my best memory of democratic voting in action is when my dad took 2nd grade me to polling place at the community room in produce market building when they were counting votes.

the whole process took a couple hours. after polling closed, they started opening each ballot. one guy pulled it out of the box and read it out loud. he passed it to the next guy who would hold it up to show everyone in the room. another guy was in front of a board marking down a tally for each vote. occasionally the ballot would have an invalid vote (no stamp, stamp touching the lines separating the candidates, multiple stamps, etc) which would be scrutinized by the officials and the public.

every person in the room could see what was happening. every person was, in their own way, authenticating the validity of the vote. it is the most straight forward execution of democracy.

#taiwannumber1