While the COVID-19 pandemic has shuttered theatres across the world, performance groups in Taiwan are still hard at work. The latest result is a new production for children from the Hakka Affairs Council.
Pedestrians near central Taipei’s Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall on Monday might be forgiven for thinking they took the wrong medicine in the morning. A three storey-high, bright blue horse with a rainbow-colored mane strides through the enormous white gates to the central square. It’s quite the sight. But we’re not in dreamland, and no one here is hallucinating.
This enormous puppet is called Rain Horse. He’s the star of a new play by acclaimed children’s theatre group Paper Windmill, with help from the Hakka Affairs Council. It’s an adaptation of a picture book written thirty years ago by the novelist Hsiao Yeh.
Hsiao is delighted to see it come to the stage. He says seeing it for the first time, he was overwhelmed with emotion. Thirty years on, Rain Horse has arrived in a country more peaceful and free than before, he says. Now, when children are born, their parents can have faith that Taiwan is continuing to progress.
Hakka Affairs Council Vice Chairperson Fan Zuo-ming says the play features the culture of the Hakka people, one of Taiwan’s linguistic minorities. He says it captures the inner character of the language. It’s a gift for children all around the world to enjoy.
Paper Windmill Theater Director Jen Chien-cheng says the group lost nearly everything they had in a warehouse fire last year. He says they had to start making Rain Horse completely from scratch. They called on their friends to help and spent half a year building it. He says it’s been an emotional process.
Performances of “Rain Horse” will take place in the plaza on Friday and Saturday. There will be limits on the size of the crowd, but you can also catch Saturday’s performance live on Facebook.