Taiwanese volleyball player Elaine Liao (廖苡任) yesterday said that she was unfazed by Chinese criticism online over her “pro-Taiwanese independence” remarks on Instagram, adding that she is ready to play the first match at the FISU World University Games.
The 26-year-old was chosen to carry Taiwan’s Olympic flag at the opening ceremony of the Games in Chengdu, China. She became an overnight sensation in China after more than 600,000 people commented on the Chinese social media site Sina Weibo about “the cute flag bearer from Chinese Taipei,” making her one of the trending topics on the platform.
However, Liao’s popularity quickly dissipated after some commenters took issue with a post she wrote on Instagram, in which she described the trip to Chengdu as a “trip abroad.”
Photo courtesy of Chinese Taipei University Sports Federation
Some called her an advocate of Taiwanese independence and reposted the comment on other Chinese social media sites, causing more to post on her Instagram account.
Liao said the photograph that was circulated online in association with the comment was not her, adding that people should not overinterpret it.
She also told Deputy Minister of Education Lin Teng-chiao (林騰蛟) and Sports Administration Director-General James Cheng (鄭世忠), who visited the national teams at the athletes’ village, that she is completely unfazed by what online commenters said and was ready to play her first match of the Games.
Members of Taiwan’s national volleyball team looked cheerful in a photo released by the Sports Administration, in which they posed with Cheng and Lin.
Taiwanese political commentator Wen Lan-tung (溫朗東) said that online commenters in China first took advantage of Taiwan’s national team, before they were completely outranged by Liao’s remarks.
“Seriously, at this point no one should believe whether Taiwan should be unified with or be independent from China is a fake issue, or that it was Taiwan that provoked China to want to invade Taiwan. It was China who turned this whole episode into a political event. They [Chinese commenters] are a peculiar group of people who would be enraged whenever they see Taiwanese describing a trip to China as traveling abroad,” he said.
Taiwan’s national volleyball team played their first match against Poland yesterday evening and are scheduled to play Brazil today. Taiwan won a gold medal in the Games (then known as the Summer Universiade) in Izmir, Turkey, in 2005 and a silver medal in Daegu, South Korea, in 2003.
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