Telling it like it is
In support of Dan Bloom, (Letters, March 26, page 8), I would like to add the following comments. Yesterday I received an e-mail from the BBC Global Minds asking me to join its viewers’ panel. While completing the survey I came across a perturbing part and sent the BBC the following e-mail.
“I have just completed your online questionnaire and have found one part extremely disturbing which I am going to report to the British Trade and Cultural Office, Taipei. Under the section ‘which country do you live in,’ you have listed Taiwan as ‘Taiwan, Province of China.’ I have previously written to you about this on two occasions but you still persist with this title. Once again, TAIWAN HAS NEVER BEEN A PROVINCE OF CHINA and, for the sake of all Taiwanese people in general and my wife in particular, I hope it never will be. Yours sincerely, Michael Wise, Taiwan, ROC.”
I have also found this to be the case in most UK government Web sites and also the Halifax, Plc Web site.
It is getting harder to know what the name of this beautiful island is and what its people are called, not only for anyone living abroad, but also for those of us who have chosen to live here and call it home. Especially when we read the following quotation from President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九): “Let’s begin today and work toward ethnic and social harmony, and peace in the Taiwan Strait,” he said. “Let’s work together so the Chinese people can pursue progress and world peace in an amicable atmosphere” (“Kuo’s articles discriminatory, Ma says,” March 25, page 1).
I’m happy that Ma is preaching to the Chinese people about world peace or anything else, but I’m also confused, so my question to him is: “Do only Chinese people live in the Taiwan Strait?”
MICHAEL WISE
Tamsui
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“Can you tell me where the time and motivation will come from to get students to improve their English proficiency in four years of university?” The teacher’s question — not accusatory, just slightly exasperated — was directed at the panelists at the end of a recent conference on English language learning at Taiwanese universities. Perhaps thankfully for the professors on stage, her question was too big for the five minutes remaining. However, it hung over the venue like an ominous cloud on an otherwise sunny-skies day of research into English as a medium of instruction and the government’s Bilingual Nation 2030
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