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Back in my student days, I remembered having been a stranger to Chinese culture. One song was called "高山青 (read as Gāo Shān Qīng)" which literally means "High Green Mountain". The dancers wore the costumes used for traditional Ifugao dances. My interest in this topic came back because of a local tea company called Alishan Tea. Before that, other tea shops offered tea from Mt. Alishan. Chatime also promoted tea from Taiwan which was grown from Mt. Alishan. I'm afraid that the cultural revolution of Mao Zedong could've destroyed them if Chiang Kai Shek didn't split Taiwan from China. Hopefully, Taiwan's desire for independence would be granted if China becomes a democratic country.
I remembered being told that a trip to Taiwan's Mt. Alishan might remind one of Baguio or Nueva Ecija. It turns out that the Banaue Rice Terraces, as marvelous as it is, may not be so unique. I love the Banaue Rice Terraces and they should be preserved. Countries with terraces should preserve theirs as well. It turns out that Taiwan and the Philippines do have some common tribes. Settlers tend to move here and there.
I found this interesting note from the Indigenous Welfare Research Institute National Center of Excellence. This is about the common links between Taiwan and the Philippines since both are members of ASEAN and are very close to each other:
The diversity of Taiwanese languages strongly suggests that Austronesian peoples have inhabited Taiwan for 8,000 years. Population growth contributed to out-migration from Taiwan to the Philippines starting 6,000 – 7,000 years ago, and thence to mainland Southeast Asia and the islands of Indonesia. From maritime SE Asia, Austronesians fanned eastward to the islands of the South Pacific between 1200 B.C. and 1280 A.D., when New Zealand became the last major island group to be settled. Austronesians fanned westward into the Indian Ocean and landed in Madagascar by 500 A.D.
Did a couple of Taiwanese aborigines end up introducing terracing to the Philippines? It would be very hard to determine that. If there are rice terraces for raising food (Taiwan has the Xinshe rice terraces and Yehang terraces to name a few. Did the people of Banaue and Cordillera descend from Taiwanese aborigines? That means a couple of indigenous Filipinos are descendants of Taiwanese natives.
The Inquirer even shares this amazing piece of information about Taiwanese indigenous folks:
TAIPEI—In communities of the indigenous Amis tribe across Taiwan, locals say lima for five, pito for seven and mata for eye, just like Filipinos. In southern Taiwan’s Alishan mountain, the Tsou tribe calls the community’s meeting hut a kuba, strikingly similar in design to the Philippines’ kubo.
Whether in language, architecture or way of life, links among indigenous peoples of the Philippines and Taiwan are undeniable, with both sides tracing their ancestry to the Austronesian migrations across the Pacific Islands thousands of years ago.
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| Ying Xuan Zhuang |