Even though Shanlin in Kaohsiung had never suffered from flooding even through Typhoon Morakot, residents of Shangping Village and Yuemei say that in the second year after the first phase of the permanent housing base was completed and the second phase was still under construction, a flood occurred the likes of which had not been seen in a hundred years.

Counting up the causes, although the permanent housing base sits on high ground, it had been a Taiwan Sugar Corporation sugarcane plantation, so every rainy season things always passed without incident. But at the second explanation meeting, held on 4/25 in a secretive black-box process, local Shanlin residents finally discovered this: the city government's Economic Development Department planned to allocate NT$150 million in funding subsidized by the Ministry of the Interior for the "Da'ai Park Road Improvement Project," and last year had already intensively convened the management committee, the reconstruction committee and other units to hold planning and design review meetings.

Here's the problem: how the road improvement funds for the Yuemei permanent housing base are used has nothing to do with the residents of Shanlin's original hometown (truly unfair, but this is charity money, belonging to Typhoon Morakot reconstruction funds, which by rights should be used only for its designated purpose). But if all the main roads of the permanent housing base are paved with asphalt, then when the rainy season comes each year, the surrounding neighborhoods may flood yet again. This is the first reason the residents of Shanlin's original hometown are furious.

Where was the NT$150 million in post-disaster reconstruction funds spent?

It's true that some interlocking bricks are severely sunken and loose, but this wasn't caused by tour buses; it was the construction vehicles coming and going. So why not just outsource it, repair the sunken and loose sections one by one, have the management committee inspect year by year, contract it out to park residents or nearby people, and take on the responsibility of greening and landscape restoration within the park? Wouldn't that be better? What's more, doesn't your esteemed park have groups like a labor cooperative, which could be used for self-directed construction, both strengthening their essential learning skills and adding a job opportunity in Shanlin? Wouldn't that be more meaningful?

The following is purely grumbling with rather heavy emotional language; just skim it:

I hear the Morakot Reconstruction Committee is about to be disbanded this year? Hear, hear, but let me boldly suppose that if this is just a rush job to write off that NT$150 million in charity funds, why not simply place this charity money in a trust, giving residents ample time to carry out self-directed construction of their homeland! Actually, this is the real point that prompted me to write. The residents already have a place to live; what they need most should be job opportunities. NT$150 million could do much better community planning. For the sake of paving asphalt for tour vehicles that don't help the livelihoods of the many residents, why not instead fight to simply distribute the charity funds to each household proportionally - wouldn't that be more practical? In remote rural areas the population is aging very seriously, young people have moved away, job opportunities are few, the scale of farming is small, and agricultural prices are controlled by middlemen; the purchase price of green plums has crashed to single digits per kilogram - this, this, this is the urgent difficulty that needs solving, not asphalt roads!

Of course, the asphalt road can be expected to cause the flooding of Shanlin, which the residents of Shanlin's original hometown do not wish to see. Therefore Ms. Fu Shui-chao, founder of Embrace Shanlin, hopes relevant professionals can teach the people of Shanlin and help the people of Shanlin to avoid the suffering of flooding! Protect the trees! Please, everyone, pass this message on! Please! Construction is about to begin.

"Embrace Shanlin" May issue - Straight Talk ~ excerpted from Fu Shui-chao

Da'ai Activity Center 4/25 - Exposé of the Official Scene; Revelation of the Shanlin Yuemei Da'ai Permanent Housing Mourning the mountain spirits and river gods, the beautiful scenery of Shanlin's mountains and rivers; Tzu Chi adds glamour, the ethnic groups add color, yet it is all just ordinary clowns playing out a dirge

At the NT$150 million official-business explanation meeting, a section chief from the Kaohsiung City Government Maintenance Engineering Office held up Hongda Company's explanation meeting. Why wasn't it the official body that sent out invitations to Da'ai residents? Why was there no first meeting, yet there was a second explanation meeting? Why wasn't the explanation meeting held before the contract was awarded? One section chief wrapped up NT$150 million of the people's hard-earned money; I think what the bureau chief is playing with must be NT$1.5 billion.

To all the elders and townsfolk and visitors who have been to the nation's largest Morakot permanent housing base - the Shanlin Yuemei New Homeland Da'ai Park! The air-permeable, water-permeable interlocking bricks that Da'ai is most proud of before Tzu Chi are about to be abolished; the Maintenance Engineering Office of the Kaohsiung City Government Public Works Bureau has commissioned Hongda Construction for NT$150 million to remove the ground bricks and cut down all the shade-forming trees on both sides, roots and all. The Da'ai International Demonstration Village, built with charity funds from 55 countries around the world, piled up with love, the nation's most refined residential park interlocking bricks, are about to be replaced by asphalt pavement; in summer the temperature will rise by two degrees to 37 degrees. It is about to be turned upside down by the public departments that collect my taxes, the construction company, the troublesome residents, and the mouthpieces, removing the road surface; the ecologically rich ditches will be fully paved with concrete; the tree species that Tzu Chi planted on both sides, transplanted by residents from their original hometown, deliberately planted as commemorative trees, will all be dug out. Five years of achievement, the beginning of shade; the vigorous, lush posture is just waiting for time to show its graceful bearing, the green growing denser and denser, its deep meaning just ripening, its graceful posture awaited.

But in another two months, it will all vanish like smoke, and the trees will wither and the land go barren; the April issue of "Embrace Shanlin" wrote of public servants bullying the employers and despising the employers, and in Shanlin it is even worse, replayed again and again. NT$150 million in funds, making a big concrete culture; the project has already been contracted out, and now they hold an explanation meeting, with cannons booming. Councilor Zhong Sheng-you and Councilor Lin Yi-di had no clue about the whole project's ins and outs, yet someone notified them to come to the meeting; who exactly is "messing around"? Everyone came to the explanation meeting to get a rinse; the Maintenance Engineering Office and the construction company look at us meek citizens with cold smiles. The day before, a senior brother contacted me insisting I must come; on the evening of the 25th I entered the People's Hall. Goodness! The three central committee bigwigs of Da'ai each brought their underlings; the Zhang faction and Wang faction, only lacking Xiao Zhong and Da Hai; the hall was a black mass.

I looked at the senior brother's corner, just these few bad elements, this bunch of muddleheads, who don't love bright pavement but love shade-forming trees to death, and love even more the interlocking bricks laid with air and water permeability; the senior sister even boldly held the microphone, describing in detail that these are love bricks, love bricks branded by charity money from 55 countries around the world. She didn't even open her eyes wide to look at the Maintenance Engineering Office official, full of bulging flesh, fat-brained and big-bellied, not even crossing his legs, with a look of "what can you do about me." Senior sister! The official has already contracted out the project; giving you face, he's going to dig up your cinnamon tree, your cork tree, your sea hibiscus, your camphor tree, and ask you to transplant them yourself - wasn't it projected up on the screen? How many of those big characters can you actually read! And you still grab the microphone and won't let go; and you don't even look at Wang's and Zhang's expressions and eye signals; they're of the "chief" generation, and the whole scene came alive as a mouthpiece for officials and businesses; it looks like at the very least they'll grab a village chief post. In Da'ai Village, the nation's newest village chief.

"Da'ai is just a kingdom." Ai! Senior sister, you dragged me into this kind of scene too, damn it! Watching Teacher Li Huai-jin, citing classics and speaking slowly and gently as he scolded, ai! Go be his ceramic artist! I'll sound off at this scene; an old rustic has to take on an old brute, a bumpkin guerrilla has to take on a nincompoop like me; I grabbed the microphone. I know there's no road of truth here, and even my ancestors for eight generations wouldn't get a chance to have reason spoken at this kind of scene; dogs barking at a train, this bunch of officials joined in one spirit, sharing common gain, the whole family rejoicing, what can you do about them. Heaven bless Da'ai! My home is in Shangping, this Da'ai Park is a cave-heaven blessed land, how many can match such beauty? Now, satisfied and pleased, truly how many can match it, the whole street stinking of rank meat! (Sorry! I stole a page from Lin Juemin's Letter to His Wife.)

I lost my temper and threw a fit, and at the Da'ai People's Hall I used every bit of crude vulgar slang, all that crap, just to spit at the officials; and I didn't get what I already knew - the project delay - without the Meinong Hometown Love Association it couldn't be done.
Let me tell you gentlemen, if you want to come to Shanlin, if you want to glance at Da'ai, and think it can really scratch your heart and win your delight; then to revisit the old place and see this ecological beauty, you'd better grab a digital camera and photograph it now, capture this scene at this moment, for the days are numbered.

The mountain scenery of Shanlin is always just such a drinking snack for officials; the mountain spirits and river ghosts, what do they fear? Whether descendants have any backbone, they can't be bothered, they'll deal with it when it comes. I never listen to my classmate Hippo, always loving to wade into muddy water, my big mouth overreaching, either firing at the 2021 entrepreneurs, or poking at the Wang and Zhang factions of sprites. I should blame myself, senior sister, I was standing on the sidelines, and with a splash, some fellow pushed me into the water. My mother! The whole hall is full of crocodiles! Big mouths gaping, hung all over with Wang and Zhang rakes. Hippo! Where's my fish intestine? Truly, truly, it's endless; I advise you troublesome folk to bring a knife, I come bearing a sword!

(This stage called Da'ai) Over five years it has let me see through the muddleheadedness of the bureaucratic system and the greediness of association organizations. The dominators and the givers, and also fearing the oligarchists like the Xiaolin Self-Rescue Association with its 34 project plans, and next year another 28 that the bureaucratic system can't make anything of; they're scared to death, sidelining him while setting up another stove to suppress the oligarchs. Today this stage called Da'ai writes the epitome of Taiwan, China; add to that the sky high and the emperor far away - it's not the Greater Taipei area that can cause a Dapu incident or a Taipei Wang family incident.
The NT$150 million pie, a few scraps, a few percent of the soup, jackals, wolves, tigers and leopards, fierce faces and white eyes, one can imagine. Shanlin has no gangsters, no beggars, so there are no rascals or troublemakers running wild everywhere; I've seen through the rascal face of Da'ai, all with faces turned sideways writing "I love Da'ai."

The "high-class people" and intellectuals of "Da'ai Park" - could it be that before the NT$150 million project took shape, they all had their mouths covered? With what can you cover such eloquent, deep-scheming, sharp-eyed, first-rate observers and readers of faces? May I ask you, Hippo: with what to cover them? "What would the big boss have you take?" Damn! Nunchucks. "Bah! You think you're Bruce Lee. The big boss takes this..." A-Bian wouldn't.

The NT$150 million turning everything upside down, a beautiful masterpiece of the Kaohsiung City Maintenance Engineering Office, comes to the second explanation meeting just as construction is about to begin. No one knows where the first explanation meeting was held; presumably it was just a mouthpiece, troublemakers and rascals messing around to make a record, but it could also be published to see whose greediness is in it.

For such a big matter as NT$150 million, goodness! Xiao Zhong and Da Hai actually stopped playing just as their front-door trees were about to be dug up and their home road removed, and actually no one was seen; I wondered what script this was? Could it be such a coincidence that they all went to hug women's thighs! What a good scene for "reading faces" - should such a first-rate person who knows when to appear not appear? One night I saw through the whole exposé of the official scene, bloodily castrating community consciousness; the one who should jump off a building is Professor Xia Chou-jiu; they, as public intellectuals, should have made Taiwan, China good. This whole bunch of Taiwan, China's common-interest players, tonight, sitting all along the official seats with nothing to hide, came alive as officials leading through financial groups and local crooked associations, colluding to monopolize public opinion, pulling strings in every direction. I don't know what my Da'ai friends think; for the first time I saw it all, saw through Da'ai's five years of official-people-business ecology. Heaven bless Da'ai, may my virtue endure. Done writing!