VIEW THIS PAGE Hong Kong singers Jill Vidal (衛詩) and Kelvin Kwan (關楚耀) were arrested in Tokyo on Feb. 24 over alleged possession of cannabis, according to a report in Sina.com earlier this week.
The arrest allegedly came after the pair was busted for shoplifting at a discount shop and getting into a verbal altercation with an employee. When the cops arrived they searched Kwan and reportedly discovered a joint.
The two celebs, both of whom have taken part in anti-drug campaigns, remain in custody as of press time and face a maximum five-year prison sentence and could be barred from Japan. But what shocks Pop Stop most is that it took so long for the paparazzi to break the story.
Celebs busted for drugs may be old hat in Taiwan, which has seen starlets such as Suzanne Hsiao (蕭淑慎) repeatedly caught using cocaine and ketamine, but the Kelvin/Jill bust got Hong Kong in a tizzy. Perhaps this will provide some relief from the ongoing Edison Chen (陳冠希) sex scandal that continues to make headlines. Don’t count on it though.
Last Friday, a Hong Kong actress caught up in the Internet sex photo scandal finally spoke with the media about the incident in a two-part interview with Hong Kong network i-Cable, the first segment of which was a tirade against the luckless lothario Chen. Cecilia Cheung (張柏芝) said during the interview that since the scandal broke, she has taken to writing a diary about her youthful transgressions, which she plans to give her son when he turns 18. Let’s hope it doesn’t serve as a guidebook for the young man.
“I’m sure he’ll be very understanding by the time he is 18 years old,” she said, implying that he is not very understanding now.
A better course for Cheung, Pop Stop suggests, would be to take a page out of Canto-pop singer and actress Niki Chow’s (周麗淇) book. Chow plans to release a work teaching people how to recycle, according to a report in the Oriental Daily. Perhaps Cheung could pen a book on protecting endangered species or, better yet, produce a guide on sexual mores for distribution by the Singaporean government.
Anyway, the second part of the Cheung interview has itself become grist for the rumor mill because Cheung insists that i-Cable not broadcast it.
Unsurprisingly, and in an ironic twist of history repeating itself, the contents of the second part were leaked on to the Internet. In a case, however, of history not repeating itself, it was mostly mundane chatter about how the case has affected Cheung’s family.
Back home, Jay Chou
(周杰倫) is packing on the pounds, according to a report in the United Daily News. The Chairman was in southern Taiwan filming a television drama when fans said they couldn’t help but notice that the crooner has beefed up. Perhaps he ate too much cake for his 30th birthday celebration, which just passed.
In a gesture of love that would make any parent proud, Chou celebrated his birthday with his mother, grandmother and 800 fans. And what did Chou want for his birthday? A limited-edition Lamborghini Reventon. Price tag: NT$44 million. VIEW THIS PAGE
June 2 to June 8 Taiwan’s woodcutters believe that if they see even one speck of red in their cooked rice, no matter how small, an accident is going to happen. Peng Chin-tian (彭錦田) swears that this has proven to be true at every stop during his decades-long career in the logging industry. Along with mining, timber harvesting was once considered the most dangerous profession in Taiwan. Not only were mishaps common during all stages of processing, it was difficult to transport the injured to get medical treatment. Many died during the arduous journey. Peng recounts some of his accidents in
“Why does Taiwan identity decline?”a group of researchers lead by University of Nevada political scientist Austin Wang (王宏恩) asked in a recent paper. After all, it is not difficult to explain the rise in Taiwanese identity after the early 1990s. But no model predicted its decline during the 2016-2018 period, they say. After testing various alternative explanations, Wang et al argue that the fall-off in Taiwanese identity during that period is related to voter hedging based on the performance of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Since the DPP is perceived as the guardian of Taiwan identity, when it performs well,
A short walk beneath the dense Amazon canopy, the forest abruptly opens up. Fallen logs are rotting, the trees grow sparser and the temperature rises in places sunlight hits the ground. This is what 24 years of severe drought looks like in the world’s largest rainforest. But this patch of degraded forest, about the size of a soccer field, is a scientific experiment. Launched in 2000 by Brazilian and British scientists, Esecaflor — short for “Forest Drought Study Project” in Portuguese — set out to simulate a future in which the changing climate could deplete the Amazon of rainfall. It is
Artifacts found at archeological sites in France and Spain along the Bay of Biscay shoreline show that humans have been crafting tools from whale bones since more than 20,000 years ago, illustrating anew the resourcefulness of prehistoric people. The tools, primarily hunting implements such as projectile points, were fashioned from the bones of at least five species of large whales, the researchers said. Bones from sperm whales were the most abundant, followed by fin whales, gray whales, right or bowhead whales — two species indistinguishable with the analytical method used in the study — and blue whales. With seafaring capabilities by humans
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