Translated…
On a snowy night in Boston, Eric and Stan whom I’d stayed with came in. “My childhood playmate,” Eric made the introductions excitedly, “Now, a professor in New Mexico.”
Stan took his coat off, pulled out a box of Japanese Mochi to share it with everybody, “My wife bought it at the supermarket in California”. I’d looked at the writings on the package, felt “weird”, I couldn’t help, but start laughing aloud, I couldn’t imagine, that it was possible, that I actually, had some foods from where I’m from.
After we’d finished talking about mochi, I’d recalled that Stan was of Mexican descent, I’d asked him about a news: at the bottom of 2012, because of the drug sweeps, the former mayor, Gorrostieta from Tiquicheo, of Tijuana was tortured, and brutally murdered by the drug dealers.
“Tiquicheo?”, that next to my hometown, Stan was overcome with shock.
The very first time that Stan heard this news from me, and learned, that my students won a literary award as I’d assigned them a poem on the topic of the mayor, he was moved, and gave me a man hug, “I’m moved, that in a distant place like Taiwan, someone actually cared about what happened in my hometown, and wrote a poem, in memory, of this heroine.”
That very night, we were like, old friends, talked, until four in the morn, forgot about the language barrier, the race barrier, from how Mexico had signed the NATO agreements, to the pros and cons of globalization; then, from Marquez’s “A Hundred Years of Solitude”, to the difficulties of drugs and revolution in South America.
Every time I’d taken a tour group abroad, what intrigued me the most was this sort of no-topic discussions, not only was I able to increase my forgotten English abilities, but also, gain knowledge, more importantly, I’d made friends, from various regions of the world too.
Like there was another unforgettable Canadian friend, Teresa. Recalling how the first time I’d taken my students to Vancouver back in 2001, there was an afternoon for us to spare, after we’d finished the tour of the fifty story tower at around 2:30, the female tour guide, Teresa asked me if I wanted a cup of coffee before I go, I’d gladly accepted her invitations.
In the café, I’d read the headlines of “Capriati won the Female Australian Open”, I’d exclaimed, and shared with Teresa, Capriati’s story. At age fourteen, she’d become the youngest winner of the championship games, but, immediately thereafter, she’d gotten addicted to drugs, but, she’d worked hard, and persisted, and at the end, she’d won the very first single’s trophy. This story was too inspiring, as she’d listened, Teresa started crying, turns out, her own daughter who is in college, was also, taken with a drug habit, and she couldn’t get herself cleaned.
That very afternoon, we’d talked of the differences in ways of the eastern and western cultures educated the younger generations, until the stars started, rising up from sea level, and I must take the last ferry to northern Vancouver, Teresa said goodbye to me, unwillingly. Before I went off, Teresa said something that affect3ed me, “Vincent, you are different. You know the world.”
I’d found enormous encouragements from Teresa’s words, and it’d also, sown the seeds for me to set up a newspaper company, and the mock U.N. for the middle sections of Taiwan. But, it seems, that Taiwan is leaving the world behind, as the media kept getting intrigued in digging into the belly button of the island.
“During those years, our station had reporters set up their stations, in the major parts of the world.” The reporter who was sent, as the first correspondence to the White House, Yeh said, “Back then, we could have Taiwan’s point of view on various matters in the world front, but now, Taiwan has the most numerous news stations in the world, and yet, the quality of the news that these stations have to offer had declined. And, it cost too much, to send our own reporters abroad, and, every last one of them retreated; and, the news from the international papers are way too expensive, we don’t buy them anymore. But, the misfortunes are on the next generations, after they’d gotten used to the small and limited realm of Taiwan, how, will they, reconnect with the world?”
Perhaps, the students in Taiwan not only needed the smaller blessings, but they must have the courage, to converse, with the rest of the world too, then, whether it be putting Taiwan’s goods on the markets, or to fight for the rights of Taiwan, the people of the world will then, walk in front of this next generation and, affirm their beliefs, “You are different, you know the world.”
So, this, is about getting that LARGER perspective, getting more in-tune with the world, that, is what we need to do here, but, with how the politics and education is going in this place, it will be hard, as we’d managed, to LOCK ourselves up, in those tiny 4 by 4 boxes here.
Life, the Obstacle Course 