Dear Editor:
After reading "Of War and Remembrance--Taiwan's Japanese Military Veterans" in the July issue, I felt many sentiments in my heart. I have the deepest sympathy and respect for those Taiwan veterans who went and never came back or who underwent such hardship.
But one point I can't understand is why in the photo of those "compelled" to serve in the Japanese military, they are holding Japanese flags in their hands and there are still Japanese flags hanging in their homes. Are they simply commemorating those tragic days? Or do they "miss" the colonial era?
I feel very sympathetic toward all Taiwanese who suffered under the boot of Japanese imperialism. As Chinese, but growing up under an inhumane colonial system, some are still unclear about who they are forty years later, and are still confused and lost in their thinking.
Chen Ssu-yuan
New Zealand
Dear Editor:
As a student of Chinese and a keen birdwatcher I greatly enjoyed the article on Chinese bird and flower painting in the March, 1993 issue of Sinorama. It gave me a fascinating insight into the psychology of both modern and ancient painters.
I feel obliged to point out two areas of confusion in the article. The first is that the painting by Sun Long is not of a Hoopoe but is a fine rendering of a Japanese Waxwing (note the length of the bill). The second is that Li An-chung's "bamboo pigeon" depicts a Chinese Grey Shrike with great accuracy and feeling, whilst the painting by Ho Hua-jen is a superb painting of a male Brown Shrike--a related but distinctly different species (note the different colors of the wings, back, and tail).
I offer these correction in the spirit of accurate observation which your article celebrates in showing such fine works of art.
Michael Kilburn
UK
Editor's Reply: Besides letters from our readers abroad, Sinorama also received a call from the Republic of China Wild Bird Society expressing doubts about whether or not the bird in the painting by Sun Lung of the Ming dynasty is a Hoopoe.
We apologize for any errors that may have occurred in the identifications of birds. But part of the problem may be explained by this interesting fact: Though our friend points out that the bird painted by Sun Lung is what we now know as a Japanese Waxwing, Sun himself would not have made such a distinction. In fact, he added the words dai-sheng, the Chinese for "hoopoe," right on the painting. It seems that people at that time saw these two birds as being in the same category. Today's meticulous biological classifications would leave the men of old stumped!