Taiwan and larger than Belgium. The island of Taiwan has an area of , and lies some from the southeastern coast of mainland China across the Taiwan Strait. The East China Sea lies to the north, the Philippine Sea to the east, the Bashi Channel of the Luzon Strait directly to the south, and the South China Sea to the southwest. Its shape is similar to a sweet potato, giving rise to the slang term "hanji" ("sweet potato" in Hokkien) used by Taiwanese Hokkien speakers to refer to people of native Taiwanese descent. The island is characterized by the contrast between
Mainland China "the land of the utopian past [and] childhood". Schoolchildren were taught slogans like "Counterattack the mainland!" () and "Save our mainland compatriots from the deepest water and hottest fire!" (). The Taiwanese were also told that they were the guardians of traditional Chinese culture until political reunification. However, democratization on Taiwan has led to the rise of voices which denounced traditional attitudes towards the mainland and the ancestral home system, pressing for Taiwanization, Desinicization, and "Taiwan cultural independence" (). Concurrently, the mainland Chinese economic reform changed the connotation of "mainland China" to one of "primitiveness, nativeness, and raw cultural material