This Friday, 19th September, we’re going to be at the Bookstore and Café Nothing / 無有為 in Taiwan’s East District, for a Ghost Month themed storytelling and writing workshop. Ghost Month is the seventh month of the lunar calendar, when the gates of hell yawn open wide, and the “good brothers” and “good sisters” (it pays to be polite when calling them by name) roam around in the world of the living.
Taiwan is replete with ghost stories, and perhaps no city more than Tainan. So we are looking forward to sharing and translating ghost stories in Taiwanese. We’ll be working with the brilliant Taiwanese writer and creative Naomi Sím, and the team from the Bookstore and Café Nothing to share some truly hair-raising tales!
The language of the event will be Taiwanese (Tâi-gí), and some English — with Taiwanese (not Mandarin) translation. We’ll be writing stories on 金紙 (kim-chóa) ritual paper money, and talking about the everydayness of ghost life and lore in Taiwan. And—fear not!—the session will end with a small artistic ritual, to appease any disaffected spirits.
The sign-up link is here: SIGN UP.
And if you are interested in reading more about Taiwanese ghosts, I can’t recommend Michelle Kuo and Albert Wu’s substack highly enough. This is a great read about what the ghosts want.
