An 81-year-old lawyer who came to Taiwan with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) when he was 13 said in an interview with China’s CCTV that he is full of “bitterness” that his four grandchildren are all “little Taiwan independence [supporters].”
Kao Ping-han (高秉涵), who was born in China’s Shandong Province in 1935, took his family to China in July to “find their roots,” and during the trip he was followed by a group of Chinese reporters.
Kao is famous in China after he received the “Moving China” award in 2012 for his efforts in helping more than 100 veterans’ families take their loved ones’ ashes to China after they passed away in the past 20 years.
Photo: CNA
In the interview, Kao said he had taken his grandchildren to China so that they could learn more about Chinese culture, and visit the Yellow River and famous mountains “that are in their textbooks.”
“I want them to look at them for real. They think that those belong to China and have nothing to do with Taiwan,” Kao said.
When a journalist asked Kao’s 10-year-old grandchild: ‘Are you Chinese?’ she replied: ‘No, my grandpa is Chinese; I’m Taiwanese,’” Kao said.
“I’m full of bitterness,” Kao said.
The CCTV reporter said she could not understand how “that kind of situation emerged” among his grandchildren.
To the reporter’s puzzlement, Kao said it was due to “so-called Taiwanese cultural independence.”
“After [former president] Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) died, [former president] Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) implemented ‘desinicization’ during his eight years of presidency, which was followed by [another eight years of former president] Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). There had been nearly 20 years of ‘desinicization,’” Kao said.
“There is nothing I can do; those who voted for [President] Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) are exactly those ‘little Taiwan independence [supporters]’ who started [to form] 20 years ago,” Kao said.
“Taiwan itself has no culture, as it is part of the Zhonghua minzu [Chinese ethnic group, 中華民族]; its culture is China’s culture, but what the Democratic Progressive Party has taught them is to believe that Taiwan belongs to the Aborigines,” he said. “I asked one of my granddaughters which is the longest river in our country and she said it was the Tamsui River, when I expected her to say the Yangtze or the Yellow River, which she said are not Taiwanese rivers. They will not say Taiwan is a nation, a notion they have not yet acquired, but [they simply say] they are Taiwanese.”
“I’m doing my job as everybody has to when the nation is in trouble,” Kao said in response to reporters’ queries as to how he could change the trend by himself. “By bringing my grandchildren [to China] I want them to recognize their ancestors and remove from them this independence [thinking].”
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
TEMPORAL/SPIRITUAL: Beijing’s claim that the next Buddhist leader must come from China is a heavy-handed political maneuver that will fall flat-faced, experts said China’s requirement that the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation to be born in China and approved by Beijing has drawn criticism, with experts at a forum in Taipei yesterday saying that if Beijing were to put forth its own Dalai Lama, the person would not be recognized by the Tibetan Buddhist community. The experts made a remarks at the two-day forum hosted by the Tibet Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama titled: “The Snow Land Forum: Finding Common Ground on Tibet.” China says it has the right to determine the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation, as it claims sovereignty over Tibet since ancient times,
Temperatures in some parts of Taiwan are expected to fall sharply to lows of 15°C later this week as seasonal northeasterly winds strengthen, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. It is to be the strongest cold wave to affect northern Taiwan this autumn, while Chiayi County in the southwest and some parts of central Taiwan are likely to also see lower temperatures due to radiational cooling, which occurs under conditions of clear skies, light winds and dry weather, the CWA said. Across Taiwan, temperatures are to fall gradually this week, dropping to 15°C to 16°C in the early hours of Wednesday
RSS