The Journey of Homecoming

I think every story has a source, and I should probably start my story from when I was little. I was born in Hsinchu City. My parents are from Taichung. My grandparents are basically illiterate. They are traditional farmers in rural Taiwan. My parents graduated from elementary school and are part of the traditional generation that grew up in the countryside, went to Taipei, and started from scratch. So to be honest, I am ordinary. Children from a similar background are everywhere in Taiwan – so many that if a shop sign falls, it can fall onto more than one of such; if it bounces back, it can hit two more. So why is such a rural landscape lingering in my heart?

Let me talk about my childhood. I graduated from San Min Elementary School in Hsinchu. If you are from Hsinchu, you know it is located in a zone where the city meets the countryside. It was just that I was so young that I didn’t understand the situation: it was also an overlapping space pushed and pulled between the city and the countryside. At that time, my grandparents were still farming in the countryside and raising buffalo. They suffered all their hardships to send their children outside of the countryside, but their children could not even go to school. Because their family was very poor, the children could only learn a professional skill. My parents went to Hsinchu, starting from scratch as blue-collar workers. At that time, as children, we were actually there while the city was expanding. Back then, I was studying at San Min Elementary, and right behind it is what’s known today as Jingguo Road. If you know Hsinchu, you probably know of Jingguo Road. It is a very big, four-lane or several-lane road, and it directly bypasses downtown Hsinchu. I remember that in sixth grade of primary school, the greenery of the farmland disappeared one paddy after another into a road, but at the time studying next to it, we were unaware that the world was changing at a speed we could not imagine. By the road, next to the fields, in the watercourses and the ditches next to the paddies, we continued to play after school, catching loaches, and even catching frogs and fishing for small shrimp. The way I came home from school, from the the San Min Elementary School of Hsinchu – it was a bit… like the way I came back to the countryside from the city, then back to the city, and again back to the countryside: a staggered landscape of light and shadow in my heart. As you went out of the school and looked around, it’s actually a rice field. Then, as you slowly walked along, there would be a grocery store under the big banyan tree. Then, as you walked along slowly, you would walk to some scattered, mottled old houses. As you walked further ahead, you would find a place where more houses gathered and you would start to enter the residential area. Later, you would return to our small factory in the lane. When you went to school, it would be a rewinding image. But this did not last long.

When I was in middle school, my father started to operate an export factory because with the economic take-off, he hoped to run a bigger business and make more money. It was when all of Taiwan was in the era of “Taiwanese money flooding the feet” [in Taiwanese]. When I was going to Zhubei for middle school, I remember, something happened that left a deep impression on me. At that time, my father’s business had actually gone through many twists and turns, and he had already started to go downhill because he was a layman after all. I remember one day, I was going home from middle school as usual. It was a time when [kids in] Taiwan had to attend a half-day of class on Saturday. I was carrying a schoolbag and walking on the small road between rice fields and with lush greenery on both sides. I saw Ah Gong [in Taiwanese], my grandfather, far away. Next to him was a taxi. He called my name loudly. In fact, I could hardly believe my eyes. Because my grandfather was illiterate, he basically had no ability to leave his hometown. But then, when I took a closer look, it really was my grandfather, with my brother and sister also sitting in the car. My heart sank. Since our [family’s] previous economic situation hadn’t been very good, I basically already knew what had happened. Starting from about sixth grade of primary school or the first grade of middle school, I was not able to pay the registration fee. Something big must have gone wrong. The first words of my Ah Gong confirmed my imagination. He said [in Taiwanese]: “Ah Soong, Ah Soong, hurry up! Your father’s factory closed. Hurry up!” Maybe you can’t quite feel what I mean, because many of you [in the audience] are relatively young. It is the era under the “Law of Negotiable Instruments.” If you owed money, you would be in great trouble and the government would deal with you. You had to RUN AWAY [in Taiwanese]. When you hear about this expression you don’t feel it has any special meaning, but I personally experienced it. Within one afternoon, I returned to Taichung from Hsinchu and began a whole year of so-called “returning-to-a-century-ago” rural life. That life, I think, was almost like my farmer’s life today … If you came here to ask me about the turning point in my life, there’s no need to wait, for in this matter was the turning point. It’s almost like [that cartoon character] that we used to call Little Bell, but is now called Doraemon: suddenly, overnight, you’ve been pulled into a drawer [which is a time machine]. As soon as you came out of the hole [in the space-time continuum], it closed. You returned to a life thirty or fifty years ago. There was no way to go back. You had to continue from here, pick up a farmer’s hoe and use it. You had to adapt to life here.

When you went back to the countryside, there was no way to distinguish between what flavor your life was taking on because you just thought: Will I even be able to keep staying here past today? Actually, something my grandfather said really helped stabilize my heart and mind. In that courtyard house [a traditional type of architecture, built with three parts of the house encircling a central courtyard], with the so-called hall, first room, second room, kitchen and corner room [in Taiwanese], there was a so-called traditional Feng-Shui layout. I lived my life under someone else’s roof in the small room next to the kitchen. Living under someone else’s roof means you are a second-class citizen. If you don’t have that experience, you couldn’t know what it’s like. I heard many relatives and friends in the kitchen constantly complaining to my grandfather. They said: “In fact, when your third son – my father is the third son – made money, he didn’t help the family much. In fact, [in Taiwanese:] you don’t have to care for him. Just send him away.” At the time, I remember thinking [if they kick me out] where will I turn to tomorrow? I haven’t even completed the transfer procedures to enter this new school! And to that, my grandfather, as if it were a movie scene, suddenly threw some words out in response. He said [In Taiwanese]: “You said so much, but are we lacking a few sets of tableware to provide meals?” I think that that moment, basically, if it were a movie, it would be the scene where the soundtrack suddenly fades out. The camera would pull away from the scene, and then the lens would move to the flaming stove that every child in a Taiwanese farming village would remember, with a lively flame. Then you would see that the fire had never died, and hope is always alive.

After that, I spent a whole entire year living in the countryside. Living in the countryside brought me a complicated mixture of feelings. Life there had a little of every flavor. You had no time to think, because as soon as you faced one thing, you would encounter something new. I remember the best food I ate wasn’t from a restaurant. There is usually some purpose in going to a restaurant. That is why I liked the kind of daily-life-style restaurant we went to. I remember at that time, I had to do a lot of work for my grandma, enduring the wind and the sun, and many mosquito bites. I think that mosquito bites were the most unbearable because you couldn’t hide from or avoid them. Sometimes, [when we were out working] she [grandma] would bring a small, “bomb bread” [so it was called] that we who grew up as village children knew very well. Inside, there’s a crumbly pastry part, but only one side has it. If you bite into it, you have to guess which side has the crumble. I got used to eating from the side that doesn’t have crumble. This is called eating sugar cane from the less sweet end. But, [if you had been there] you would find that you could never forget the taste… because in that moment, your body was so cold and hungry… To speak the truth, I know I used to leave Taiwan working and studying elsewhere, but I have never felt such a big culture shock as when I moved from the city back to the countryside, which was like traveling back to the time thirty years ago. That was the biggest experience I’ve had. In fact, I think my study-abroad started when I moved to the countryside of Taiwan: [it was like] studying abroad… in the countryside. In addition to what is called a really good taste, I also learned one thing. For another example, I often had to go back. When I went back, I was basically my grandfather’s seed shepherd boy because at that time, my grandpa still had a buffalo. I had to take it to the next town to work. The people in the countryside are very warm and generous. When you are eating, they will bring you extra things. I remember one time: Under heavy rain I hid underneath a thin raincoat, shrinking and watching my grandpa holding his only buffalo in the field. They brought sweet soup, and then they also brought cakes for worships that no one today would like to eat [in Taiwanese]. Mixed with that taste… the cakes were difficult to swallow without water, but it just so happened that there was water… you couldn’t tell whether it was rain, sweat, or tears…that taste. I’ll never forget it for as long as I live. You will find that there is a place to care for you when you need it most: that is called hometown.

I think we all often say that Taiwan has entered the era of industrialization and is a developed country, as if the industry could exist independently of agriculture. But as far as my personal experience is concerned, I feel that, in fact, looking back – I was born in 1970 – you will find that the society turned quickly from the agricultural era to the industrial age, but agriculture is always there. Basically: no agriculture, no human beings. Everyone has forgotten this. We can have an agricultural era, but there is no absolute industrial era. Underpinning industry, there is always agriculture, but in Taiwan we seem to forget this. In our media, newspapers, and magazines, basically we have forgotten the countryside, forgotten the farmers. It’s so serious that in the future, there might not even be anyone willing to be a farmer. Put in an even simpler way – in the past there were two things that were passed down in the family: Moms taught their daughters how to cook, so school did not teach cooking. Also, grandpas taught fathers how to farm, so agriculture and farming were not taught in school either. But today, if you want to learn cooking, you can find a lot of good culinary schools, and even go abroad to France. Today, if you want to be a farmer, you can’t find any schools because it’s not VALUED. I think this is very strange because I feel that agriculture and the countryside are VERY valuable. When you need them, they can care for a broken family like ours. When the financial situation is run down, you must have a place to go. The words that my grandfather said at that time gave a family full of conflict and a child who had nowhere to go the greatest courage. In fact, my deepest memory is not my father’s back [which alludes to Zhu Ziqing’s well-known essay “Father’s Back”]. I didn’t see him because he ran away [in Taiwanese]. I didn’t know where he went. What I remember is that my grandpa rode a big iron horse. We Taichung people called [a bike] an iron horse [in Taiwanese]. The image of his back was as majestic as a mountain. He went to the school and talked to the teacher for me. He pleaded and pleaded [in Taiwanese], saying: “This child has no money to study [in Taiwanese]. Help him find a solution.”

But do you really want to understand why I put so much effort into going to Yilan to make a Community Supported Agriculture collective? In the early days [of the program] we let the consumer take the risk. It’s to support a farmer who is willing to return to farming. This is the greatest support we can give, so that they don’t need to worry about the natural disasters. In fact, to depend on the weather for your food, or to live under someone else’s roof: these are meaningless words to people who have never had the experience. If you had the experience, you would know… “the terrible things are too many to record.” In short, there is no way to describe the feeling with words. But eventually I left the countryside… I was lucky enough to leave the countryside. I went to Taipei to study. I graduated from Yonghe Middle School. After graduation, I was fortunate enough to study in Jianguo High School. I was admitted to the National Cheng Kung University the same year that I graduated. The day I graduated from college, however, there was only one sentence in my heart: I will never go to school again in my life. I have had enough! I can’t find what I want in school. But what I didn’t know at the time was that my being was close to the land. I like living out my existence on the land. And I want to be myself. No school can teach you that. Later, I had lots of jobs, and changed from environmental education to green consumption, to Japanese translation, and I even went to Japan to study. And through that I realized something… When I was 30, I left the city, really said goodbye to Taipei, and went to Yilan to farm. In my heart and mind I was very clear about one thing: To save the world, I believed it was too late. To help Taiwan, I was not qualified to do so. To find a job that I really wanted to do, a road, to be honest, I didn’t have much time to waste. Being a farmer was almost the last option in my pocket.

Eventually, I chose to really go back to Yilan. The last driving force, the last straw, to be honest, is that I wanted to give my children a hometown. Because I used to have a childhood that went through twists and turns, I know what a hometown is. Today children are growing up in the city. Especially in Taiwan, half of the young people are born and raised in the city. If you ask them what a hometown is, they can give you a long discussion of descriptors, but you know that what they are describing isn’t what hometown really means. A hometown is, in four simple words: the “closer” to the “hometown,” the more “apprehensive” you “feel.” There is a place in the 35,000 square kilometers, on the land of the world, a place that makes you go three steps forward, two steps back, to look forward to seeing it, but also being afraid of getting hurt by it. Just like thinking about going back, you are afraid of running into that person you had no way of getting together with – you overthink it all so much that you dare not go back [in Taiwanese]. Why can a piece of land have such a strong pull on people’s emotions? I used to think that it stemmed from an Asia-specific romantic imagination. Until later… I don’t listen to a lot of English songs, but I felt it deeply when I heard this one song. It goes, “Country road / Take me home / to the place / I belong.” “A place I belong:” honestly, this is how “hometown” should be written in the English dictionary. That is what hometown really means. If you have a hometown, you’ll know the deeper essence of the word. Being a farmer was not my original intent, but a result, a means: I hope to give my children a place, when they feel low and get hurt, when they need someone to care for them, a place that recognizes them, that they really belong there. Finally, I want to give everyone a final word of wisdom: you can be a farmer, as long as you are willing to be one [written on the back of his shirt].