Write It 500 Times
20250808 15:10-20:38
On August 1, I picked up a set of cram-school desks and chairs through a Facebook group. I bought 2B non-sharpening pencils for writing, thick red grading pens like those used by teachers (and one blue pen), and a 30-meter roll of paper. The pencils were to write lines and the red and blue pens were for others to circle, cross out, and write on my sentences. I placed the desk and chair in the center of Meiren Green Park and began repeatedly writing: “I am not good enough yet. I must try harder.” My plan was to write it 500 times, or until the paper ran out.
By the fourth repetition, a young woman approached. She said she had thought I was drawing, but felt sad for me when she saw the words. I shared that when I was a child, I was often punished by copying sentences like “I must not talk back” or “I must listen to my mother.” A middle-aged taxi driver stopped to listen. He said he practiced calligraphy and took the pencil to write the fifth repetition for me. He told me to slow down so the writing would look better.
A visiting friend, Gabon, circled the words “good enough” with a question mark in blue, then drew a Chiikawa character in red. A shop owner across the street, Woody, lent me kitchen buckets to weigh down the paper from the wind. A neighbor in purple suggested I should start writing from the far right end of the roll, not left to right. A passing grandmother thought I was practicing handwriting and praised it, without associating it with punishment.
At the 170th repetition, a grandmother arrived with two young grandchildren. She asked why I chose this sentence. I said this was probably the phrase that had appeared most often in my mind throughout my life, though I was no longer as trapped by it as before. Perhaps by writing it repeatedly today, I could finally let it go. She wrote beside my sentence in red: “Humility? Self-blame? Inferiority? Sort it out.” In blue she added: “Step out of the whirlpool. Think about what I like. What lets me express myself freely.” The granddaughter asked her to help write in phonetic symbols, “Where is the lion?” and “Become strong.” The grandmother firmly insisted that I should change the sentence to truly escape it. From that point on, I began writing: “I have done my best. That is enough.”
A young man asked what I was doing and suggested I go perform in front of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum for more visibility. A man walking his dog asked in Taiwanese what I was writing so much. He said doing your best and being happy was most important. A neighbor in orange said I was lucky to meet the grandmother. A woman in green urged me to attend a Buddhist study group on Nanjing East Road, saying it would work better than writing lines. A Western man pointed to a Taiwanese woman walking her dog on the other side of the paper and said his wife had already seen me and explained it to him. He had guessed it was performance art.
Another dog walker declined my invitation to revise my sentences, saying I should figure it out myself. Half an hour later, she returned with a coffee and told me to keep it up. Two elementary school girls asked, “What are you doing?” while their mother waited on an electric scooter. Their teachers don’t make students write lines. They drew a smiley face and a star. I nodded in greeting to their mother. A couple with school-aged children read the text. The father smiled and told one child that yes, they should work harder too. A man cooling off nearby told me the grandmother from earlier used to be a teacher, then said it was getting dark and nearly time to rest.
An eighty-year-old grandfather came cycling with his grandson. The grandson declared, “I’m here to race!” The grandfather spoke with me for a long time, saying that effort alone is not always enough. Timing and circumstance also matter. If the straight road does not work, there are side paths—like how he now hikes with a group but takes detours instead of rope-climbing like the younger members. The grandson complained, “Grandpa, stop talking about history!” The woman in orange returned to take photos. I told her that I wrote the new sentence much faster. She said the new sentence had one less character. The grandfather added that the feeling of writing must be very different too.
In the afternoon, a woman passed by quickly and said, “Performance art?” After dark, she passed by again: “Still writing? Keep going!” A man said he had studied at Yu Da High School nearby. When he was young, even fifty repetitions were unbearable. Many people observing from afar thought I was doing calligraphy, copying sutras, or drawing. Many asked which school I attended. A girl who came after seeing the event information repeatedly wrote “I am important” on the paper in red and blue, staying for an hour and a half to witness me complete all 500 repetitions.
When I finished the 500th line, the 30-meter paper roll had also reached its end.
Thanks to The Trxxble Exhibition and Kurage Taipei for the invitation
Photo documentation: Bengisulavuksu, Gabon, Tsaitaochua
