Austronesian boat sets sail on epic voyage from Taiwan to Philippines

ORCHID ISLAND, Taiwan — Battling huge waves, twenty Austronesian men in orange lifejackets set off on a hand-carved longboat into the western Pacific Ocean, destined for the home of their ancestral kin for the first time in 300 years. The indigenous Tao people, native to the tiny Orchid Island 90 kilometers (56 miles) off Taiwan’s southeast coast, have close cultural, linguistic and historic ties with the Philippines’ Batanes islands and its Ivatan communities. AFP journalists saw Tao crew members tying oars onto the “Golden Friendship” narrow watercraft and doing a test row on Sunday ahead of its 100-nautical-mile (about 185-kilometer) […]... Keep on reading: Austronesian boat sets sail on epic voyage from Taiwan to Philippines