Chapter 3: Everything can be change if we change within

The story-teller was 10 years old. My grandmother went to school every day and had a happy life under the serving of the Lin family. For she was considered a young lady of one of the five family clan who had power over Taiwan back before the emperor was executed.

The kids in the clan were going off to school, and as they pass my grandmother they would all stare at her not because she was ugly. The kids stare at her because she was different. For she was require to take etiquette training instead of normal classes. The story-teller learned many type of servitude as a lady of the family, such as the art of serving tea, painting, writing and reading in both Japanese and Mandarin. At ten years old, she felt the pressure of all the things a lady was supposed to learn.

There was no holiday for the kids back then. There was no Christmas, since it was a western religion, and there was no Thanksgiving because there was nothing to be grateful for. Everything you have is because you earned it yourself. Of course there were parts where my grandmother was treated with extra care and food simply because of her heritage. Still, despite her circumstances, my grandmother was taught to love and to care.

At the age of 22 my grandmother met my grandfather on a bus. He had just entered the bus when he saw her, the bus was bright and kind of stuffy, and the people were packed tightly together. When my grandmother first saw the young man she saw him muttering to himself, then suddenly he puffed up his chest and went up to her and spoke in Japanese. Now this was during the time period where Taiwan had just gained its independence and was slowly recovering but yet this young man dare to speak in the Japanese language really surprised my grandmother. They then begun talking slowly getting to know each other, finally my grandmother found out that this young man had spent the years of the revolution in china where he had stayed before escaping to Taiwan before the communist could take over.