Taiqi

As I have mentioned before, I practice taiqi three mornings a week with a lovely little group of Taiwanese people, all over the age of 50. I like to think of myself, the tall blond 30 years their junior, as their mascot - I show up to things, make a solid effort, usually get my butt whipped by all of the 70-year-olds, understand about 30 per cent of what is said around me and have an overall grand time. Everyone else in my group works at the Kaohsiung City Tax Office, just a block past my apartment building next to the Cultural Center. There are a couple of other people who come regularly, who clearly know everyone, but who always walk off in a different direction. Maybe they are retired now? One of these is my coach, a little old guy, completely adorable. He is always walking over and correcting my body posture - I do not know where he finds the patience. :) Then there is also the main teacher. He only comes some of the time, which confuses me. I did not ever work with him until back in January when I finally became good enough to join the entire group. Even so, he often comes and just observes from the back the whole time. Every once in a while, he will get on a microphone and demonstrate things for us.

Back when my family visited in March and came to watch me practicing taiqi in the Cultural Center, my group asked if I wanted to join them in a performance come May. I readily agreed, of course!

The performance turned out to be an exhibition of nearly all of the certified taiqi groups in southern Taiwan performing for the Kaohsiung mayor. There were over a thousand people, coming from Tainan, Pingtung etc. Kaitlyn came with me to watch and take pictures. As we were driving up to the stadium, she started to point out someone wearing the same uniform as me, to ask if they were from my group. She was shocked to discover that all 1000 of us were wearing the exact same clothes. Looking for me in all of the pictures and videos she took is a little like "Where's Waldo" Grace-style.



While we had to be at the stadium at 8am, nothing really happened until after 10am when the mayor finally arrived. We spent the several hours getting marshaled around the field, arranged into lines, marching out, marching back again. We even did a practice run of the whole thing with music and girls (dressed like majorettes) holding signs. Once the mayor did finally show up, we had to stand, in the by-now oppressive heat, listening to nearly an hour of speechifying and acknowledgments for every single person of the several dozen sitting on stage. If this sounds boring/tortuous, now imagine listening to all of the speechifying in Chinese. Haha I really wanted to strip off all my clothes and then pass out in the middle of the field. In the end, I decided that might not be kosher... After all, I was already the only non-Asian on the field, so I had a reputation to uphold as the sole westerner. :)

We were finally allowed to start, and for the next seven minutes, the whole experience was very fascinating to be a part of and to watch. All 1000 of us were in lines, doing the same routine, moving in "perfect" uniformity to the music (It was actually far from perfect, thanks to the grass making it very difficult to turn properly. The best part was these two guys right in front of me - not from my group! - who obviously had no idea what they were doing. It was hilarious, and made me feel much better about myself). It was cool to watch all of the lines move as one, almost like waves of the sea. At the front of the lines, were nine taiqi masters, wearing silken pajamas. I did not realize until later when Kaitlyn showed me pictures, but one of these was my group's instructor. If you look in the videos, he is the one closest to the camera (or on the far right if you were facing the field).











After baking in the sun for a few hours, the entire field retired to another in-door stadium across the street where certain taiqi groups entered into a competition. My group did not take part in the competitions, for they told me they did not have enough people. This surprised me, because there are usually over 20 people at practice on a given day. Anyways, after about 30 minutes of watching more of the same routine performed again and again, Kaitlyn and I were utterly bored and left. The morning was a very fun experience, though, and I am glad I was able to participate.