It's the eve of Chinese New Year at the Panchiao Veterans' Home. The old soldiers come out of their rooms one after another carrying their bowls, chopsticks and cups. Tonight there will be special dishes and even some alcohol! Sitting around the table, they finish eating and then quickly clear the dishes away. Tradition has it that on this day, and this day alone, they can gamble on their mahjongg game.

One tipsy old gent asks everyone he meets, "You want to go to my house for some fun? My house, uh. . . it's the Veterans' Home!" In fact, if he really thought of the veterans' facility as his home, perhaps he wouldn't be getting so drunk.

Crossing through the New Year's music and decorative auspicious couplets pasted on the walls, Qiu Ruhua, a native of Shandong, walks quietly back to his room alone. He is afraid he will see people begin to cry thinking of their hometowns, and then he might begin to lose control himself. Originally planning to go to sleep, he simply sits and stares out the window, holding an old milk bottle which serves as an ashtray and smoking cigarettes one after another.

After being lonely for so long, a house full of children and grandchildren with red candles burning looks like a beautiful dream that would disappear if you tried to touch it.

Who goes back?

A look at the applications at VACRS for permanent relocation back to the mainland reveals that most of the applicants fit into this category: low-ranking soldiers, now living in veterans' homes, who never married, and who left the military early so that they have no pensions. Higher grade officers usually have families and pensions in Tai wan, so at most they only live back in their hometowns part time.

The first thing anyone considers in deciding whether to go back to the mainland is whether they have a family in Taiwan. UP until 1959, the aim was to "recover the mainland within five years," and serving soldiers were not permitted to marry. But by 1959 most of these servicemen were past the marrying age, and after many years in the military they found it hard to integrate into civilian life. Their small incomes made it all the more difficult to find a partner. Thus most have remained alone all these years in Taiwan.

These old soldiers, with no relatives and no land, were discharged from the army with only three months pay, a few hundred dollars in ration tickets, a mosquito net, a straw bed mat, and two sets of clothes. They had to fend for themselves. With no skills, they had to settle for being unskilled laborers like restaurant cleaners or apartment building watchmen.

The military officials who came to Taiwan with the national government were seen by most people as a "privileged minority." But ordinary soldiers who identified with the government lived at the bottom of society, and were a "disadvantaged minority." Hu Tai-li, a researcher at the Academia Sinica who follows the problems of veterans, points out that ordinary soldiers lacked the same opportunities for changing careers which were open to higher-ranking officers, so we should give our greatest concern to their plight.

You're from the northeast, I'm from the south west. In this veterans' "home," you eat your food, I'll drink my drink, and let's hope nobody mentions "missing home.".

Different ways to go back

"This is the way I figured it. If I had completed the process to go back and gone to the mainland to get my PRC ID card, after that it would have been difficult to go back to Taiwan. Since anyway you can take ten months off every year from the veterans' home and stay in the mainland, I just go back to Taiwan when the winter weather gets so cold that the water freezes. I'll only move back permanently when I'm so old that I can't travel anymore," says 85-year-old Le Ah Tang of Zhejiang Province.

A certain Mr. Qian from Shanghai has been back to visit more than 20 times. He has neither wife nor children in his old hometown, but he does have a fully furnished house. When his kids in Taiwan are busy, he moves to Shanghai for a while. He spends his time roaming about and chatting with relatives. When he misses his grandchildren, he just goes back to Taiwan and enjoys himself with the kids. "On one side is my hometown, while my grandson is on the other. They are both home," says Qian. He has purchased eight houses in the countryside around Shanghai. "I feel proud when I buy a house. I just do it for the sensation it gives me, not as a practical investment."

For an old vet like Qian, with wife and children in Taiwan and plenty of money, living part-time on both sides is the most flexible arrangement. But poorer veterans have only their monthly pension of NT$8,000 per month, which is actually only NT$5,600 after meals are deducted. They have to scrimp and save to buy an air ticket, so there's no way they can afford to go back and forth as they please.

"Except for cigarettes, I don't buy anything and I don't go anywhere. I live in the Panchiao Veterans' Home, and I probably only go into Taipei City, which is right next door, a few times a year. I don't dare meet with friends or people from the old home town. Just giving gifts here and there and eating makes it impossible to save anything," says Qiu Ruhua, who saves enough money to go back to Shandong once every 18 months. He says regretfully that as a young man he gave up hope of ever going back, and he didn't save any money, so now he only has enough to pay for his funeral.

Putting Taipei's congested city life behind me, I stand at the door of my home in a little country lane. Please don't wake me before I open the door.

All of China in a single room

Yet, whatever practical difficulties may exist, the call of family ties is hard to resist. "People crave a home. After being on their own in Taiwan for 40 years, these guys are truly lonely," says Hu Tai-li.

These old soldiers, torn from their homes by an era of upheaval, and with neither land nor relations in Taiwan, had to broaden their definition of "home" to make the Kuomintang and the country their "family," and the national leader their "father," entering veterans' homes in their advanced years. But in the end these could never replace a real home.

"I was born a couple thousand miles from Shandong and a few thousand from Sichuan," says Wang Fangzhang of Henan, pointing to the other old veterans in the room. He quips, "But now we've fit all of China in a single room!" There are four beds to a room here at the nursing home. The soldiers come from all over China, and were stationed in all kinds of places in the service, only coming together here in these rooms. It's not uncommon for conflicts to arise.

"When you are old, with no woman at your side, naturally you're a little cantankerous and get into a lot of disputes. We've had a case where two old soldiers tried to kill each other over a roll of toilet paper," says Wang, shaking his head.

At four in the afternoon they come, carrying bowls and chopsticks, to the dining room for dinner. Afterwards, some feed some pigeons being raised in a clearing, while others push their wheelchairs into the hall and stare out the window at the silken threads of falling rain. "I want to go back to my hometown, because I want someone to take care of me when I am sick or in pain. However much kids today may lack a sense of filial piety, at least they'll ask if you've eaten, and that's the kind of thing your life depends on," says Qiu Ruhua, who still plans to go back. "I never had one real meal in 40 years in Taiwan," says one old gent who lives with his son in Zhoushan in Zhejiang Province. That sums up the experiences of these old veterans in Taiwan.

Back home, I have already prepared my own grave. I've learned that in this life you have to rely on yourself.

Getting past the first barrier

Once one decides to go home, the first problem is taking care of a series of procedures. "We welcome Taiwanese compatriots to visit their relatives, travel, or invest, but they must fulfill certain conditions if they want to relocate permanently," notes Yu Changfeng, the director of the Taiwan Affairs Office in Zhoushan City, Zhejiang Province. Relocation is governed by the regulations, issued by the mainland authorities, entitled "Important Points for the Permanent Resettlement of Taiwan Compatriots." Those who wish to move to the mainland must first of all have immediate relatives in the PRC, be all alone in Taiwan, and have nobody to support them. Secondly, the individual must provide for his own house and living expenses in the mainland, and have some immediate relative in the mainland guarantee that they will look after him.

Those who meet the mainland's conditions must either travel to the mainland or ask one's relatives to apply for and pick up a residence certificate and ID card and that most important of documents: the certificate of approval from the mainland side giving permission to relocate there.

Next, on the Taiwan side, one takes the certificate from the mainland to a veterans' home, training center, or veterans' center to apply for a relocation handbook. It is also necessary to go to court to verify that one's financial affairs in Taiwan are all in order. The handicapped must be accompanied by a family member, while those with partners in Taiwan must get a letter of agreement from their spouse, as well as a certificate verifying transfer of guardianship of the children.

After they move to the PRC, their veteran's pensions are accumulated and transferred to their bank account in the mainland each July upon receipt of the fingerprint of the veteran. Every year at that time the veterans who rely on that money to live will get very anxious if it comes even a day or two late. Their insecurity derives not only from their daily needs, but from worries about the two different regimes.

I'm back, but it's taken me nearly 40 years to walk this road.

Everything has changed

"Once a cop over there said to me, 'you watch a lot of opera over there,' I really got nervous. It really scared me that they knew about my life in Taiwan," recalls one veteran who relocated to the mainland but couldn't adapt and ended up moving back to Taiwan. In the mainland he always dressed very simply in a Mao jacket, partly because the mainland authorities were very clear about his background and he didn't want to stick out, and partly out of fear of being robbed. "In the mainland everyone wants to talk about Taiwan all the time. You can't really tell people the truth about Taiwan, or freely say what you want to say, so you feel stifled. Also, you can't wear nice clothes or wear good jewelry. It's a lot easier to be in Taiwan," says this old soldier, who hails from a very rural area in mainland China.

After being away for 40 years, not only are people and situations changed, one has to relearn about local life from scratch. Although these veterans are going "back home," it is a home where there is now a new reservoir here, where a hill has been leveled there, where the old house is gone, and where the roads have been rerouted.

And even if the old hometown hasn't changed much, these veterans are no longer the strong young men they were when they left. It's not so easy for elderly people to adapt to the climate and the standard of living. "If you cross to Zhoushan in winter, the wind cuts right through you like a knife. One winter in Zhoushan it was so cold I couldn't even urinate, and I nearly collapsed in the outhouse," says Le Ah Tang, who only lives in the mainland part-time. It's especially hard in the countryside, where often one has to go outside to draw water. For "Taiwan compatriots," used to running tap water and indoor plumbing, however sentimental they feel about their old houses, they cannot just ignore the practical problems of daily life.

This is all without mentioning the fact that afflictions come upon the elderly one after another, and things are a lot different in the mainland. In Taiwan, old soldiers just go to a veterans' hospital and everything is free. In the mainland they have to pay for everything themselves. This is the expense that returned veterans find hardest to swallow.

Family ties

A Chinese poem reads, "After three months in battle, a letter from one's family is worth ten thousand pieces of gold." That is why many veterans sneaked across to live in mainland China even before the ban on such travel was lifted. The Zhoushan City Taiwan Affairs Office says that altogether 988 old soldiers have relocated to Zhoushan, of whom 300--nearly a third--did so before Taiwan legalized travel to the PRC.

"The first time or two you go back to see your family, you hate to leave and you want to settle down right then and there," says one old vet who lived in the mainland for a time. Some men with families in Taiwan have even quarreled with and divorced their wives over the move back to the mainland. As someone who has been there, this old vet urges families in Taiwan not to make any blanket prohibitions. Old veterans feel they owe a great deal to their families in the mainland, and there's no harm in moving over there for a while to see how it goes. He also urges old veterans who can think of nothing but relocating that they only make a final decision after really understanding the local environment in China and how well they get along with their relations.

Whether they are going back to visit or to live, many old veterans feel a great debt to their families because they did not have the chance to show their respect for their parents or to raise and educate their children. Many of these men try to repay this debt by offering something concrete: financial support. Correspondingly, many relatives in the mainland look back at their hard lives over the past decades and conclude that such payments should go without saying.

300 golden rings

"Those of us who have been in battle know that we can endure anything, and can adapt to life no matter how hard it may get. The one thing we are afraid of is being surrounded by our children asking for money, and no matter how much you give it's never enough. I think everybody who has gone back knows exactly what I'm talking about," regretfully says one old vet who has gone back to the mainland several times.

"My baby had just been born when I left home. I hardly had time even to hold her. Now she's approaching 50 and is very ill. I can't sleep thinking about it," sighs Qiu Ruhua. He feels that one should give whatever support one can; if the emotional tie is still there, all the better, but even if it's not, one must still give.

When veterans received compensation for certificates that had promised them land should Nationalist forces recover mainland China, many were able to go back home in style. "Back and forth, I must have given out over 300 gold rings alone, not to mention all the other stuff," says Mr. Qian. But can veterans really keep this up every trip? And what about those who live there day in and day out?

Those who merely go to visit are like guests, so they give their gifts away and come back to Taiwan. But it's a lot different for those who have relocated permanently. Many old soldiers hope to rely on their children, and they use all the money they have saved to buy their sons a house. "Looking back, I had to have my hand out for money from my kids just for cigarettes and fruit. We argued and fought over money every time. It's not so much that feelings were hurt as that there were really no feelings at all!" Many old vets discover that when their money runs out, with sentiment proving so unreliable, they have to watch out for themselves and avoid offending their offspring. It was even worse for many old soldiers who went back before the travel ban was lifted. Being unable to return to Taiwan and unable to figure out where to turn, they just got sick and died. The saddened vet just quoted warns others who want to go back that they should always leave themselves a lifeline out, and have enough to cover their own living expenses.

God bless the vet who's got his own

Another man relates, "I've already had my own grave made, right near my father's. You can see that the grass has never even been cut there. You've got to rely on yourself in this life," states Chen Sharen, who has been living in the PRC for three years now. He built a big house in his hometown and lives with children on both sides, but still they eat their meals separately.

"The first few times I went back my niece was really kind and caring. Who would have guessed that after I moved back, when she found out I'm not rich and might have to depend on her if I got sick, she would not give such a warm welcome to her uncle." This old gent, whose relationship with his mainland relatives only went bad after he resettled there, says that he ended up just blowing all the money he brought with him to build up a big reputation for himself, after which he applied to return to Taiwan.

Of the more than 30 men who have applied to relocate back to Taiwan, most said they did so because they couldn't adjust to the climate. But staffers at VACRS believe that the real reason is that they couldn't bear to be ignored by their own families. Last year there was a certain Mr. Mi--a paraplegic--who sold everything in Taiwan to resettle in the mainland. His wife met him at the airport in Hong Kong, and promptly stole everything he had and went back to the mainland alone. Says the old vet mentioned in the last paragraph, "Sure it is exciting to go back to the old hometown. But it's excitement purchased with cash, and it doesn't last five minutes." Of course these old soldiers know very well that money is not a solid foundation on which to rebuild family feeling. But they don't know what else to use except money to make up for their absence the last 40 years.

Making friends with your children

Yet, even that old vet who spent all his money and returned disillusioned to Taiwan still plans to go back to visit his family. "I often ask myself what there is about that place worth being nostalgic for. But still it's not so easy to escape from the ties that hold you to your old hometown. When I'm gone I want my friends to bury me back there. Even though there will be nobody to sweep my grave and remember me, at least I'll finally be home with my mother and father." The idea that falling leaves always go back to the roots is strong among this generation of elderly men.

The poet Ho Chih-chang wrote, "Leaving home so young and returning so aged/Though they have the same local accent/The young ones do not recognize them/And ask with a smile where they come from." "The first time I went back my granddaughter asked her mother, 'Where did this old guy come from?' It's no wonder, because I never even held her mother, much less this little girl. If you've never held them and raised them, how can you expect them to feel an emotional attachment?" asks Qiu Ruhua. "Now when I go back it is to make friends from scratch with my sons and grandsons. I went back there at Mid-Autumn Festival the year before last, and I've been there twice for New Year's. When this New Year passes I'll go again. I'm anxious to go because I'm afraid that our feelings will fade if we don't see each other for a long time. The thing is, friends are just friends, and they can turn against you over a single word. Friends stay together only as long as they get along, but as soon as they stop getting along, there's nothing to do but go their separate ways." It is New Year's Eve in the Veterans' Home, and Qiu sits by himself, speaking with the voice of experience. In the gathering dusk, only his cigarette, alternately brightening and darkening, remains visible; his face fades into shadow.

According to VACRS, those who relocate back to the mainland average 71 years of age, and one-tenth of them have already passed away. In both Taiwan and mainland China, the number of old veterans steadily dwindles, finally bringing their stories to a close.

[Picture Caption]

p.74

"Can you tell me how to get go Zhimashan?" After being away from for 40 years, everything looks different. The road home is nothing like he imagined it would be.

p.77

After being lonely for so long, a house full of children and grandchildren with red candles burning looks like a beautiful dream that would disappear if you tried to touch it.

p.78

You're from the northeast, I'm from the south west. In this veterans' "home," you eat your food, I'll drink my drink, and let's hope nobody mentions "missing home."

p.80

Putting Taipei's congested city life behind me, I stand at the door of my home in a little country lane. Please don't wake me before I open the door.

p.81

Back home, I have already prepared my own grave. I've learned that in this life you have to rely on yourself.

p.83

I'm back, but it's taken me nearly 40 years to walk this road.