For the longest time, "metropole" and "colony" were the slid historical categories in colonial studies, and the metropole was deemed to be unquestionably superior. Yet contemporary scholars now seek to present a more dynamic picture of modern empires by exploring the metropole and colonies within a single analytic framework. Ishigaki Shincho's trajectory indeed questions how the conventional dichotomy of the colonizer/colonized of the Japanese empire. Born into a humble farmers' family, he still made career by moving across Taipei, Kaohsiung, and Tokyo, regardless of the metropole/colony divide.