Page 92 - An Overview of Penghu

The Inspection of Wangan Village and its Islands

The Odes

Ÿ The sixty-three islands/ Administered by me/ Are blessed by Gods/ Bestowed with good yields on land/ And
abundant harvests at sea.
Ÿ Sailing among violent tides/ I got seasick/ But continued to push forward the inspection/ While praying to the
gods of sea/ Asking for their protection.
Ÿ A seventy-year-old doctor/ Served in Wangan Village/ For twenty-right years/ Dedicating himself to patients/
His commitment is admirable (Satō Inui from Aizu Prefecture. He has the body of a middle-aged man.)
Ÿ The Wangan Village Governor/ Was a former private first-class soldier/ Of General Hijishima's mixed brigade/
Who luckily recovered from/ The plague spreading in the army (Mr. Noda Kotaro, 66 years old).
Ÿ The lack of postal and telecommunications services/ Makes it utterly inconvenient to communicate/ The lives of
ten thousand people/ On the eight islands of Wangan Village/ Are painful and miserable.
Ÿ Food is always running so low/ That people can only live on it for half a year/ The Islanders have to rely on/
Fishing or seeking jobs elsewhere/ Struggling to keep their heads above water.
Ÿ Bamboos, woods, and tiles/ Are only imported from elsewhere from time to time/ And are treated as treasures/
The lack of building material/ Is genuinely lamentable.
Ÿ Without academies/ There is no way to receive education/ Children on the islands/ Grow up / Like beasts.
Ÿ Wearing a modern/ And light straw hat/ That young folk/ Must be a modern teenager/ Coming back from his job
outside the Island.
Ÿ There are no plants on the islands/ More trees need to be grown/ To greenify this laterite Island/ The seedling
named “Heshoumanliu” was given to the islanders/ To encourage them to plant trees.
Ÿ The Huayu Isle/ Sits on the sea at the western edge of Japan/ Infrastructures are scarce/ And lands are infertile/ It
is even difficult for pigs to grow fat.
Ÿ Albeit an uninhabited island/ Mao Isle is the home to/ tens of thousands of seabirds/ It is truly an amazing island.
Ÿ At the sound of a steam whistle/ tens of thousands of seabirds/ Flock to the sky/ Like clouds of dust/ Squawking
like crazy/ It is truly a sight to behold.
Ÿ Infrastructures on the islands/ Are far worse than those of mountainous areas where the aboriginals inhabit/ So I
am touched by officers there/ Who strive to provide quality services.
Ÿ The Japanese pupils/ Studying alongside their Taiwanese counterparts/ At the Wangan Public School/ Appear so
lonely/ Because there are so few of them.
Ÿ Transportation is extremely inconvenient/ Newspaper delivery can get delayed for up to twenty days/ Lives of
the islanders/ Are truly miserable.
Ÿ With no shuttle boats/ People's lives are inconvenient and miserable/ They have to rely on fishing boats/ To
bring back all kinds of daily necessities for them.
Ÿ Officer Kado from the Dayu Police Station/ And his two family members/ Died from a fever/ Their coffins were
made from wood torn down from the ceiling/ And their bodies cremated in the fire created by burning furniture
(Governor Honma composed the poem out of grievance after hearing the news of Dayu Police Station Officer
Kado and his two family members died of typhoid fever within a day.
Ÿ Serving at the police station for over a decade/ While Teaching at an academy/ Police Officer Iwakoshi/ Had
contributed significantly to the education in Donji/ He is a treasure to the Isle (Governor Honma awarded Officer
Iwakoshi Tetsuji from the Donji Police Station for his commitment to the region.
Ÿ When I visited Jiangjunao/ I was excited to see a young/ And sturdy police officer/ Teaching fishermen how to
sail/ With a small boat (Governor Honma was happy to see Officer Takaki Matsu at work during his visit.
Ÿ Single officers/ Serving in isolated islands/ Must be lonely/ Let's hope this officer/ Can marry a good wife in the
future (It was said that there were three single officers).
Ÿ As Japanese is not widely used/ In the islands/ Many officers suffer from mental breakdown/ because of
loneliness/ Resulted from the lack of conversations.
Ÿ The situation in Wangan is/ Far worse than that in Taipei/ Those in Wangan only receive/ Salaries forty-percent
less than their counterparts in Taipei besides some subsidies/I felt so sorry for them that I cried.
Ÿ What I saw today/ Those islands and its residents/ To which the Empire's Generosity could not reach/ Broke my
heart because I could not help them/ I was shameful of myself as a governor.
Ÿ Although Penghu is an isolated island/ The moon/ Shining upon the gravel beach of Wangan/ Is as bright as that
of the Seine/ And Venice

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