Becoming Taiwan: in China's shadow, an island asserts its identity

Wang Ya-june didn't think much of the town where she washed up in the autumn of 1949. When she stepped off a Chinese Nationalist warship laden with refugees and injured and dead soldiers in Keelung on that rainy day, the port on the northern tip of Taiwan was just another Chinese city to her, just another place for seeking temporary refuge.

For 14 of the 16 years of her life, Wang had been following her mother and three older sisters around China, fleeing first Japanese invasion forces and then the Communist army. They were lucky to secure a spot on one of the last ships evacuating the remainders of China's collapsing Nationalist, or Kuomintang, government and military to Taiwan as Communist forces were closing in.

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