An enemy of the state in a Yankees cap
What's the meaning of this hat?
Just as they are with Brooklyn moms, or maybe all moms, or perhaps anyone who cares about protecting their skin and hiding their hair, baseball caps are a popular accessory with Taipei moms, of which I am one. Within a few months of coming here, I noticed that a particularly vogue choice among them is a New York Yankees cap. My father’s side of my family played Yankee games on the radio all summer, and not just in the car, but over a little plastic radio balanced on the dirt while fishing or playing outside. So the first Christmas I lived in Taipei, I asked my Secret Santa for a fresh, classic, navy Yankees cap. It unsettled my spirit to see so many other people on the other side of the world demonstrating New York pride or affiliation when I was not. And the Yankees caps you see here are very often fake—the logos too big or small, the designs and colorways a bit off, the threads hanging loose.
Here’s why Yankees caps are on my mind now: An immigrant mother in Taipei (on a spousal visa, like myself) was recently deported to China for her political dissidence, and in her final, dramatic appearance at the airport, as in many of her videos and public appearances, she was wearing a Yankees hat. She clearly has several. With over 150,000 followers, and after 12 years in Taiwan, she had advocated for the “reunification” of China and Taiwan by military force and praised Chinese military drills around the island. In a case that has stirred conversations about true free speech, her residency was revoked by the National Immigration Agency for “endangering national security and social stability.” I don’t yet have a fully formed opinion on her forced separation from her children due to her stated political views, though it has a chilling parallel to the deportations and detainments the Trump administration is enacting of legal immigrants in the U.S. who express views they don’t like. We live in eerie times, made eerier still by the dissonance of this hat.
Stories I published elsewhere recently:
For Condé Nast Traveler, an interview with the pianist Lang Lang, who performed at the Opening Games of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the coronation of King Charles III, and the re-opening of Notre-Dame cathedral.
For the New York Times, the love story of a couple who met on a night out in Hanoi, Vietnam before reconnecting on Bumble in the Bay Area five years later.
For Business of Home, a chat with a designer in Boise, Idaho who shares a decor shop with two other designers.
Also for Condé Nast Traveler, a look at a destination wedding in Switzerland that offered fondue and Bollywood dancing.
