As I finish reading Don Quixote, I wonder if my college idealism has gotten the better of me. Assuming that my own experiences are somehow new under the sun is a fallacy.
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After we climb the stairs to pay a brief visit to Chiang Kai Shek’s memorial, my grandfather leads me through an exhibit in the Memorial Hall, situated in the center of Taipei. Grandpa stops by a large glass case, pointing out memorabilia that he also wore when a child. When he was in school, he was a generation that participated in the New Life Movement, an effort to encourage students to be thrifty, diligent, and clean. The movement, which had fascist undertones, was a clear reaction to communism in China. When he thinks back to this time, a brief, pained expression crosses his face, a mere ripple in a calm lake.
My grandfather was basically embroiled in war for the entirety of his life since he was three years old.
In 1921, my grandfather was born in Shanghai during the heyday of the Chinese Nationalist government, incidentally, also the year the Chinese Communist Party was formed. At the age of three, the government began an all out war (Northern Expedition) to unite the country by striking down warlords, starting military schools, and raising funds from abroad. With better equipped and trained armies, Chiang Kai Shek successfully consolidated the Kuomingtang’s power, something the founding father, Dr. Sun, couldn’t achieve. Success, in its usual fleeting form, vanished as World War II ravaged China after the Lu Gou Bridge incident.
My grandfather’s school was bombed when the Japanese invaded Shanghai, burning down parts of the city, and striking inland toward Nanjing. The family village was also razed. For some time, he moved into “loaned lands, or 租界区. Those affiliated with the Allies were either placed in detention or simply disappeared. With unusual resourcefulness for the age of 21, he eventually enrolled and graduated from a university program administered by the puppet government instituted by the Japanese. From a kindhearted lady, he learned basic Japanese language and customs to survive. Ironically, after the war, he never dared to declare his college degree, knowing that it would mean time in jail with the zealous right-wing Nationalists. Today, his ability to learn new languages is still frightening: almost in his nineties, he asks me how to say fresh in English one evening. The next morning, he pauses in front of a plate of fruit, and in perfect pronunciation declares it to be “fresh fruit.”
Political wars were not the only wars that were fought in his life. Bemoaning the fact that his own father married three women, my grandfather reckoned with having three factions in the same family. Each wife vied for power through subterfuge and webs of resistance and open attack, much like political parties would flicker amongst different alliances. Such wars continued to be fought even when he returned for the first time to his hometown decades later. The Communists had targeted his family for having reared a member of the Nationalists, and made short work of his other family members by deporting them to labor camps. The remaining family members were none to happy about the “escape” of my grandfather to Taiwan.
We walk toward the Taipei train station, a bustling hub of humanity, before turning a corner to visit a tiny ryokan renowned for housing Dr. Sun. In the sweltering Taiwan summer heat, we circle through the garden when suddenly my grandfather pauses. From the corner of my eye, I see as his features relax and the tip of his mouth slide into a gentle grin. There is a moment of silence as he soaks in the beauty and subtle fragrance of flowers, as if trying to pause at a fleeting frame of tranquility amidst a long, hectic movie. I’m tempted to ask him about his impression of Dr. Sun but catch myself.
He’s gone a long way for this quiet pause.
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During my cross-Taiwan biking trip, I stop by Elanbi (鵝鑾鼻) lighthouse in the southernmost tip of Taiwan, now painted immaculate white. The lighthouse was designed and built by the British after an American vessel sunk off the coast of Taiwan. If you look closely at the architecture, you notice small holes in the surrounding walls and in the cylindrical steel sheet on the lighthouse itself. These were used by the lighthouse staff to defend against aboriginal raids. Oh, did I mention that this was where my grandfather first met my grandmother?
In 1949, Grandpa explains, the KMT troops heading over to Taiwan were hardly the best trained. The elite had gone north to fight Russians and Chinese communists from taking over Heilongjiang: a large portion of mineral resources is located in the Northeast of China. After World War II, Grandpa moved to Taiwan for a job as a customs officer, beginning a new chapter in his life. Around 1945, his mother warned him to take his whole family with him, in spite of having to live at a lighthouse. He never saw her again, only receiving a letter proclaiming her death. Death would visit another loved one: the sweetheart of his youth and first wife passed away from an illness. Almost all of the family savings were used to try to cure her illness, leaving my grandfather to raise my eldest uncle and two aunts alone.
As a customs lighthouse officer, he was rotated among different lighthouses. He eventually landed at Elanbi lighthouse, near a town that is now known as Hengchun, or “Eternal Spring.” My grandmother at the time was a young Taiwanese woman who had grown up on the island under Japanese colonial rule, knowing very little about the situation on the mainland. She likes to say that the Japanese came to Taiwan with boots and perfect uniforms, while the KMT soldiers came in tatters and looking more like farmers. In some cases, marriages with an outsider shamed families, accustomed to marrying off daughters to nationalists only when they were extremely poor. The details of how they met are unknown to me, but I listen as my grandparents relate the first years of their married life at the lighthouse.
First, the lighthouse served as the locus of central government authority in the area, so living conditions were comparatively good. While three or four lighthouse staff used to reside at the base of the lighthouse (a 6x6 meter space), my grandfather helped build a new structure that could house his whole family. Supplies were delivered by a boat traveling around the island to each of the lighthouses. Schooling was provided for the children in the family, and high profile visits, like the visit of the youngest of the Soong sisters Soong Mei-Ling, meant luxuries like a toilet were installed.
They had to keep the lighthouse impeccably clean, wiping down the steel plating on the lighthouse, clearing out the gunk in the gas lamp, sweeping the grounds, and repainting the walls. When the family decided to raise chickens, my grandfather joined with a few other lighthouse staff to punch a hole in the back wall. Because manure was obviously not allowed on lighthouse grounds, they built a small doorway to a pen. They were even called to rebuild the walls surrounding the actual lighthouse structure.
When my grandfather moved with his entire family to Penghu, a chain of islands off the coast of Taiwan, their two sources of sustenance were canned food and seafood. Here were stories of going out to sea in the middle of the night to catch squid, which could be cooked over coals or used for bait. Simply drop a net into the dark waters and burn a piece of magnesium, which bathes the ocean with incandescent white light. The squid swarm toward the light and, voila, pull up the net. Deep sea fish were also commonly eaten, where weary fishermen would land near the lighthouse to repair their nets or find medicines, trading a fish or two in return. Sometimes, they would even share a meal and share supplies… a can of beans for a whole, fresh fish boiled in a pot of water.
The same evening I’m listening to my grandparents talk about squid, we’re eating it. For some reason, it looks a lot more appealing than before.
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Reading the newspaper with his glasses sliding lazily down his nose, my grandfather settles into the chair across from me. One thing that he’s taught me is how to appreciate a good meal, cooked slowly and thoughtfully.
During the Chinese New Year’s meal, he gingerly takes a sip from his wineglass, filled with golden whiskey. He pauses and raises his chopsticks as he considers what to stockpile atop his rice bowl. Then his hand dives gracefully through a web of chopsticks hovering over the food. While the other family members are almost finished with their meal, allegretto, he approaches his meal slowly, lento. His bowl, as a result, contains a treasure trove of selected portions.
Two nights ago, we asked my grandfather what the most meaningful thing in life is. His answer? My grandfather stops to reflect for a few moments before half-jokingly pointing at the food on the table. “Just remember to eat well and enjoy life.”
