Lee Shang-hsuen (
Next month, he will further spread his wings at UN headquarters in New York City and one of the most famous musical venues in the world.
Lee, a winner of a Concern for Life Award from the Chou Ta-kuan Foundation and a Presidential Education Award nominee in 2005, is scheduled to leave for New York on Dec. 1, where he, along with another young autistic pianist from Taoyuan, Chuang Tien-yue (
PHOTO: KE YU-HAO, TAIPEI TIMES
The performance will be part of a demonstration concert at UN headquarters and Carnegie Hall in midtown Manhattan for events surrounding the International Day of Disabled Persons.
The performance is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the 20-year-old pianist, but it has also become a burden for the Lee family.
Lee was born with G-6-PD deficiency -- a genetic, sex-linked enzyme defect that results in the breakdown of red blood cells when an individual is exposed to stress from infection or certain drugs.
At the age of three, he was diagnosed as a "hyperactive autistic child with medium-grade mental disability." Nevertheless, like Dustin Hoffman's character in the movie Rain Man, Lee is gifted with an extraordinary memory for numbers and musical scores.
Undeterred by their son's multiple disabilities or their modest financial means, his parents have devoted an enormous amount of time and energy helping him develop his musical talent.
Lin Mei-shu (林美淑), chairwoman of the Kaohsiung Autism Foundation, where Lee plays the piano for its percussion band -- said the Institute for Piano Teachers and Disabled in Japan had invited Lee, Chuang and Sung to perform in New York after its members saw their performance at the first International Piano Paralympics held in Yokohama, Japan, in 2005.
Then in his late teens, Lee won two awards in the competition.
The institute, however, did not mention to the three performers until earlier this month that participants were required to share the cost of the hall, Lin told the Taipei Times last week.
All the expenses -- food, transportation, accommodation and rental of the performance hall -- will add up to about NT$130,000 per person, Lin said.
When Lee's mother was informed of the cost, she decided she would not let it prevent her son from experiencing this golden opportunity, said Cheng Fang-hsin (
"All she was concerned about was that her child have a chance to perform on the international scene as a representative of Taiwan and that he be able to take his music to the next level," Cheng told the Taipei Times on Tuesday.
As Lin said, the trio's performance will contain Taiwanese folk songs to enhance the nation's international exposure.
The foundation has started raising funds for the trio, Cheng said, adding that Kaohsiung City Government's Social Affairs Bureau has offered to subsidize Lee and his mother to the tune of NT$100,000.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) Deputy Spokeswoman Phoebe Yeh (葉非比) also promised on Tuesday that MOFA would do all it can to help the Lee family, including providing financial assistance.
It would also ask the Taipei Economic and Trade Office in New York to encourage overseas Taiwanese to attend the trio's performance.
Although the Lee family is on its own in covering their share of the cost for the performance, as the subsidies are only for their plane tickets, food and accommodation, they are determined to make it to the UN and Carnegie Hall, Cheng said.
"It is very hard to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of this opportunity in monetary terms," Cheng said.
Left-Handed Girl (左撇子女孩), a film by Taiwanese director Tsou Shih-ching (鄒時擎) and cowritten by Oscar-winning director Sean Baker, won the Gan Foundation Award for Distribution at the Cannes Critics’ Week on Wednesday. The award, which includes a 20,000 euro (US$22,656) prize, is intended to support the French release of a first or second feature film by a new director. According to Critics’ Week, the prize would go to the film’s French distributor, Le Pacte. "A melodrama full of twists and turns, Left-Handed Girl retraces the daily life of a single mother and her two daughters in Taipei, combining the irresistible charm of
A Philippine official has denied allegations of mistreatment of crew members during Philippine authorities’ boarding of a Taiwanese fishing vessel on Monday. Philippine Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) spokesman Nazario Briguera on Friday said that BFAR law enforcement officers “observed the proper boarding protocols” when they boarded the Taiwanese vessel Sheng Yu Feng (昇漁豐號) and towed it to Basco Port in the Philippines. Briguera’s comments came a day after the Taiwanese captain of the Sheng Yu Feng, Chen Tsung-tun (陳宗頓), held a news conference in Pingtung County and accused the Philippine authorities of mistreatment during the boarding of
88.2 PERCENT INCREASE: The variants driving the current outbreak are not causing more severe symptoms, but are ‘more contagious’ than previous variants, an expert said Number of COVID-19 cases in the nation is surging, with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) describing the ongoing wave of infections as “rapid and intense,” and projecting that the outbreak would continue through the end of July. A total of 19,097 outpatient and emergency visits related to COVID-19 were reported from May 11 to Saturday last week, an 88.2 percent increase from the previous week’s 10,149 visits, CDC data showed. The nearly 90 percent surge in case numbers also marks the sixth consecutive weekly increase, although the total remains below the 23,778 recorded during the same period last year,
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is pushing for residents of Kinmen and Lienchiang counties to acquire Chinese ID cards in a bid to “blur national identities,” a source said. The efforts are part of China’s promotion of a “Kinmen-Xiamen twin-city living sphere, including a cross-strait integration pilot zone in China’s Fujian Province,” the source said. “The CCP is already treating residents of these outlying islands as Chinese citizens. It has also intensified its ‘united front’ efforts and infiltration of those islands,” the source said. “There is increasing evidence of espionage in Kinmen, particularly of Taiwanese military personnel being recruited by the
RSS