Native name: 拉魯島 | |
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| Geography | |
| Location | Yuchi, Nantou County, Taiwan |
| Coordinates | 23°51′20″N 120°54′40″E / 23.85556°N 120.91111°E |
| Adjacent to | Sun Moon Lake |
| Total islands | 1 |
Lalu Island (Thao language: Lalu; Chinese: 拉魯島; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lalu Tó) is a small island in Sun Moon Lake, Yuchi Township, Nantou County, Taiwan. The island used to be much bigger, separating the lake into a part shaped like crescent moon and another part shaped like a round sun.[citation needed] When the island was still bigger, people lived on it; in fact, the locals called it "Pearl Mountain"(Chinese: 珠仔山 or 珠嶼; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Chu-á-sū / Chu-sū) ever since the Qing dynasty. Under Japanese rule, the island was renamed "Jade Island" (Japanese: 玉島), and in the 1930s, the Japanese built a dam that raised the water level in the lake and almost entirely flooded the island. After Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist Government moved to Taiwan in 1949, the island was renamed Kwanghwa Island (Chinese: 光華島; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Kong-hôa-tó; lit. 'glorious China island'). In 1999 the island shrank as portions sank during the 1999 Jiji earthquake, which also destroyed a wedding pavilion constructed by the local government in 1978.
"Lalu" is an Austronesian word roughly corresponding to "after", "later" (Chinese: 後) with similar meanings from Taiwan to Indonesia. In legend, Thao hunters discovered Sun Moon Lake while chasing a white deer through the surrounding mountains. The deer eventually led them to the lake, which they found to be not only beautiful, but abundant with fish.[1] Today, the white deer of legends is immortalized as a marble statue on Lalu Island.
In recent years, due to increasing social and political awareness, more deference and recognition are being given to Taiwanese aborigines. As a result, after the 921 earthquake, the island was renamed in the Thao language as "Lalu".[2]
