TV series `Wish to See You Again' debuts in Japan

Two good-looking taxi drivers carry customers to various locations around the nation -- from the National Palace Museum, to Alishan, to the Love River in Kaohsiung. At times, they even have had the opportunity to eat in five-star hotels. Most likely, however, they eat meatballs or oyster noodles in one of the nation's many night markets.

Such was the setting for Wish to See You Again (在這裡等你), a TV series debuting in Japan today.

Featuring two members of the boy band F4 -- Vic Chou (周渝民) and Ken Chu (朱孝天) -- the 32-episode series was produced to promote tourism in Taiwan.

The Bureau of Tourism said the production cost NT$8 million and is expected to generate NT$5 billion (US$155 million) in revenue.

Hsieh Wei-chun (謝謂君), the deputy director-general of the bureau, said in a press conference yesterday that the boy band had contributed to the success of the tourism campaign in Japan and South Korea.

The number of tourists from both countries had increased by more than 23,000 between March and last month, compared to the same period last year. The visitors generated foreign exchange revenues of NT$816 million, Hsieh said.

Producer Tsai Chih-ping (柴智屏) said the series will be shown every Wednesday at 7pm on Japan's Broadcast Satellite Nippon (BS日本台), adding that each episode will last for about an hour.

Tsai said the TV station in South Korea has asked that all the episodes be completed before it would start airing the series. She said it wanted to see the episodes before they decide the best time slot to run them.

She said the production team had already shot two-thirds of the series.

Tsai said that TV stations in Japan have rarely shown TV series produced overseas. Meteor's Garden (流星公園), another TV series featuring F4, was first shown on Broadcast Satellite Nippon, she said. The episodes were aired on local TV stations for four years before they were offered on national networks, she said.

Tsai said Broadcasting Satellite Nippon had played many reruns of the episodes featuring F4 members, which helped give rise to a large fan base for F4 in Japan.

Wish to See You Again "is expected to reach 17 million households in Japan," she said.

Besides Chou and Chu, the series also features teenage idols including Kingone Wang (王傳一) and Terri Kwan (關穎).

Meanwhile, Hsieh said that the bureau would publish pamphlets highlighting the scenic spots appearing in some of the Taiwan-made films and TV series, such as Secret (不能說的秘密), Island Etude (練習曲) and Summer's Tail (夏天的尾巴).

He said the pamphlets, titled Star-Chasing Guide (追星手冊), would be available in Chinese, English, Japanese and Korean. They are scheduled to be released next year and distributed to overseas tourists for free.

Hsieh also said the tourism bureau was interested in bidding for the opportunity to organize the New Year's Eve fireworks display at Taipei 101 next year.