====== Biography of Grandma W ======

By [[yiler-huang| Yiler Huang]]


Grandma W, is a 77 years old grandmother in her family. She likes to plant flowers, and play board games with her friends. 

Grandma W was born on April 3rd of Chinese calendar, 1945, in Sindian, Shuangkeng. Looking at Google Map, we can find that there were not much informations about this place.  It is reasonable to believe that it is a rural place in a mountain.

{{:yiler-shuang-keng.png?800|}}

//Shuangkeng in Google Map// (Google, 2022)

The pictures of Shuangkeng district in Google Map is shown above. The area looked rural, and there are not much streets or roads. According to Wikipedia, the cost of living was high because the resources were all used in wars at that time. Therefore, it was hard for people to live a luxury life. The cities at that time were not developed very well, or they were bombed during the war. It is reasonable to believe that there might be many people who where living in this kind of rural place at that time.

Grandma W farmed most of the time in her childhood. After 1945, the Taiwanese government revised the farming industry that was greatly damaged after World War 2. Therefore, the farming industry in Taiwan improved at that time. The government also came out with laws about ownership of lands, and rules that helped to give laborers in farms a better treatment. There were about one third of lands in Taiwan are used for farming in 1956, and the most farmed crops are rice and sugar cane.

{{:yiler-elderly-bio-people-farming.jpg?800|}}

//People farming in around 1940// (Unknown, n.d.)

{{:yiler-crop-produced.jpeg?800|}}

//A table showing variety and amount of crops grown in 1937// (江昺崙,2017)

Grandma W had 5 siblings, two older sisters, two older brothers, and one younger brother. They lived in a house made of mud with their parents on the top of a mountain in Shuang Keng. It takes days to get down from the mountain, so she stayed on the mountain most of the time. According to //臺灣女人」研究計畫結案報告書//(中央研究院近代史研究所,2003), Taiwan's education for females was actually becoming common because Japanese government in 1898 cerated a female educational department in their official school Kokugo gakkou(the National Taipei University of Education now). After that, females got a lot more chances to go to school than before. However, grandma W still didn't go to school because her father didn't allow her to. Because she didn't go to school, she helped her family to farm their food. They farmed their food everyday. They also had animals farmed around their house, but Grandma W was interested in plants more than animals. This also developed her interest in horticulture in her life later. Besides planting and farming, she also liked to talk to her sister at that time, and that was one of the very few entertainment she could get.

{{:yiler-kokugo.jpeg?800|}}

//Kokugo gakko around 1940//

Grandma W didn't go to school. But actually, a school called Kokugo gakko started providing handicrafts classes for females to study in and created a place for girls to study after 1896. This is because people at that time wanted to improved the household skills of females. The main goal of the system at that time wasn't to teach females how to live on their ow in the society, but teaching them how to be a good housewife or household worker. Later on, the system develop from elementary school to middle school and high school, and made educations for females become more common after 1930. After 1943, all Taiwanese people had the responsibility of finish studying elementary school. However, grandma W's father still didn't allow her to go to school.


By the age about 20, Grandma W's second brother brought them away from their father because they didn't like the way their father took care of the family. They went down the mountain to Gongguan and worked there. Grandma W worked at a police department, and her job was to make drinks for people and clean. According to the author's research, the economic situation in Taiwan during that period of time wasn't really good. The two most common jobs at that time were farming, and factory works. Also, the population at that time also increased. It is reasonable to believe that at that time, it is harder to make money. In the police department, Grandma W met the man who was going to be his husband. Her husband was a police officer that worked in the police department, and her loved each other and they had the idea of starting a marriage. However, Grandma W moved back to Shindian to start a new business of selling fruits. Her husband knew that and asked to be deployed in the Shindian police department. Later on, Grandma W met with her husband again. Her husband started visiting her house more often, and they married when Grandma W was 24 years old. Grandma W said that at that time, her neighbors were all talking about the gossips about their marriage before they married. After they married, Grandma W's oldest sister gave Grandma W her youngest son. When Grandma W was 25 years old, her first daughter was born. 

After her first daughter was born, she moved to Taipei because her husband was been deployed to the Daan police department in Taipei. She also got some health problem at that time, so she took a surgery. During that period of time, she was living in the houses for governmental people the police department provided. Her second daughter was born during that period of time. She lived there for a long time with her husband.

Because Grandma W's husband passed away, she couldn't live in the governmental people house anymore. Fortunately, her second daughter bought a house, and they are currently living in that house. In the house, she is living with her second daughter, and the first and second children of her first daughter. The older one is a girl, and the younger one is a boy. 

In about 2017, she was 72 years old, she got hit by a car while on the way to go shopping. Her left leg got injured, and she took a surgery in MacKey hospital. Fortunately she could stand and walk again after the surgery. Her daughters were worrying about her, so they sent her to the Datong elderly care center. In the center, she likes to talk with other people and play board games with them. She leaves the center at evening, and her daughter usually takes her home. When she is at home, she does many house hold work including cooking, washing dishes, and wash clothes. In her free time, she likes to watch Taiwanese koa-á hì, and her favorite koa-á hì actor is Lihua Huang.

==== References ====

https://zh.m.wikipedia.org/zh-hant/1960%E5%B9%B4%E4%BB%A3%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3

https://www.google.com/maps/place/231%E6%96%B0%E5%8C%97%E5%B8%82%E6%96%B0%E5%BA%97%E5%8D%80%E9%9B%99%E5%9D%91/@24.9491113,121.5807277,16.54z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x346801b2b688deb1:0xd72e2ca11d75ce20!8m2!3d24.949045!4d121.582253

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3%E6%95%99%E8%82%B2%E5%8F%B2

https://zh.m.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3%E7%B8%BD%E7%9D%A3%E5%BA%9C%E5%9C%8B%E8%AA%9E%E5%AD%B8%E6%A0%A1

https://tme.ncl.edu.tw/tw/%E7%B6%93%E6%BF%9F%E7%99%BC%E5%B1%95%E7%AF%87

https://zh.m.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/1945%E5%B9%B4%E8%87%BA%E7%81%A3

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E7%B6%93%E6%BF%9F%E5%8F%B2

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.jstor.org%2Fstable%2F20677&psig=AOvVaw1b3uwc6BRh3Q3BHWGMJ06s&ust=1668579920399000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CBAQjRxqFwoTCOCmut3Gr_sCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAc

https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-tw/%E5%8F%B0%E7%81%A3%E8%BE%B2%E6%A5%AD


江昺崙. (2017, April 17). 江昺崙—嘉南大圳與台灣農民—想想Thinking Taiwan—想想台灣，想想未來. //想想論壇.// http://www.thinkingtaiwan.com/content/6202


Author Unknown.(2003).游鑑明計畫主持.//《「臺灣女人」研究計畫結案報告書》（臺南：國立臺灣歷史博物館籌備處；臺北：中央研究院近代史研究所，2003）。//

Author Unknown.(n.d.).Unknown https://scontent.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t31.0-8/16252162_1424490274248958_650269452873631756_o.jpg?_nc_fx=ftpe7-1&_nc_cat=0&oh=86ca56b3ab3e13f654451ded727ba0d9&oe=5BD625EC&_nc_fr=ftpe7c03