On a Saturday in October, the crowds kept pushing their way into a department store elevator in east Taipei and getting off at the top floor. And this during the unlucky extra eighth month of the lunar leap year, when virtually all Taiwanese proprietors found business slumping! The credit for the unexpected crowds goes to some planners with a good eye for business. Putting on a large-scale emigration exhibition, they invited dozens of local emigration agencies and representatives of foreign organizations in Taiwan.

Decorated like the exhibition hall at the Taipei World Trade Center, the space was adorned with signs like these: "The tree of affluence that never withers: land + teak + rights of residency-emigration through investment in Panama." Or "The Republic of Cape Verde: Apply here for citizens' passports." Or "How do you grab that best of life preservers, a visa that allows for unlimited entry and exit and won't expire? Become a resident retiree in the Philippines." There was also an abundance of informational booklets and maps showing the locations of the nations in question. The scene was sure to improve the geographical knowledge of those attending, and those planning to emigrate could get a lot of information. But was it enough?

Not long ago, a certain development company took out large advertisements in the papers to introduce its "newest offering": villas in Palau for just NT$2.86 million, with the right to apply for resident visas in one year and citizenship in five. The bargain price pricked the interest of even factory workers. Many people from central and southern Taiwan came north to buy the properties, and only a few weeks after the 600 vacation homes were put on the market, two-thirds of them were sold. Other Taiwanese construction companies marvelled with envy at how quickly the properties moved.

But then cold water was splashed on the emigration dreams of those buying the properties. At the end of September Palau's foreign minister wrote a letter to Fredrick Chien, the ROC's minister of foreign affairs, stating that the claims made in the ad were "false," and that the Palau government denied them and refused all responsibility for them.

The letter pointed out that citizenship in Palau was reserved for those with Palau blood. Palau was in the process of changing its residency laws, but they hadn't been changed yet. And according to the Palau constitution, only Palau citizens and companies wholly owned by them could own land. Foreigners could only sign leases, which were limited to 50 years.

Similar incidents have occurred before in small countries when governments shift hands. Even after painstakingly obtaining residency rights, an emigrant may find that the road to immigration is not an easy one. Moving far across the seas, buying a house, a car, insurance, finding a school for the children.... Mistakes people make in this process represent very expensive lessons.

To help our readers gain from others' experience, starting this month Sinorama will include a new topic for the "Life Overseas" column, entitled "Pitfalls in Emigrating." We invite readers overseas to write short essays drawn from their own experiences and the stories of friends or from legal cases in their adopted lands. We hope the column will serve as a bulletin board in a network of mutual assistance.

[Picture Caption]

p.55

In the past, when a family emigrated, the father typically went first, but now the mother leads the children in the advance guard while the father stays in Taiwan to make money. Will everything go smoothly across the seas? (photo by Vincent Chang)