How do you pronounce the word for “tea” in your culture? Is it more like “cha,” or more like “tea”? James Shih, a guide for “Walk in Taiwan,” likes to use this question as an entry point when explaining to foreign visitors how tea culture spread from China to other lands around the world.
The plant life of forests is rich and varied. Raising bees on the forest floor can provide an abundant supply of honey, while the bees can also increase the rate at which trees set seed. Raising chickens and growing mushrooms on logs can bring in additional income that helps foresters plant more trees. And when farmers don’t interfere with the forest, and uphold the practice of applying neither pesticides nor chemical fertilizers, they can develop ecotourism in the beautiful, fecund woodlands.
This song tells the story of a Paiwan indigenous family, but it is also the personal story of Golden Melody Award winning singer Abao (Paiwan name Aljenljeng Tjaluvie). The abundantly creative Abao released her second solo album, Kinakaian: Mother Tongue, at the end of 2019. It had been three years since she released her first solo album, Vavayan: Woman, produced by Soichiro Arai.
Punk-influenced Kaohsiung band Fire EX. sings in Taiwanese about the times we live in and the band’s deep love of Taiwan, writing and performing such highly popular tracks as “Good Night! Formosa!” and “Island’s Sunrise” that kindle their fans’ hopes for Taiwan’s future.
ROC government scholarships offered to citizens of friendly nations have changed two young people’s lives.
A member of Taitung’s Pinuyumayan community, Sangpuy Katatepan has been deeply attracted to the ancient melodies of his tribe since childhood. He composes the lyrics for each song on his albums in the Aboriginal language of his people. This love for the land is channeled by a robust yet gentle voice that not only moves the Taiwanese, but also transcends the language barrier, resonating with musicians abroad and earning him a gold medal at the September 2017 Global Music Awards in the USA.
Stepping foot on the rooftop of the Hong-Gah Museum on a clear day, the outlines of Mt. Danfeng, Mt. Qixing, Mt. Datun, Battleship Rock, and even that stronghold of local arts, Taipei National University of the Arts, are all visible. On the Guandu Plain in Taipei’s Beitou District, where the museum is situated, a wide road splits the landscape into an endless expanse of fields to one side and a forest of metal factories and homes to the other.
“Youth Banana” is a Taiwanese rock band whose very name bespeaks the younger generation’s creativity and sense of the absurd. Its four members—leader, keyboardist and lead singer Wang Kiwei (known as “Lao Wang” or “Old Wang”), bassist Jiang Wang, drummer Huang Tang Hsuan, and guitarist Zack Guo—all grew up in the little town of Qishan in Kaohsiung.
In 2019, Vietnam’s National Hospital of Pediatrics conducted a successful liver transplant on the youngest patient in the nation’s liver-transplant history; a surgical team from Taipei Veterans General Hospital performed the operation. A Thai government promotional video on smart medical care featured a wellness diagnostic kiosk manufactured in Taiwan.
Lin Sheng-xiang is a unique voice in Taiwan’s music community. He has long been focused on issues related to farming, labor and the environment, and he has a particular style that has absorbed the traditional and the modern in a blend of traditional Taiwanese music with Western rock and roll.
