A Call to Support Indigenous Activist Cafe in Taipei
In 2022, Bunun activist Savungaz Valincinan opened Lumaq; today, Lumaq needs your financial support
Last Friday, Bunun activist Savungaz Valincinan made a public Facebook post asking for financial support to keep Lumaq 露瑪恪, an Indigenous activist cafe / community space that she opened in 2022, afloat in the midst of financial difficulties. “Lumaq” means “home” in Bunun; Lumaq the space has served as a central hub for Indigenous youth in Taipei since it opened two years ago and is located less than 2 km north of DAYBREAK.
For folks who don’t know, Savungaz has been a crucial part of Taiwan’s Indigenous rights movement for more than a decade. In 2013, she was one of the founding members of the Indigenous Youth Front (IYF); the following year, she was a central IYF figure during the Sunflower Movement (see Brian Hioe’s Daybreak Project interview with her documenting Indigenous activists’ participation in the Sunflower Movement). Back in 2021 when New Bloom’s event space was at Tacheles (now demolished), Savungaz was one of the first people we invited to give a public talk; she shared her reflections on President Tsai’s legacy on Indigenous rights five years after Tsai made her historic apology (the recording of this talk is posted on Radio New Bloom here). In 2022, she co-hosted Season 4 of Lima 幫幫忙, a television program by Taiwan Indigenous TV; that same year in the midst of two controversial Constitutional Court cases on Taiwan’s Status Act for Indigenous Peoples, she was a core organizer of the Mixed Indigenous Youth Forum Working Group (which New Bloom provided exclusive coverage for here here and here). She also ran for legislature in the last election. These are just a few of the things that Savungaz has done in the past decade and barely scratch the surface of her activist career so far; a full profile and history of her activism would require its own archive.
In her Facebook post, Savungaz shared that Lumaq has been facing financial solvency issues since March of this year, which were temporarily resolved through the help of some friends. Earlier this month, however, Lumaq was unable to make its full rental payment; hence Savungaz’s public call for support. Since opening, Lumaq has hosted over 15 salon-style events for Indigenous youth (including a recent salon with renowned Indigenous musician and artist Panai Kusui for her new book Return to the Motherland about her 2,644 long occupation protest of the Tsai administration’s policies on Indigenous land rights) and recently hosted Igorot Kalanguya/Kankanaey tattoo artist Ate Wamz from the Philippines. Earlier this week, Queer Margins and the Taiwan Indigenous LGBTQ Alliance collaborated with Lumaq to host a documentary screening on transgender reproductive rights.
DAYBREAK and Lumaq are currently two major hubs in Taipei’s geography of activist spaces and have maintained a mutually supportive relationship since both were opened in 2022. Savungaz has also been a friend of New Bloom the publication since its founding ten years ago. We are calling on our transnational readership and community to respond to Savungaz’s call for financial support to keep Lumaq afloat. Every donation helps! If you are unable to financially give, please support Lumaq by sharing this call for support with the people around you.
I (Yo-Ling Chen) will be managing New Bloom donations to Lumaq and updating this post with transfers and currency exchange information for transparency. Folks can donate via Taiwanese bank transfer or Paypal at the addresses below:
Domestic Taiwan bank transfer:
郵局代號：700
郵局帳號：00012220593611
戶名：陳有靈Paypal: paypal.me/dchenyl
Please add “Lumaq” to your donation so I can keep track of it. Thank you all for your support! Updates below.
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2024/08/16 transfer update:
We got $286.86 USD via Paypal on 8/14 and $100.00 USD on 8/15; with an 8/14 exchange rate of 32.27TWD/USD and 8/15 rate of 32.46TWD/USD, that totals to $12,504 TWD.
I didn’t receive any domestic transfers, so I just transferred the Paypal amount of $12,504 TWD to Savungaz’s bank account.
2024/08/17 transfer update:
Received $6,000 TWD via domestic bank transfer, just transferred that amount to Savungaz’s account.
