Tue, Jan 12, 2016 page5

• FEATURE: Taso ci Cou group seeks to restore roots

  SEEKING ASSISTANCE: The organic farming group is also asking for donations of old PCs or laptops to help with its educational outreach and marketing efforts

  • By Jake Chung / Staff writer, with CNA
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  Seemingly isolated from the rest of the world, connected only by the torturous road winding 243.84m above sea level, Sinmei Village (新美) on Alishan (阿里山) holds the key to the Tsou Aborigines, Taso ci Cou Organic Farming Association director Yang Pei-chen (楊佩珍) said.

  The Tsou’s origins run through the village, Yang said.

  To realize her dream of returning home and living a life as close to the style of her ancestors as possible, Yang turned down an offer of a high-paying city job to return to the village, striving to retain as much of her roots and culture as possible.

  

  Taso ci Cou Organic Farming Association director Yang Pei-chen, left, poses in Chiayi with students from the Shinmei Elementary School in an undated photograph.

  Photo courtesy of Yang Pei-chen

  Yang said she founded the Taso ci Cou, which in the Tsou language roughly translates as “the healthy Tsou people,” as a way of encouraging other Tsou to grow organic food.

  Like many other Aboriginal villages, Sinmei Village has suffered from the loss of its young people to cities for education and jobs, Yang said.

  Although she was also educated in a city, the song of the wild seemed to sing in her veins, urging her to return to the village, she said.

  By founding the association and reintroducing organic farming, Yang said she was following in the footsteps of her ancestors, describing the venture as a spiritual successor to the hopes of the Tsou’s ancestors when they first branched off from the old tribe to start anew.

  According to Yang, most of Sinmei’s residents moved from the Lijia Village (里加) and elsewhere, and the name Sinmei was given to it during the Japanese colonial period to symbolize that it was a new village.

  “Like the spring season, we hope to grow our crops and with it, our hopes of retaining the essence that makes us Tsou,” Yang said.

  The association, with help from villagers and others on Alishan, are growing crops such as ginger, bamboo shoots, taro, aiyu (愛玉) and camellia, and planting trees such as the Chinese fir, bamboo and Formosan gum, Yang said.

  Sinmei Village, which is upstream of the Tsengwen Reservoir (曾文水庫), has natural slopes that are the result of rivers passing through the area, which are excellent for farming and forestry, Yang said.

  While the villagers’ ties with the land has always been strong due to agriculture being an important tradition handed down from generation to generation, organic farming is something new, she said.

  “We are simply trying to retrace the traditions of our ancestors, whose methods were natural and the most idealistic model of organic farming,” Yang said.

  The association’s crops are grown on about 5 hectares that were offered free of charge by five villagers, Yang said.

  The association’s goals are in line with the Agriculture and Food Agency’s efforts, Yang said, adding that she hoped to work with the Sinmei Elementary School so children would become more aware of the relationship between food and agriculture.

  The association lacks computers for educational purposes and to market its crops, so it is seeking donations of laptops or PCs, she said.
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