Named after a flower that symbolizes vitality and hope, the Sunflower Library in Terong Village (德榮) in Pingtung County’s Changjhih Township (長治) is more than an ordinary library. Having survived the brunt of storms and frequent flooding, it has become an embodiment of the power of love and collective effort.
The establishment of the library stemmed from a tragedy involving a young girl surnamed Huang (黃), who died in a car accident a decade ago while cycling to a downtown library to return some library books.
At the time, the village did not have a library, which was why the young girl had to cycle a long distance to borrow books.
Photo: Li Li-fa, Taipei Times
Saddened by this misfortune, Lee Chen-wei (李鎮衛), who then served as a village coordinator, resolved to take action and push forward with the creation of a library in the remote community.
The proposal was encouraged by Lee’s wife, Tsai Hui-ling (蔡慧玲), who joined her husband’s efforts to bring about changes to the region.
A well-connected man, Lee received approval to locate the proposed library within a local community center, with the village warden and a number of community volunteers also aiding in his efforts to decorate the place.
To enrich the library’s collection, Tsai also made a generous donation of a range of publications and magazines, worth over NT$10,000 (US$330) in total.
Following years of concerted effort between Lee, Tsai and residents, the library was eventually opened to the community in 2003, boasting a collection of more than 6,000 publications.
However, because it was located in a low-lying area, the much-anticipated library was flooded as many as 10 times between its opening and 2006, with the floodwaters damaging large parts of the collection.
In August 2009, when the country was battered by Typhoon Morakot — which led to Taiwan’s worst flooding in 50 years and claimed the lives of nearly 700 people — many homes in Terong Village were severely damaged, as was the community library.
Before it could recover from the devastating effects of Typhoon Morakot, the library was further hit by another powerful storm, Typhoon Fanapi, in September 2010.
Last year, things finally started to look up for the library when the Pingtung County Government’s Cultural Affairs Department notified villagers of a plan to relocate the library to higher land.
“Thanks to the reporting by the [Chinese-language] Liberty Times [the Taipei Times’ sister paper] on the library’s dire post-storm situation, which caught the attention of different sectors of society, the Fo Guang Shan Foundation for Buddhist Culture and Education decided to make a generous donation of NT$3 million to facilitate the library’s relocation,” the department’s Division of Library Information chief Hsu Shih-wen (許世文) said.
After its relocation to the more spacious community center located in a higher-lying area, the library was reopened to villagers on June 17 this year.
“The concept of the renovated building’s exterior and interior design was inspired by what sunflowers represent — which is sunshine and vitality. Because of the attentive care of all villagers, the flower is at last able to bloom again,” Buddhist Master Yi Fa (依法法師) said.
Sunflower Library director Sun Jung-hsiu (孫榮秀), who also doubles as a voluntary worker at the facility, said that with the help of many officials of the cultural affairs department, the relocated library has also been successfully modernized.
“They not only helped categorize the library’s collection, but also installed a computer checkout system,” Sun said, expressing hopes that the love of reading could continue spreading through the community.
Expressing special gratitude to a benevolent woman, Tseng Chiung-hui (曾瓊惠), from Taipei City, Lee said Tseng had been sending box after box of books to the library for the past eight years.
“In an effort to encourage more young children to go to the library, Tseng even sent a batch of stationery to our facility,” Lee said, adding that her generosity often touched the many volunteers at the library.
Lee added he would sometimes send local fruits, such as wax apples, mangoes and bananas, to Tseng as a way of showing villagers’ appreciation for her efforts.
Tseng, who visited to the community following the reopening, said she started making donations after being deeply moved by the villagers’ meaningful devotion and effort in setting up the library.
“What they are doing is truly significant,” Tseng said, adding that selecting suitable publications and sending them to the library from time to time had become an integral part of her life.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods