Talking Taiwan

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   As she watched the humanitarian crisis unfold due to the war in Ukraine, S. Chien wanted to do something to help. She came up with the idea for the Taiwan Cares project and together with Dr. Monty Wang and Dr. Bo-Chheng Lin, mobilized the efforts of over 30 Taiwanese Americans from New Jersey to raise over $9000 in 24 hours. The funds were used to pur...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Will China attack Taiwan given the current circumstances surrounding the war in Ukraine? My guest on this episode of Talking Taiwan is Kuan-Ting Chen, the CEO of Taiwan NextGen Foundation, which is an NGO (a non-governmental organization) founded in Taipei that focuses on various issues such as Taiwan's soft power, promoting democracy, educational pol...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Jiho Chang tells us the inside story first hand by reliving the Sunflower Movement from Ground Zero. March 18 th  will mark the eighth anniversary of the beginning of the Sunflower Movement during which time activists occupied Taiwan's Legislative Yuan in order to protest the passing of the Cross-Strait Service Trade Agreement, which was a treaty betw...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   On March 9 th Taiwan Post will be issuing a stamp commemorating the 150 th anniversary of the arrival of Canadian missionary George Leslie Mackay in Northern Taiwan. Mackay was unlike most 19 th century missionaries. He has been referred to as the "son-in-law of Taiwan," and was a forward thinker. He was one of the first to oppose the Head Tax imposed...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin: Dr. Michi Fu and Dr. Tsuann Kuo are helping 228 Survivors deal with trauma.   This year marks 75 years since the 228 Massacre and this week we continue our discussion on the topic. 228 refers to February 28, 1947, which could be argued is a misnomer because tensions leading up to the massacre of tens of thousands of people had been building for quite so...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   The 228 Massacre has been a subject of taboo for those who have had family who lived through it and the White Terror Era that followed.   The Lunar New Year holiday and celebrations in Taiwan have just ended, but another national holiday will soon be here, the 228 Peace Memorial Day. But what is 228?   It's been, 75 years and as you'll hear from my gu...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   David Kilgour recently wrote an article that appeared in the Ottawa Citizen, Winter Olympics — here's why we're calling them the China Genocide Olympics.   For nearly 20 years, he has been outspoken about the human rights abuses and organ trafficking in China. When he and David Matas were asked in 2006 to investigate allegations that the organs of Fal...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Michael Cannings is the Publisher at Camphor Press, a British-Taiwanese publishing house focused on East Asia, that he co-founded with John Grant Ross and Mark Swofford, in 2014. Profit was not the motive for setting up Camphor Press, but promoting books, especially those about Taiwan was. Michael spoke with me about how they weathered the challenging...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   My guests on this episode of Talking Taiwan are serial solo entrepreneurs Ramon Ray and Paolo Lising. Ramon has started 5 companies and sold 2 of them. He is the author of  Grow Your Solo,  a book about how to grow a solo business. Paolo Lising is founder of MillionDC.com, a learning platform for entrepreneurs from developing countries. He is the auth...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   This year, the Lunar New Year falls on February 1 st  and it's the year of the tiger. For those of you familiar with Lunar New year celebrations, you may recall some of the traditions, which might include: wearing the color red, receiving or giving red envelopes, eating special foods, lion dances and firecrackers   My guest on this episode of Talking...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin: "If you are listening to this episode as part of a class or institutional program, we'd love to hear from you — please tell us the country, city, and name of the university you are studying and listening from, and give us details  about how this episode is being used as part of a class or an ongoing project, and email us at talkingtaiwanpodcast@gmail.co...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin: Cindy Wu is an English and Mandarin Chinese bilingual performer, speaker, and music educator based in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. She loves and enjoys all aspects of life, travel, and culture. I met Cindy years ago when I lived in Kaohsiung. I've invited her on to Talking Taiwan to speak about her music career and how she's dealt with the setbacks and challenges...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   My guest on this episode of Talking Taiwan is Amazin LeThi, a global LGBTQIA+ advocate and one of the first Asian ambassadors for WorldPride at Copenhagen 2021. She reached out to me not long after hearing that Taiwan would be hosing WorldPride 2025.   She spoke with me about the challenges she's faced as an Asian and LGBTQ youth, and how her sports t...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Now it's time to announce our Top 5 of 2021 Talking Taiwan episodes.  In doing so we'd like to recognize our wonderful guests, who make what we do possible.    But first, we have some exciting news!   On December 21st Talking Taiwan won a Golden Crane Podcast Award. We are so honored to have been recognized for our work and to have been nominated alon...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   In November it was officially announced that Taiwan had been chosen to host WorldPride 2025. The Kaohsiung Pride Team won the bid over Washington D.C. to host World Pride Day. My guest on this episode is Darien Chen, the founder of WorldPride Taiwan 2025.   WorldPride 2025 will be first time that a WorldPride will be held in East Asia and this is exci...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   To mark the year's International Human Rights Day, I reached out to Yibee Huang, the CEO of Covenants Watch to talk about Lee Ming-che a Taiwanese activist who has been imprisoned in China since 2017.   December 10th is International Human Rights Day. It's also an important day in Taiwan's history and a turning point in Taiwan's transition from author...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   When you think about things made in Taiwan what comes to mind? Barbie dolls, textiles, plastics, toys, bicycles, or maybe these days its boba, bubble tea, or semiconductor chips?   What's made Taiwan the leader in the semiconductor industry, what is its competitive advantage, how can it maintain it going forward?   The story of how Taiwan's semiconduc...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Tim Chng is one of the founders of ITASA (Intercollegiate Taiwanese American Students Association), and we've known each other since those college days. He is currently documenting the overseas Taiwan Independence Movement on Wikipedia.   I thought I'd invite him onto Talking Taiwan to talk about some of the media attention that Taiwan's been getting...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Esther Chen is a Taiwanese American actress and comedian. We spoke about how she got into doing standup comedy, worked with Jerry Seinfeld, and ended up back in Taiwan during the pandemic. Esther shared how she's had to adjust her standup comedy material to suit the different tastes of audiences in Taiwan, other parts of Asia, and the U.S.   While in...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   Earlier this year there was a lot of buzz about this thing called NFTs. These days you know that something's definitely gone more mainstream when it's talked about on The Ellen Show and The Daily Show with Trevor Noah.   What are NFTs, these non-fungible tokens? I was curious about the whole thing myself which is why I've asked Kaku, a Taiwan-based DJ...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   November 9th would be the 103rd the birthday of the late revolutionary, Taiwan independence activist, and historian Su Beng (史明), who passed away on September 20, 2019. I've been working on his English-language biography and I wanted to remember him on this day.   In this episode of Talking Taiwan, I spoke with Jiho Chang one of the co-authors of  T...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   We thought it would be a good time to re-share this past episode about the Ghost Month in Taiwan. It's November first, the day after Halloween, October 31st which is actually short for all Saints' Eve, and November first is All Saints' Day, a Christian feast dedicated to celebrating departed saints. When you really get into it there are many festivals...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   My guest on this episode of Talking Taiwan is Ming Chiang, the president of Hello Taiwan. We talked about how Hello Taiwan got started, its charitable contributions and events, its connection to the annual Passport to Taiwan event in New York, what its mission is, how it creates greater recognition of Taiwan, and the unexpected PR generated for Hello...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   This week's episode of Talking Taiwan continues with the second half of my conversation with Hsinyi Lin, the Executive Director of the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty. We continued our conversation by talking about what the public opinion in Taiwan on the death penalty is, the types of surveys that are typically done to gauge public opinion,...

A note from Talking Taiwan host Felicia Lin:   My guest on this episode of Talking Taiwan is Hsinyi Lin, the Executive Director of the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty. She spoke with me about the movement to abolish the death penalty in Taiwan. 2000 was an exciting year for Taiwan, it was the first time that there was a transition in power from the Kuomintang, and the first time that a De...