Mama Yang’s broken children
A new Taiwanese indie documentary tells the remarkable tale of an immigrant to the US and her bond with Chinese prison inmates
Come Home, My Child (2023), by Taiwanese independent filmmaker Jasmine Ching-Hui Lee (李靖惠), will be making its Asia premiere next month at the Taiwan International Documentary Festival (TIDF). In this intimate documentary, Lee explores the life of Mama Yang, an elderly Chinese woman living in New York City who takes care of 45 high-security prison inmates as if they were her own children. In November last year, I interviewed Lee at the San Diego Asian Film Festival where she gave me a behind-the-scenes peak at her filmmaking process.
Junobi Ree: First of all, congrats on the world premiere. How did you find such a remarkable topic?
Jasmine Lee: In 2013, my last documentary, Money and Honey was selected for a film festival in New York, and the audience loved it so much. Mama Yang [the main character of Come Home, My Child] hosts a radio program and interviewed me. That’s how I got to know her and her story. I’m interested in immigrant stories. Later, I found out she wrote to inmates. Most of them came from China and are undocumented immigrants. Mama Yang wrote thousands of letters. They were so touching. I found five inmates who became supporting characters. In the beginning, the story was about Mama Yang and the inmates. I had no idea about [her granddaughter] Ellen. Then, one day, Mama Yang said, “you are welcome to visit my home, and I will show you my photos.” That’s where I got to know Ellen. You know, Mama Yang could write very lovely letters to the inmates but she could not communicate with her granddaughter. Even though they lived together, they communicated by email or notes. The Ellen character is very important [to the film] because it shows Mama Yang is not a perfect person.
JR: I’m also a documentary filmmaker and I noticed how beautifully shot your film is. Did you have a vision for the atmosphere you wanted to create or did it come together on its own? JL: I felt that even though Mama Yang is a very simple person, she’s elegant. If the film was not poetic and beautiful how could an audience sympathize [with the characters]? So I thought photography was very important. Even if it’s a tough subject, you will see hope and love in the film.
JR: You touched on both Ellen and the presence of COVID-19 during filming. How did you incorporate the pandemic and the character Ellen into the film?
JL: You know, life is very dramatic but you must spend time to wait for something to happen. It took 10 years to find out about Ellen and then, the pandemic happened. During the pandemic, I lived with Ellen and Mama Yang. The ice between them actually began to break while I was there.
JR: So it was during the pandemic when their relationship started to deepen?
JL: They could not go anywhere. I shared the rough cut [of the film] with them and they started to talk to each other. Ellen really didn’t know her grandma well but through the documentary she got to know her more. My supervising editor Liao Ching-sung (廖慶松), who is also the editor for [film director] Hou Hsiao-hsien (侯孝賢) said, “It’s more dramatic than fiction!”when he was making the final cut, and saw them talking.
JR: How are the inmates doing now? Will they watch your film?
JL: Unfortunately, the inmates cannot see the New York screening, but I will visit them. After the film festival season ends, we will have screenings in prisons in Taiwan.
JR: What are the differences between the US and Taiwan with regards to prisoner rights? JL: I couldn’t believe the prison terms are so long in the US. And it’s very hard for Chinese inmates to fight in court — expenses are so high plus the limits of language and other racial problems. I know there are other documentaries about inmates, but Come Home, My Child is unique because these inmates are invisible, you know?
JR: I’ve read that your past films have also been focused on disadvantaged social groups. How did you decide you really wanted to do this, to help people or spread a message?
JL: Making documentaries is a very hard job. It is non-commercial and costs so much.
So if you don’t love the subject, you will give up very quickly. It’s like falling in love with somebody. If you really love the person, you will be curious about him or her. You want to know more about them, right? I think love is the most important thing. So for me, I think it’s a calling from God. I am Taiwanese. I don’t know anyone in New York. But it’s amazing that I met someone like Mama Yang.
JR: What do you hope the younger generation will get out of your film?
JL: I think the younger generation will be touched by Ellen. Ellen lost her father and her mother, and she stayed with her grandma. So her childhood was not so happy. Many generations have similar experiences. Older and younger generations often don’t know how to share with each other. So I hope the new generation, when they watch the film, can start to talking to their families.
Junobi Ree is a filmmaker whose work in includes a short documentary for the BBC on Asian American teen identity and a short experimental documentary, The Valorant Ones, about multiple homelands and diaspora, depicted through different locations: Oregon, San Diego, South Korea and Oakland.
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest.
Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your typical Lonely Planet or Rough Guide. Yet this kind of diary entry is followed by maps, alluring photographs of mountain roads and instructions detailing how to get from point A to point B without missing a scenic bridge or roadside bathroom.
There is, in the introduction, the caveat that “we don’t recommend specific hotels or hostels, and we don’t rate or grade restaurants or attractions.” But such information would doubtlessly be useful to a first-time cyclist in a country where English-fluency remains limited, especially in the rural uplands that are the principle subject of the book. The justification that “There is no wrong choice in Taiwan,” applies to the limited F&B listings as it does to what equipment you’ll likely need, but again, some hard advice might be warranted here — what kind of terrain am I up against and what tools will I need beyond the obvious “puncture repair kit with tire levers?”
However, for certain details, such as the road categorization system used in Taiwan, or where you might be able to pitch a tent for the night — apparently the lawns of “temples, churches and schools” are good — the information provided is helpful, alluding to both on-the-ground experience and serious research.
Once you get through a few chapters of Tovell’s book and acquaint yourself with its home-made style, the value of Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds surfaces like a buoy released from the seabed. This is a very specific book, one aimed directly at the class of traveler that unboxes their velo at the airport (not Taoyuan’s, where cycling is prohibited, although Kaohsiung International is fine) and pedals directly towards the high hills. And after reading a few chapters more, you’ll want to do just that.
BETWEEN THE LINES
Self-published by addoil, Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds rides above its imperfections to offer something unique to the travel book market — an indispensable companion to anyone that is keen to cycle beyond the flatlands promoted by the government as the must-ride Cycling Route No.1 (自行車環島1號線). In fact, the author argues that “the country’s first official cycle route, skips, avoids and straight up ignores some of Taiwan’s highlights and best areas.”
Cycle Route No.1 doesn’t even appear in the book. Instead, the alternatives are advanced. The first three chapters essentially guide a reader/cyclist through the island’s craggy interior along Taiwan’s “spine” through Nantou County and down to the southwest, a region that, as the author notes, “has one of the highest densities of high mountains anywhere in the world…”
Detailing day-long bike rides from little known places like Lishan (梨山) and Renai (仁愛), the reader rolls vicariously through “Blue-hued mountains” that “stretch off in the distance, nearby peaks and their lush green caps contrast with a clear blue sky.” The fact that you can actually follow this route via a map, comprehensive road notes and hand-drawn sketches is where the book’s genius lies — it takes you off-thebeaten-path as a cerebral traveler then challenges you to go there yourself. The second half of the book guides readers around Taiwan’s “tail” — the Hengchun Peninsula — where you’re invited to “glide around hidden ocean roads and camp by the island’s best surf, sunbathing and palm tree spots” with excursions to outlying island like Siaoliouciou Island (小琉球) and Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼島) also included.
Returning north, again Tovell’s book highlights an alternative to the classic round-island (環島) route that is a rite-ofpassage for so many Lycra-clad cyclists, recommending instead, the East Rift Valley between Taitung and Hualien as a scenic ride.
HYBRID PUBLISHING
At almost 300 pages, the book might seem like something of a dinosaur in our compact, digital age. However, Tovell has linked the analogue book to cyberspace via an easy-to-navigate website from where you can purchase a compact “touring edition” of the book, a PDF e-book as well as posters and route maps, the latter of which can also be accessed via QR codes included in the book.
Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds then, is more than just a bicycle touring guide. In some ways, notwithstanding its digital appendages, the book recalls an age of publishing past, when Victorian adventures would produce works that were part diary, part anthropological investigation, and would include illustrations and maps for readers at home — a far cry from the formulaic world of publishing in our time.
What truly distinguishes Tovell’s book, however, is the care, time and love the Tainan-based author (who also designed the book) has clearly put into this passion project. Sure, he has ignored certain expectations of the book market, deliberately omitting routes or details he considers uninteresting. The book is unashamedly niche and deeply personal. Yet the core of the book, namely how to cycle “roads above the clouds” through a “stunning, complex and often misunderstood island” is covered with infectious zeal and the rigor of a cycling aficionado.
As the blurb on the back cover has it, this is a “love letter to Formosa” made by one that knows its heartlands.