The Opinion page has published several articles and editorials over the past few weeks addressing Taiwan’s efforts to leverage unique or strong aspects of its culture to increase international awareness of the nation.
These have included submissions by foreign journalists and overseas students, highlighting how bubble milk tea, Guinness World Record attempts, the entertainment sectors, impressive scenery, world-class cuisine and important contributions to the high-tech supply chain can enhance Taiwan’s recognition overseas and therefore its soft power.
That entails competing for attention in already crowded sectors. Other nations, after all, offer popular entertainment exports, beautiful scenic spots and great food.
China’s Mandarin-language cultural exports and wealth of impressive sights to draw in visitors make it even more difficult for Taiwan to differentiate itself.
One underused resource that Taiwan has that few other countries do, which it could say differentiates itself from China, is its vibrant folk religion temple festival culture.
Unfortunately, leveraging these presents not only challenges, but also a fundamental contradiction.
Several major temple festivals could be considered, including at Nankunshen Daitian Temple (南鯤鯓代天府) in Tainan, held annually, and the Wang Ye boat burning ceremony, held once every three years in Pingtung County’s Donggang Township (東港).
Perhaps the most impressive, attracting the largest number of people, are the Matsu (媽祖) pilgrimages that occur this time of year.
The Baishatun Matsu Pilgrimage this year starts on May 1 at Gongtian Temple (拱天宮) in Miaoli County and ends back at the temple on May 11, after visiting Chaotian Temple (朝天宮) in Yunlin County’s Beigang Township (北港).
Chaotian Temple also hosts the Beigang Matsu Pilgrimage on Wednesday and Thursday next week. The Dajia Matsu Pilgrimage departed from Jenn Lann Temple (鎮瀾宮) in Taichung’s Dajia District (大甲) late on Saturday last week.
All three have their own characteristics: Dajia has scale and Baishatun is unique in that the path is negotiated en route. Both are grueling for pilgrims who stay from start to finish. Beigang is a smaller, briefer affair that has its own advantages in intimacy and convenience.
The big draw of attending the festivals is that, even though they can involve a large commitment of time, energy and logistics, they offer a truly authentic experience; they are not stage-managed by the government or the tourist industry, they are a genuine expression of traditional culture and folk religion with not only Taiwanese, but also distinctly Chinese elements that cannot be found anywhere in China.
The challenge is that the festivals are very much geared toward Taiwanese, and much of the information is available online in Mandarin only. In addition, the dates change every year: Dajia and Baishatun decide the dates for each occasion. Beigang has set dates, but they are according to the lunar calendar, so the actual dates in the Western calendar differ from one year to the next.
Attendance at the longer Dajia and Baishatun festivals offers the chance to experience the warmth of Taiwanese united in devotion to Matsu and to the completion of a shared goal after more than a week of walking; attendance at the Beigang festival affords an immersive look into what temple festivals would have looked, sounded, smelled and felt like decades, even centuries ago, and with few other tourists to alter or dilute the experience.
Therein lies the contradiction. The overriding sense of tradition and history, of the authentic and immersive experience, would be quickly obliterated by a large influx of tourists. The question is, how can organizers preserve the purity of the element that gives the festivals their most attractive feature?
When US budget carrier Southwest Airlines last week announced a new partnership with China Airlines, Southwest’s social media were filled with comments from travelers excited by the new opportunity to visit China. Of course, China Airlines is not based in China, but in Taiwan, and the new partnership connects Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport with 30 cities across the US. At a time when China is increasing efforts on all fronts to falsely label Taiwan as “China” in all arenas, Taiwan does itself no favors by having its flagship carrier named China Airlines. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is eager to jump at
The muting of the line “I’m from Taiwan” (我台灣來欸), sung in Hoklo (commonly known as Taiwanese), during a performance at the closing ceremony of the World Masters Games in New Taipei City on May 31 has sparked a public outcry. The lyric from the well-known song All Eyes on Me (世界都看見) — originally written and performed by Taiwanese hip-hop group Nine One One (玖壹壹) — was muted twice, while the subtitles on the screen showed an alternate line, “we come here together” (阮作伙來欸), which was not sung. The song, performed at the ceremony by a cheerleading group, was the theme
Secretary of State Marco Rubio raised eyebrows recently when he declared the era of American unipolarity over. He described America’s unrivaled dominance of the international system as an anomaly that was created by the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War. Now, he observed, the United States was returning to a more multipolar world where there are great powers in different parts of the planet. He pointed to China and Russia, as well as “rogue states like Iran and North Korea” as examples of countries the United States must contend with. This all begs the question:
Liberals have wasted no time in pointing to Karol Nawrocki’s lack of qualifications for his new job as president of Poland. He has never previously held political office. He won by the narrowest of margins, with 50.9 percent of the vote. However, Nawrocki possesses the one qualification that many national populists value above all other: a taste for physical strength laced with violence. Nawrocki is a former boxer who still likes to go a few rounds. He is also such an enthusiastic soccer supporter that he reportedly got the logos of his two favorite teams — Chelsea and Lechia Gdansk —
RSS