Exclusive book excerpt from "Taiwan White Horror Essays": Cai Deben's "Sweet Potato Boy"

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 ◎ In 1991, he began to write "Taiwan のいもっ子" in Japanese. It was published by Shueisha in Japan in September 1994. The following year, with the assistance of his daughter Cai Shizhen, he translated it into Chinese "Sad Potato Boy", published by Vision Publishing , November 1995. In March 2008, a new edition will be published, grassroots publishing.

Author: Cai Deben (1925-2015)
Pu Ziren, Chiayi, went to Japan to study after graduating from Pu Zigong School. After graduating from Tokyo Prestigious Middle School, he returned to Taiwan to work at Pu Zidong National School. In 1946, he entered the Taiwan Normal University, during which he published short stories such as "Bitter Gourd" and "Beer", and organized the Taiwanese Drama Club of the Taiwan Normal University to engage in the realistic Taiwanese drama movement. In 1953, he went to the United States to study for a year at public expense. One month after returning to China, he was implicated by a friend and imprisoned. After 13 months of unjust imprisonment, he was released. After that, he continued to teach at Dongshi High School. He retired from Tainan No. 1 Middle School in 1990. Author of "Sweet Potato Lament".

11 Hero Yukun

After the cigarettes he brought were finished, Youde reached for the cigarettes on the table.

"is it okay?"

"Um."

Wang nodded.

Since Youde started writing, Wang has not spoken or urged. Whenever Yode finished writing a piece, he picked it up and read it, uttered a "whoosh", and put it back. Is it contempt? Still not up to his expectations?

Finally, I have to write about Zhang Yukun.

Yukun is the upper level of Youde in kindergarten and elementary school. He has always been a compelling figure. It is not enough to write about him in a few words.

There is only one public kindergarten in the town, which accepts both Japanese and Taiwanese children. Whenever Taiwanese children were bullied by Japanese children, Yukun always stood up, with his tall physique, he dealt with two or three fights without hesitation. During the intercollegiate sports meeting in the elementary school, in the finale of the relay race, Yukun was always applauded by the whole school when he appeared on the stage. After entering Tainan No. 2 Middle School, Yukun became a black belt judo master and became famous for a while. In a word, Yu Kun is a heroic figure of the dragon of the pack.

However, in the February 28 Incident, Yukun, like most college students, did not have any active activities. Most of those who died in the February 28 incident were elites who had already become famous, or people who were well known in the local area. College students, who have yet to achieve prestigious status, are hardly harmed. However, with the February 28 incident as a turning point, college students felt extremely disappointed and angry with the government, and from then on, they quickly turned to anti-government and turned to communism to find their lost hope. Within a year, this tendency spread like a prairie fire all over the island, out of control. Yukun may have joined the Communist Party during this period.

Students staged demonstrations, chanting anti-government slogans. Needless to say, Yukun was always at the forefront of the parade.

The government was finally determined to launch a major purge targeting intellectuals, arresting a large number of students. This is the April 6 Incident (or the April 6 Student Incident) that occurred in the year following the February 28 Incident. 16

After this major blow, the number of college students has dropped by more than half. In the English department that Youde studied, the number of students was reduced from more than 40 to 20. There is only one math department left by Zhou Shenyuan! However, this does not mean that more than half of the students were arrested. Fleeing and disappointed dropouts, I am afraid more than arrested.

Of course, Yukun was the main target of arrest. Sensing the danger of being arrested, he had already left the dormitory secretly and hid in Pu Zi's house. The spy did not catch him in the dormitory, and immediately went south to surround his hometown. When the plainclothes spy banged on the front door of his house, Yu Kun was dressed in black, and was let down by ropes from the second floor to the roof behind. Following the planned route, he escaped successfully. This is Yu Kun's first escape.

After Yukun escaped from Puzi, he hid in Jiziliao, a small coastal village more than ten kilometers away. A year later, the agents found out his whereabouts and mobilized a large number of police officers to surround his residence. However, Yu Kun had already left on alert the day before. In just one day, the spies came to nothing.

After Yukun left the small village, he went into the mountains to join other political prisoners. 17 They have a base in the mountains and live a barely self-sufficient life. No matter how desperately the agents outside tried to catch them, they just lingered on for two years.

One day two years later, for some unknown reason, Yu Kun disguised himself as a farmer and went down the mountain to Chiayi City. While eating noodles at a noodle stall in the East Market, several giant men suddenly appeared. They rushed forward together, crushed Yu Kun to the ground, and immediately tied him up. Yu Kun was taken away just like that. At that time, his primary school classmate Xu Xingming was the one who was present to verify his identity.

"The big fish has been caught!"

The agents happily received the bonus and held a celebration feast.

This is what happened during Youde's stay in the United States. In his letter to Youde, Taojiang only quietly wrote one line:

"Gandhi (Yukun's nickname), arrested."

12 Gratitude for Restoration

In an understatement, I described the young days of the two of them. Youde started from the recovery of Taiwan and wrote about the relationship with Yukun.

Returning to the motherland is called "Guangfu" in Chinese. After World War II, when it comes to Taiwan, it is divided into pre-recovery and post-recovery.

In 1945, Japan surrendered and Taiwan returned to the motherland. After countless struggles by the ancestors, the unfulfilled dream suddenly came true and appeared in front of us. The Taiwanese cried gratefully.

It can be said that: those who do not know the gratitude of the Taiwanese people during their liberation are not qualified to talk about the history of Taiwan after the liberation.

At that time, the old, young, farmers, businessmen, civil servants, workers, housewives, and even local gangsters all indulged in the wine of the Restoration and enjoyed the drunken happiness.

When taking a walk outside, many people held a small homemade flag in their hands and seemed unable to let go for a moment. The local ruffians and hooligans all joined the Zhongyi Church to help maintain local law and order after the Japanese police left. The crime rate in the town dropped to zero all of a sudden.

Young townspeople returned from demobilization one after another. Youde was from the Japanese Air Force, Yukun was from the Japanese Army, and Wenbang, Tetsuo, and Zhizhi were from the Student Corps. Everyone returned to their hometowns one after another.

The returning youth immediately organized the "Three Principles of the People's Youth League", and they voluntarily assisted in any work that would help build a new country. They swore passionately that they would be the foundation stone of a great new government.

First, they learn to sing the national anthem and then teach others to sing it over and over. They curled their tongues to learn Beijing dialect, which was completely unfamiliar, but had to use Japanese hiragana phonetics next to the Chinese characters. Some phonetics are too outrageous, and there are many jokes.

Although the pronunciation is not accurate, the affection is sincere. It is difficult to find a second national anthem sung so full of sincerity in the world.

The youth mobilized all musical instruments, hung a large national flag as the background at the entrance of the temple, the assembly hall, and any open space, and enthusiastically taught the people to sing the national anthem. The voices of men, women, old and young resounded one after another in every corner of the town.

Along with the national anthem, there is also a "March of the Volunteers".

Little did the young people know that this song would become the national anthem of the communist regime in the future. They sang it loudly with tears in their eyes and sincerely praised the brave Chinese who fought bravely against Japan:

Rise up, those who do not want to be slaves build our new Great Wall of our flesh and blood

In Taiwan, some people also compose songs to express their feelings, which are all the rage:

Taiwan celebrates today, raises its head, looks up to the blue sky, clears the sky and clears the day, and welcomes six million people with a happy pot, pulp, and rice table.

On the stage, the young people with messy hair and waving the baton were full of enthusiasm, symbolizing the new hope of the new Taiwan.

The youth are also working to restore the cleanliness of the town. The post-war town was a desolate place. Abandoned bomb shelters overgrown with weeds. The road that has not been repaired for a long time has water in the cave, which has become a breeding ground for the wicked. The youths assigned their respective areas of responsibility and mobilized all the manpower, even elementary school students. Every day before dawn, everyone gathered together with hoes, bamboo brooms, and dustpans to clean up. Within a few weeks, the town's new look is amazing. In such a clean town, the Japanese police even threatened with fines before the Restoration, but there was no way to do it!

The young people, including the female team members of course, participate in the Three People's Principles seminar every night, earnestly and happily learn the new motherland language and political philosophy. A beautiful new hope.

However, these enthusiastic young people did not realize that a fate that was far more severe than before the Restoration had quietly come to a very close place, quietly waiting for them.

13 The day is blue

After writing about indulging in gratitude for Guangfu and the various activities he had engaged in with friends such as Yukun and Wenbang, Youde didn't know if there was one thing he should write about. Although this incident has nothing to do with this case, it is the most appropriate example, and it is written so that they can understand how much Yude and other sweet potato boys love their motherland. Anyway, there is nothing wrong with writing it. Youde thought about it this way, and then he started writing.

It happened not long after the Restoration, when the whole of Taiwan was rejoicing, the story of three anti-Japanese heroes from Puzi returning home from Tainan Prison. These three are seniors of Youde's public school. In May 1939, about two years after the Sino-Japanese Incident, they were arrested by Japanese agents on charges of rebellion and given heavy sentences respectively:

 The mastermind, Huang Kun, was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Li Qinming was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Huang Jiazong was sentenced to 12 years in prison.

By the standards of the time, it was a very heavy sentence. They were both eighteen-year-old young students when the incident occurred. Huang Kun studied at Tainan No. 2 Middle School; Li and Huang studied at Tainan Normal School. The three of them swore allegiance to the motherland, and carefully wrote an affidavit with bloodmarks. They meet regularly at cemeteries far away from the crowds, sing the national anthems that Youde and others learned after the Restoration, and study the Three Principles of the People.

At that time, the Sino-Japanese War broke out, and the Japanese army was advancing on the Chinese mainland with the momentum of breaking bamboo. The town often held lantern parades to celebrate the victory of the imperial army.

Although it is almost impossible to imagine that the Chinese army will attack Taiwan, Huang Kun and others vowed that once the Chinese army landed, they would respond internally.

When it came to light, they were arrested, brutally beaten and sentenced to severe prison terms.

At the time of their recovery, they had spent six years of their youth in prison, and if the war continued, they would soon die of abuse and malnutrition.

As soon as the news of the three returning home was disclosed, Youde and other young students rushed to the train station to greet them with the national flag in their hands.

The train station is at the southern end of the town. It belongs to the sugar company and is a small, neat white building. This railway station must be a place full of memories for the three people who are about to return.

When it was time to go back to school at the end of the holidays, boys and girls in uniform, hats and wicker suitcases arrived at the train station an hour or two before departure. It was the only social place where male and female students could smile at each other or have an occasional conversation or two. Even a short sentence or two will be deeply etched in their hearts and become a sweet memory that nourishes their hearts during their studies away from home.

On this day, some of the female students at the time also came to the station to greet them, and some brought little girls with carefully arranged bouquets in their hands, ready to lay flowers.

The people from Zhongyitang also came with a ryaka (a trolley) and a gong and drum.

The little train whistled and slid slowly into the platform. Immediately the gongs and drums were roaring, and firecrackers were blaring. People waved flags and cheered: "Hooray! Hooray!"

Amid the thunderous cheers, the three returning heroes finally appeared on the platform. Huang Kun, a former tennis player, walked with a limp, his pale face, thin arms, and bony body, nakedly told people the pain and torture they had endured in the past six years, which made their nose sour. But their tearful eyes, despite the vicissitudes of life, are still bright and sparkling.

The three shook hands and thanked the people who kept waving their flags. The three little girls ran over to lay flowers, causing a round of applause. They squatted down to pick up the girl, and teardrops the size of beans, like pearls with a broken thread, gurgled out of the eyes of the three of them.

Then Huang Kun put down the little girl, took off the tennis cap he was wearing, threw it high into the sky, and shouted with all his strength:

"It's daylight!"

Naturally, Youde and others followed Huang Kun's example and threw their hats high into the sky, shouting excitedly:

"It's daylight!"

Enthusiastic cheers resounded through the sky, and not a single one of the people present could not shed tears.

There is no doubt that the sky in this world is clear blue sky.

This is a story that happened in a very short period of time between the surrender of the Japanese army on August 15, 1945 (the thirty-fourth year of the Republic of China) and the takeover of Taiwan by the Chinese government on October 25 of the same year. Although Taiwan was in a state of anarchy at that time, it was truly a world with clear sky and daylight.

14 Drama clubs and sororities

"Tuk, tuk." Someone knocked on the door. Tian got up to go. A man named Fatty Su and Hong Mou, who was wearing silver-rimmed glasses, walked in.

"Ha!" Wang stood up and yawned a long time.

"What? Are you still writing?"

Fatty Su murmured.

Wang Mou whispered a few words to Fatty Su at the door, and went out with Tian Mou. The door closed again, and locked. The two who took over came to sit down in front of Youde. Hong, who wears silver-rimmed glasses, dropped a pack of cigarettes on the table. It seems that Youde seems to be really favored.

"Write the facts well, you can't deceive us even if you lie."

Fatty Su said in a slightly threatening tone.

Youde nodded and continued to write. Every word is the truth, nothing is false.

Then it's time to talk about the Taiwanese Drama Club of Normal University. Youde carefully described the motivation for the establishment of the agency and the course of its activities. If this society is considered a peripheral organization of the Communist Party, Youde is doomed. At that time, almost all the associations in the universities were peripheral organizations of the Communist Party, so there were very few people in charge who were still alive. 18

During the Japanese occupation era, the use of Taiwanese was prohibited in schools at all levels. With the vigorous implementation of the imperialization policy, many sweet potato boys are proud of not being able to speak Taiwanese, and they openly boast about it. After the Restoration, Taiwanese was only allowed to be used in schools for a short period of time, but soon it was banned under the government's name of "promoting the national language". It was a very abused language. Therefore, many words in Taiwanese have been lost and become more and more vulgar. The main purpose of the Taiwanese Drama Club is to study those lost words and phrases, improve the style of the language, and then carry forward Taiwanese culture. Youde is the founder of the Taiwanese Drama Club. He drafted the theme and recruited members, so he was elected as the president.

At that time, Communist Party students gradually infiltrated into all associations, further grasped the dominance of associations, and became increasingly anti-government. Only the Taiwanese Drama Club has the name "Taiwanese", and the members are all sweet potato boys, so it is difficult for mainland students with complex backgrounds to penetrate.

During the February 28 Incident, although the college students were dissatisfied, they remained calm. But seeing the massacre of the February 28 Incident and the increasingly corrupt regime, college students were generally outraged and began to actively participate in the anti-government movement. At the beginning of the Restoration, the hope for the government turned into disappointment, and after the February 28th Incident, it was almost despair. Desperate students want to find new hope in the new regime emerging on the mainland. No matter what the doctrine is, the sweet potato boy longs for a strong and powerful regime to overthrow the corrupt government in front of him. The people of the mainland are also like this, right? Otherwise, why was the Communist Party able to sweep the entire continent in such a short period of time?

The Communist students who came out one after another from the mainland absorbed pure Taiwanese students one by one, and formed groups of cells in groups of three or four. If they are not in the same group, they will not know each other as party members and comrades. 19

All the rallies at that time had anti-government speeches, and anti-government satires were everywhere. The campus was filled with anti-government flyers and posters. Under such circumstances, it is very natural that more than ten members of the Taiwanese Drama Society will join the Communist Party.

On the other hand, the vocational students of the Kuomintang also secretly reported the activities of the students one by one. They are like double-faced beasts, pretending to be sympathetic to the Communist Party members and scolding the government, while acting as a whistleblower.

The Taiwanese Drama Club first released "Sunrise" by the famous mainland playwright Cao Yu, which was well received. This is a tragedy describing the gap between the rich and the poor. It belongs to the literature of the proletariat, and the students of the Communist Party applaud. Unexpectedly, Cao Yu turned into a Communist Party member a year later, and the play was banned in Taiwan. However, Youde's motive for performing this play was very simple, just to introduce the masterpieces of the motherland.

The second drama of the Taiwanese Drama Club is "The Death of Arishima" by Takero Arishima, which Youde translated into "The Death of Ah T" and directed it himself. It seems a little out of place to stage such a pure literary work on a campus that was full of emotions at the time. However, the performance of this drama proves that Taiwanese, like other languages, can express a very high style.

In the same year that the drama club was established, Pu Zi's students established a "Student Association" in their hometown, with nearly 60 college students and more than 100 high school students participating. The only college student who did not join was Huang Lietang. Presumably, he may have joined the Communist Party at this time.

Yukun greatly praised Youde's organizational skills and dramatic talents in the Taiwanese Drama Club at the election of the president, and strongly recommended Youde as the president. Yukun himself served as the vice-chairman; Wenbang and Tetsuo were the ministers of general affairs and recreation; Hirao was in charge of stage design. It seems that not long after the association was established, the four of them joined the Communist Party one after another.

In hindsight, it was a blessing for Youde to serve as the president of the sorority. If it was Yukun, the sorority would probably be considered a peripheral organization of the Communist Party, and none of Pu Zi's students would be able to escape prison.

The sorority used the vacation and borrowed the theater to hold performances. Perform chorus, dance, drama and other programs. In addition to performing Cao Yu's "Sunrise", they also put on the stage another mainland playwright Tian Han's "Return to the South".

There was no TV at that time, and the townspeople happily bought tickets to watch the show. When the income exceeds the expenditure, the sorority uses the surplus as a relief fund for poor children.

Encouraged, Youde adapted the well-received American film "Kings Row" into a stage play with three acts and five scenes, which was performed in Taiwanese. Originally, Youde was very hesitant, wondering whether the country people could accept this kind of drama mainly based on psychological description, but it turned out to be a great success.

In this play, Youde plays the male lead Barris, and Yukun plays the father of Barris' lover. The two worked flawlessly together.

The success of this play proves that it is not necessary to cater to the vulgar tastes of the public, as long as it provides high-level works, the public can still accept it. Youde and others felt very comforted and greatly encouraged. Just as he was about to make a big difference, the incident of the Fourth or Sixth student suddenly occurred. The drama club and the sorority were forced to disband, Wenbang, Tetsuo, and Hirao were arrested one after another, and Yukun began his fugitive career. From then until now, Youde never saw Yukun again.

Fortunately, there seems to be no Youde in the list of all the whistleblowers. All the plays performed have also been approved by the Disciplinary Office and the Police Department. Every poster posted is also stamped by Youde from the Disciplinary Office and the police station. At that time, some people accused Youde of being too weak, but this cautious approach may be the biggest reason why Youde was not on the blacklist!

After the four or six major storms, all student activities stopped. There is nothing special to write. Youde briefly mentioned graduation, employment, marriage, studying abroad and returning to China, and ended all the confessions.

The ten lines of paper used are more than fifty sheets.

15 Kind Agent

"Finally finished? This is the first time I've seen such a long confession."

Fatty Su didn't look carefully at what Youde wrote. He collected the manuscript papers, put them in a kraft paper bag, picked up a cigarette on the table, lit it, and walked out.

It was He Mou and another spy called Shandong Dahan who came in after the shift.

Before locking the door, He asked Youde:

"Do you want to go to the toilet?"

Because there was no desire to urinate, Youde thanked him solemnly.

"Come and sit here!"

He Mou sat on the sofa and waved to Youde.

Youde stood up, dragged his numb feet, and walked over.

Shandong Dahan whispered in He Mou's ear with a small voice disproportionate to his size.

"...documents...meetings...you sticks..."

Youde heard only these intermittently.

He nodded, and the Shandong Dahan went out.

He pointed to the sofa in front and said to Youde:

"Tired? Take it easy, it's better to rest a little."

Such a gentle and cordial voice, Youde felt that he could ask He Mou some undisguised words.

When He Mou came back from the lock, Youde said:

"Will I be okay?"

"Probably not? As long as you write everything as it is....But you write a lot!"

"Those are all facts."

"Well, I am also a sweet potato boy. I can understand all your feelings. It is really sad to see the sweet potato boys being arrested one by one and sent to the Military Law Office. Almost all of them have a sense of justice and are smart. What about the young people. If they are not labeled as ideological problems, they will be very promising people in the future!”

Youde felt a little abrupt at this unexpected conversation.

"However, there are too many young people from Pu Zi's background. Li Shuijing, Zheng Wenbang, Huang Lietang, and Huang Shilian have already been shot. How can there be so many?"

"..."

Youde doesn't understand the reason, maybe it's just tradition?

Without a conclusion, He changed the subject.

"I remember you were in the aviation unit during the war, didn't you?"

"Yes, I am in Makoto's unit. Although it belongs to the air force, Makoto's unit is on the ground."

"I was in the Japanese Navy during the war, and was assigned to a destroyer. The main task was to defend the transport ships."

He told Youde that he could sleep if he could, and he continued to talk about his naval career. He seemed to put the questioning aside and talked about Hainan Island, Hong Kong, Singapore, comfort women, and the women he played in various ports, and so on. Youde really wasn't in the mood to listen to this, but he felt a sense of intimacy with He. It is a bit exaggerated to say that He is the Guanyin Bodhisattva in hell, but Youde does have the feeling of meeting his own people in hell.

Although Youde closed his eyes, he couldn't fall asleep. Seizing the opportunity, Youde opened his eyes and said:

"The family must be worried about me now."

"Well, of course it will."

"They probably didn't know I was here."

"Well, probably won't know."

Yoder's concerns are well-founded. In the February 28 Incident, there are countless examples of this. The family members have no idea where the person concerned was arrested and questioned, but a few days later, it was found as a floating corpse on the river or an abandoned corpse under a bridge. The family must be worrying about this right now.

"Is there a way to let them know that at least I'm still here safely?"

"This... I can't promise you. However, if it takes a long time... it would be more appropriate to let me know."

"Will it take a long time?"

"Haha... I don't know, it's up to you. It may take two or three days to go back, or it may drag on for several years."

"..."

If your confession is consistent with the investigation here, it's useless to keep you here. Besides, you just returned to China, didn't you want to report your contribution to the country? We'll try to get you home as soon as possible. However, if your statement is found to be false, further investigation will be required, and things may not be easy. "

"Ah? Everything I said is the truth."

"Well, I don't know about others. I'm also a sweet potato boy. I'll try my best to help you."

"Thank you so much."

After Youde thanked him, he added a sentence that even made him blush when he heard it, which was learned from Chinese sociology.

"If I can go home early, Mr. He's kindness will be forever grateful."

"Ha ha!"

He stood up, patted Youde on the shoulder and said:

"It's a bit of a rest for your mind, and you can take a nap. If someone comes, I'll wake you up."

Youde sincerely thanked the gods for being able to meet such a kind spy at this time and place.

16 A glimmer of hope

Shandong Dahan came back, carrying a paper bag with sesame seeds, fried dough sticks and soy milk. This is a typical Chinese breakfast, indicating that it is morning. But every window was covered with thick curtains, and Yode could see no sign of morning.

He picks up breakfast and eats it, and invites Youde to eat too. Then he took Youde back to his original seat at the table, leaving Shandong Dahan alone, and went out by himself.

The Shandong Dahan sat down in front of Youde and began to tell how the CCP bandits had done in his hometown. For example, after hanging the landlord from a high tree, after all kinds of torture, he was deliberately dropped to the ground, and this was repeated several times until the landlord died of blood. In a cordial tone, he persuaded Youde to leave the Communist Party as soon as possible. He also assured that his words were definitely out of good intentions for Youde. This Shandong man seems to be a straightforward soldier from the lower ranks.

Within an hour, the door suddenly opened. Captain Tao took the lead, and five or six people filed in. As before, they sat around Youde, and everyone's faces were ugly.

Captain Tao threw the confession written by Youde earlier on the table, and said, "Let's talk about the conclusion first! We all agree that your confession can only be described in four words, that is, "avoid the important and take the light". The important word Don't mention it, it's all bullshit. You've betrayed my good intentions. I didn't want you to write this crap, I gave you plenty of time. I want you to write all the correct facts!"

"But everything I wrote is true!"

Youde answered hurriedly, his voice trembling a little.

"Is that so? The problem is the fact that you didn't write it down."

Fatty Su suddenly stood up and cursed:

"This guy won't plead guilty without giving him some color."

"But the main points are all written down!"

Youde tried desperately to argue.

Wang said angrily:

"Cunning guy!"

No one believed Youde's words. From this scene and atmosphere, Youde knew in his heart that Captain Tao's so-called "frankly speaking, you can go home", this ray of hope was completely dashed.

Captain Tao said:

"You ruined my favor, you made a wrong judgment. You underestimate us. You should know that you can't hide us."

The captain got up and left.

Now I can't count on the captain's good intentions anymore. Wang took his place and sat down. Tian took the ashtray and cigarettes in front of Youde. The preferential treatment appears to have ended.

The people just now left in a hurry, leaving only Tian and Wang. Tian Mou locked the door, came back and sat next to Wang Mou, took out a stack of interrogation papers from the drawer and placed it on the table.

The exhausting interrogation of four days and five nights or five days and four nights (youde himself did not understand) began.

Annotation (this article is commented by Lin Chuankai)

16 The "228 Incident" broke out in late February 1947, and the "46 Incident" broke out in early April 1949. Although left-leaning students in the school were wanted at the time of the "46 Incident", most of them were from other provinces, and the "Student Work Committee" with students from the province as the backbone was not seriously affected. It was not until the "Guangming Pao Incident" occurred in the autumn of 1949 and Li Shuijing was arrested in the summer of 1950 that the "Student Work Committee" was really destroyed and led to large-scale hunting.

17 Refers to Wang Yaodong (from Anding, Tainan) and Liu Guangdian (from Lushun, Liaoning). They originated from different underground party systems, but during their escape, they worked together with Zhang Bikun and others to escape, including hiding in places such as Kaohsiung Qishan. Wang Yaodong and Zhang Bikun were executed in the same case; Liu Guangdian was sentenced to death in 1958 and executed on February 4, 1959.

18 This is a bit of an exaggeration. At the end of 1947, after the establishment of "Hospital Self-Government Associations" at all levels of National Taiwan University and the Teachers College, the activities of the associations became increasingly prosperous. At that time, there were indeed many left-leaning students from other provinces, who brought into the popular forms of posters, dramas, singing, and research societies on the other side, and established various associations. But not all left-leaning students joined the underground. Especially in National Taiwan University, the active members of many associations are students from other provinces who are more proficient in Beijing dialect and Chinese; while the "Provincial Work Committee Student Work Committee" is mainly composed of Taiwanese students.

19 If it refers specifically to the "Student Work Committee" involved by Cai Deben's friends, then this is not the case. After "February 28" in 1947, Liao Ruifa, an "old Taiwanese Communist Party" from Luzhou (then the head of the Taipei Municipal Committee), absorbed the teachers' colleges, Yanping College, National Taiwan University and other schools that were dissatisfied with the repression. Students, organized the "Student Work Committee", and it was not until the end of 1947 that Xu Maode, a native of Jiangsu, took over the leadership. There are very few people from other provinces in this system, and even a few convicted people, such as Wu Chongci (Jiangsu native, sentenced to ten years in prison), as mentioned in the interview, he was recruited by Taiwanese Zhang Bikun before he joined the underground organization.