25 Feb 2026

Waste cases / Nice guys

Reflections on futility with Brian Hioe, and Hollywood memories with Kent Osborne and Jack Pendarvis

Donald Trump and Xi Jinping. White House photo by Daniel Torok

Today: Brian Hioe, Taipei-based editor, translator, activist, DJ, co-founder of New Bloom, and author of Taipei at Daybreak; and Jack Pendarvis, an American screenwriter, author, and voice actor.

Issue No. 510

Childish Things
Brian Hioe

Kent Goes to Chelmsford: Episode 3
Jack Pendarvis

Childish Things

by Brian Hioe

It’s been over seventy years that Taiwan has faced military threats from China. This last time, the drills were launched right before the end of the year, because the Chinese government apparently felt that the year couldn’t end without new missile threats.

There’s a strange disconnect between everyday society and the frequent Chinese military drills that take place here. New Year’s Eve wasn’t much different than usual, even though I had spent the night before feverishly writing about the drills. I contemplated going to see the fireworks at Taipei 101 with my partner, then considered going to an outdoor rave under a bridge. But we decided against it, given the rain.

Watching a stream of the New Year’s programming, I noticed that I didn’t know many of the artists; they were older. I saw some friends on Instagram visiting what is now an annual celebration in Taiwan—a screening of Tsai Ming-liang’s art film classic Vive L’Amour in Da’an Park, with hundreds, even thousands watching the movie at the location where the film’s climax takes place on New Year’s Eve. The director himself usually attends. I went last year, but one time was enough for me. There was little mention of China’s military exercises in any of this.

That shows the pointlessness of these drills, in a way. Because a small group of men in suits in Zhongnanhai have decided so—as far as I’m concerned, humanity would be better off if they’d never existed—we have billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware hurtling through the seas and airspace around Taiwan, entirely disconnected from anything that happens in Taiwan.