Jiang Feng-ying leads the
housewives of the
neighborhood in building a
better future for Maple
Community.

The image of a woman washing
clothes in Maple Community
also represents a cleansing of
people's minds with eco-
friendly soaps.

The waste water produced
during the soap-making
process can be taken home to
clean your house.

Foreign brides in the community
became more confident after
learning how to make soap.

The Maple Community eco-
classroom teaches the
residents how to produce
healthy, pollution-free soap
with recycled cooking oil.

The eco-friendly soap can only
be used after 60 days of
saponification.

Maple Community Development
Association has developed
some unique community
souvenirs made of maple
seeds.

Healthy, natural Jute Nougat is
among Taichung's most
representative gifts products.

Thanks to community efforts,
the Maple River is no longer a
stinky waterway filled with
garbage.

Maple Community: Homemade eco-friendly soap foster cleaner homes

Words by Yeh Chia Huei　Translated by Angel Pu
Photography by You Jia-huang

The Maple Community in Taichung City is considered a
community-building pioneer. For 22 years, its residents have
experienced highs and lows of pride and frustratration, but
they've never considered giving up. Now they are using
eco-friendly soap made of recycled cooking oil to transform
not only their own community but also all communities in Taiwan.

"Most people only care about Maple Community's infrastructure but, seriously, this is the least important to me. What I want to do is present to everyone the culture and vision of the community. However, I don't want to see Maple Community end up helping construction companies involved in real estate speculation after it becomes famous for community building", said housewife Jiang Feng-ying, who has doing community building in Maple Community for 22 years.

Although she isn't a city councilor or township chief, Jiang has been a key figure when it comes to the changes that have occurred in her community over two decades.

"If it wasn't for living, I wouldn't start doing community building", recalled Jiang, currently director-general of the Maple Community Development Association.

She moved to Taichung city from Fengyuan city (now district) with her husband and started a family in Maple Community. From the first day she arrived there, Jiang took her neighborhood very seriously and realized that Maple Community had numerous problems awaiting solutions. For instance, there was always garbage lying around, dog feces in the alleys, and filthy and polluted waterways. Local women were also frightened by homeless people who sometimes hung out in area parks. Jiang found these situations unbearable, but even more unacceptable was having the kids in this community being labeled as "children living in a village of gamblers and thugs". Before becoming a full-time mother, Jiang was a teacher who felt disappointed at Taiwan's education system. While she could always quit when she had had enough in her workplace, she could not neglect her duty as a mother, as her children were given disgraceful names for no good reason.

That was how Jiang's journey of community building started 22 years ago, when the term “community building” was still a very unfamiliar term for most Taiwanese.

The history of Maple Community dates back to 1736, when this place was discovered and developed for the first time by the Chen, Zhou, Huang and Liu families. As neighborhoods formed along the Maple River, these large families started hiring tenant-peasants, and their fortunes grew with each passing day. However, many descendants of the wealthy families became indolent and contented themselves with gambling and other unproductive activities. After they exhausted their money and had sold off all their properties, outsiders started to calling Maple Community negative names such as the "village of thugs" or "village of gamblers". For those unwilling to stay in their hometown and not interested in caring for the place they grew up in, the only connection sought with the community was rent collection.

Staying one step ahead of the government
For the above reasons, Maple Community's development came to a standstill. Worse yet, although the government had some plans for community public areas, land expropriation never took place, leading to an abundance of vacant properties in the neighborhood. Maple Community only finally got the chance for restoration after Jiang decided to carry out community building and rent vacant plots from land owners for reuse. As a member of the Humanistic Education Foundation and the Homemakers' Union and Foundation, Jiang believed that if these lands could become organic farms for the community, they would serve as great educational resources for the children, while community properties would also be protected. Under her leadership, community housewives started opening their minds and made their homes better places for living together. Because its community-building plan was far ahead of similar government policies, Maple's case became Taiwan's leading community-building example.

Left: This eco-friendly liquid fertilizer is made of kitchen waste instead of chemicals.
Right: Many communities have participated in Maple Community soap-making lectures.

As Maple Community became better-known and residents started feeling pride in the place they lived in, something happened that turned all previous work to nothing. Small processing factories originally situated near Huangzhong Road in Xitun and Nantun districts were forced to move to suburban areas due to urban expansion, and ended up driving community farms away. In only three years, all of the farms became factory sites and the community's beautiful scenery was destroyed. The old tenant-farmers who had lived there their whole lives were forced to move so that land owners could sell the properties to construction companies. As tall buildings and fancy mansions were built, one after the next, construction companies continued using the fame of Maple Community to sell their products. As Jiang recalls the changes which happened over those three years, she gets emotional: "I was really, really upset, because all the work done by the residents was now turning to nothing."

While the brilliant results of her community's hard work were destroyed, she always believed that the spirit of community building was "never giving up", so she decided to establish the Maple Community Development Association. This time, she dreamed even bigger. Besides caring for her own community, Jiang wanted to improve all communities in Greater Taichung, and even around Taiwan. The Maple Community housewives who learned to make eco-friendly soap and liquid soap from Jiang started to become teachers themselves for "Eco-Friendly Soap Lectures", and instructed anyone willing to learn about how to make soap with recycled cooking oil in the hope that students would transmit these techniques to every corner of Taiwan.

Community building with eco-friendly spirit
But what does "community building" have to do with "soap making"? In light of her many years of experience, Jiang notes that "people" are always the most difficult factor to change when doing community building. Therefore, the best way to change a person is to use the overall environment to make an impact on them. While making soap with recycled cooking oil appears to limited to teaching certain techniques, such reuse of cooking oil ensures it won't be used again for cooking and consumed. It also reveals the quality of cooking oil used by restaurants. In addition, these soaps contain no surfactant or Nonylphenol compounds (commonly found in detergents), preventing related harm to humans and the environment. If such eco-friendly soaps is used in every household, perhaps it will help people feel both refreshed in body, mind and spirit, further promoting overall social welfare.

Maple Community is a fairly conservative neighborhood, and women who don't bring financial benefits to their families--foreign brides, for example--can be treated disrespectfully. To help these women, Jiang brought them to the association and taught them how to make eco-friendly soap so they could have incomes. With new roles as "eco-friendly lecturers" and "people with eco-friendly lifestyles", they gained confidence and began earning more respect. At the same time, they also have made fresh contributions to their new home--Taiwan. Today, family members of these foreign brides are all very supportive when they say they are going to work at the association.

"I think I've fulfilled my responsibility to promote social welfare", said Jiang with a smile.

Different internal, external development plans
As Maple Community tries to communicate with other neighborhoods with these little soap bars, its residents are also making the community more competitive. According to Ceng Han-xiong and Lu Mao-lang, the two director-generals of Maple Community Development Association, they encourage residents to participate in various activities, such as regular care for senior citizens, morning exercises, singing lessons and handicraft classes. The exclusive "jute nougat" developed by the association has been selected as a Cultural and Creative Product by the Council for Cultural Affairs, and was also chosen as Greater Taichung's official wedding candy. Jute is central Taiwan's most representative plant and, in the old days, senior family members loved eating it during the peak of summer for its uniquely refreshing taste. However, cooking jute can be very complicated and it has a bitter flavor not welcomed by younger generations. To Jiang, jute is a very healthy food that represents a memory from the good old days. Therefore, with the help of friends who worked in the food industry, she has developed additional products such as the Jute and Milk Popsicle, Jute and Honey Shaved Ice, and Jute Milk Tea.

Urban growth did badly damage community-building progress in Maple Community but, after over 20 years of hard work, a growing number of residents believe that "the world can be changed if you're willing to do something". In the future, Maple Community will be developed as an eco-friendly showcase area and commercial zone near the Taiwan High Speed Rail Taichung Station. The community association has also come up with many new plans, such as building a "blue highway" along Mayuantou River, making waste-water treatment plants more eco-friendly, and building an eco-friendly art park with an ancestral monument in it. There is a lot of work to do in the future, and there will definitely be more difficulties to confront. However, Jiang Feng-ying believes if she keeps working and never gives up, she will be successful one day.