Between two worlds

"You could tell it was false when talking to ordinary people. Even the communist cadres were not around; they would have had to say phony words," he said. "From A to Z, everything was false."

The class divisions of people did not disappear, he remembers, and people's suffering and living conditions didn't change. "It was much much worse," he said.

"Ironically, we [the UN staff] were then the leftists who criticized the KMT government the most. But we were also the first ones to criticize China the most," Chang said. "Now, we are probably the most anti-communist among overseas Chinese."

In the 1960s, many of Chang's American friends were activists in the various anti-war and civil rights movements and he soon followed. Eventually, he began to be watched by KMT "captains" -- political students hired to watch overseas students -- and his name was put on a black list. The KMT government then rejected his application to renew his expired passport, which stopped him from entering Taiwan for 22 years.

Many of Chang's Taiwanese activist friends shifted their aspirations for patriotism toward communist China in the 1970s after being frustrated by KMT policies that they believed weakened the ROC's sovereignty. "The KMT had been ignorant in handling the movement. They took us as Taiwan independence advocates, because they thought only the independent activists would organize such an anti-government movement. How ironic! But they were wrong by excluding and harassing the intellectuals. Had the KMT negotiated well with activists, those intellectuals would not have been pushed out and become devoted to the left side," he said.

These days, Chang sometimes jokes about being in the middle of cross-strait communication and struggles, whatever the topic. "But I please neither side of the Strait," he said.

Lost ideals

After 1979, the Taiwanese were slowly phased out of the UN translation team through attrition. By then, Beijing had started sending its own translators, the result of a build-up in US-China foreign relations and the establishment of translator training schools in Beijing.

After retiring from the UN in 1996, Chang began writing a martial arts novel, Hsia Yin (俠隱), which he finished two months ago. In Chinese martial arts traditions, Hsia is the term for a rebellious hero for social justice, who is also a kung-fu master. Hsia Yin focuses on the fading away of Hsia, which has led some to wonder if this is a reflection of Chang's disillusionment.

"I don't want to be cynical, but I could not help to be. Any kind of idealism is skeptical."