Taipei resident and Mynamar native Celia Yang (楊華美) considered herself fortunate after Cyclone Nargis, which devastated Myanmar earlier this month. Both her brother and sister were safe and sound, though their houses were badly damaged by flooding.
Still, after hearing first-hand accounts of the damage and the countless number of displaced people, Yang wanted to “bring more attention” to the cyclone victims.
So she gathered with friends and members of Burmese community in Taipei to organize the Myanmar Cyclone Relief Concert — an all-day, outdoor event that takes place tomorrow at the Xinyi Public Assembly Hall near Taipei 101.
PHOTO: COURTESY OF UNDERFLOW
Besides live music throughout the day, Yang has planned for a photo exhibition on Myanmar and screenings of a short film containing footage of the cyclone aftermath, compiled by two students at National Taiwan University.
Food vendors from Taipei’s Burmese community will also be there, selling Burmese snacks such as tealeaf salad. Rock Starkey will also set up his portable pizza shop, Pizza Explosion.
One positive outcome of organizing the concert for Yang has been the opportunity to strengthen her ties with the Burmese community in Taipei. She says she is grateful for the help of Taipei-based groups such as the Myanmar Overseas Student Association (緬甸僑生同學會) and the founders of New Idea (新觀念緬甸資訊網), a Web site dedicated to providing information on Myanmar.
Through these connections, Yang and co-organizer Sean Scanlan have been able to bring in several musicians with ties to Myanmar.
Eric Duan (段培權), the lead singer of Hsinchu band Underflow, was originally from Myanmar’s Shan State. Underflow, which plays industrial rock, participates every year in an annual benefit for pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi held at the Wall (這牆) in Taipei.
Duan, who came to Taiwan 10 years ago for university studies, says he’s looking forward to tomorrow’s event: “It’s good to tell [Taiwanese] people that somebody needs help back home.”
He suggests that with the sizable Chinese population in Myanmar, Taiwan has a reason to care: “Those Chinese people [in the KMT army] used to fight for you.”
Another act of note is the Hong Kong pop-rock act Soler, a duo of twin brothers, Julio Acconci and Dino Acconci. The Acconcis, whose mother is Burmese, will be making a short diversion from their Asian tour to play an acoustic set tomorrow.
The lineup also includes Timmy, New Hong Kong Hair City, Pan Africana, the Pine Top Surgeons, Bopomofo, the Muddy Basin Ramblers (my own band) and Taimaica Sound System.
Tomorrow’s event goes from 1:30pm to 10pm and is free of charge. Originally Yang had planned on charging an admission fee with all proceeds going to the Taiwan Red Cross, but she said that venue regulations prevent her from “actively pursuing donations.”
Still, the goal of the event remains the same: “Please don’t forget about the victims,” she said.— David Chen
Last week Joseph Nye, the well-known China scholar, wrote on the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s website about how war over Taiwan might be averted. He noted that years ago he was on a team that met with then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), “whose previous ‘unofficial’ visit to the US had caused a crisis in which China fired missiles into the sea and the US deployed carriers off the coast of Taiwan.” Yes, that’s right, mighty Chen caused that crisis all by himself. Neither the US nor the People’s Republic of China (PRC) exercised any agency. Nye then nostalgically invoked the comical specter
April 15 to April 21 Yang Kui (楊逵) was horrified as he drove past trucks, oxcarts and trolleys loaded with coffins on his way to Tuntzechiao (屯子腳), which he heard had been completely destroyed. The friend he came to check on was safe, but most residents were suffering in the town hit the hardest by the 7.1-magnitude Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake on April 21, 1935. It remains the deadliest in Taiwan’s recorded history, claiming around 3,300 lives and injuring nearly 12,000. The disaster completely flattened roughly 18,000 houses and damaged countless more. The social activist and
Over the course of former President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) 11-day trip to China that included a meeting with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping (習近平) a surprising number of people commented that the former president was now “irrelevant.” Upon reflection, it became apparent that these comments were coming from pro-Taiwan, pan-green supporters and they were expressing what they hoped was the case, rather than the reality. Ma’s ideology is so pro-China (read: deep blue) and controversial that many in his own Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) hope he retires quickly, or at least refrains from speaking on some subjects. Regardless
Approaching her mid-30s, Xiong Yidan reckons that most of her friends are on to their second or even third babies. But Xiong has more than a dozen. There is Lucky, the street dog from Bangkok who jumped into a taxi with her and never left. There is Sophie and Ben, sibling geese, who honk from morning to night. Boop and Pan, both goats, are romantically involved. Dumpling the hedgehog enjoys a belly rub from time to time. The list goes on. Xiong nurtures her brood from her 8,000 square meter farm in Chiang Dao, a mountainous district in northern Thailand’s