Let’s travel to Matsu, Taiwan
If the 21st century will have its own legends, then it’s going to find them in Matsu!
Matsu is named after the Taoist deity Matsu. Legend has it that during the reign of the Song emperor Taizu (960-975) a spiritually wise girl named Lin Moniang jumped into the sea to save her father. She drowned, and her body floated to a Fujianese island, which was later named Matsu in her honor.
Despite its renown for this reason, Matsu was long an impoverished island reliant on fishing. But when the Nationalists fled to Taiwan and Matsu and Kinmen became the front lines of the ROC’s defense, it took on tremendous political significance. At the same time, the large number of troops stationed there and their buying power also provided the island with substantial business opportunities.
In the year 2000, Liang Chieh-teh, a maker of documentary films, shot a nature film about terns on Matsu, and he accidentally discovered some Chinese crested terns there. The species had only been sighted five times before, and many assumed it was extinct or described it as a “legendary bird.” The news put Matsu on the world’s ecological map.
In January of this year, when discussions about the “three small links” to mainland China were grabbing headlines around the world, Matsu, due to its unique conditions, beat out Kinmen to become the first place in the ROC with direct travel, mail and trade links with mainland China.
Yet unlike the people of Kinmen, who were chomping at the bit to push development under these ties as fast as they could, the residents of Matsu showed a willingness to take it slow. Matsu’s special qualities have often attracted people’s attention. Can the island, which is undergoing tremendous changes, really act as a bridge of peace across the strait and serve as a source for our modern day legends?
At the end of March this year, a trade group from Matsu set off from Fu-ao, an ROC open port under the “three small links,” and sailed directly to the port of Mawei in Fujian Province on the mainland. There the group attended a “business welcome meeting” put on by the mainland authorities in Fuzhou and participated in various friendship activities.
This was the third group of private citizens from Taiwan to travel to the mainland directly from a Matsu port since the “three small links” were initiated.
The next evening, the ROC armed forces in Matsu held air defense exercises. As the sun sank into the ocean, flares were sent skyward in the area around Peikan, and Nankan shook with the sound of big guns, whose blasts gave a neon glow to the sky. Yet, if not for the troops in battle array, one could have easily come to the mistaken conclusion that these were fireworks set off to beckon back home the business delegation that had left a few days previously.
Matsu, which has long been accustomed to combat readiness, has become adept at navigating the mix of peace and hostility that characterizes cross-strait relations. Chang Peng-chu, the ROC political warfare director for the Matsu area, points out that when the clear days of summer arrive in June, the high command will order the forces on Matsu to conduct open battle exercises. This will send several messages: On the one hand, with visitors present, it will show that the era of Matsu being an off-limits military area is over.
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