Today the general election was held in Taiwan. Going against everyone's prediction, the blue won the majority. I will go read local newspapers tomorrow for some analysis.
In order to watch this election, some prominent scholars are visiting from Japan, including Profs. Tanaka (Akihiko), Tadokoro, Soeya, Nakanishi (Hiroshi). They held a Japan-Taiwan Forum at National Taiwan University. Prof. Philip Yang was the host so I went and helped them with some administrative work. I might write about it on the East Asian International Affairs blog later. Japan's new Defense Program Outline was just approved by the Diet yesterday, and Prof. Tanaka's comment on it was informative since he himself was in the decision-making body.
Anyways, I met one of my classmates in Prof Yang's class at the conference, he is an American (ABC) who has a master's in sociology, but is now in NTU's master's program studying Political Science. Last time I talked to him, he was already thinking of applying back to American programs. Today, he said "I am pretty unsatisfied with Taiwan's program. I will apply to American schools before I finish the current program.." He continues, "People have been asking me why an American guy needs to study in Taiwan. That sort of question did not bother me at all before, but it started to now. I feel like I should go back. I am an ABC, my parents got out of this country. Why did I come back?"
Gishin is a friend of mine at ICLP. She was born and raised in Japan but her parents are Taiwanese and became Japanese. Gishin loves the life in Taiwan, but I remember that she said "my parents are happy about me studying Chinese. But they do not welcome the idea that I work here. For them, they finally got out of Taiwan and became Japanese in pursuit of a better life. Why does their daughter have to go back to Taiwan?"
Posted by sayaka at December 11, 2004 01:57 AM | TrackBack