“Art was what was truly permanent therefore what truly mattered. The rest was ‘but a spume of things / Upon a ghostly paradigm of things.’” Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
Wendell Berry’s lamentation is more poignant since the COVID-19 virus forced us into stultifying solitude. Confined to our homes, art viewing in galleries seem like a distant memory. Saskia Fernando Gallery in Colombo, Sri Lanka, fills this artless void with Art in Curfew. For their inaugural show, the gallery invited four Sri Lanka-based artists, Hashan Cooray, Pushpakanthan Pakkiyarajah, Fabienne Francotte, and Firi Rahman to create or curate a collection of work as a response to the forced hermitry. To enrich this virtual art experience, an open studio session on Instagram Live took place each Saturday, enabling the viewer a glimpse into each artist’s space, practice, and current projects.
It was through one of these open studio sessions that I discovered Firi Rahman. When I tuned into the Live session, Buddy, one of Firi’s parrots, greeted me with a loud squawk followed a succession of trills. During Firi’s walkthrough of his humble one-room abode that also dubs as his studio, we met the other creatures that live in his space. Besides Buddy, Firi is currently looking after other less vocal birds as well as a squirrel. Then Firi sat down and started to draw, using a Rotring pen with slow, circular motions to create the pattern of the dotted coat of a leopard. It’s a painstaking process, but the results are mesmerizing.
Left: Hornbill, 2018 Centre: Lemur, 2018 Right: Cougar, 2018 For inquiries: Saskia Fernando Gallery
In 2018, Firi made a series of pen-on-paper drawings depicting animals in urban settings. He was initially inspired by the four pet macaws that had fled their gilded cage inside the palace of the then Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa. These bright, long-tailed birds are not native to Sri Lanka, and the elites had kept them as status symbols. On the other hand, Firi, a bird lover his whole life, has only kept birds to help them. He would free them as soon as they’re well or old enough to be on their own. The only ones he would keep are the ones that are born in captivity and would not survive independently in the wild. When he heard about the escaped macaws, he wondered where these birds would go in Colombo. As he started to imagine wild animals and what they would do in urban settings, he made a series of drawings. There is one of a hornbill sitting in a hefty, colonial-style wooden chair with its beak tilting in the air. He looks like a king summoning his subject for an announcement. Another drawing consists of two lemurs perched on the tiled roof of a house made of wood and corrugated iron. My favourite is the drawing of a cougar crouching on top of a dolly cart, looking down as if it regretted jumping onto the unstable surface in the first place.
The cougar drawing reminded me of the puma that has been visiting the near-empty streets of the Chilean capital of Santiago. Since late March, the wild feline has been prowling the central district, looking disoriented and confused. It roamed through several private gardens and a school before it was tranquilized and sent to the wildlife officials. This adventurous puma is not the only animal venturing out of their homes. Since the advent of the COVID-19 virus, many creatures are found cruising the newly deserted cities around the world. In Paris, two bucks strolled down an empty road next to park cars. In Istanbul, dolphins frolicked in the Bosporus Strait that has recently become free of tankers, cargo ships, and tourist boats. In Adelaide, a kangaroo hopped around the heart of downtown in full strides.
I am envious that the animals are out and about in the world. Even the crows perched on the trees in my neighbrouhood are cawing to flaunt their freedom. It’s poetic justice—as the humans are under curfews or lockdown around the world, the wildlife is enjoying a quieter and cleaner world, reclaiming habitats that we once took away from them.
Before the pandemic, humans as a species devoured resources like bottomless pits. Our consumer society insisted that we needed more to be fitter, happier, and more productive. When I was having a bad day, I ate and drank my feelings while shopped online to buy joy. When the curfew started suddenly in Sri Lanka, I became trapped inside my home in a new country with no access to Amazon, Book Depository, or Etsy. I soon ran out of snacks and booze and no means of getting more. Then, I realized that the post services stopped, and I couldn’t order anything online. The first couple of weeks were miserable. But slowly and grudgingly, I realized that I don’t need nearly as much as I consumed.
In What are People For?, Berry quotes William Blake from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell: “No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings.” Berry responds with a quote of his own: “Only when our acts are empowered with more than bodily strength do we need to think of limits.”
These quotes reminded me of the differences between humans and animals. The escaped macaws freed themselves with their bodily strength. On the other hand, humans have insatiable desires beyond our physical needs, and we haven’t had the opportunity to contemplate our limits until we are cooped up inside with nothing but our thoughts. Many of us didn’t want to face this reality–but the pandemic has certainly forced it upon me. For me (as a privileged person who was able to work from home), I feel like this pandemic has given me a clean slate because it drove me to confront the way I worked, played, and consumed. Now that we are slowly emerging from a strict curfew, I feel like I have become more resilient both in body and in mind. I am ready to tackle this new normal while feeling fitter, happier, and more productive–this time, without succumbing to the endless distractions and the unquenchable desire to consume.
It turns out that the little scratchy throat The Woman has been experiencing is nothing more than a case of cabin fever. The Woman sleeps off her minor illness but she’s got a more persistent problem: she is constipated. I know this is private information and The Woman is probably going to be mad at me for sharing this, but it’s true. It must be reported. Since the curfew started, she’s been so stressed that her body is revolting by clenching everything in. The doctor on the oDoc app says that she will be more regular if she eats more fresh vegetables and fruits. So, she has made it her quest to order as many vegetables and fruits as she possibly can. However, something as simple as going to the grocery store is no longer an option during the COVID-19 curfew in Mount Lavinia, Sri Lanka.
The first thing she did was make a post on a Facebook group called “Expats in Colombo” asking fellow members for tips on where to get vegetables and fruits. She was given several phone numbers from the group but learned that many of the vegetable vendors are not reliable. The Woman watches her vegetable stock dwindling in despair.
Just when they are down to a couple of cobs of corn, her friend, Conrad, texted in the group chat to let them know that a vegetable truck has arrived at their building.
“Can you ask them to come to our place?” The Man texted.
“No, no,” The Woman says in a panic, “What if they don’t speak English? We have to go there!”
The Man disagrees. “We can’t go there during curfew!”
“It’s only a block down the street,” The Woman says with desperation, “I am sure it will be fine!”
The Woman grabs a few cloth shopping bags and walks out the door. The Man follows her out angrily. “If we get caught by the police, you are paying the fine!” He shouts.
About 30 minutes later, they returned, hauling in an abundance of veggies. The Woman is smiling as they unload their bounty. I have never seen this many veggies in my life. This should last them a while–good thing I don’t need to eat!
The veggie truck (left). The veggie bounty (right).
“So, to get veggies these days,” The Woman announces. “We need to be there when the truck comes by our neighbourhood. I think we’re going to starve.”
“Oh, quit being a drama queen, Punk Bunny. We will be fine.” The Man says.
A few days later, The Woman even manages to find a box of Mandarin oranges. When the delivery man calls, The Woman has no idea who it is, only that someone is probably trying to deliver something.
The Woman: “Hello?” Pause. “Are you delivering something?” Pause. “I am sorry, I don’t understand.” Pause. “Sorry, I still don’t understand.”
When the phone rings again, she answers with trepidation. “Hi, here’s a man downstairs bringing you some fruit.” The male voice on the phone says.
It turns out that the English-speaker is one of her upstairs neighbours. Moments later, I see him standing outside of our door–he has helped The Woman carry the box of Mandarin oranges. “Thank you so much, Tim,” The Woman says.”Here, take some oranges for your wife. There is no way we can eat 150 oranges between the two of us.”
The fridge full of Mandarin oranges and fresh vegetables.
Now, in addition to all the veggies, The Man and The Woman also have a fridge full of Mandarin oranges. The Man uses a part of it to make wine. Don’t worry–there will be a future report dedicated to The Man’s COVID-19 Tropical Brew.
A few days have passed. Someone is knocking on the door. When The Man opens the door, Tim is standing outside with two loaves of bread. “Hey, do you guys want some bread?”
“Yeah, absolutely,” The Man says.
They give Tim a watermelon in exchange. They chatted for a few minutes–I watched closely to make sure that Tim stands at least 6 feet away from our door. After he leaves, The Woman closes the door. “Isn’t it funny that we are living under a barter system now?” She asks.
“Well, that’s how civilization has always worked,” The Man says, “Maybe this COVID-19 is a good reset for the world.”
Now, The Man and The Woman have all the vegetables and fruit they will ever need. They even have bread. However, The Woman still isn’t feeling well; she is still constipated. She is desperate to fill her prescription for a laxative, which she received from the doctor she spoke to on oDoc. She’s had a prescription for over a week and no matter how many pharmacies she has called or messaged, no one can seem to fill it. Finally, she decides to take the matter into her own hands.
“Conrad said that he called the tourist hotline and the person informed him that people could leave their home for absolute necessities, such as going to the ATM or picking up medicine,” The Woman says. “He said he’s going to the ATM today and I think I am going with him and we can head to the pharmacy.”
The Woman is ready for the outside world.
The Woman puts on a cloth mask, rubbed some sunscreen on her face, and donned a big straw hat. “Now, I am ready for the outside world,” she says.
The Man and The Woman are a bit giddy–it’s been so long since they stepped out of their building! It’s almost like they are going on an adventure, even if it was just walking down to the pharmacy.
They come back an hour later drenched in sweat. The Woman has her laxatives. They have also managed to pick up other things, like zinc pills and hand sanitizer. They are hoping to find some soap–since they have run out of both dish soap and their regular bar of soap for hand-washing is disappearing fast. Through their conversation, I learn that the two pharmacies they visited have sold out of soap.
This essay was originally published by The Normal School on April 21, 2020.
What does it mean to be Chinese these days? Illustration by Ahmara Smith.
When I was 18, I crashed my car for the third time. My mother shook her head and said, “I should have listened to the fortune teller. He did tell me not to let you drive.”
My mother’s words echoed in my mind at the 2018 Microwave International New Media Art Festival in Hong Kong. I was standing before “RuShi” (2018), created by Hong Kong-based artist John Wong. It is an immersive installation that applied the algorithm of Bazi, the eight characters assigned to the birth year, month, day, and hour in Chinese fortune-telling. After entering my name, the date, and the hour of my birth on an iPad that was part of the installation, I walked into a dark room surrounded by curtains. I studied a projection consisting of eight squares, all flashing with horizontal and vertical threads of electrical lines in different colors. They appeared from different sides of each square, and as they moved across the projection, they gradually intersected. The result was a mesmerizing neo-noir tartan pattern that was supposed to represent my Bazi. I squinted my eyes and stared at the projection, hoping to glean some meaning from it. I could not.
Where were the prophetic narratives that were supposed to guide my future? When I was young, the westernized and feminist in me scoffed when my mother mentioned anything the fortune teller had said, especially the fortunes about me. Like many Asian-Canadians growing up in suburbia of the Greater Vancouver area in the 1990s, I tried to blend into my Anglo-Canadian surroundings. Mama’s nonsensical reasoning to take away driving and the freedom that came with it was unimaginable to my teenage brain. Ironically, I did give up driving—not because of what the fortune teller had said, but mainly because my insurance had become unaffordable after so many car crashes. I moved to the city where I could access public transportation to attend university.
“RuShi” is the first of Wong’s Immersion/Decentralisation (迷/信) series. In his artist statement, he claims that Bazi, often used by the Chinese to predict the future and help navigate life, is a form of big data. Therefore, he says, big data could potentially become the religion of the age of new media. The starting point of “RuShi” is Bazi, which is a familiar concept to me— like ziweidoushu, an astronomy-based system of fortune-telling— Bazi is a common form of Chinese superstition. These practices provide believers with a narrative of their past and prophesize the direction of their lives. My mother has been a believer in these practices for as long as I can remember. In Wong’s work, however, I did not see any narratives or anything familiar. By digitizing the ancient algorithm and turning it into an unrecognizable form, Wong erased the cultural references associated with Bazi and left me with a void filled with meaningless lines.
The artwork made an impact on me. I thought about it for many days as I started to question my own confused reaction to the work. As a Taiwanese Canadian, I was raised with the belief that mainland China (中國), or the “Middle Kingdom,” cannot be trusted. Its ruling party, the Communist Party of China (CPC), has always viewed Taiwan as one of its wayward provinces, a thorn in its ‘One China’ doctrine. It has been trying to claim Taiwan since the CPC defeated the Nationalists, the Kuomintang, in 1949. When I was a child, I often overheard the grown-ups lamenting that the communists would eventually destroy Taiwan’s independence. My experience with “RuShi” somehow indirectly reinforced my sense of impending doom, but it took me almost a year to confront and analyze my fears.
Fast forward one year, the Middle Kingdom has been increasingly casting its shadow over Hong Kong, the city I have called home for the last seven years. Since June of 2019, Hong Kong has become entrenched in political turmoil. The major event to ignite the recent protests is when Carrie Lam, the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, proposed the extradition bill in early 2019 as a response to a gruesome murder that took place in Taiwan. She claimed that if this bill passed, it would allow Hong Kong to extradite a murderer—a Hong Kongese man who had killed his pregnant girlfriend—to Taiwan. This bill would enable Hong Kong to surrender fugitives to be extradited to other countries it does not have agreements with, including Taiwan, Macau, and mainland China. There is no inherent problem with transferring a murderer from Hong Kong to Taiwan, as both countries have functioning courts. However, the prospect of being tried in mainland China is terrifying—its courts have a dubious track record for respecting human rights and have a conviction rate of 99.9%[1]. In other words, this bill opens up the possibility that anyone Beijing deems unsavory, such as activists, journalists, or even business executives, could face the opaque justice system in mainland China. Therefore, Hong Kongers from all walks of life, from university students to senior citizens, civil servants to mothers, have marched against it. At first, the protests were calm and imbued with a sense of optimism. However, as the government continued to ignore their demands, the tension escalated, and violence erupted. The once orderly city has become a scene of bloodshed and in its wake, turned a bustling metropolis into a ghost town.
Back in 2018, I couldn’t have predicted the protests that would break out a year later, but I viscerally knew that “RuShi” represented more to me than what I saw. This feeling intensified in recent months as I have witnessed the erosion of Hong Kong’s freedom of speech and assembly. I have also started to worry about Hong Kong’s culture as a world city and its freewheeling way of life. At first, the artwork did not sit well with me. For something that is based on Bazi, I expected the work to give me a prediction. After all, that was the point of Bazi— to reveal my destiny. However, I have recently come to understand that the artwork also represents my fears—a future devoid of freedom of expression and diversity of culture. I fear that if the CPC has its way, it will fill Hong Kong with distracting and meaningless lines, a busy illusion like in “RuShi.” The more I think about it, the more I understand what is at stake.
I have found it helpful to frame my newfound stake in Roland Barthes’ idea of punctum, which describes a “special acuity” in photography[2]. To Barthes, the punctum is a “sting, speck, cut, little hole—and also a cast of the dice.” A photograph’s punctum is often a result of an accident, creating details that enable the viewer to think beyond the image and to imagine the moment before or after the picture was made. What Wong’s work was missing, was the punctum of Bazi. More specifically, the work took away the superstitious elements of a cultural practice. Though I resented Taiwanese superstitions as a young person and still have my reservations about them, I do have many memories associated with them.
When I was a baby, a fortune teller told my mother that I should delay marriage, that I would not be happy if I married ‘too early.’ He did not give my mother a specific timeframe, but this may be the reason Mama never approved of any of my boyfriends. When I was 17, my Hungarian-Canadian boyfriend bought me a bouquet that contained a white carnation, among other vibrant flowers. “Is he cursing me to die?” she yelled, “tell him to never give you white flowers!”
Mama’s words illustrate how many Taiwanese people, even when they have immigrated to Canada, hold their superstitions dear. Mama did not want to see white flowers because white is the color of death. But how would an 18-year-old Canadian boy, whose family fled Communist Hungary when he was a toddler, know anything about the role of white flowers within Chinese superstition?
The word ‘superstition’ in the Chinese language is ‘迷信’ or mixin, consisting of the characters of “lost” and “faith” or “belief.” In other words, someone who is lost in their faith or belief is superstitious. Mixin is often lumped in with the Chinese folk religion rituals, a complex combination of teachings from Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Unlike Abrahamic religions, the Chinese folk religion has no canonical text, nor is there any congregation. Each family has its own practices that take place at home altars or in temples. There are two layers of Chinese folk religion. The communal layer consists of local deities such as an earth god, a city god, and Mazu, the patron goddess of the sea. This layer also includes ancestor worship and its rituals, derived from the Confucian teachings of filial piety, the virtue of respecting one’s elders and origins. The individual layer of the Chinese folk religion consists of supernatural beliefs and practices that include a wide variety of fortune-telling practices, such as Bazi and ziweidoushu. In addition to the two layers, many Taiwanese people, my family included, also follow a school of Buddhism, worshipping deities such as the Buddha, the Enlightened One, and Guanyin, the bodhisattva, or the goddess of compassion and mercy. These mixin provide Taiwanese culture with a sense of time, a narrative, and that particular little ‘sting’ that makes me pause and think.
However, as a Canadian teenager in the 1990’s, I did not appreciate the quirkiness of my Taiwanese culture or how meaningful it was to have one outside of the dominant Anglo-Canadian ethos. Now, perhaps because I am getting older and have lived in East Asia for over seven years, I have started to develop an affection for my mother’s mixin, which to me, has become the punctum of my Taiwanese culture. When I saw “RuShi,” I could not understand or articulate my reaction, and why the technologically driven iteration of my destiny troubled me so. After months of contemplating, I have realized that despite my dismay about Chinese superstition as a young person, I still associated Bazi as a part of the Chinese folk religion, which is something sacred. To me, technology in places of worship felt unnatural. Seeing my Bazi displayed in lines on a projection is perhaps equivalent to praying before a digital recreation of Jesus on a crucifix. The digital projection did not make sense to me because, throughout my whole life, whenever my mother coerced me to, I have witnessed or partaken in the rituals of Chinese folk religion with low-tech activities, such as praying to physical pictures of statues of deities, burning incense, and physically interacting with monks, readers and fellow worshippers—not looking at a projection in a dark room by myself.
Wong’s work seems to suggest that technology can replace mixin, and more broadly, that the idea of progress can substitute for the ethos of different Chinese ethnic groups. “RuShi” indicates the disconcerting trend of CPC’s quest for ‘One China’ to eliminate ethnic identities across its vast and contested territories. In Xinjiang, the CPC has been tightening its grip through the use of sophisticated surveillance systems and the adoption of ‘re-education’ camps to force the Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group, to renounce their language as well as their cultural and religious identities. I shudder as I look at a photograph of rows of despondent Uyghur men sitting on the ground wearing blue prison uniforms and taqiyah, short, rounded skull caps worn by Muslims. Like the Han Chinese who only half a century ago were forced to denounce all beliefs deemed ‘traditional’ or ‘capitalistic,’ and sing songs in praise of Mao during the Cultural Revolution, these Uyghur men are subjected to similar self-criticism routines and forced to sing patriotic songs about Xi Jinping. History is repeating itself, and I dread the CPC’s attempt to eradicate cultures, languages, and identities.
Lately, I have been thinking back to the first time I saw “RuShi.” After the projection of my Bazi ended, I studied as other people viewed their eight characters on the screen. A woman stood in front of her projection, allowing the lines to fall on her face while her friend snapped a photo with her smartphone—they found joy in the seemingly meaningless lines and turned them into a photo-op. They remind me that the CPC has already effectively expunged Chinese folk religion. In a 2012 study, Fenggang Yang and Anning Hu mapped the practitioners of Chinese folk religion in mainland China and Taiwan. The percentage of people who still consider themselves practitioners of the Chinese folk religion in mainland China (11.8%) is significantly lower than in Taiwan (42.7%). While 82.5% of people in Taiwan worship local deities, only 4.1% of people in China do so. [3] The difference in religiosity is jarring across the different practices: ancestor worship, 87.4% to 17.5%; fortune-telling, 34.0 % to 9.8%; amulet practices, 74.4% to 30.2%. In short, the CPC has somehow succeeded significantly dilute traditional beliefs and rituals in mainland China in less than 50 years. Nowadays, Chinese people seem to be more interested in consuming the latest fashion garments and technologies, rather than worshipping their ancestors or reading life charts.
I do not believe that it is Wong’s agenda to represent the CPC’s point of view through “RuShi,” but his work reminds me that my cultural identity, one I did not even acknowledge as a teenager, could be annihilated by the CPC. At the same time, I realize that besides the technological and economic progress in recent years, China’s core beliefs have not changed since the Cultural Revolution. The CPC is the same iron fist that subjects its secular, authoritative power over its populace, demanding complete obedience. In fact, it has been my perception that has shifted. It is this shift that has led to my understanding of what I could lose.
I left Canada when I was 26 to pursue a career in academic librarianship, first in the United Arab Emirates and then in Bahrain. A few months before my 30th birthday, I moved to Hong Kong to be closer to my parents, who had repatriated from Canada to Taiwan. At that time, I was secretly going through a divorce with a man my family thought was my boyfriend. Two years before, we had eloped so I could sponsor his spousal visa in Bahrain. I did not tell my family because he was between jobs, and there was no way my mother would have approved the union. Perhaps the ziweidoushu reader who warned my mother about my marriage had been right.
At first, my mother was excited to have me closer to her and thrilled that I had finally broken up with my good-for-nothing ‘boyfriend.’ However, she soon began to worry about my marriage prospects. As she saw my cousins get married and start families, she grew anxious that I might never find a suitable husband—she might never have grandchildren.
In 2014, after I had lived in Hong Kong for about two years, Mama handed me a bracelet, a type of amulet, made of red threads knotted together. She said it was blessed by Mazu, the patron goddess of fishermen, and that she had asked the goddess to lead me to a good husband. This time, I did not roll my eyes and dismiss her behavior as mixin. I humored her and put on the bracelet. Whether it was the bracelet’s doing or not, by the end of the year, I started dating Derek, a colleague from the university I was working at. Early in the relationship, Mama was suspicious due to my track record of dating men she deemed not good enough. But, upon meeting the blue-eyed, well-mannered ‘gentleman redneck’ from Kentucky, Mama was smitten and accepted him.
Mazu is the protector of the fishermen, Queen of Heaven in the Chinese folk religion. She also found Derek. Illustration by Ahmara Smith.
Shortly after Derek and I got engaged, my ecstatic mother bragged about my magical amulet-bracelet and matching fiancé. Most of our family members were happy for my good fortune, except for Aunt Lily, who is a reader of ziweidoushu. She was hesitant about my engagement but would not give a reason. “Why can’t you be happy for Kayo?” Mama demanded.
After weeks of pestering, Aunt Lily relented. She told Mama that according to my life chart, my first marriage was supposed to fail. Mama, who had just learned about my first marriage, was relieved. “It’s okay,” Mama said, “She’s been married once already. This is her second marriage.”
Delighted, Aunt Lily gave Mama her blessing.
A year later, Derek and I were married. To this day, Mama is convinced that the Mazu has led Derek to me. The feminist in me would have liked to say that Mazu had led me to Derek, but Mama’s mixin is still very much entrenched in a symbolic order in which women’s sole concern has to do with finding a man, submitting to his needs, and bearing his children. When I was younger, I had nothing but disdain for these types of patriarchal mixin. Lately, I am not so sure. Can feminism co-exist with mixin? I can’t say that Mama’s mixin has not brought me fulfillment and happiness—maybe ziweidoushu does have my destiny spelled out for me in the stars. Perhaps it was Mazu who led me to my marriage. I have no concrete answers. On my wedding day, I took off my amulet-bracelet. Now, four years later, it is sitting in my jewelry box. It is faded now, but I cannot bear throwing it away. I have such affection for it—a part of me believes that it continues to bestow good luck.
The fond memories associated with fortune-telling, the Chinese gods, the amulets— the so-called superstitions, the mixin—are the punctum of my culture. In recent months, I have been thinking about all that is dear to my heart, as I watched a group of protestors wielding metal sticks and shattering the glass of the entrance of the MTR subway station in my neighborhood in Hong Kong. They were clad in black, their youthful faces concealed behind industrial gas masks. Moments later, a group of Raptors, the tactical unit of the Hong Kong Police Force (HKPF), stormed out from their hiding places, threw tear gas canisters, and chased after the fleeing protestors. In the process, there have been many serious injuries, mostly on the part of the demonstrators. Since June until October 2019, more than 2,000 people, some as young as 12, have been arrested. 1/3 of them are under the age of 18.[4]
Though I do not condone the violence, I understand what the young people in Hong Kong are fighting for. They are not only struggling for their rights and freedoms outlined in the Basic Law, the CPC sanctioned constitution of Hong Kong, they are also safeguarding their way of life. They may not think about this consciously, but by demanding their rights, they are also protecting the punctum of their culture, which is not so different from mine.
Thinking back now, “RuShi” is more ominous in light of the current situation. I am anxious about the future of Hong Kong and Taiwan as the shadow of the Middle Kingdom is expanding its reach. Though I am powerless to stop it, I can bear witness, document, and share my stories.
[2] Roland Barthes discusses his thoughts about punctum in Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography (London, UK: Vintage, 2000).
[3] To read Yang and Hu’s study on the level of superstition in Taiwan and China: “Mapping Chinese Folk Religion in Mainland China and Taiwan,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 51, no. 3 (2012).
Kayo Chang Black is a Taiwanese Canadian writer who explores hybrid identities, global citizenship, and the intersection of cultures. Her career as an academic librarian brought her to the U.A.E, Bahrain, and Hong Kong. After an eight-year stint in Hong Kong, she packed up her books and cat and moved to Colombo, Sri Lanka. She currently teaches research and writing at the Academy of Design (AoD). Her work has been published in Sunspot Literary Journal, Photography of Art, and others. To read her work, visit http://kayochangblack.com Follow her on Instagram: @kayo.chang.black or Facebook: @kayochangblack
One of the exits of Wan Chai station was on fire on September 29, 2019.
Several oversea friends and family members have been getting in touch after watching media reports of the unrest in Hong Kong. After speaking to many, I see that despite their best intentions, there is a lack of understanding of the political situation in Hong Kong. Honestly, I have been rattled by what’s been happening in the city I’ve called home for the last seven years. My mother has been warning me not to write anything political in these turbulent times, but I can’t help myself (sorry Mama). I have decided to write a personal account of what’s been happening here. I hope to provide some information alongside my personal anecdotes.
Leading up to National Day on October 1, while mainland China was gearing up to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the violence in Hong Kong escalated. Thousands of Hong Kongers marched and chanted on the major thoroughfares throughout the city, some vandalized public properties, set barricades on fire, and trashed storefronts. The raptors, which are the tactical unit of the Hong Kong Police Force (HKPF), would eventually storm out from their hiding places and start throwing tear gas canisters, bean bag rounds, and rolling out the anti-riot vehicle spewing blue water. Many Hong Kongers, most of them young, were arrested. Tension peaked on National Day–the streets were the most violent I’ve seen in the recent months. It hit close to home too. There were tear gas canisters fired on my street and Derek and I had a painful time trying to get home.
Just when the situation couldn’t seem to get any worse, hell broke loose shortly after Carrie Lam, the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, announced the anti-mask law on Friday, October 4th, 2019. The protests and the accompanying violence intensified. For the first time since I’ve lived in Hong Kong, and probably for the first time in recent Hong Kong history, the MTR Corporation shut down all MTR services. This whole weekend has been a virtual lockdown–with the paralysis of the public transportation system, many malls and stores have shuttered and the usually bustling city of Hong Kong seems like a ghost town.
What happened to the free-wheeling city of Hong Kong? To get the story straight, I need to go back to 1984, when the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (U.K.) signed the Sino British Joint Declaration in Beijing. This declaration laid out the stipulation of the then British Hong Kong’s return to China on July 1, 1997. At this time, both the U.K. and the PRC agreed that Hong Kong will fall under the constitutional principle of “one country, two systems” and the socialist system of PRC would not be practised in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) for a period of 50 years. Based on this agreement, Hong Kong maintains its capitalist system and its currency. Its way of life would remain unchanged until 2047.
Under this “one country, two systems,” Hong Kong is supposed to have a great level of autonomy. Hong Kong is to operate under the Basic Law, the constitution of the HKSAR and national law of the People’s Republic of China. Furthermore, Hong Kong’s legal, legislative, and judicial systems are separate from those in the PRC and the rights to freedom of speech and assembly remain. Furthermore, the Basic Law also stipulates that Hong Kong will have universal suffrage by 2017, allowing its citizens to elect their own Chief Executive.
In 2014, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPCSC) of 31 August 2014 prescribed a selective pre-screening of candidates for the 2017 election of Hong Kong’s chief executive. This led to the umbrella movement that lasted 79 days. Various groups set up barricades in the central district of Hong Kong and camped out in tents to protest against the decision. Sadly, this movement did not achieve universal suffrage and most of the leaders and organizers have been arrested since. However, it sparked a new generation of politically-minded protestors concerned about their future and freedom.
The major event to ignite the recent protests is when Carrie Lam proposed the extradition bill in early 2019 as a response to a gruesome murder that took place in Taiwan. If passed, it would have allowed Hong Kong to surrender fugitives to be extradited to other countries it does not have agreements with, including Taiwan, Macau, and mainland China. There isn’t an inherent problem to extradite a murderer from Hong Kong to Taiwan, both countries have functioning courts. However, the prospect of beingtrialled in mainland China is terrifying–its courts have a dubious track record for respecting human rights and have a 99.9% conviction rate. This bill opens up the possibility that anyone Beijing deems unsavoury, such as activists, journalists, or even business executives, could face the opaque justice system in mainland China. This is why Hong Kongers started protesting.
The first anti-extradition bill protest I participated in 2019 was at Victoria Park on June 4, 2020, a peaceful sit-in that coincided with the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre. The Hong Kong government ignored people’s peaceful requests to scrap the bill, and they continued to do in the subsequent protests. Over the next several months, the protests have escalated. During the early summer, the protests in my neighbourhood of Wan Chai were orderly. People, young and old, families with their strollers marched and chanted along Hennesy Road, one of the major roads connecting Victoria Park to the government buildings in Central. There was a sense of optimism in the air, the people of Hong Kong hoped that Carrie Lam would hear them.
However, Carrie Lam not only ignores the peaceful protests, but she also condemns them and calls them rioters. She’s been hiding behind the shield of the HKPF, using them as sticks to strike the protestors who are merely practicing their rights as outlined in the Basic Law. Over the course of several months, many people have been hurt by the police and the reputation of the HKPF has fallen to an all-time low as the Hong Kong people no longer trust the police. People are enraged. All they wanted was the scrapping of an unjust law. Carrie Lam, under the “one country, two systems,” should have the power to do so. But she dragged her feet and refused to do so. Until it is too late.
After months of protests, it is clear that Carrie Lam has no autonomy to govern Hong Kong. What has been suspected all along is true: The “one country, two systems’ principle is a sham; Carrie Lam is merely a puppet of the Communist Party of China. The mood in the protests has taken a turn. After months of not being heard, and knowing that they will probably never be heard, the young protestors are losing patience and are starting to resort to violence. In early September, Carrie Lam did formally withdraw the extradition bill–but it seems to be too little, too late. Now Hong Kongers have five demands and unless they are all met, they are going to continue to protest. Can you blame them? If this was my only home and my future is at stake, I’d be out there protesting with them too.
Protesters in Wan Chai.
Chaotic weekends have become the new normal in Hong Kong. The public transportation of Hong Kong has been paralyzed. What used to be normal, like meeting friends outside of one’s district, has become a challenge. Many shops and malls have been closed, along with movie theatres, restaurants, and other types of entertainment, forcing many inside all weekend. Having said that, the unrest does not threaten my physical well-being. To me, this whole situation is more of a mind fuck than anything else. One day, the city is seemingly trashed and burning, but overnight, the diligent city workers clean up the city and repair damaged properties to allow people to return to work in the morning. The next day, it is business as usual, and all traces of the unrest, besides a few graffiti here and there, have been erased. I feel like I live in parallel universes, and my mind can’t reconcile the two realities.
Many people in Hong Kong, locals and expatriates alike, have been impacted by the recent turmoil. While many are supportive of the young people of Hong Kong, others are dismayed by the loss of income and the inconveniences brought on by the closure of roads and disruption of the public transportation system. I’ve also experienced frustration and anxiety, but I don’t lose sight of the fact that I, as an expat living in this great city, can choose to leave. On the other hand, the people who are out protesting are fighting for their freedom in the only home they have.
Despite my anxiety, I can’t help but to be proud: Hong Kongers are the only people in this world who are openly defying China right now. (Yes, the Uyghurs and the Taiwanese have been defying China too, but not in this in-your-face kind of way– these are topics for another post for a different day). I don’t know how long they will last and how much impact they can make, but I admire the resilience of the Hong Kong people. Add oil, Hong Kong!
If you have any comments or questions, please post them below.
We are in riot gear and armed with full-body clear shields, facing thousands of young protestors. These kids—clad in black, carrying umbrellas, and covered in face masks—should be at school or at work. Instead, they are using their sweaty bodies to block a major road in downtown Hong Kong, preventing lawmakers to enter the Legislative Council building to read the controversial extradition bill.
As
a law-abiding person, this bill has no effect on me. But my wife says that if
the bill passed, activists, journalists, and even business executives—anyone
Beijing deems unsavory—could be extradited to mainland China, in a justice
system known for its lack of human rights and a 99.9% conviction rate. Last
Sunday, my wife joined the one-million strong march where people were chanting
about this “evil law” that will erode Hong Kong’s freedom of speech. I did not
participate—My duty is to protect and serve while maintaining order.
As
I stand in the middle of the wide boulevard in my soaked-through uniform, I see
a woman approaching, eventually standing between the protesters and us. She is
bespectacled, middle-aged and wearing a t-shirt with a towel draped around her
neck. “I am a mother, and I am sure some of you have kids,” She wails. “Why did
you attack our kids like this?”
She, like many mothers on the streets today, are protesting on behalf of their children who have been shot at with rubber bullets, beanbag rounds, and tear gas when the Commissioner gave us the directives to disperse the crowd. Our duty is to protect and serve while maintaining order.
“I am not here to attack you. I have no weapon.” She unloads her small backpack and stretches out her thin arms. “I have been smoke-bombed by your tear gas so many times. Can you please stop?” She pleads.
As
she steps nearer, I feel tears trickling down under the clear visor over my
face— this woman could have been my mother, who also drapes her towel the same
way when she practices Tai Chi in the park. I cry for my divided city. While my
colleagues on the force want nothing more than the protesters to go away, the pro-democratic
students behind the woman, like my wife, are resisting the tear gas with open
umbrellas and face masks, demanding the scrapping of the extradition bill.
Then,
out of nowhere, a colleague comes dashing behind me. With a beanbag round, he
shoots at the woman who is only inches away from my shield. My ears ring as I
watch her topple backward. Luckily, a bystander catches her fall and leads her
away. Instantly, my eyes start to burn—the same colleague has also fired tear
gas into the crowd.
The crowd scatters within seconds. I dab away my tears with my handkerchief. Then I return standing in line with my shield up. My duty is to protect and serve while maintaining order.
Dear Reader, this post is part of a three-part series. Please read Part I and Part II before proceeding.
After we visited the temple and the columbarium on the first day of the Chinese New Year, my family always visit the Chang mausoleum with offerings and freshly cut white Chrysanthemum. To get there, Baba droves us through the scenic cemetery ground, which has small, winding roads with proper street names. I felt like a tourist visiting the City of the Dead.
Derek’s first visit to the Chang burial grounds in 2015.
The Chang burial plot is marked by a large, black granite plaque with dignified golden Chinese characters. The mausoleum itself is shaped like a stone house, surrounded by an open, paved space. In front of the mausoleum is an altar. To the right of the house-like tomb is the shrine of two gods: the god of Feng Shui, and the god of earth.
In the Abrahamic tradition of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, there is only one god. However, in the Chinese folk religion, there are multiple gods, such as Buddha, the enlightened one, the goddess of the sea, Mazu, and Guan Yin, the Bodhisattva of compassion. When Mama is concerned about my grades or my career prospects, she pays Wenchang Wang a visit, who is the god of culture and literature. Another important deity for the Taiwanese soul is the ancestors, which consists of the older generations, all the people who are responsible for our existence. When an elder passes away, he or she joins the ancestors and become a god. They are vital as they remind the living of our roots while protecting and blessing their decedents.
On the left side of the ground, there is also an imposing plaque made of black granite. With golden Chinese characters, it illustrates the story of my ancestry. In the year 1721, the first male Chang in my bloodline, from a village just outside of Xiamen, Fujian, crossed the Taiwan Strait and migrated near Taichung, near the west coast of Taiwan. Since then, the Changs have blossomed and spread. In the early 90’s, Agon and his brothers bought the burial ground and erected the mausoleum in its current location to enable the future generations to honor our ancestors and to remember our origin. Currently, it is the final resting place for at least three generations of Changs, dating back to Agon’s parents.
Mama prays to the ancestors.
To prepare for the worship ritual, Derek helped to unload the rest of the offerings, and we distributed them between the god of Feng Shui the god of earth and the ancestors. We stacked the food offerings neatly in each area, but the fresh flowers are always reserved for the ancestors. Mama lit the incenses and gave each of us three sticks. Then, we went around to the different gods and the ancestors and asked for their blessings. After we finished praying in each area, we put one of the incense sticks in the little pots next to their plaque. We worshipped the ancestors last, and Mama talked to them:
“Dear ancestors, Kayo has brought her husband Derek to see you. Please bless them and ensure that they are healthy and successful in their careers.”
Mama closed her eyes as she prayed, her palms in front of her chest. Then, she tossed a couple of coins on the ground. If the coins came up with different faces, this meant that the ancestors were happy. If they come up with the same faces, Mama would have to pray again and toss the coins until the ancestors indicate that they were satisfied. After that, we stand around the stone fireplace and burn joss papers.
“Burn those first,” Mama said pointing to a stack of joss paper wrapped in red rubber bands. There are many stacks, but the ones we burn first are the special ones with Sanskrit verses in Chinese characters written inside a large circle shaped like an old Chinese coin.
Joss papers are money for the dead, and we burn them to ensure that our ancestors have the means to live comfortably in the afterlife. Mama said we should touch every piece of the paper, which guarantees their validity in the heavens. I took off the rubber band and carefully folded the first piece of the rough yellow paper. I made a bundle of five or so pieces and fed them into the vibrant flames. Derek followed suit. We repeated the process until the whole stack was gone, and I reached for another one. After the first stack, the rest of the joss paper is less fancy—they are smaller and decorated with a tiny gold or silver foil paper glued in the center. Derek and I continued to toss the joss paper, and we watched as they fluttered in the fire, consumed by flames, turned black and reduced to ashes.
After we burn all the joss papers, we headed home. While driving through the City of the Dead, we drove by Mama’s younger brother, my Uncle Freddie and his wife, my Aunt Christine. Baba stopped the car as Freddie rolled down his window, and exchanged pleasantries. Mama and Aunt Christine spoke over their husbands in their respective passenger seats. Before we drove away, Aunt Christine said, “see you at our place tomorrow.”
Even though Mama’s family’s burial plot is in the same cemetery, only a few blocks from ours, she was never invited to worship there on the first day of the New Year. Superstition dictates that a married daughter would bring ill fortune to her maiden home on the first day of the New Year’s. The family tomb, which houses the ashes and the spirits of the ancestors, is also considered “home.” We always saw Mama’s family on the second day of the New Year, which is reserved for married daughters to return home with her husband and children.
Ironically, as a married daughter, with an American, Christian husband, I have been going home and worshiping the Chang ancestors on the first day of the Chinese New Year’s. My parents’ desire to see me and Derek is stronger than superstition—I like knowing that their love for us is stronger than their beliefs in ill fortunes. I like that Mama and Baba are a little rebellious in defying tradition. I also like to partake in this defiant act.
Mama typically frets this time of the year. While we were burning joss papers, she looks anxious, “You are going to come back and visit us after we die, aren’t you?”
When I was younger and lived far away, I never even considered it. I also thought ancestor worship reeked of patriarchy and superstition. Also, I hated being reminded of Mama’s morality. Logically, we all know that our parents will die one day, but I hate it when she forces me to think about it on an annual basis.
Lately, my perspectives on ancestor workship have been shifting. Based in Hong Kong, I am barely two hours away by flight. I also start to appreciate many aspects of the tradition. I love spending time with my parents, and I like feeling connected to my ancestry and knowing that I came from somewhere. Yes, it’s patriarchal and superstitious, but it seems that my parents are more fixated on the positive aspects of the traditions. Even Derek is interested in the rituals and has been prompting me to explore. Although looking after the ancestor’s is supposed to be my brother Davis’ job, it’s more likely that Derek and I will remain in Asia and will take over the duty. Like Ama, I will be in charge of a role traditionally assigned to a man, which is something I think is another defiant act I could partake.
Looking at Mama’s anxious face, I said, “of course I will, Mama,” I reassured her by giving her shoulder a little squeeze.
Dear Reader, this post is part of a three-part series. Please read Part I before proceeding.
Once Baba parked the car on the unpaved gravel lot, we got off and started to unload the offerings. Derek emptied a basket of fruit and candies and passed them to Mama. He then tried to give her more but Mama, in her rudimentary English said, “Okay, enough. No more.”
Derek looked at me, puzzled.
“Sweetie, the rest is for the cemetery,” I explained.
“Why do we need to have different offerings for the cemetery?” He asked.
His question made me pause. I’d never thought about why. It has always been the way it is: Ama’s family get their offerings, the Chang ancestors get their own, plus the flowers, and the gods also get their set of offerings.
“Mama,” I asked in Mandarin, “Why do we have different offerings for everybody?”
“Well, you wouldn’t offer leftovers to your guest when they come to your house for dinner, right?” She stated, matter-of-fact, “it’s the same with the gods and ancestors.”
Ironically, Derek, my American, Midwestern husband who grew up in a Christian household, was the person who got me thinking about the traditions I always took for granted.
Baba led the way to a little shack next to the make-shift temple. He approached the two smiling nuns with clean-shaven heads at the counter and pass them two 1,000 NTD notes. One of them gave him a donor form. He filled it out using his mother, Ama’s name as the head of the household. He wrote down everybody’s names, including his older sister and younger brother, along with their spouses and children. This year, he also added a new name on the form: Derek’s.
We placed the offering on a table in a large room. A gigantic, golden Buddha took up most of the front of the room. There are numerous round tables with little lotus shaped signs with the names of the donors written on them. By donating to the temple, our names sit in a room with Buddha all year long, bring us peace and prosperity. Mama gave me, Derek, and Baba each two lit incenses. We first worshipped the Jade Emperor in the sky. Then we turned around to worshipped the Buddha.
In the last few years, Baba had moved Ama’s family ashes to a new temple.
After the temple, we headed to the columbarium.
Mama forbade Derek and me to enter the columbarium the first time we visited because she wanted us to avoid ghostly spirits close to our wedding day. Despite Mama’s best effort to avoid entanglements with the afterlife, Derek and I got married on Halloween, my favorite holiday, later that year. We had a costume party, and my wedding dress was black.
When we revisited the following year, we went inside. As we entered, there was a faint waft of incense and I shivered—the temperature dropped slightly as if appeasing to the dead who no longer needed warmth. Baba guided us through a narrow hallway that had rows and rows of wooden urns stacked on top of one another. Following behind Dad, I made mental notes of the almost identical containers labeled with the deceased person’s name, and sometimes it might also include a headshot. Some of the urns were new and shiny, while others looked dusty and faded. Walking around in the columbarium was like traveling in a packed subway train during rush hour, surrounded by a bunch of strangers in a tight and intimate space. Imagine feeling squished and cramped but not able to see the other passengers. Though their spirits were invisible, their lack of manifestation still had a presence.
As I walk, I could feel the spirits of the people inside the urns brushing up against me, as if pleading with me to stop and visit them. I paused before a box to study a black and white photograph of a stern looking old man in a suit. His urn looked as though it’d seen the changes of seasons, and yet it was clean, and the picture on the box was fresh, indicating a regular visit from his family. At one point, I came across a photograph of a young girl smiling in her pigtails. However, her urn was dusty and the features of her face blurred. Studying her young face, I wondered what misfortune had fallen on her, and why her family had not been visiting. When we got to the front of the urns that contained the ashes of Ama’s family, Mom gently tapped on each of them to let them know that we had arrived. There weren’t headshots, but the urns had their names printed in black characters. I look at my adopted great-grandmother’s name and contemplated about this person who raised Ama. I have no recollection of her as I had only met as a baby before she died. We merely stopped for a minute or two to say hello. Then we took the same route out of the columbarium, leaving all the spirits behind.
Derek and I only went into this columbarium once. The following year, Baba moved Ama’s family’s ashes in a brand new temple on a hilltop with a pretty garden. It took a lot of research for Baba to choose this place because this is where Ama will be after she passes. Typically, when the matriarch of the family passes away, she goes into her husband’s family’s tomb. However, since Ama was not Agon’s legitimate wife, other arrangements need to be made. I think Baba has always felt sad about his mother’s situation; this is why he always makes sure that we get up early every Chinese New Year’s Day to worship Ama’s family, to show her that when she joins them one day, we will be visiting her every year.
In the next post, we visit the Chang mausoleum in the cemetery, and I will tell you all about my ancestors.
Hello my dear readers, this is a new series about the Chinese observance and ritual of death: ancestor worship. I hope you enjoy it.
In 2015, Derek and I went to Taiwan for his first Chinese New Year’s celebration with my family. We arrived just before supper time, and Mama was running around in the kitchen, getting our feast ready. Since the gods and ancestors must eat before we do, as she finished preparing the food, I would bring each dish to a large round table in the altar room where Buddha, Guanyin, and our ancestors live. In the center of the room is a picture of Buddha wearing a yellow robe under the Banyan tree, a golden statue of Guanyin, and our ancestors are next to them, represented by a wooden plaque in a glass case.
While Mama was cooking up a storm in the kitchen, I sat in the bone-crushingly hard cherry wood sofa in the living room, mindlessly tapping on my phone. Derek walked into the living room, his nose crinkling, “Oh man, that food smells amazing!” He exclaimed. After a moment of pause, he asked, “why aren’t you in the kitchen helping Mama?”
“Oh, she’ll holler when she needs help carrying the dishes to the altar,” I said without looking up.
“But don’t you want to learn what she’s making?” He asked.
I turned my attention to Derek, this handsome man with twinkling blue eyes I was about to marry. Honestly, the thought of cooking with Mama had never crossed my mind. What business do I have in the kitchen? I would only get in her way. Besides, he was the cook in our family. But then again—if I don’t learn what Mama knows now, her knowledge will go when she goes. I pushed away this morbid thought. It’s not that I didn’t want to learn, but by learning, I am acknowledging her mortality.
The first time I was reminded of my mother’s mortality was at the funeral of my maternal grandmother. During the service, I sat next to Mama in the front row, my nose twitched at the sharp sting of the formaldehyde. While the monk chanted, Mama was heartbroken and bawling her eyes out. I gave her my hand to comfort her. She clutched it so hard my knuckles turned white. At that moment, I thought about the day I would have to cremate my mother—who is going to offer me their hand when that day comes? I hate having to think about the day when Mama will no longer be with us. But, I stood up anyway and walked towards the kitchen.
“You are right. I should learn so I can cook for you.” I smiled at him.
By the time I got there, Mama had finished cooking. “Okay, start bringing the dishes to the altar,” she instructed as she wiped her hands on a towel.
I was too late to learn anything.
Before we eat, we say our prayers with three burning incenses. First, out the window, praying to the Jade Emperor, the Zeus-like deity in the Chinese folk religion. Then, we pray to Buddha and Guanyin, and finally, the ancestors. After the prayer, we place each incense in their respective pots, one of the Jade Emperor, one for Buddha and Guanyin and the final one for the ancestors. When the incenses are burnt about halfway, Mama tosses two moon-shaped wooden blocks while asking if the ancestors were happy with their meal. If the blocks land in two opposite directions, it meant they were satisfied. We could then bring the dishes to the dining room and start eating.
This is a typical Chinese New Year’s Eve feast prepared by Mama. Some of the items are store bought, like the bird.
In the Taiwanese tradition, like many Chinese speaking communities in southern China, the veneration of ancestors, or ancestor worship, is a significant ritual in the Chinese folk religion. It is how Chinese people understand and deal with death. When our parents pass away, they join the older generations of the family and become gods. It is the responsibility of the younger generation to remember our parents, our roots while asking for their blessings. The values of ancestor worship can be traced back to the Confucius concept of filial piety, the virtue of respecting one’s parents and elders by submitting to them. Not only do we love and obey our parents while they are with us, but we also continue to honor them in the afterlife with daily prayers and offerings. On special occasions, such as Chinese New Year’s, the offerings are more elaborate.
On the first day of the New Year, my family always continue to worship our ancestors. First thing in the morning, we would visit the temple to worship Ama’s family. Then we head to the cemetery, where my parental grandfather, my Agon, had purchased the mausoleum for his family and descendants. Derek and I got up early to help my parents load up the car with offerings, which consisted of fresh fruit, candies, and bottled tea. Then, we would stop by a flower stall and pick up freshly cut white Chrysanthemum, a gift to our ancestors.
The temple where we keep Ama’s family’s ashes is a short distance from Taichung. Most families only worship one set of ancestors, as the responsibility gets passed down by the oldest son in the household. However, my family is unique. Based on what I gathered, Ama’s family moved to Vietnam to pursue wealth and fortune when she was an infant. They only took the older boys with them, leaving Ama and her two older sisters behind in Taiwan. It seemed unthinkable for people nowadays to leave their children. But back then, the journey on a boat to Vietnam would be treacherous with young children. Ama’s parents decided to keep the boys, who carry the family name and gave their three daughters away. A childless widow adopted Ama who raised her with love and kindness. Ama claimed that the reason she chose to be with Agon, a married, wealthy doctor, was to have the means to take care of her aging adopted mother.
When her adopted mother passed away, Ama, as her only child, took on the responsibility to worship her. Ama also worshipped her adopted grandmother, who doted on her, as well as her ancestors. Their ashes are kept at the columbarium next to the temple. Now that Ama is getting older and less mobile, it’s Baba and Mama who make the trip to venerate Ama’s ancestors. Since 2012, when I moved to Hong Kong, I would join them on every Chinese New Year’s. And now, Derek also participates in the ritual.
The temple was destroyed by the “921 Earthquake” in 1999, and in its place are some temporary structures. Before the earthquake, it was a beautiful place— a broad, concrete staircase led to the grand temple, the railings on both sides are in the shape of dragons. One dragon was blue, and the other was red. As I walked down the stairs with my hand trailing down the back of the dragon, I felt the grooves of its scales. The sculptor painstaking painted each scale of the dragon in the hue of vivid sapphire. At the bottom of the stairs, the dragons had their mouths wide open, revealing their sharp teeth and blood-red tongue. There was also a garden on the grounds where my brother Davis and I used to play with our cousins, chasing each other around near the pond where koi fish swam in lazy circles, surrounded by luscious tropical plants.
In the year 2018, there are no remnants of its former beauty and magnificence. The temple raised funds to rebuild it, but somehow it never got finished. On the top of the hill where the temple once stood is a half-built structure, an abandoned construction project. Currently, the temple and columbarium are housed in flimsy, make-shift structures, though the earthquake took place almost twenty years ago.
The next post will illustrate the rest of the ancestor worship process. Have you been to a columbarium before? It’s super creepy but cool at the same time.
My first experience with censorship was when I first moved to Dubai. When I first moved there, I tried to log into my OkCupid account. Instead of the blue and pink login page, I was directed to a grey and red warning sign that told me that this site was restricted. I was stunned. Growing up in Canada, I had never had an experience where I couldn’t access a website due to government censorship. I eventually got a VPN and accessed whatever I wanted. However, I vehemently disagree with censorship in any form, personally and professionally.
When I was working as a librarian, I made a pledge to provide equal access to information and to fight censorship. China, with its great firewall, blocks thousands of websites and services, most of them from the West. Obviously, the Chinese policies regarding the internet and the dissemination of information have never sat well with me. However, now living in Hong Kong, reading about how the Communist Party of China (CPC) is controlling their populace and using their wealth to control other countries’ foreign policies and economies brings a chill down my spine.
On August 6, I read an article in The New York Times,A Generation Grows Up in China Without Google, Facebook or Twitter. It describes a group of Chinese millennials who grew up with social media sanctioned by the CPC. Unlike the rest of the world, they didn’t use Google, Facebook or Twitter. Except for one student who studied in Australia, the young people interviewed for the article either don’t know about western social media or don’t see the need for them. They basically trust whatever is fed to them through Baidu, WeChat, Tik Tok, and Weibo:
“Accustomed to the homegrown apps and online services, many appear uninterested in knowing what has been censored online, allowing Beijing to build an alternative value system that competes with Western liberal democracy.”
What worries me is that these young people have zero curiosity over other ways of thinking and a lack critical thinking skills. They will not question or hold their government accountable.
It gets worse:
“These trends are set to spread. China is now exporting its model of a censored internet to other countries, including Vietnam, Tanzania, and Ethiopia.”
This is a digital colonialism.
Back in April, I wrote “China’s New Silk Road” where I talked about the Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) and how it’s changing political and economic policies in Central Asia, West Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. In some ways, BRI is a form of Chinese colonialism, where the CCP can exert control over and gain strategic advantages by investing in foreign countries. This in itself is scary enough, but now, they are entering another realm importing their internet to African countries.
Original illustration for “China’s New Silk Road.” Illustrated by Ahmara Smith.
Am I being paranoid, or is China trying to take over the world through their version of the internet?
I am sitting here trying to grapple with my fear. Why am I so freaked out? Other people who read The New York Times article might pick up on the fact that this article is not legitimate—it is merely Chinese propaganda on the New York Times—after all, no sensible Chinese citizen would speak out against the CPC and its policies, especially to a foreign newspaper. To me, just the fact that the New York Times printed the views of these young people shows that they want to normalize this alternative, Chinese approach to the internet. It’s like they are saying, “Look, censorship is working. We’ve just brainwashed a population of young people who aren’t curious or critical and would not defy the government.”
Remember the man who stood in front of the tanks during the Tiananmen Square Protest? He wouldn’t have existed in the year 2018.
Tank Man by Jeff Widener, 1989.
Using the power of technologies and harnessing the wide reach of the internet, the CPC has bred the perfect citizens under a dictatorship. And, it only took less than a generation. We should be worried, very very worried.
For the last month or so, I have been writing personal stories, such as lessons on love and my first marriage. I almost forgot that this quest to tell my story and discover my Taiwanese culture came from a deep-seeded fear of China’s influence. I don’t want to live in a world where the government restricts our access to information. I don’t want to live in a world where people are passive and uncritical of their surroundings. I don’t want to live in a world where activists, writers and artists and jailed for speaking up against the government and challenging the status quo.
I can feel the chill as the shadow of the Middle Kingdom creeps closer. I don’t really know what to do about it. I don’t know if I can do anything about it. All I do is read news about the growing influence of CPC around the world, be horrified by it and write about it.
Dear Reader, this post is part of a three-part series. Please read Part I and Part II before proceeding.
At an impressionable age, Mama and Ama, my parental grandmother, taught me what I know about love. Ama chose to be with a married man in exchange for a financially secure life. Mama broke down when she found out that Baba was cheating, but eventually decided to swallow her pride because she didn’t have economic means of her own (and she also loved him desperately). I would never want to be in a situation where I have to make the choices they made.
As soon as I got my graduate degree in library studies, I took a job in Dubai to start my career as an academic librarian (the alternative was to stay in Vancouver to write invoices for a plumbing company.) Since then, I moved to Bahrain, and then to Hong Kong for work, to ensure that I am always financially independent. That’s all I learned about love from the women in my life—I must never rely on a man.
In 2012, I arrived in Hong Kong for a new job, a few months before my 30th birthday. With a failed marriage behind me, I still didn’t know what a healthy, lasting relationship looked like. Regardless, I plunged myself into the world of online dating. It was something I dabbled with in the past, but I always disabled my account the minute I found a new boyfriend.
At first, it was fun. Hong Kong is a transient place, and I met men from all over the world. After dating a string of men that didn’t materialize into a steady boyfriend, I was disappointed that it wasn’t as easy as when I was younger. Was it the curse of turning 30?
After venturing into the dating circuit for a while, I begin to feel that I wasn’t good enough. I was in my 30’s; I couldn’t compete with all the skinny 23-year-old Hong Kong girls. Having been in relationships my whole adult life, I didn’t know how to date. For example, a guy I was casually dating didn’t text me back, and that was supposed to be normal. Some of my guy friends suggested I shouldn’t expect so much; I was too needy, too emotional and maybe a little too weird. I didn’t know what to do. I drank, I danced up a storm, and I flirted shamelessly. I did everything to hide that confused and hurt little girl behind a carefree facade. I gave men what I thought they wanted, in the hopes that one of them would love me. Instead, they walked all over me, and I hated myself for it.
I was miserable. How do we end up living in a society where people take sex for granted, and fear intimacy? Why can’t a woman expect the man who she hooked up with to return her text and have an adult conversation after a night of fun?
For years, I put up with a lot of bad behaviors from men. One day, after ending an on-again, off-again relationship I decided enough was enough. I vowed that I would never allow a man to make me feel like I wasn’t good enough ever again. If he thought I was “too” something, then he wasn’t the right person for me. I vowed that I wasn’t going to be apologetic for wanting a serious relationship and that I wasn’t going to settle. I vowed that I would rather be alone than to be with someone who wasn’t going to accept and love me for who I am. I resolved to my fate: I would rather be single for the rest of my life than to be with the wrong person.
It’s not that I stopped dating—I just had zero tolerance for men who mistreated me. I had expectations and boundaries, and I commanded respect. Men called me demanding, bitchy, crazy. I didn’t care. I stopped putting up with shit.
Then it happened one day.
I had known Derek for almost a year at this time. I met him at SCAD Hong Kong, where I was the head librarian, and he was one of the graphic designer professors. He borrowed a bunch of books on typography. I told him about my fifth-grade teacher who made us practice calligraphy. We became friendly and eventually, our paths started to cross.
One night in the fall of 2014, he and I went out for a drink with a bunch of our friends from work. At the end of the night, Derek texted me. “It was great seeing you tonight. You looked cute, even though you were wearing a cat dress.”
He hates cats.
I was wearing the cat dress the day before my wedding, while my best friend Sarah and I were buying flowers for my big day.
“Is Derek flirting with me?” I showed the text to my friend Kuba, who was visiting me at the time.
Kuba confirmed my suspicion.
The rest is history. After a whirlwind engagement, Derek and I married a year later. We will celebrate our third anniversary on Halloween this year.
It’s very ironic that Derek, who hates cats, ends up marrying a cat lady.
Last summer I resigned from my position at SCAD to work towards my M.F.A. degree in writing. I plunged myself into the world of freelance writing. I no longer have a regular paycheck, which taps into my primal fear —to be dependent on a man, like Ama and Mama. Sometimes I freak-out, doubting my abilities and decision. Derek has spent hours comforting and encouraging me. He won’t let me quit and go back to the library.
Sometimes I still can’t believe my luck: my husband not only loves and accepts me, but he also supports me in my writing career. By choosing not to put up with shitty men, I in return found the best man ever. I couldn’t dream of having a better husband.
So, this is what I learned about love. From my Ama and my Mama, I learned to be financially independent. From my dating experience, I learned to stop taking shit from men, and that I had to love and accept myself before I can find anyone who would do the same for me. From Derek, I learned to let go of my fear (though I still have moments of doubt). I couldn’t have got to where I am today without these lessons. Finding love was hard, but I was lucky. For those of you out there who are still looking, don’t despair: You have someone that has been through it all rooting for you.
