After Reading Something: Worker’s Stories by Li-Ching Lin
From the Beginning of Din Tao
“You must be interested in what he posted on Facebook…” Someone shared a post on the Facebook page with me and that was how I kick-started to know Li-Ching Lin. It’s an article about “Din Tao”. Din Tao is one of the most representative temple festivals in Taiwan. Some believers costume and making up for playing regional characters in the parade with ritual performance. Such a typical culture festival might be impressive to foreigners, but some residents here in Taiwan keep having a diverse discussion on the cyberspace.
Some teenagers in Din Tao are involved in gang affairs lead people who are not familiar with the Din Tao culture to label Din Tao as a group of non-skilled, poorly educated troublemakers. You can easily search some ironic hashtags and terms about Din Tao teenagers. What’s more, parents, education experts, and some teachers even keep taking this kind of bias for granted.
We can’t judge what people behave and how they do for living by only one criterion. However, Li-Ching Lin, a young overseer in the construction field, telling a story about his working partners who participate or even costume regional characters in the Din Tao parade in a gentle way.
“They come here together, working with their friends together. Most of them soup up their motorcycle and even tattoo their lovers’ names on it…”
“They may know nothing about what they are working for but they absolutely know where they come from and rooted in local life in their own hometown; they are close to their community instead of being ambitious in the world outside; they all contribute their energy to family instead of a diploma; They would not be absent in the parade instead of involving a life moving in a better way…”
“Returning” has become a significant plan as government’s appeal. Designing, recreating culture merchandise are ways being encouraged for young people to return and rebuild their hometown. We hope and pray those young people who are well-educated transfer their experiences that learned from the most sophisticated and advanced city into a power of renewing local community which is defined “brain drain”.
There is only one mistake that we makes: We keep dismissing those young kids participate Din Tao and refusing to admit that they are just the knights who stay in the same side of supporting traditional culture events in lifetime. It’s totally unfair for assuming them as potential criminal just because they do not attend college and living a way far from good boys.
What Li-Ching Lin describes in the beginning chapter “Din Tao” is just one of the most serious and unseen problems in Taiwan. Immigrant labors, sex workers, and those unable workers without healthcare…they are still having rough times. Immigrant workers situation gets attention recently and Lin has also note that in this book. I will write something about immigrant workers problems in Taiwan from the view of Lin and coverage reveals controversy.
