Just the other day, I saw Chyi Yu or Qi Yu 齊豫 on TV. The sight of the Taiwanese folk-pop singer immediately reminded me of The Olive Tree 橄欖樹, Chyi's 1979 hit. The lyrics of the song was based on an English poem written by Sanmao, a Chinese writer. The poem is about a small donkey which the writer had encountered on a plain in Spain. Interestingly, the song was called The Olive Tree and not The Donkey or something like that and I suppose, that was because in translating the poem into Mandarin, the donkey had been intentionally ommited as it was thought that it would not appeal to the Taiwanese fans. Since then, the song has been covered by others including , Taiwanese Fei Yu Ching, Singaporean Stefanie Sun and Chinese-American heart-throb Fei Xiang.
The Olive Tree 橄欖樹, cover version:
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