Jubilation in Taiwan, celebration outside Democratic Progressive Party headquarters as election results come in

It’s a sleepless night outside the Democratic Progressive Party’s Headquarter in Taipei on Saturday night, with thousands of exciting supporters bringing their loved ones to join the carnival.

“President Tsai Ing-wen, light up Taiwan!”shouted supporters, waving Tsai’s campaign flags and crowding the main road outside DPP HQ, where police blocked nearby to give way for the gala. Fireworks let off on the grand stage, pushing the atmosphere to highest gear.

Among them is Cavin Chen, a 37-year-old IT engineer, his nurse wife and their three children from 1 to 9.

“I want to let our children witness the most important moment in Taiwan’s history as we finally have our first female president, who is so different from her predecessors, not only because of Tsai’s gender, but her talent and personality,” Chen said.

“I and my wife are middle class family and swing voters. We only voted for qualified candidates based on their political views. We gave chances to Kuomintang in the past eight years, but we are very disappointed on President Ma Ying-jeou’s performance.”

The supporters are excited, but they said they are also rational. Many of them were supporters of ban-blue parties.