In an inconspicuous, three-story ivory-colored building surrounded by heavy traffic in downtown Hsinchu City, memories of a particular part of Taiwan’s history between the 1950s and 1970s are relived through documents and artifacts on display at the Museum of Military Dependents’ Villages.
According to Chou Su-chuan, a section chief from the Hsinchu City Government who doubles as museum curator, the facility is the result of joint collaboration among the city government, the city council and a local organization dedicated to the preservation of the unique culture arising from such communities, called “juan cun” in Mandarin.
“Thanks to the civic group’s efforts, we have been systematically collecting related articles since 1997,” Chou told “Taiwan Today” April 9. While Hsinchu does not have the largest number of military quarters on the island, the museum has the richest collection of objects from military dependents’ villages among its peers in Taiwan, she added. These items, ranging from military gear to housewares from half a century ago, were donated by occupants of such residential communities in Hsinchu, who are trying their best to preserve this unique history, born of the political vagaries of modern China.
Through the background introduction and photographs laid out in the exhibition area on the first floor, visitors learn how these settlements came into being. “These villages are a product of the long-standing rivalry between the Kuomintang and Chinese Communist Party,” said Yang Ah-yi, a museum guide fully qualified for the post, as she grew up in one such neighborhood.
As the documents presented at the museum reveal, when the Nationalist government retreated to Taiwan after losing the civil war in 1949, it brought along more than 1.2 million immigrants from the mainland, most of them members of the armed forces and their dependents.
“To accommodate these new inhabitants, the KMT administration began building temporary shelters throughout Taiwan, so that the armed forces could prepare for the national mission of reclaiming the mainland,” Yang explained. Statistics from the Ministry of National Defense show that there were once as many as 108,000 households residing in 886 such villages of varying size on the island.
These jerry-built, state-owned facilities were provided free of charge to qualified personnel, who believed that they would return to their hometowns in just a few years. The provisional residences ended up becoming permanent settlements, however, as it became evident that returning to the mainland would be next to impossible.
The original inhabitants came from all corners of the mainland, speaking different dialects and sharing lifestyles that distinguished them from locals. The linguistic and cultural barriers made it difficult for them to blend into the greater society outside the boundaries of their communities. “These quarters gradually developed into enclaves of mainlanders on the island, who displayed a strong sense of neighborliness within their world and developed a distinctive culture of their own,” Yang explained, drawing on her own experience.
On the second floor of the museum, a vivid replica of a typical juan cun leads visitors back in time to experience life in an enclosed community more than 50 years ago, with ramshackle houses separated by narrow lanes, which served as playgrounds for children and gathering places for adults after a long day’s work.
“We never had to lock the doors and no secrets could be kept, because the village was essentially a big family, where everyone looked out for everyone else,” Yang recalled, immersed in her childhood memories.
While life was difficult in most parts of Taiwan at that time, the situation was even more challenging for occupants of these housing projects. Having left their homes and belongings on the mainland and having no acquaintances on the island, they had to start a new life from scratch.
“Everything that could be salvaged would be turned into something useful,” Yang noted. For example, in a corner of the museum courtyard, a beat-up fuel tank caught the attention of inquisitive visitors. “It was taken from an obsolete transport plane and used as a makeshift cistern during the 1950s,” she said.
“As trained staff with the armed forces, male residents could easily turn discarded military material into household items such as furniture and cookware,” she noted, pointing to a one-of-a-kind pot hand made from the nose of a military airplane. Their wives were the Martha Stewarts of their times, finding ingenious means to improve the lives of their families. “Most moms could make clothes for their children out of flour sacks and spare pieces of cloth, and that was just one of the many skills they possessed.”
Since the museum reopened to the public in December 2006 after renovation, the third floor has become a venue for workshops and exhibitions organized by the museum and the city government’s Bureau of Cultural Affairs. “We are constantly proposing themed activities that will help inspire the younger generation’s interest in the juan cun culture and promote awareness among the general public of the contribution of military dependents’ villages to the ethnic diversity of Taiwan,” Yang pointed out.
The museum has become a popular outing destination for schoolchildren, who marvel at a life completely beyond their imaginations, according to Yang. “We have also welcomed several tourist groups from mainland China, who still remember the bitter standoff between the two sides and can deeply relate to this particular history,” she noted.
While the history of juan cun is being carefully preserved at a few museums and designated historical sites, in reality most such settlements, after years of wear and lack of maintenance, are being demolished as a result of the Act for Rebuilding Old Quarters for Military Dependents, passed in 2007.
“It’s a pity that these villages will soon be gone,” Yang said with a sense of helplessness. But juan cun, arising from the dust of the civil war and playing an important role in the island’s post-war history, have become an essential part of Taiwan’s culture. “The collective memory of a minority group will live on through the exhibitions at the museum,” she concluded. (THN)
Write to Meg Chang at meg.chang@mail.gio.gov.tw