Photo: Fisfisa Media
Set on Orchid Island, this documentary follows Indigenous writer Syaman Rapongan and his son as they build a traditional Tao boat, offering a rare glimpse into Tao culture.
I DREAM OF THE OCEAN 《大海浮夢》
Directed by CHOU Wen-Chin 周文欽
2026｜97 min | In Yami/ Tao and Mandarin with Chinese and English subtitles
Join us for a special screening of I Dream of the Ocean 《大海浮夢》(2025), followed by a conversation with Tao cultural documentarian Si Rapongan 施藍波安.
Set in Lanyu, or Orchid Island, off the southeast coast of Taiwan, the documentary follows award-winning Indigenous writer Syaman Rapongan 夏曼．藍波安 and his son, Si Rapongan, on their four-year journey of building a traditional Tao plank boat—a powerful expression of cultural heritage, family legacy and the Tao people’s strong connection to the sea.
Following the screening, Si Rapongan will share with us the rich oceanic culture of the Tao people, his father's celebrated literary works, and the maritime philosophy that shapes Tao identity and storytelling.
Syaman Rapongan is a Tao writer and anthropologist. He holds a Master’s degree in Anthropology from National Tsing Hua University and a degree in French Literature from Tamkang University in Taiwan. At the height of social and political movements in 1980s Taiwan, he felt compelled to reclaim his Indigenous identity. After returning to Lanyu in the late 1980s, Syaman re-engaged with traditional ways of life, rebuilding his cultural identity and transforming Tao maritime philosophy and lived experience into literary expression. Known for its lyrical style, his writing integrates Tao linguistic structures with Chinese literary forms, exploring the relationship between humanity and the ocean, as well as the tensions between tradition and modernity. Syaman Rapongan’s literary autobiography, Eyes of the Ocean《大海之眼》(2018), which reflects on the survival of the Tao people in a settler state, was recently translated into English and published under the title Eyes of the Ocean (2025) by Columbia University Press. He is regarded as one of the most important Indigenous writers in contemporary Taiwan.
Si Rapongan is from the Tao community of Lanyu, Taiwan. Son of the award-winning author Syaman Rapongan, he has long worked alongside his father in documenting Tao culture through field research and visual media. In 2022, he and his father completed a traditional two-person plank boat, fulfilling a shared dream of building the vessel together and participating in the flying fish harvest. With the support of Fisfisa Media, they also completed the documentary I Dream of the Ocean. In 2025, he collaborated with his father and their boat-building team to create a traditional plank boat for cultural exchange between the National Taiwan Museum and the National Science Museum of the Czech Republic.
This event is supported by Taiwanese Bookshelves, part of the Taiwan Film Festival in Australia, and the Ministry of Culture of Taiwan (Republic of China).