Legislator Ju Gau-jeng is a native of Yunlin County in Taiwan. His wife Chiu Man-ju is Che-kiangese. And their two children, aged 10 and 11, were born in Germany, though their residential registration is also Taiwanese.

There is provincial origin, but no complex:

Ju Gau-jeng often raises the question: "Children! What is the people to which you belong?" The two children have been trained to make a standard response: "Taiwanese." Then Ju will invariably ask, "And what else?" The children will then reply, "Chinese."

Recently there has been much talk in political circles about the "provincial origin complex. "Ju's household includes a mainlander wife. So do they have a "complex"?

"Provincial origin absolutely does not constitute a major obstacle to marriage," says Ju, brooking no argument.

He points out that marriage is, after all, as the Chinese saying has it, "a match of households." That is to say, it is best that the two partners are similar in social, economic, educational, and cultural aspects. "In contemporary Taiwan society, differences in provincial origin do not constitute differences in social status," he contends.

Ju Gau-jeng relates that when he was first pursuing the hand of Chiu Man-ju, her parents did indeed have objections. But it wasn't a problem of provincial origin, but rather it was that Ju was only a second year university student at National Taiwan University at that time while Man-ju was just a freshman. Naturally her parents were not all that thrilled about their daughter tying herself to a man "of unknown origin" at that young age. "As it turns out, her parents quickly accepted me," he recalls. This is because his grades were exceptionally good, which quickly won the approbation of his in-laws.

We all speak Taiwanese:

Generally speaking, one can see some cultural differences among people of different provincial origins; this is most evident in language. But because Chiu Man-ju grew up in Kaohsiung, she can speak perfect Taiwanese. When Ju Gau-jeng brought her home to the family in Yunlin, not only did she have no trouble communicating with his parents, who did not understand Mandarin, she won over this traditional native family with her genteel and virtuous character.

What's interesting is that though the Ju family had no objections to this future daughter-in-law, the lady next door had to throw in her two cents worth. She heard that Ju had brought a mainlander girl home, and without giving it a second thought chattered away at the Ju family: "You can find any girl, so why do you want to marry a mainlander?" The Ju family just laughed at such prattle, and didn't take it to heart. Later, after Ju and Chiu had married and gone abroad, and returned after five years, they discovered that the old gossip's five children had married one after the other--and three of them had mainlanders as their partners.

Divided by a common language:

"In fact, when I first wanted to marry into the Ju family, my parents had their doubts," states Chiu Manju. It seems that mainlanders are more likely to overprotect their children; her parents worried that, being unused to doing household chores, she would find it hard to adjust after marrying into a traditional family. "It was fine. I didn't have to do the slightest hard work in the Ju home," she laughs.

The sweet yam is native to Taiwan, the taro is not. Ju's family is thus a "yaro household." And they have their living contract for daily life to keep things on an even keel. While in Germany, Ju and his wife agreed that at home they would only speak Taiwanese, so that the children could naturally learn to speak the language of their grandparents. "If when it came to it they couldn't communicate with their grandparents, how could they be their grandchildren?" Ju says that the kids established a foundation in Taiwanese in Germany, and then naturally picked up Mandarin at school after returning home.

Ju's thoughtfulness toward his wife is even expressed linguistically. He says that every husband and wife have their arguments because this is a necessary process of conflict resolution. Nevertheless, conflicts are brought out to be resolved, so one can't get over-emotional in disagreements. "When someone is arguing, of course they can express themselves most lucidly and fully in their mother tongue. My mother tongue is Taiwanese. Although my wife speaks fluent Taiwanese, her mother tongue is Mandarin. So when we argue I require myself to use her mother language, which is to say Mandarin. Otherwise, even if I win the argument, there's no glory in an unequal contest," he jokes.

Who's the sweet yam? And who's the taro?:

And when you ask what language they use in daily life? The four mouths of the Ju family seem to have some difficulty responding, because they commonly use Taiwanese, Mandarin, and perhaps even English with a bit of German thrown in, and there are no fixed rules.

Ju Gau-jeng feels that stressing that Taiwan has a provincial origin complex is really due to stereotypes. He raises a case in point: In the past, Taiwanese rarely ate hot peppers or garlic, assuming that only mainlanders ate these things, and have no idea that after decades even eating habits have become impossible to separate by provincial origin. "I love hot peppers, and never expected that Chekiangese didn't eat them. My wife never thinks to add hot peppers to the food on her own, so sometimes I really can't stand it. Ju and Chiu say that sometimes they wonder who the "taro" is and who the "sweet yam" really is. This is a problem perhaps many "yaro households" have in common!

[Picture Caption]

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Legislator Ju Gaujeng is Taiwanese, and his wife is Chekiangese. Though their "yaro household" sometimes sees arguments, given their consensus that they must be resolved rationally, they seem to have integrated rather well. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)