Adozen excited 10-year-olds are bouncing in their chairs. The small classroom’s walls are lined with racks of wetsuits and water equipment, and decorated with posters of turtles. But the students’ eyes are trained on their teacher, Tseng Ching-ming, describing the currents and sea conditions at nearby Banana Bay, where they’ll soon be going.
“Today you have one mission: to take off your equipment and float in the water,” he says. Some of the kids grin, nervously. They don’t know it, but the students from Kenting-Eluan elementary school on Taiwan’s southernmost point, are rare among their peers and predecessors.
Despite most of Taiwan’s 24 million residents living near the coast and rivers, swimming ability is low. Ocean safety skills are even lower. Classes like Tseng’s rely on a few individuals who…
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Guardian Weekly (Digital) - 1 Issue, 7 February 2025