Toy boys are all the rage at the moment with female stars. Leading the trend is pop diva Jolin Tsai (蔡依林), whose relationship with New Zealand-Singaporean model Vivian Dawson (錦榮) sent the media into a frenzy when the two were spotted walking the streets of Tokyo together last month.
A celebrity romance of this magnitude attracts daily coverage, detailing each and every move the lovebirds make. Recently we learned that the couple visited the Taipei Songshan Sports Center (台北松山運動中心) for a workout around noon on Oct. 6. On Oct. 7 at 11:30pm, the pair showed up at Tsai’s apartment on Zhongxiao East Road. The two were tracked down again the next day at a bowling alley in Shilin (士林).
Clearly the 30-year-old Tsai is not hiding her new relationship with the 26-year-old hunk, which is a noticeably different approach on Tsai’s part, as the Liberty Times (the Taipei Time’s sister newspaper) noted. The pop singer had been previously known for keeping schtum about her rumored flings with actor Eddie Peng (彭于晏) and model-actor Godfrey Kao (高以翔). The change of heart can only mean one thing, the newspaper’s journo reckons: the Mando-pop queen must be “getting serious this time.”
PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES
Before hooking up with Tsai, Dawson commanded NT$15,000 for a catwalk show. Now he charges NT$100,000. The increase has upset some public relations companies, which say they will not be using the model’s services again.
While Tsai is a relative newcomer to the pleasures of dating a catwalk hottie, 31-year-old Elva Hsiao (蕭亞軒) is an expert. In 2008, it was Brazilian-Japanese model Leandro Bittencourt de Araujo e Silva (also known as Li An-cho, 李安卓) who caught Hsiao’s attention. They dated for one year and broke up in October last year. More recently, Hsiao has been romantically linked with Hong Kong models Tom Price (白梓軒), 24, and the 23-year-old Keo Leung (梁耀基).
Hsiao, however, denies any involvement with the two studs.
And from the sublime to the even more sublime. Portly singing sensation Lin Yu-chun (林育群), also known as Jimmy Lin, was criticized this week for turning down an invitation to sing the national anthem at the Double Ten National Day celebration held in front of the Presidential Office on Sunday. The honor was instead performed by 60-year-old Betty Pai (白嘉莉) and 52-year-old Jeanette Wang (王芷蕾), both of whom are former pop singers who now live abroad.
Observers speculated that Lin’s unwillingness to do his bit for Taiwan stems from the fallout pop diva Chang Hui-mei (張惠妹), better known as A-mei (阿妹), endured after she sang the national anthem at Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) presidential inauguration in 2000. China was not amused, and banned her from performing there for four years.
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