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| Laha Mebow, director of “Finding Sayun,” says she found her roots in an abandoned village where her ancestors used to live. (Staff photo/Chen Mei-ling) |
“Finding Sayun” is the first Taiwan feature film on indigenous culture shot from the perspective of an aboriginal director—Laha Mebow of the Atayal tribe.
The film, which interweaves the past and the present, portrays Taiwan’s rich indigenous culture and speaks of the Atayal people’s desire to return to Ryohen Village, their ancestral home.
Representing the past is an Atayal girl named Sayun. In 1938, the 17-year-old Sayun was helping her Japanese teacher carry his luggage across the Nan-ao South River in Yilan County, when she slipped, fell into the river, and drowned. Her teacher continued on his course to fight in what the Japanese called the Great East Asia War.
“I’ve seen many aboriginal movies produced by other directors, and of course I thank them for drawing attention to our people,” Laha Mebow said in a Dec. 9 interview with Taiwan Today. “But those movies mostly portray aborigines as miserable and underprivileged, or as leading unsuccessful lives while they struggle to make a living in the city.
“In those films, our people never smile, when in fact we are quite happy, despite our lack of material goods. I wanted to make a different indigenous movie that allows the world to really understand our people and culture.”
According to Laha Mebow, Sayun’s story received very little coverage in the Taiwan Nichinichi Shimpo, a Japanese-language newspaper then circulating in Taiwan, with little more than a matter-of-fact headline stating “Aboriginal woman missing after falling into river.”
The story of Sayun became more widely known only one year after the incident, when a welcoming party was held in Taipei for Kioyoshi Hasegawa, the Japanese governor of Taiwan in 1940.
“During the reception, my grandmother, who had been Sayun’s classmate and who witnessed the accident, performed a song in memory of her childhood friend,” said Laha Mebow. Upon hearing the song, Hasegawa thought it was the perfect story to promote the Kominka Movement, which aimed to turn Taiwanese into loyal and devoted subjects of Japan.
In 1943, the story of Sayun was given a touch of romance and made into a patriotic movie called “Sayun’s Bell.” “It was shown around Taiwan and mainland China to instill loyalty and encourage the people to serve and fight for the Japanese emperor,” said Laha Mebow.
Ryohen Village, the tribe where Sayun lived, also became famous for a while following the successful screening of “Sayun’s Bell.”
During the last 70 years or so, however, the legend of Sayun has gradually been forgotten. Indeed, much of the original Atayal culture, in which Sayun was raised, has been lost as well, according to Laha Mebow.
The director said that when the Nationalist Government first arrived in Taiwan in 1949, it followed a policy of “concentrated management.” In order to control the Atayal more easily, it forced the tribespeople to leave Ryohen Village, their ancestral home located high up in the mountains, and to move to Jinyue Village by the foot of the mountain.
“We had to leave behind all our possessions, forsake the homes our ancestors had built, and move to a place we were completely unfamiliar with,” Nolay Piho, an Atayal hunter and priest, said at a movie symposium hosted by Taipei-based Taishin Bank Foundation for Arts and Culture Nov. 23.
Nolay Piho is also best known for his role as the elder Mona Rudao in the recent Taiwanese blockbuster film “Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale.”
“The wisdom of our forefathers was destroyed and replaced by a new government system, with laws and norms completely different from our own.”
To explain what he meant, Nolay Piho mentioned current laws that make it illegal to hunt certain protected species. “For the Atayal people, hunting is an essential survival skill; and though we hunt these animals, we also know how to protect them,” he said, noting that the Atayal hunting season runs from November to February, and that during the remaining eight months the animals are left alone to breed and multiply.
“The new systems and norms are cruel to us, as they do not take our culture and habits into consideration. Moreover, the government did not even bother to notify us in advance of the new laws,” he said.
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| Yukan Basan (left) and Wilang Bonoy, who played grandchild and grandfather respectively in “Find Sayun,” go on a root-seeking trip from Jinyue Village to Ryohen Village. (Courtesy of Sky Films Entertainment Co. Ltd.) |
According to Nolay Piho, even today many unemployed indigenous people rely on hunting to make a living and support their families. Yet when they are caught shooting protected species such as the Formosan goat or the Formosan barking deer, they are fined and sometimes put in jail.
Noting that many aborigines struggle with alcoholism, Nolay Piho said this affliction can be attributed to the sense of frustration felt by his people. In addition, many of them feel lost, because the old norms and former ways of life have been destroyed, and there are no ancestors and fewer and fewer elderly tribesmen left to pass down their ancient wisdom, he said.
“We are facing a civilization and development that we cannot keep up with, since these things were not a part of our lives before. There is no way back and all we can do is to try to fit into the new system.”
According to Laha Mebow, her tribesmen began to organize annual trips back to Ryohen Village starting about 10 years ago, an event that is also a root-finding trip. “Every year, more than 10 hunters, young and old, as well as students who have left to study in the big cities, carry tools such as grass cutters to participate in the half-month activity.
“The routes back to our old village are either damaged or covered by overgrown plants and creeping weeds, as no one has maintained them during the past 70 years. So we have to clear our own path and build temporary bridges with logs and branches along the way.
“Before we start on our journey, we pray to God and our ancestral spirits for a safe trip, since difficult trail conditions can make the journey quite dangerous,” Laha Mebow said.
She explained the Atayal believe that whenever a tribal person passes away, his or her spirit remains in the mountains to look after the descendants.
“Usually, it takes about two days to get to our destination on foot, and no matter the weather is rainy or windy, we continue onward, stopping only for brief periods to check on trail conditions.”
Recalling her first experience with the root-seeking team, Laha Mebow said she silently asked herself why they had to visit the old village, and walked until she wanted to die. “I only knew I was going on a trip searching for my roots, but lacking the experience of living in the old village, I did not have any strong feelings toward it,” the director pointed out.
“During the journey, I often had to jump over landslide areas without hesitating, although I was scared. At that time, I thought, ‘Why does the way back home have to be so complicated? I do not mind it if the trip is long, but why does it have to be so difficult as well?’”
Nevertheless, all her efforts paid off after she reached her destination. “When we got to the village, many hunters including the elders and my father began to look for their homes covered in overgrown plants,” Laha Mebow said.
“Atayal males are very manly,” she added, “but once they located what used to be their homes, and began talking to the spirits of their parents or ancestors, they started to cry. It was only then that I gradually began to have feelings toward the old village, the sense of home.”
Nolay Piho added that there is an important scene in “Finding Sayun” concerning 77-year-old Wilang Bonay, an Atayal senior at Jinyue Village. Worried about his health, Wilang Bonay’s family forbids him from going on the long and arduous journey. So he goes in secret, accompanied by his grandson, played by 18-year-old Yukan Basan.
“Wilang Bonay always wanted to revisit his native land, as he thinks that is where his soul and real home are. Although he is in bad health and leads an inactive lifestyle in his concrete house at the foot of the mountain, he started to sing along the way, as if everything he saw was giving him a warm welcome,” Nolay Piho said.
Later in the movie, Wilang Bonay dies when he was almost half way down the mountain, an arrangement Nolay Piho explains as “the grandpa’s wish to die where his home and ancestral spirits are, as well as a demonstration of family love and the yearning for home.”
“Every existence is a culture, a memory,” Laha Mebow said. “Our old home is where our grandparents and ancestors lived. Without them, we would not be. This, I think, is the meaning of root-finding.” (HZW)
