roof that few paid attention to. Why? Because it sat right next to a massive highway ramp. When I had a class in Wugu, a student would drive me back to Taipei Main Station and I'd always notice how pretty that old Minnan-style roof looked, silhouetted by the city lights beyond. It was hard to get close to the actual gate, though, and on the ground its surroundings drained its attractiveness.

Friends began pointing out the gate's significance. As one of the only relics of the Taipei city walls (constructed just before the Sino-Japanese war in the late 1900s, and demolished very soon after by the incoming Japanese), and as the only Taipei surviving city gate retaining its original southern Chinese form. The others were renovated (retconned) into the bright red-and orange northern Chinese style buildings the KMT plonked on Taiwan to make it seem not just 'Chinese' but the specific kind of "Chinese" aesthetics they preferred. That is, not simple, elegant Southern Min brick. 

Imagine my shock when one day I walked by that intersection to see the ramp gone, and pedestrian friendly walkways allowing one to truly admire this forgotten old gate in the shadow of an overpass. But of course people hadn't forgotten; it took awhile to do the right thing and give North Gate its due.It took breaking the KMT domination of the Taipei mayorship and showing that in fact, a simple, local-style gate can be more lovely than the most firecracker-red columns you can out up to push your view of history on the people.

It's small, and takes just a moment to walk through. But you can walk through it now, and that wasn't always the case. And that's what matters.

Taipei Info Hub

Not far from Futai Street Mansion (you can walk between the two by crossing under North Gate), Taipei Info Hub is a recently-renovated warehouse building housing various exhibits on the first floor, with a second floor event space. Built in 1913 for the erstwhile Mitsui & Co (no relation to the current company), Taipei Info Hub also houses a cafe with ample seating in an area where there were once very few food and drink options. Interestingly, the semicircular gable that graces the building now isn'r original; the original was deemed too vulnerable to be left in position and is now on display inside the building.


National Center of Photography and Images

In the same article linked above, I wrote about NCPI -- the National Center of Photography and Images. In the same neighborhood as the Railway Department Park, North Gate, Futai Street Mansion and Taipei Info Hub. 

You probably know this building; very near Taipei Main Station, it was designed by architect Setsu Watanabe and built in 1937. It's certainly got Japanese influences in the roof design -- note the distinctive turret -- but was also designed to be simple and modern. Originally an office for the Osaka Mercantile Co., the turret was eventually lopped off in order to build a fourth story, during the period when it housed the Provincial Highway Bureau. During renovations, Watanabe's original intent was coaxed back into existence, with the turret replaced. 

Now, NCPI hosts rotating exhibits on photography in Taiwan's history. Not everything is subtitled in English, but enough is to enjoy yourself. While enjoying the exhibits, be sure to take in some of the other Art Deco details of the building, especially the stairway.

The first floor also houses a minimalist cafe and interesting gift shop. (I bought a Furoshiki Shiki miscellaneous goods bag, because I thought the design was cool.) 

New Culture Movement Museum

One thing I love about Taiwan: when dealing with the renovation of historic sites that evoke painful memories of colonialism and brutality, the current government has not shied away from re-imagining them as spaces to talk about Taiwan's history on its own terms, while reminding people of the original purpose of the sites. Nowhere is this more evident than in the Japanese-era police stations in Taipei and Tainan. Tainan uses its old police station as part of a fine arts museum complex, exhibiting fine artwork specifically from Taiwan which evokes the Taiwanese experience through history and today. 

In Taipei, this means using an old police building to house a New Culture Movement museum. When I went, the current COVID outbreak was just starting to become a concern, and the place was deserted. While that's probably due to the pandemic, I also worry that news of the museum's existence hasn't gotten around yet, either. That's a shame, because in addition to exhibits about the New Culture Movement (which was strongly tied to the Home Rule movement of the time), the building itself is of historic interest. From my article: 

Built in 1933, the station also served as a detention center. In the ensuing decades, the edifice was replaced with red tiles and a third story was added. Renovations began in 2014, and the choice of exhibit was intentional: Taiwan Cultural Association (台灣文化協會) founder Chiang Wei-shui (蔣渭水) had been imprisoned at the station’s former site in the 1920s. The New Cultural Movement in Taiwan encouraged understanding of Taiwanese culture and history through performances, lectures, essays and a newspaper, the Taiwan People’s News (台灣民報).

POPOP Taipei

This is another one of those city government initiatives aiming to renovate Taipei's historic sites and re-make them into usable spaces for contemporary times. POPOP was once a bottle cap factory in Nangang, a part of the city that, to be honest, doesn't have a lot going on (though if you find yourself there, the Academia Historica museum is interesting, and there's an old family mansion near the Academia Sinica). 

Unlike, say, the creative parks at Huashan and Songshan, POPOP is a fairly new project, and hasn't quite taken off yet thanks to the pandemic -- but hopefully, it will. Instead of following the old 'creative and culture park' model, POPOP was conceived as a 'maker space', with the main part of the old factory buildings turned into a single long workspace with tables, counters, outlets -- you know, a space for makers. There's not a lot going on yet, but check back in a few years.

For the casual visitor, there's also a cafe, a sake bar and an antique shop in addition to some small but pleasant outdoor spaces. 

U-mkt

From the same article above, the Shintomicho Cultural Market (U-mkt) can be found at the other end of the MRT's blue line, near Longshan Temple and Bopiliao. Built in 1935, commercial operations ceased in the unique U-shaped building in the 1990s. Xinfu Market, however, still bustles around it, and is interesting both when open and closed (as the pull-down garage doors on the shops are covered in colorful graffiti). Today, U-mkt has exhibits on the building's past, kitchen and lecture spaces and two cafes, one in the curve of the "U" and the other in the Japanese-era office just outside. 

Neihu Assembly Hall

This Art Deco building caught my eye in a book of Taipei heritage buildings. Looking one weekend day for something to do, I suggested to Brendan that we head up to Neihu just to have a look. After all, we rarely get up that way; there just isn't that much to do in Neihu if you don't live there! We weren't able to enter the building, and frankly, the façade is probably the most interesting thing about it. Built in 1930, it's one of the few Japanese-era buildings that isn't done in the "baroque" style reminiscent of British colonialism, but straight-up Art Deco, complete with 'air defense' tiles which were probably more for decoration than actual camouflage.

It's worth coming up here, though, as you can combine it with a visit to visit the Kuo ancestral shrine (below). 

Kuo Family Shrine

This gem of a building is designed more in the Japanese Baroque style that is so common in Taiwan than the Neihu Assembly Hall, and is linked with it above. Hiking up the steps to get to this hilltop mansion, you'd never know that it's right next to an MRT station. Unlike the assembly hall, the family mansion is open most days, and is pleasant to wander around. It's also the headquarters of the World Kuo Family Association, has some Tang-dynasty tablet rubbings, and features a shrine to the most famous Kuo -- Kuo Ziyi. Though he's claimed as the ancestor to all people surnamed Kuo, that's likely not the actual case. 

Sun Yat-sen Memorial House / Yixian Park / Umeyashiki

Can you imagine someone living in Taiwan for almost 15 years, and not visiting this site? Well, that was me. Next to Taipei Main Station, this was a restaurant and guesthouse during the Japanese Era, where Sun Yat-sen apparently spent a night (also, it's apparently been relocated from its original site nearby). 

After so many years of seeing the walls keeping this small park and building from the noise and traffic outside, I finally popped in one day when I had nothing else going on, and had just had lunch with a friend nearby. I ended up spending much of the afternoon just sitting and relaxing. The Japanese-style building itself houses a small exhibition related to Dr. Sun, and the garden around it is landscaped in a Chinese style. A brochure describes it as a fusion of the two styles -- Japanese and Chinese -- with some sort of metaphorical link to Taiwan and fusion of the two cultures. 

            

I don't care much for the metaphor, but it is a pleasant spot. Perhaps sit and reflect on how the "father of modern China" (or something) visited Taiwan, stayed here, and never said a thing about Taiwan being Chinese. To Sun, Taiwan was very obviously Japanese. Now consider how China views its 'claim' to Taiwan as something historic -- the evidence is apparently 'antiquity' itself. 

Does that claim seem particularly legitimate in light of what you've just learned? I hope not! 


The Lin Antai Mansion

Competing with other old family mansions such as the Banqiao Lin Family Garden in New Taipei, the Li Family House in Xinzhuang and the Wufeng Lin Mansion just outside Taichung city, the Lin Antai house is probably the best-preserved old mansion in Taipei. It took me years to visit, simply because it's not close to anything else and not particularly close to an MRT (some bus lines run up to that corner of the city, but that's about it). I enjoyed it immensely when I did, however. Fun fact: the house used to be located on what is now Dunhua South Road. I saw the original site on an old map once, and it wasn't far from MRT Technology Building -- it's surreal to think the whole thing got moved up to the riverside.

Ciyun Temple (慈雲寺)

We found this temple so many years ago that the photos I took got lost somewhere in the shuffling of files from old computers to new. I remember it though, because in a district full of flashier and more famous temples, this simple brick structure felt like a throwback, or at least a very unpretentious example of its type. The old brick arcades certainly give the area the feel of a time long past. Built in 1924 with private funds, it was on newly reclaimed land behind what is now Ximenting when first constructed. Now, the temple lives on, but seems to be bookended with hip-looking cafes. I don't mind, that, really. 

If you make your way from some of the sites around Taipei Main to Ciyun Temple, you'll find yourself walking through Ximen, which is an interesting way to spend a day regardless of your destination. There's plenty to see in the area, and if you aim your walk in the direction of Zhongshan Hall and some of the other historical sites and temples I've skipped, you'll also pass one of my favorite old houses:

 

I don't think there's anything especially historic about it, I just think it looks cool. 

In fact, although it's often labeled an unattractive city, Taipei has lots of architecture that is in fact quite interesting:

Contrastia

It's all tilted.

I do not want to write about Abe Shinzo. I’m not qualified to, but it seems that hasn’t stopped many. I do not want to discuss my opinion of him, but I will say this: some things are simple and some are complex. 

Xi Jinping is simple. He’s a brutal dictator and genocidaire and should not hold the position he has. Nuance regarding him only serves to distract from that fundamental truth. Abe Shinzo, however, was complex.

I can’t say I agreed with Abe’s conservatism. But there’s more to it than that; he was an important ally to Taiwan, and his legacy is not one of straight-shot conservatism. I don’t know that I agree with everything in this piece, but it’s worth a read for another perspective. (I do not exculpate him from war crime denialism to the extent Smith does in that link, for example). 

Now that I’ve just spent a few paragraphs talking about the thing I didn’t want to talk about, let’s get to what I do want to discuss in the wake of last week’s assassination. You know the old grade school cliche that such-and-such is a “land of contrast”? 

Well, it would be silly to call Taiwan that; fundamentally the term connotes something that doesn't quite line up or make sense, and given the geopolitical reality thrust on Taiwan by the both the world and the former KMT dictatorship, I think a lot of things actually do make sense when you take two seconds to think about them.

But I will call myself that: my own head is a land of contrasts. Contrastia? That's my brain.

If I didn't care about Taiwan, my views on Abe Shinzo's legacy would be far less inflected; he's probably not someone I would have voted for. In the country where I can actually vote, I wouldn't have to tolerate friendly overtures toward Taiwan from politicians I despise -- I could just hate them outright. 

To be honest, I already do: I certainly wouldn't vote for a right-winger. Recent bipartisan agreement on Taiwan has been a salvation at the voting booth; I wouldn't vote for anyone who was anti-Taiwan or, say, anti-abortion. What would I have done between a candidate who was pro-Taiwan but anti-abortion, and another who was anti-Taiwan but pro-abortion?

But if I didn't care about Taiwan I would not, for example, find myself explaining to like-minded friends in the US that Taiwanese didn't favor Trump in 2020 because they love the right wing, white supremacy or electing rapists. I don't even think they favored him because they genuinely thought he, personally, cared about Taiwan. One would have to be airy around the ears to think he did.

They favored him because his administration was the first in awhile to speak favorably of Taiwan. That's it. A lack of similar rhetoric from the other side -- at least until very recently -- was noticed and does matter. 

I may have to live in Contrastia, where I vote against people whose only good platform is support for Taiwan (often for the wrong reasons, but at some point support is support). But it's quite straightforward from a Taiwanese standpoint: who offers the stronger commitment to international friendship, however informal, with Taiwan?

The same is true of Abe. The Taiwanese mourning him are not stupid, they do not need to be lectured at that he was a conservative (and a pretty normal one by Japanese standards). They're not misunderstanding anything. 

He cared about Taiwan and was not afraid to stand up to China. Think what you will of his push to increase the defense budget and end an era of pacifism; it signaled that Japan was a regional partner that might actually be there for Taiwan in ways that mattered.

Even if they didn't care for anything else he did, it makes perfect sense that many Taiwanese would mourn him for these reasons. Does the opposition in Japan stand for Taiwan as much as Abe did? Would one of their senior leaders call Taiwan a "country"? How about other factions in the LDP?

If the answer to any of these questions is "no", then the reasons why Taiwanese liked Abe Shinzo should be obvious. If you don't like that, try to get better commitments to Taiwan from people you prefer. That's how you move the dial.

Telling Taiwanese that it's wrong to feel favorably to leaders who act favorably toward them is, frankly, condescending. Yes, even if those leaders are otherwise terrible. The only solution is to secure similarly good relations from less-terrible people. Otherwise, you're not living in Contrastia with me where sometimes things don't make sense; you're inhabiting Delusia where you refuse to see the world as it is. 

I'm a bit guilty of this too. I've made it clear that I don't care for these right-wingers in other countries who support Taiwan. During the Trump presidency, I'd point out that if the US slides toward right-wing authoritarianism, that influences the world -- simply saying a few kind words about Taiwan was insufficient. If the US is weakened globally because the blorp-in-chief can't even get diplomacy with America's friends right, that hurts Taiwan too. 

I still think I was right about that. But it would have been foolish of me in 2019 to expect the general public in Taiwan to support the guy whose administration's stance on Taiwan would be unclear until after he was elected, over the guy whose otherwise awful Secretary of State had one (and only one) good position: supporting Taiwan.

In the past few years, I haven't noticed much lasting affection for Trump in Taiwan. What changed? People didn't suddenly realize that Trump actually sucked (I think they already kind of knew that). Rather, the Biden administration made similar or even better commitments to Taiwan, and Taiwan responded. 

It's really that simple. 

Of course, Abe wasn't Trump, and those comparing the two are wrong. He was more of a conservative who retained public support despite corruption scandals thanks to a lot of rah-rah patriotism. That makes him more of a Reagan. 

There's a lot one might say about the legacy of Japanese colonialism in Taiwan here, but I don't actually think it's as relevant as it seems. Taiwanese didn't feel affection for Abe because they think of the Japanese colonial era with great nostalgia. They liked him because he was a friend of Taiwan. 

I could write a whole post on how Taiwan views the Japanese colonial era, but my conclusions would not point to a failure to deal with that historical legacy, rather, what it says about the era that followed. Regardless, I don't think it's more than tangentially relevant here. Taiwan does know its history; it retains informal but warm ties with Japan despite this, not because people have forgotten.

I understand why many disliked Abe. I didn't like him either (though I have no comment on Abenomics, because I am not an economist). He was not a fascist, as I've seen him called, and in a country that is still legitimately considered 'free', he was not an authoritarian. 

In fact, I think it's straight-up dangerous to be throwing these words around to describe democratically-elected leaders unless they (*cough* Trump *cough*) actually try to overthrow democracy. Calling Abe such things not only render the terms meaningless, but reveal only that you have not lived under a truly fascist state. 

Feel free to call him a war crimes denier, though -- he was. However, every other Japanese leader has been more or less the same on this issue, some worse than Abe (a half-assed apology regarding Korean comfort women isn't good enough, but it's still better than visiting Yasukuni Shrine annually, as Koizumi did). 

Should Taiwan eventually seek to resolve its own war crimes issues with Japan? Yes. Should Taiwan give Japan the cold shoulder over it? Not when they're a friend at a time when China is looking to invade, no.

Still, it is tempting to compare Taiwan's reactions to Abe and Trump. I wouldn't. Unlike Trump, Abe actually knew something about Taiwan. He understood the local and regional issues involved. Of course he did; unlike Trump he wasn't an unread clown, and he was actually from the region. I might be rather conflicted on the man -- after all, my brain is Contrastia -- but for Taiwan, it makes perfect sense that people would realize this and react accordingly.

In other words, let's not pretend Taiwanese are unaware of who Abe was or what his legacy entailed, including all the negatives. They did. But he was an ally of Taiwan, and people noticed. There aren't many choices here: rely on the allies you have, or try to gain more allies. Even if you do the latter, a multilateral, cross-party international consensus on Taiwan matters too, and you'd be wise to keep the allies whose politics you don't otherwise love. That may mean dealing with some icky people, lest Taiwan become a partisan issue again.

Anything less is imposing an impossible moral test on Taiwan that frankly, a country in its position -- trying to gain international recognition while holding off a slavering, brutal, genocidal and subjugationist China -- does not deserve. It's moral highgrounding at (not for, and not alongside -- at) a country just trying to do what's best for itself, as all countries do.

In fact, with Taiwan still working toward that international recognition and regional security, it's deeply unfair to expect it to go against its own interests, whether because confronting China is hard, or because you don't like whomever is showing support for Taiwan, or because it forces some of us to live in Contrastia, where the people you like and the people who support Taiwan may not be the same.

In fact, as a final point, I think it would be wise to simply make more space for Taiwan to express itself, rather than tell Taiwanese what to think, or why they are wrong about whatever thing is happening at the moment. If the rest of the world -- including other countries in the region -- aren't going to give Taiwan the recognition it deserves or even stand with it against the horrible bully next door who wants to invade, then it makes sense that Taiwan would find its own way, and consider its own interests rather than sublimating them into whatever the rest of Asia, the left, or the right deems correct. 

If we stop thinking about whatever Taiwan can do for our cause -- whether that's the US-led world order (if you're a pro-US or conservative libertarian type) or the global left (if you're not) -- and start thinking about what Taiwan needs to do for itself, then a lot of these issues really do resolve themselves.

Or, to put it another way: one supports anti-imperialism in in Taiwan by supporting anti-imperialism in Taiwan. Right now, this means doing what is necessary to stop Chinese annexation.  It does not mean lecturing Taiwanese people about how yes, China is imperialist, but so are all of Taiwan's (informal) allies, so they won't do either, sorry Taiwan, you just have to sit in the corner and wait until the 'right' anti-imperialists notice you, hope China doesn't get you first, ta! 

I can't think of a worse fate for Taiwan than that.

No, the US did not create, fund or support "Taiwanese separatism"

Past support for these jerks is not the same as support for "Taiwan independence"

More often than seems reasonable, in political discussions I see some variation of this take far too frequently. Recently, a version of it came from someone who claims to teach “East Asian History” — that is, someone who should know what they’re talking about. To paraphrase: 

Taiwan is a part of China. The idea of Taiwanese identity or nationalism is a farce created by the United States in order to drive a wedge between themselves and China, for their own interests in keeping tensions high. They backed the KMT, who were corrupt narco-running gangsters at best, and set up that whole “Nationalist” idea on Taiwan as a thorn in China’s side. 

Maybe there was some blah blah forever war blah blah Raytheon stuff in there, or perhaps some junk about the US funding Taiwan’s “color revolution” splittists; I don’t care to remember. Most of this subtype seems to think the US "gives" Taiwan weapons (it doesn't -- Taiwan buys them) or that the US sends aid to Taiwan (wrong again -- the aid ended in the 1960s). 

Crucially, both of these strains of thought assume that “Taiwanese independence” or “Taiwanese [ethno] nationalism” was either created, supported or funded by the United States of America. 

Although regular readers will already know why this view of Taiwanese national identity is wrong, someone needs to talk about it in English in a clear way and historical perspective, as these takes love to reference history: usually something about how the horrible Nationalists were backed by the US and that’s the seat of everything. 

So, let’s go backward in time, stopping at scenic historical overlooks to discuss why this view is simply, plainly, clearly not true. 

I'm not going to go chronologically here; let's start with the era such people reference most frequently: the KMT occupation of Taiwan and subsequent rivalry with the CCP.

The 1949 Question

A shallow reading of history might lead a dilettante type to think that both the KMT and CCP wanted Taiwan, that they'd both historically believed Taiwan was an inalienable part of China, and that with US assistance the KMT was able to retreat to Taiwan where the US-led Western order supported them simply because they hated and feared communism and wanted to keep Taiwan out of the hands of the CCP for their own selfish reasons.

After all, the Allies said yes to Chiang Kai-shek's desire to take Taiwan in Cairo, and allowed the KMT to occupy Taiwan in 1945. In the early 1950s, they agreed to financial and military support of Taiwan (or at least, to Taiwan as a site for US military bases). If you just ignore a few years in the middle (say,  approximately 1947 to 1952) and assume that support was unwavering, it might look a bit damning, and certainly the US has historically acted in its own self-interest, as all nations do. 

But it's just not true that the US unequivocally supported the KMT. That period of history is complex and can't be covered in one section of a blog post -- entire books have been written about it. It's well-known that Truman didn't care for Chiang Kai-shek, and while he disliked Mao and the CCP, he wasn't much of a fan of the KMT, either. Some of his advisors advocated for defending Taiwan, but plenty also said that the KMT were not worth funding. For several years, the US seemed just as willing to let the PRC take Taiwan as help the KMT hold it. Talk of some sort of international trusteeship for Taiwan was probably destined to go nowhere, but there was indeed talk. The US knew of at least one coup plotted against Chiang and did nothing.

Yes, the US stance eventually changed, but that it had to change means there had been a different stance to change from; they had not always been strong supporters of the Nationalists on Taiwan. 

I can hear my own readers screaming, so here's the bigger problem with this line of thinking: support for the KMT is not the same as support for Taiwan independence.

I honestly can't believe I have to clarify that, but it seems necessary. 

It's easy for someone who has spent zero time actually watching Taiwanese politics think the KMT opposes the CCP, Taiwan opposes China, and the KMT founded the government on Taiwan. The US helped them, and therefore "Taiwan independence" must be the same as that KMT-CCP rivalry in which the US clearly supports the KMT "independence" side. 

Let me tell you, from inside Taiwan, that sounds absolutely bonkers. 

The KMT has believed since around 1943 that Taiwan is a part of China; on this, the KMT and CCP actually agree. The KMT rejiggered an entire educational system to drive home this point and push Chinese identity on Taiwanese people. Not Taiwanese identity, Chinese. They refused to compete in the Olympics as Taiwan (rather than the Republic of China). Although the US tried to propose a seat for Taiwan as Taiwan -- not the ROC -- at the United Nations, Chiang Kai-shek would not have accepted it. (This is a shame, as the UN resolution that allowed the PRC to join as "China" did not explicitly block Taiwan; theoretically, there is nothing save China's recalcitrance barring Taiwan from joining as itself.) 

The KMT attempted to render the Taiwanese language extinct, banned just about any media that might cause Taiwanese to think their cultural homeland might be Taiwan, not China, and continues to push One China narratives on Taiwan regardless of how outdated they are. Their vision is consistent only in the respect that they are oriented towards China, not Taiwan.

Time and time again, when given the opportunity for formal recognition as Taiwan, the KMT rejected it under the belief that they were the sole legitimate government of China.

Even when they talk about fighting for democracy, they point to events that happened in China, not Taiwan: 

Today we commemorate our hard-earned democracy on #YouthDay! We are honored to carry on the legacy of the young revolutionary, who sacrificed their lives to establish a democratic #RepublicOfChina🇹🇼111 years ago. pic.twitter.com/SWinjawKQO

— 中國國民黨 KMT (@kuomintang) March 29, 2022

Decades of KMT dictatorship saw Taiwanese independence activists surveilled, jailed, tortured and murdered. Anyone who so much as called for a recognition of Taiwanese identity or pushed for democratization on Taiwan was subjected to this; for two generations, the biggest opposition to Taiwanese self-rule was the KMT. From 1947 until the early 1990s (when the imprisonment of political dissidents ended), the KMT systematically hunted and brutalized anyone who even breathed the idea of Taiwanese independence. 

You know, that party the US supported during many of those same decades. 

How does it make any sense at all that the US "support of the KMT" had anything to do with them creating a "Taiwan independence" movement? They quite literally supported the oppressors of that same movement! They bankrolled the guys who murdered pro-Taiwan activists! 

And yet, I still hear it. Occasionally, the person spouting this nonsense seems to think ardent supporters of Taiwanese sovereignty -- myself included -- must therefore support the KMT. Some think it's imperative to tell us how awful the KMT actually are. 

Do they not think we already know? Insulting those corrupt gangster colonizers isn't a searing indictment of the Taiwan independence movement. It's quite literally the opposite. 

This dynamic hasn't changed much since democratization.

The US and Democratic Taiwan

Remember in the early 2000s, when an unabashedly pro-Taiwan president was elected, the first from the "opposition" DPP, and the US political establishment didn't seem especially enthused? Then, do you remember when they seemed to be more generally supportive of the election of pro-China KMT candidate Ma Ying-jeou eight years later? 

Does a distant relationship with pro-Taiwan Chen and tacit endorsement of pro-China Ma sound like the tactic of a country trying to foment a 'color revolution' of furious 'splittists'? (No.) 

I'd like to take a little side road here: it's unclear exactly how much balking Chen actually engendered. It was once a widely-spread rumor (in some circles) that US officials had labeled him a 'troublemaker', but I can't find much evidence that this actually happened. President Bush was said to have used the term, but apparently that's wholly apocryphal. Those who say it did point to 'some' officials, but never state who those officials are or the circumstances of it happening. No details, just 'some people said'. That's hardly concrete.

China sure seemed invested in touting Chen as a 'troublemaker' and seemed all too happy to get the US in on this, but it doesn't seem to me that they took the bait. Ma Ying-jeou himself said he wouldn't be a 'troublemaker' like Chen, but then Ma was always influenced by whatever the CCP wanted from him -- of course he'd repeat a rumor like that. So, I have some ideas about the origins and truthfulness of this "Chen is a troublemaker" story.

It's true that the US seemed to warm up to Tsai quite a bit -- the spate of pro-Taiwan legislation and visits to Taiwan by high-level US officials during the Tsai administration at least indicate as much. 

That said, the shiny new AIT complex in Neihu broke ground under the Ma administration in 2009, meaning it was probably planned in the waning Chen years, and opened under Tsai. To me, that shows a US commitment not to any given vision of Taiwan's future -- independence included -- but to the US-Taiwan relationship.

Now that we're back on the main highway, let's kick it forward a bit. It's true that there's been an uptick in supportive rhetoric on Taiwan by the US, with President Biden calling the US's commitment to Taiwan "rock solid" (among other things). 

However, as with the Bush debacle in the early 2000s, these kind words for Taiwan always seem to come with a chaser: "the US doesn't support Taiwan independence". 

What they mean by this is that they don't support Taiwan unilaterally declaring independence, as the Taiwan Relations Act (and the bevy of assurances and communiqués accompanying it) clearly state US support for a peaceful, bilateral resolution. It does not mean that Taiwan independence can never happen, or that the US believes Taiwan is not currently autonomous (they clearly do, if they're selling Taiwan weapons, upgrading unofficial relations and calling their commitment "rock solid"). 

I may not personally be the biggest fan of this particular bilateralism -- I think Taiwan has every right to tell the CCP to eat dirt -- but that's what the policy says, and the US has been consistent in that regard. Even when it sounds like Joe Biden is going "off-script", everything he says can indeed be interpreted within that framework. 

Again, does this sound like a country that is arming rebel militias in Taiwan with the purpose of stoking separatist sentiment? (No.) 

Frankly, it sounds like a country that is warm toward the current administration and Taiwan in general, but historically has supported stances oriented towards Taiwan being part of China, not separate from it.

I've even heard the absurd claim that the US is "funding" Taiwan independence through all the weapons they "give" and foreign aid they "send" to Taiwan. 

Let me repeat: the US does not give Taiwan offensive weapons. They sell defensive weapons meant for the military of the Republic of China, not roving bands of guerillas. I don't buy into the idea that the Republic of China still claims "all of China" (it doesn't), but the ROC government is simply not the same as Taiwan independence activists, or "color revolutionists", or "separatists", or whatever you want to call them. 

And once again, Taiwan does not receive foreign aid from the US, and has not done so since 1965. The US isn't funding "Taiwan independence" because it's not funding anything in Taiwan. I am sure plenty of people will insist it must all be very covert, but if that's the case I know a lot of activists who'd love more information about all this money they're supposedly making, because if that's happening, nobody on the Taiwan side has heard about it! 

The origins of Taiwanese Identity

A lot of people also make the fundamental mistake of believing that the Taiwan independence movement is only as old as the Republic of China on Taiwan. Therefore, the two must be linked somehow. Memorably, I've even seen reference to 228 as the "birth" of Taiwanese identity. 

Certainly, the 228 Massacre was a pivotal moment. In terms of the modern movement, it could be seen as a birthday of sorts -- perhaps a milestone one rather than an origin point, however. 

And if we're talking about US creation or support of Taiwanese independence, those origins matter.

In Transitions to Modernity in Taiwan, Niki Alsford points out that not much research has been done on the generation preceding the pro-Taiwan generation of the 1920s. Kerr’s Licensed Revolution and the Home Rule Movement speaks in broad strokes about Taiwanese identity and the lack of desire for either Qing or Japanese rule from afar, especially among Indigenous Taiwanese. (And why shouldn’t they have been uninterested in the claims of these colonial powers? By all rights, they were in Taiwan first.)  However, he crucially notes that the average person -- of Chinese descent or not -- preferred both empires to just leave Taiwan alone. The main thing they seemed to want was good governance. 

Consider the Qing-era epithet that Taiwan “has a rebellion every three years and a revolt every five” — restive even by Chinese standards. Reflect as well that the Qing themselves viewed Taiwan as something ‘other’, an ‘Island of Women’, a defensive barrier to the ‘real’ China but otherwise a “ball of mud beyond civilization”, not any intrinsic part of China worth caring about. Emma Jinhua Teng lays this out beautifully in Taiwan’s Imagined Geography. Given those conditions, it makes sense that after a few generations, the families settling in Taiwan from China — who tended to be poor and seeking a better life — would cultivate a sense of distinct identity tied to the island. 

But to what extent? I don’t know. It was enough that when the Qing ceded Taiwan to Japan, those who fought back, and declared a (short-lived) Republic of Formosa, included language in their plans that referenced government coming from the people, not issued from far-away officials. Yes, that republic claimed fealty to the Qing, and the leaders mostly fled to China when defeat seemed inevitable (and sometimes before). The way they talked about it though? It’s not so simple to say they just wanted to be returned to the Qing. They were after some sort of home rule, too. 

Why am I telling you all this? Think about it: if this is an origin point of Taiwanese identity and the fight for Taiwanese sovereignty — unclear, problematic and fraught as it is — how on earth do you think the US funded it, let alone “created” it? 

And frankly, why would they care to? They were still dealing with the Qing and Taiwan was about to be handed to Japan. What would the rationale have been to stoke 'separatism' as a weapon against China? Notably, while a former US Secretary of State got involved in the Treaty of Shimonoseki, which handed Taiwan to Japan in 1895, notably the Tripartite Intervention that sought to influence the treaty in Western powers’ favor were Russia, France and Germany. 

If this era indeed provided the seeds that later blossomed into the pro-Taiwan, local identity, nativist, independence and democratization movements, it's simply inconceivable that the whole thing is simply a fever dream of the United States, not a real and long-lasting movement that has always been intrinsically Taiwanese.

In fact, to deny this history in favor of a jejune "everything I don't like is funded by the CIA" is to westsplain the hell out of Taiwanese history. Do these people think Taiwanese have no agency? Do they think only Westerners do? Do they think Taiwanese people are stupid, or easily manipulated, or incapable of forming their own ideas about history and identity without some evil Big Brother from across the sea tempting them with poison candy?

Come on. "It's the evil CIA! The US is funding Taiwan separatism to destabilize China!" may seem on the surface like a social-justice oriented take in which the West is bad and China can do no wrong, but at the end of the day it's just racism.


The Home Rule Movement in Japanese-Era Taiwan

Skip ahead to the 1920s, with Taiwan now an established colony of Japan. A complex web of cultural and home rule associations sprung up, many of them started by Taiwanese students in Japan inspired by modern political ideas they were exposed to there (in fact, some circumvented the Taiwanese colonial government completely and went straight to the Japanese national government). 

I could write an entire blog post just on the New Culture Association (inspired by China’s May Fourth Movement but promoting Taiwanese cultural and identity-related arts and literature), the annual petition to the parliament, the Home Rule Association, the Taiwan People’s Party, Formosa Youth Magazine, and thinkers like Lin Hsieh-tang, Chiang Wei-shui, Tsai Pei-huo and (noted communist) Hsieh Hsueh-hung. 

But the short of it is that, within the strictures of the colonial government — which tolerated their activities at times, but surveilled and arrested them at others — these early thinkers promoted not just home rule (see Kerr again for a firsthand account of their work) but Taiwanese culture through the arts. Lien Heng — interestingly enough, the grandfather of Chinese ultranationalist Lien Chan — wrote the General History of Taiwan and was also involved in promoting Taiwan as a unique cultural entity with a distinctive history worth understanding in its own right, separate from China. 

We can argue about 1895 all day, but these Japanese-era movements for greater home rule and recognition of local culture are essentially indisputable. Sometimes their supporters got tangled up in KMT politics (often to their regret), but at the end, it’s clear what they stood for. 

This link is made explicit in the music and literary history: the magazines these groups produced are held up as a historical reminder that Taiwanese were talking about Taiwaneseness when Japan was trying to make Taiwan more Japanese — well before the KMT came to town. The music, too. A lot of that era’s music was banned under Martial Law, sometimes just because it was in Taiwanese even if the lyrics were not remotely subversive. 

What’s the best way to turn something into a symbolic anthem for pro-democracy fighters? Get the authoritarian regime they’re fighting to ban it! 

Now, dig deep. Do you really, honestly think that when Japan ruled Taiwan, the US was skulking nefariously behind the scenes, training and paying the prominent figures of the era to promote “Taiwanese nationalism”...to stoke a rivalry with China? In an era when China didn’t even consider Taiwan to be Chinese, and it was assumed it would be Japanese in perpetuity? (And they did -- Sun Yat-sen visited Taiwan twice and at no point mentioned any sort of belief that it was part of China. The early CCP, as well, considered Taiwan a separate entity.)

How does that make even a lick of sense? Even if the US were capable of hurting China in this way in the 1920s -- which they were not, because Taiwan was part of Japan! -- why would they want to?

I'm skipping the Indigenous uprisings against the Japanese here because frankly, I think events like the Musha incident do tend to get swiped and used for every narrative other than the ones Indigenous people want to tell. The independence activists want to paint it as Indigenous solidarity. The KMTers want to make it look like they had similar sentiments to brave ROC soldiers. I don't love that, and don't want to join the grabby-grabs, so I'll just point out that Taiwanese of all kinds fought for home rule as they saw fit, and these causes have origins that far pre-date any KMT or US presence on Taiwan. 

In Conclusion, You Don't Make Sense

I mean, I get it. I get the desire to blame everything on the US. It kinda, sorta, if you look at it through a kaleidoscope, seems like you're standing up for the rest of the world by doing so. I get the hatred of the Nationalists -- I hate them too. What I don't understand is the distorted interpretation of history in which all Taiwanese would want to be Chinese if not for the Big Bad United States. 

It just doesn't make sense. There wasn't that much enthusiasm for the Qing, uprisings continued well into the Japanese era, and the KMT were absolutely not supporters of "Taiwan independence", to the point that it's offensive to imply they were. If the US funded or aided anyone in all these centuries of Taiwanese history, it was the KMT -- the brutalizers of those who fought for Taiwan in the 20th century and continue to crap on Taiwanese independence.

Regardless, the idea of a distinct Taiwanese identity and the notion of 'home rule' all pre-date any era in which US involvement in stoking Taiwan "independence sentiment" or some sort of invented rivalry with China would have made a lick of sense. 

Today, this belief that "everything I don't like is the CIA's fault" just looks bad. If you assume that this is a sort of splittist/color revolution thing, you have to assume as well that it's a view held by bands of violent, passionate "separatists" willing to, I dunno, Molotov their own government to get what they want.

But that's not the case. Most Taiwanese identify as solely Taiwanese, most don't want Taiwan to be a part of China in any sense, and most view the current status quo as sufficient qualification to consider Taiwan independent. I don't think there's enough money in the world to control public opinion that tightly, after decades of KMT-dictated schooling in which Taiwanese were instructed to accept that they were Chinese.

Even if it were possible, it's simply a racist take to assume it's true. People have agency. Not just the US or China, or the groups you do like, but even the ones you don't support. Taiwanese people are not jarheads just walking around with their thumbs up their asses waiting for someone else to tell them who they are. Quite the opposite, a point which has been proven over and over and over again with every iteration of the long battle for identity and recognition.

So maybe, just maybe, all you "it's the CIA!" folks could sit down, shut up, and examine how unrelentingly racist your take sounds.