Displaced by a typhoon, Taiwan’s Bunun people fear for the future of their culture

Typhoon Morakot killed 755 people across Taiwan in 2009 and forced the permanent resettlement of Tengjhih, a Bunun Indigenous hamlet, after the storm destroyed its only access road. Though Indigenous peoples made up just 2.1% of Taiwan's population, roughly 70% of the areas the government deemed high-risk after the storm were on Indigenous land.

Repair attempts on the road failed repeatedly — washed out again in 2012, 2021, and once more in 2023 within months of finally being rebuilt, with another section torn away in 2025. Five residents, including cultural guide Saminat Maliklan, still refuse to leave, teaching Bunun language and songs to visiting grandchildren in houses the storm spared.

Village leader Dahu Ismahasan and elderly residents like his 85-year-old mother Clrenge continue petitioning local government for permission to return, aware they likely never will. Tourism and agriculture, the hamlet's former economic base, remain nonviable with the forest recreation area closed and the road unreliable.

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