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Johnny Neihu's NewsWatch: Let's shoot hoops for the heathen

By Johnny Neihu

Saturday, Jul 14, 2007, Page 8

I enjoy a bit of sport now and again. Kendo is my game, but I've also been known to attend a soccer match on occasion. I'll even watch a bit of stick ball to satisfy my masochistic urges.

I must thank Taipei County Commissioner Chou Hsi-wei (周錫瑋) and his recent pork gaffe (see last week's column) for piquing my interest in my beloved country's basketball scene. I decided this warranted a flip past channel 73 on the old boob tube to check out the William Jones Cup, Taiwan's annual international invitational tournament.

But before we get to that, a bit of background. When it comes to bending over to Chicom demands, nobody can beat Taiwan's athletic establishment. It must be like a form of stretching for them.

When China came to Taiwan for the Davis Cup earlier this year, the Chinese Taipei Tennis Association gleefully banned all spectators from displaying national flags or overt patriotism. Being there made me feel like I was on a happy little slice of authoritarian China right here in democratic Taiwan. Jiayou, my sycophantic comrades, jiayou.

As for the athletes and fans, they see Taiwanese sports as minor leagues for bigger countries. My thoughts on physical fitness role model/McDonald's spokesbunny Wang Chien-ming (王建民) are well documented.

But I had hoped that this Jones Cup business would be different. It's our tournament. We can invite who we like. The Chicoms can't get their genetically engineered eight-foot freaks within two counties of Sinjhuang stadium.

Ah, how naive of me to dream. The first thing I heard when I tuned in to ESPN was the Taiwanese announcers exhorting the irrelevance of their own tournament. It's really just a warm-up for the coming Asian Basketball Championship in Japan, they said. Nobody cares about it, not even Taiwan.

All the pork you can eat, and nobody cares. Maybe next year we should offer a heaping plate of wiener schnitzel as the grand prize. What team could take such a bounty lightly?

But this got me wondering: What kind of teams would risk China's ire by joining us here on our rogue province to shoot some meaningless hoops?

My curiosity was well rewarded. The US was represented by Athletes in Action, an "evangelical Christian sports ministry" that uses "the unique platform of sport to help people around the world with questions of faith," according to Wikipedia. Its touring basketball teams are made up of former star players in college basketball who often "give their testimony at halftime and offer those in the audience an opportunity to be saved by receiving Jesus Christ as Savior."

Oh what I wouldn't give not to have changed the channel at halftime. It takes a lot of willpower, but I'll resist the urge to detour into taking more pot shots at the US' favorite export. It's just too easy.

Anyway, the part I enjoyed most about watching the Jones Cup was that the cameramen seemed as uninterested in the play as I was. Every second the camera wasn't on the game, it was searching for lamei (辣妹) in the stands. I must say I do enjoy a bit of that.

Now looking at the said lamei, the majority of whom I would guess follow the teams around seeing who can service the entire roster first, one does not get the impression that they are of any formidable intellectual girth. And so when I see them feverishly gripping glitter-sprinkled signs plastered with images of Hello Kitty playing basketball that read "Go Chinese Taipei," I am able to contain my astonishment.

Yes, it appears that the Chicoms have ingrained it so thoroughly into the brains of our sporting community that they live in "Chinese Taipei" that they have started to believe it. "Yes, yes," say the Chicoms, "they finally love Big Brother. They don't just grudgingly play under an insulting title we've forced on them at international tournaments. Why, they even like the name! They use it at their own tournament! Victory is ours!"

For mercy's sake, call Taiwan something else. Anything else. Call this country "Bolivian Clown Penis" for all I care. Anything but "Chinese Taipei."

For me, the Jones Cup harks back to another unfortunate incident involving "Chinese Taipei" pride. Last winter, during the Asian Games, Taiwan's baseball team beat Japan for the championship with a bottom-of-the-ninth hit. Gripped by patriotic fervor at having earned international glory for their country (not to mention a large cash bonus from the then National Council on Physical Fitness and Sports), Taiwan's athletes ran onto the field and, for all the world to see, unfurled the glorious flag of the nation of ... Chinese Taipei.

It's not a real flag, you know. It represents nothing. Real flags don't have Olympic rings on them. You might as well run out there waving a pirate flag or your soiled underwear.

But back to the Jones Cup. Taiwan's South Korean coach, Cheng Kwang-suk, appears not to speak a single blessed word of Mandarin. Now I'm no expert, but I'd say being able to communicate with the players is pretty important. Taiwan has an entire professional basketball league with coaches who speak Mandarin.

But in its own self-loathing, the national basketball establishment assumes that no Taiwanese person could possibly be capable of leading the team, and so opts for a coach who doesn't speak the language. Brilliant.

Despite said coach leading Taiwan to a seventh-place finish -- not that anyone cares, right? -- he did provide some comic relief. I chuckled heartily watching him scribbling passionately on the white board and exhorting his players to do something or other. What it was was anyone's guess.

I know, the whole Chinese Taipei thing is a raw deal. But that doesn't mean we should give in to the dark side. What we need is a new flag, a flag so true to Taiwan's sports establishment that not even China could reject it.

We need a flag with Wang Chien-ming on it, drawn as a computer-animated Transformer, standing on a mound made of money winding up to hurl a 160kph Big Mac at you.

We'll call this country "Super Size Double Quarter Pounder With Cheese Extra Value Happy Meal with Transformer Toy Included of New York Yankees." Oh, what a glorious day it will be.

Heard or read something particularly objectionable about Taiwan? Johnny wants to know: dearjohnny@taipeitimes.com is the place to reach me, with "Dear Johnny" in the subject line.
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