The nation’s oldest graduate student, Chao Mu-he (趙慕鶴), 98, was awarded a master’s degree in philosophy yesterday.
He also received a special award at the graduation ceremony in recognition of his diligence.
Born on July 4, 1912, Chao, who has mastered the “bird-worm” style of calligraphy, used this as the basis for his research for his degree from Nanhua University’s Graduate Institute of Philosophy in Chiayi County.
Chao said he learned the bird-worm script as a child in China.
“It is a difficult form of calligraphy because each stroke in the script has to be shaped like a bird or worm,” he said.
As he had spent several decades learning the style, which is now almost obsolete, he knew it would be the best subject for his thesis, Chao said.
Chao, a graduate of a teachers’ college in China’s Shandong Province, moved to Taiwan in 1951. He taught at Kaohsiung Girls’ Normal College, which later became National Kaohsiung Normal University. He was the university’s director of general affairs before he retired in 1978.
Asked why he decided to pursue a graduate degree so late in life, Chao said he wanted to encourage one of his friend’s sons, who was reluctant to go back to school. Chao said he invited the young man to study with him in graduate school.
As Chao was living in Kaohsiung, he had to commute to Chiayi by bus to attend classes, but he was proud to say that in his two years of study, he had never missed a class.
Physically, Chao appears to be in good shape and moves around unassisted. Asked about the secret to his health, he said there was none, but added that he never quarrels with anyone.
Chen Teh-ho (陳德和), Chao’s thesis adviser, described his student as diligent with a sense of humor.
Chen said he was impressed by Chao’s desire to acquire knowledge.
Chao is the best example of the saying a person is “never too old to learn,” Chen said.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS