With more than 60 percent of its students being Siraya Aborigines, Donghe Elementary School in Tainan County’s Dongshan Township (東山) was officially renamed Kabasua Elementary School yesterday, after the Siraya name of the village where it’s located.
“The school had always carried the name ‘Kabasua’ since its founding in the Japanese colonial era,” Kabasua Elementary School Parents’ Association chairman Tuan Hung-kun (段洪坤) said after the renaming ceremony. “The school name was changed to ‘Donghe Elementary School’ in 1957 when the government changed the village’s name from Kabasua to Donghe [東河].”
Tuan, who is also head of the Tainan County Alliance of Siraya Communities, initiated the campaign to change the school’s name last year. He spent about a year going door to door in the village and collect signatures for a petition to change the school’s name.
“I’m glad that everyone has been very supportive of the plan, including county government officials,” he said.
School principal Liao Luo-fen (廖螺汾) said that she would make promotion and preservation of the Siraya culture a priority for the school.
Kabasua is the Siraya word for “silk cotton kapok,” a type of tree which was found in the village centuries ago.
Sirayas are Aborigines who lived mostly on the plains of southern Taiwan hundreds of years ago. During the past centuries, many adopted the Han Chinese culture, while others fled to eastern Taiwan.
Kabasua is one of the few villages that still maintains Siraya traditions.
After Tafalong Elementary School in Hualien County, Kabasua Elementary School is the second school to adopt an Aboriginal name and the first to adopt a Siraya name.
Following the renaming ceremony, Donghe village chief Wu Huo-sheng (吳火生) said the villagers would seek to officially change the village name back to Kabasua after the year-end special municipality elections.
Taiwan is stepping up plans to create self-sufficient supply chains for combat drones and increase foreign orders from the US to counter China’s numerical superiority, a defense official said on Saturday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, the official said the nation’s armed forces are in agreement with US Admiral Samuel Paparo’s assessment that Taiwan’s military must be prepared to turn the nation’s waters into a “hellscape” for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Paparo, the commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, reiterated the concept during a Congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday. He first coined the term in a security conference last
Prosecutors today declined to say who was questioned regarding alleged forgery on petitions to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators, after Chinese-language media earlier reported that members of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Youth League were brought in for questioning. The Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau confirmed that two people had been questioned, but did not disclose any further information about the ongoing investigation. KMT Youth League members Lee Hsiao-liang (李孝亮) and Liu Szu-yin (劉思吟) — who are leading the effort to recall DPP caucus chief executive Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) and Legislator Wu Pei-yi (吳沛憶) — both posted on Facebook saying: “I
The Ministry of Economic Affairs has fined Taobao NT$1.2 million (US$36,912) for advertisements that exceed its approved business scope, requiring the Chinese e-commerce platform to make corrections in the first half of this year or its license may be revoked. Lawmakers have called for stricter enforcement of Chinese e-commerce platforms and measures to prevent China from laundering its goods through Taiwan in response to US President Donald Trump’s heavy tariffs on China. The Legislative Yuan’s Finance Committee met today to discuss policies to prevent China from dumping goods in Taiwan, inviting government agencies to report. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Kuo Kuo-wen (郭國文) said
Sung Chien-liang (宋建樑), who led efforts to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Kun-cheng (李坤城), was released on bail of NT$80,000 today amid outcry over his decision to wear a Nazi armband to questioning the night before. Sung arrived at the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office for questioning in a recall petition forgery case last night wearing a red armband bearing a swastika, carrying a copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf and giving a Nazi salute. Sung left the building at 1:15am without the armband and covering the book with his coat. Lee said today that this is a serious
RSS