Medical Professionals Archives - Talking Taiwan Podcast

Taiwan American Voices Remembered on the 25th Anniversary of 9/11 | Ep 362

Felicia Lin — Fri, 11 Sep 2026 06:40:34 +0000

This year marks the 25th anniversary of 9/11. September 11, 2001 when four commercial passenger airplanes were hijacked by terrorists linked to the Islamic extremist group al Qaeda. Two of the planes struck the World Trade Center in New York City causing the twin towers to collapse and a third plane hit the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C. The passengers and crew of the fourth plane fought the hijackers, and the plane crashed in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Close to 3,000 people were killed by the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Several different figures have been published, but according to the 9/11 Memorial & Museum 2,977 people were killed.

Do you remember where you were when 9/11 happened?

I remember where I was on September 11, 2001, when I heard that the World Trade Center twin towers in New York had collapsed after being struck by two hijacked planes.

I was actually in Taiwan and all alone in my parent’s apartment in Kaohsiung. I had relocated to Taiwan from New York, just a few months before 9/11. The way I found out about the whole thing was a phone call from my Mom telling me what had happened. I remember being in disbelief and immediately turning on the TV and seeing CNN reporting on it.

25 years have passed since that tragic day.

What happens when there’s a generation of Americans who have no recollection of 9/11? That’s something that my guest on this episode, David has thought about. David found a personal connection to 9/11 through the personal stories of the Taiwanese who died on 9/11. His hope is that by sharing the stories of the Taiwanese who lost their lives on 9/11, younger Taiwanese Americans can find a connection to 9/11.

Dr. Hsing-Huan Wang (王興煥): Chairman of the Taiwan Statebuilding Party, An Unwavering Voice for Taiwan’s Independence | Ep 351

Felicia Lin — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 11:02:38 +0000

Dr. Hsing-Huan Wang (王興煥) is chairman of the Taiwan Statebuilding party. Last July we sat down to speak with him at TAC-WC, the Taiwanese American Conference West Coast hosted in San Francisco/Silicon Valley. We talked about how he went from studying Buddhist philosophy and aspirations to pursue academic research as a professor, to accidentally becoming a politician. The Taiwan Statebuilding has a clear vision for an independent Taiwan and a Taiwanese Republic. The party also takes a hard line on China as an enemy state.

This interview was recorded just weeks before the historic July 26th vote in 2025 to recall 24 Chinese Nationalist Kuomintang lawmakers. At the time it was the largest recall effort attempted by the citizens of a democracy. As a result of what was called the Great Recall Movement, a total of 31 KMT legislators were put up for a recall vote. Another 7 KMT legislators in addition to the first 24 would be up for a recall vote on August 23. Last July Talking Taiwan traveled back to witness the first recall vote on July 26th. To learn more about the Great Recall movement we encourage you to listen to our past episodes 316 with recall campaigners Carol, Acho and Eric, and 317 with Courtney Donovan Smith.

This episode is sponsored in part by the Pacific Times (太平洋時報).

Jotham Hung: Ceramic Artist and Educator on Finding Meaning and Fulfillment in Living a Creative Life – TUF Part 3 | Ep 348

Felicia Lin — Tue, 23 Jun 2026 06:35:29 +0000

Jotham Hung is a ceramic artist and educator based in Southern California reflecting on his early experiences with art. Late last year I sat down to speak with Jotham about his evolution and journey to becoming a full-time educator artist and he shared the dark moment that led to his creative process which has resulted in pieces that reflect the themes of deconstruction & reconstruction, damage & repair.

If you think you’re not creative, don’t write yourself off. Jotham believes everyone is an artist and has the potential to be creative.

This episode is sponsored by the Taiwanese United Fund (TUF). TUF is an arts and culture foundation that celebrates the cultural heritages of Taiwanese Americans. Established in 1986, the foundation’s mission is to facilitate cultural exchange between the Taiwanese American community and other American cultural communities, hoping to enrich and expand our cultural experiences.

Passport to Taiwan 2026: Making Our Rounds with Taiwanese Community Organizations FAPA, TCCNY & NATMA | Ep 345

Felicia Lin — Wed, 27 May 2026 04:18:58 +0000

We stepped out in the drizzling rain for this year’s Passport to Taiwan 2026 on Sunday, May 24th in New York City’s Union Square Park, and were happy to see that the weather hadn’t put much of a damper on the number people that came out for this annual tradition.

We made our rounds and spoke to people at some of the booths representing different Taiwanese American community organizations including the Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA), the Taiwanese Chamber of Commerce New York, (TCCNY) and the North American Taiwanese Medical Association (NATMA). And if doing a deep dive into historical facts related to Taiwan is your thing, we recommend you check out @formosa.forever on Instagram.

KITA Foundation: Mapping the Path of the Trailblazers that Paved the Way for Taiwan’s Democracy and Freedom Ep 342

Felicia Lin — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 11:34:57 +0000

So in the vein of reflecting on the past, this year I thought I’d share my interview with Sabrina Liu and Meng Chiang who are part of the team that makes up the KITA Foundation, an organization that was formed as an oral history project to understand who are the trailblazers that paved the way for Taiwan’s democracy and freedom.

Every year we try to dedicate an episode of Talking Taiwan to 228, an important date in Taiwan’s history, marking the 228 Massacre. 228 stands for February 28 1947. February 28th is now commemorated as a national holiday in Taiwan known as the 228 Peace Memorial Day.

However, the 228 Massacre is not confined to this single date in history. There were circumstances leading up what happened on February 28th and there were also subsequent events after February 28th which escalated into bloody violence and massacres leading to what some refer to as the March Massacre.

Under the authoritarian Chiang regime, and Chinese Nationalist Kuomintang, what followed after 228 was 38 years of martial law and the White Terror era. Anyone could be disappeared, executed or worse for just saying or doing the wrong thing, or for what was seemingly wrong in the eyes of the authorities. The people of Taiwan were horrified and terrified. For decades there was denial and suppression of 228 by authorities in Taiwan, and generations dared not speak of 228.

228 was absent from high school textbooks until relatively recently. To learn more about the specifics of 228 I invite you to listen to some of our past episodes on the topic. We recommend episodes 309, 277, 228, and 172.

In an effort to confront its authoritarian past, in recent years Taiwan has taken steps to acknowledge historical sites of injustice such as buildings where military police fired on civilians on February 28, 1947. Around this time of year, around February 28 and leading into March, it’s a time to reflect on the past, and what we can learn from it.

Collective Memory, Collective Trauma: A Conversation with Dr. Meng Chiang Ep 339

Felicia Lin — Thu, 22 Jan 2026 22:29:48 +0000

At the end of 2024 I sat down with Dr. Meng Chiang, the Executive Director of the 2024 Taiwanese American Conference- East Coast. We had a really wonderful heart-centered conversation about the conference theme Collective Memory and that led to collective trauma as it relates to the Taiwanese and Taiwanese American communities. We talked about the 4 types of trauma responses, the 4 Fs- flight, fight, freeze and fawn and post-traumatic growth.

This episode is dedicated to the memory of Sharon Huang, who passed away in December of 2025. She was a dear friend, mother, wife, sister, auntie, a community organizer and a cornerstone of the Taiwanese American community, especially in New York where she resided. Most notably she and her husband Patrick Huang ran the Brooklyn Artists Studio (BAS) and have supported the Taiwanese American Arts Council (TAAC) and Talking Taiwan. Together they have advocated for Taiwan democracy, human rights, and culture. The loss of Sharon is felt by so many who knew and loved her, she leaves behind family in the U.S. and Taiwan.

Mengchun “Meng” Chiang, PhD (she/her/hers), is a member of the Taiwanese American community. She has served in various community leadership roles, most recently as Executive Director of the Taiwanese American Conference East Coast (TACEC) in 2024.

Professionally, Meng is the founder of CHI Executive Consulting, LLC, where she provides leadership coaching and consulting services, specializing in workplace inclusion and organizational wellness. She is passionate about empowering leaders from diverse backgrounds, helping them enhance their communication, negotiation, and inclusive leadership skills. Meng regularly facilitates workshops to help leaders integrate their identities into effective leadership practices that drive business success and personal growth.

Meng is a licensed clinical psychologist with affiliations to Harvard Medical School, Carnegie Mellon University, the Tepper School of Business, and National Taiwan University. Her experience spans education, training, and leadership roles. She pioneered the Leadership and Connection for Asian Women+ Leaders program and served as Assistant Director of Training at Carnegie Mellon University.

In her free time, Meng enjoys traveling, practicing loving-kindness meditation, listening to music, taking walks, and grocery shopping.

Talking Taiwan Top 5 of 2025 Award Winner – End of Year Review Ep 338

Felicia Lin — Fri, 02 Jan 2026 13:35:32 +0000

It’s time to reveal the Top 5 episodes of Talking Taiwan in 2025. What’s notable about these 5 episodes is that they are among the most popular Talking Taiwan episodes of all time.

But before revealing the Top 5 episodes of 2025, let’s take look back on 2025, which was a busy year for Talking Taiwan! We hosted the inaugural Talking Taiwan Fundraising Gala at the elegant Eichholtz showroom in New York City in April. It was truly a magical memorable night. In April we were also invited to speak at the North American Taiwanese American Women Association’s (NATWA) Annual Conference.

For sometime we’ve been watching what was happening with the Great Recall in Taiwan which ultimately led to 24 legislators being put up for a recall vote on July 26th and another seven on August 23. The world had not seen anything like this happen on a national level in a democracy! And after Felicia interviewed a group of highly dedicated recall campaigners, she learned firsthand about the grassroots mobilization efforts that resulted in over one million signatures being collected in support of the recall vote, and she felt this was a historic moment that Talking Taiwan should be in Taiwan to cover. Thanks to an anonymous donor who offered to pay for our flights back to Taiwan and others who made generous donations we were able to travel back to Taiwan for a week to cover the first recall in vote on July 26^th. We left shortly after returning from the Taiwanese American Conference- West Coast (TAC-WC) which was held in the San Francisco Bay Area. It was the first time we were invited to speak at TAC-WC about our work. While we were at the conference, we also set up an on-location podcasting studio where we interviewed several of the conference’s speakers. We look forward to releasing those episodes very soon in the New Year.

It’s been an extremely eventful year for Talking Taiwan with many ups and downs. Spending only a week in Taiwan to cover the Recall Vote in July, and trying to conduct interviews, and edit and produce them in that time period proved to be a bit unrealistic and we’ll need to pace ourselves better in the future.

It was also crushing to witness the results of the Recall Vote on July 26th with none of the 24 legislators successfully recalled from office. While still recovering from that ordeal in July, we traveled to T.O. Webfest awards in September where Talking Taiwan was nominated in the Best Ensemble Cast category. While we didn’t win, it was our second nomination after being shortlisted at the International Women’s Podcast Awards in 2024 and winning a Golden Crane Award in 2021.

As we go into the 13^th year of Talking Taiwan, I’d like take a moment to especially thank everyone who has supported Talking Taiwan over the years and made a contribution to help fund our trip to return to Taiwan to cover the Great Recall in July.

We also want to thank each and every one of all of our amazing guests for being a part of the Talking Taiwan podcast.

Special thanks to our listeners. We remain committed more than ever to producing content that matters to people who care about Taiwan.

For links to the top 5 episodes of 2025 visit our website TalkingTaiwan.com. Wishing everyone a Happy Healthy New Year 2026! I’m your host Felicia Lin.

Author and Speaker Dr. Yang Szu Pang (楊斯棓) : Don’t Think You’re Too Small to Make a Difference Ep 331

Felicia Lin — Thu, 23 Oct 2025 13:57:56 +0000

Dr. Yang Szu Pang (楊斯棓) is an author and speaker. He has donated 100% of his books royalties to causes and organizations that he cares about. He has been invited to speak at several Taiwanese American conferences and communities across the country.

In July of 2024 he sat down to speak with at the Taiwanese American Conference East Coast which was held at Westchester University. We talked about a broad range of topics from how to be financially prepared to care of aging, ailing parents to his most recent book, It Only Takes One, where the title of the books comes from and how it’s related to Hsiao Bi-khim, the current the Vice President of Taiwan.

Special thanks for translation assistance provided by Dr. Lee-Yuan Liu.

This episode is sponsored in part by the Taiwanese American Council of Greater New York.

Dr. Chen Chien-jen 陳建仁 Former VP of Taiwan Reflects Upon his Life in Politics and as a Public Servant Ep 327

Felicia Lin — Mon, 01 Sep 2025 01:00:13 +0000

In July of 2024, we brought talking Taiwan to the 53rd annual Taiwanese American Conference, east Coast at Westchester University, where I had the pleasure and honor of interviewing Taiwan’s, former vice President, Dr. Chen Chen (陳建仁). We talked about how Dr. Chen was trained to be an epidemiologist and was initially reluctant to go into politics, but then fate intervened and changed his mind when SARS hit Taiwan in 2003, and his experience handling the SARS outbreak as Taiwan’s Minister of Health played an important role preparing him to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic as Taiwan’s Vice President.

I asked Dr. Chen why it’s important for Taiwan to be a member of the WHO World Health Organization and about the challenges he’s faced as the Vice President and Premier of Taiwan. how he overcame them and why he decided not to run as Vice President with Tsai Ing-wen for a second term.

And finally, for some context, at the time of the interview, the Bluebird movement had emerged in Taiwan a month and a half earlier. I touched upon this with Dr. Chen briefly at the end of the interview.

At the time, more than a hundred thousand people in total had taken to the streets of Taiwan in a series of massive protests. It was a very public objection to controversial bills passed by Taiwan’s opposition controlled Legislative Yuan. After interviewing Dr. Chen, I was left thinking if only the world had more politicians like him with a public service mindset, the world would be a better place.

This episode is sponsored in part by the Taiwanese American Council of Greater New York.

Understanding the History of Taiwan through Dr. Jerome Keating (Classic) Ep 311

Felicia Lin — Sun, 18 May 2025 12:10:43 +0000

Few contemporaries are more qualified than Dr. Jerome Keating on understanding the history of Taiwan. He has been living in Taiwan for over 30 years. Initially he came over to Taiwan to work on the MRT.

May is Asian Pacific American Heritage Month and since 1999, Congressman David Wu (OR) and the co-chairs of the Congressional Taiwan Caucus have supported the celebration of Taiwanese American Heritage Week starting from Mother’s Day Weekend, so we thought this would be a good time to reshare one of our most popular episodes, an interview we did with Dr. Jerome Keating in 2020 about the history of Taiwan.

Dr. Jerome Keating has written several books about Taiwan. We invited him on to the podcast to talk about this latest book, Taiwan The Struggle Gains Focus. Dr. Keating also reflected on how Taiwan has changed in the past 30 years, and we discussed things past and present including Taiwan’s complicated international status, amendment of the constitution, changing the official name of Taiwan (which is the Republic of China) and redesigning the passport and flag of Taiwan.

Here’s a little preview of what we talked about in this podcast episode:

What motivated Dr. Keating to write his latest book, Taiwan The Struggle Gains Focus
Who the book was intended for and who Dr. Keating writes for
How Taiwan has changed in the last 30 years
The semi-martial-like atmosphere of Taiwan when Dr. Keating arrived in 1988
Keating’s first book Island in the Stream and what motivated him to write it
What intrigues Dr. Keating about Taiwan as a subject matter
How the San Francisco Peace Treaty (signed in 1951) left Taiwan in a limbo status
How the US position on Taiwan 75 years after World War II is still undecided
The circumstances surrounding “Taiwan” aka the Republic of China losing its seat in the United Nations in 1971, which included a proposal to have 2 Chinas in the United Nations
The Republic of China and People’s Republic of China’s claims on China
How Taiwan has never had a seat in the United Nations
The Republic of China framework and constitution that Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang brought to Taiwan
Keating’s thoughts on amending Taiwan’s constitution
Changing the official name and flag that represent Taiwan
Submissions for the new Taiwan passport cover design
The Taiwan Civil Government wanting to make Taiwan the 51st state of the United States
How Dr. Keating sees Taiwan’s future

Medical Professionals Archives - Talking Taiwan Podcast

Taiwan American Voices Remembered on the 25th Anniversary of 9/11 | Ep 362

Related Links:

Dr. Hsing-Huan Wang (王興煥): Chairman of the Taiwan Statebuilding Party, An Unwavering Voice for Taiwan’s Independence | Ep 351

Related Links:

Jotham Hung: Ceramic Artist and Educator on Finding Meaning and Fulfillment in Living a Creative Life – TUF Part 3 | Ep 348

Related Links:

Passport to Taiwan 2026: Making Our Rounds with Taiwanese Community Organizations FAPA, TCCNY & NATMA | Ep 345

Related Links:

KITA Foundation: Mapping the Path of the Trailblazers that Paved the Way for Taiwan’s Democracy and Freedom Ep 342

Related Links:

Collective Memory, Collective Trauma: A Conversation with Dr. Meng Chiang Ep 339

Related Links:

Talking Taiwan Top 5 of 2025 Award Winner – End of Year Review Ep 338

Related Links:

Author and Speaker Dr. Yang Szu Pang (楊斯棓) : Don’t Think You’re Too Small to Make a Difference Ep 331

Related Links:

Dr. Chen Chien-jen 陳建仁 Former VP of Taiwan Reflects Upon his Life in Politics and as a Public Servant Ep 327

Related Links:

Understanding the History of Taiwan through Dr. Jerome Keating (Classic) Ep 311

Here’s a little preview of what we talked about in this podcast episode:

Related Links: