What I've been up to 2

Meanwhile I've been getting back into my favourite political (and personal) subject. Thinking about Taiwanese politics always gets my pulse racing, and being back here it has basically dominated my spare time. The one thing that has shaped the person that I am and the beliefs I have today is being born a Taiwanese, and witnessing and experiencing the pro-democracy movement as a young child. I am part of a generation that has been spared of the sad and unjust Chiang Kai-Shek autocracy, and grew up in an atmosphere of sweeping changes and political awakening. And while living overseas, I have continued to support the pro-democracy movement and the Independence movement. I would never be able to forgive myself if I am not part of this important sojourn. I remember getting a death threat sent to my house back in 2004, most likely from a Chinese, after one letter to the Sydney Morning Herald, would you believe. Things like that would never make me change my mind or my ways, because so many other people have had a much sicker ordeal in their personal journey for Taiwan. Every Taiwanese person knows how to fight back - it runs in the blood, just don't get it boiling.

And so every time when I come home and plunge myself back into people who share the same culture and history as me, the reconnection and reaffirmation of my beliefs is always so overwhelming. Every two years or so the politics gets a bit further and sometimes messier, but coming home and getting pulled back into being a Taiwanese person standing on Taiwanese soil the affect on my soul is always so enriching and welcoming, because I can see clearly how far Taiwan always moves through this time of absence and sometimes disconnection. This is perhaps why its so different for me coming home to Taiwan as opposed to visiting a new country for the first time. It absolutely awes me to think how extremely different this Taiwan is to the one that I left in 1990, and certainly the one that I was born in in 1980. In the twenty seven years of my life time Taiwan has transformed from a one-party autocracy under the White Terror into a multi-party democracy with open and free elections, and government monopolised media to a smorgasbord of free press all over the Internet and cable networks, and from a people basically forced fed Chiang Kai-Shek/Kuominggtang's version of Chinese dominated political history to a people that question, discuss, write, and create a history that centers around the Taiwanese identity. And this is against repression from the old KMT autocracy whom were still murdering and jailing dissidents up till the early 1990s, and that is against the military threats and international assaults from Mainland China. That's courage and that's guts. So that's my fullest respect and gratitude and pride. And hence the above post re UN for Taiwan campaign. If all this could happen in the 27 years of my life time so far, I know much much more is going to happen in the next 27 years of my life. I am so very very optimistic and positive that I will see a Taiwanese State raise its flag in every country in this world before my last breath. I want it!