Slow - Made in Taiwan?

I'm in Taiwan speaking at a conference called Between Fast and Slow. It is hosted by Dada, an institute that promotes art in public places, and is funded by the Taiwanese government. Taipei, the capital city, is a bustling beehive of a place but the Slow philosophy has really struck a chord here. There is a word in Mandarin, "kuai-huo, " that means "cheerful" or "thrilled." It is made up of two characters whose literal meaning is "fast living." When In Praise of Slow came out in Taiwan in 2005, my publisher here coined a new word for the title: "man-huo," which means "slow living." Since then, "man-huo" has entered the Taiwanese vernacular, with people using it as shorthand to describe a better way of doing pretty much everything.

At the conference, one theme that keeps popping up is whether Slow belongs more to the East or West. Are Westerners simply discovering and appropriating Eastern traditions? Certainly many of the manifestations of Slow - yoga, meditation, tai-chi, alternative medicine - hail from the Orient. But I'm not sure the East has a monopoly on Slow. I think the need to change gears is universal. Even in the West we have our Slow traditions - what is the Sabbath, after all, if not a call to put on the brakes? The Slow heritage has probably faded more in the West but that doesn't mean Westerners have nothing to offer. I prefer to think of the Slow Revolution as a coming together of East and West, with both sides learning from each other.