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I think I've written about family and things in 'Taipei' which could be considered Asian culture.

Chinese society is organised around the family unit.

My grandmother, my mother and my aunts and their friends were all of southern Chinese ancestry, and they were all strong figures. Though if you asked them who was the head of their families, they would have said their husbands; and yet it was the women who ran everything.

There's so much emphasis on the economic might of China, of Southeast Asia, Asian 'Super Tigers' and things like that. But nobody was really looking from the perspective of a family story, of these individuals.

The PRC is the big brother in this relationship, and it has the capacity to be generous to Taiwan on this issue in a manner that might do much to defuse that issue internally in Taiwan.

I was born into a very important family in Japan. My grandfather was a descendant of the Emperor, and we were very wealthy.

Taiwan is a major economy.

Many in Taiwan believe that Hu Jintao is much more sophisticated than his predecessors in understanding Taiwan. He represents a different generation of leaders, more pragmatic, less ideological.

I think that there is a relatively small number of people who are pushing for independence in Taiwan.

The Chinese view the state, not just as an intimate member of the family... but as the head of the family.