emily’s Reviews > Taiwan Travelogue > Status Update

‘—I must visit Taiwan at least once in my life. I’d first made this resolution while standing out back on the deck—heading home to Kyūshū Island from Okinawa—cargo ships—passed through Moji Port in Kyūshū, bringing crates of bananas from Taiwan day in & day out. The memory was enough to fill the air around me with that fresh yet fragrant scent. Sparrows darted in my chest. ‘It is a pineapple—it is called ông-lâi.’’

‘Round vermilion lanterns hung—alongside sunset-coloured ones shaped like seeds—Thick willows lined the river on both sides—I felt dizzied & dazzled—searing light—every colour—saturated & every scent more fragrant—everything teemed & surged toward me under the cobalt sky. There was something else mixed into that current: voices, speaking an Island language that I couldn’t understand. My gut somersaulted to my chest.’

‘The tributaries of fate—between these two women was not only—power imbalance between—coloniser & the colonised—I do not wish to begrudge readers—the right to form their own interpretations of the text. But I would like to draw attention to one crucial point—power imbalance is more subtle & delicate—more ubiquitous—than most people imagine—please remain cognisant of Aoyama—as one of the colonisers within the story.’