Jay Chou (周杰倫) congratulated ex-girlfriend Jolin Tsai (蔡依林) on her “foreign affair” when she was first linked to mixed-race model Vivian Dawson (錦榮) several months ago. Now gossip rags are buzzing that Chou may have a hapa love of his own.
According to Next Magazine (壹週刊), the Godfather, 32, is dating model Hannah Quinlivan (昆凌), who is just 17 years old and of Taiwanese and Australian parentage. A late-night date last month at a nightclub supposedly resulted in the underage Quinlivan breaking “the Cinderella law,” which bans minors from nightclubs after midnight. Her manager denied that the two are romantically involved.
Chou’s love life is competing for media attention with the upcoming wedding banquet of Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛, aka Big S) and Chinese multimillionaire Wang Xiaofei (汪小菲), even though the two eloped back in November.
Photo: Taipei times
The couple arrived in Taipei last week and were immediately set upon by paparazzi at the airport. The media also caught up with the newlyweds when they went out for a Valentine’s Day eve dinner with Barbie’s sister Dee Hsu (徐熙娣, aka Little S), Dee’s husband, the sisters’ mom and family friends including model Makiyo Kawashima.
As soon as Wang saw the crowd of photographers, he took cover behind his wife like a “little man” (小男人), chortled The Apple Daily (蘋果日報).
According to rumors, the Wang-Hsu banquet will take place on China’s Hainan Island, but Mama Hsu wasn’t giving anything away when asked to confirm the location. With a Mona Lisa smile, she said only that an announcement would be made later.
The establishment where the Hsu family ate, Kitcho (吉兆割烹壽司) on Zhongxiao East Road Section 4 in Taipei, must have bad luck with tipsters or an overeager publicist.
The Japanese restaurant was the scene of another celebrity ambush earlier when moneybags Winston Wang (王文洋) dined there with his family.
The outing gave the world its first peek at Wang’s granddaughter Elizabeth Wang (王思涵). The baby’s parents are Winston Wang Junior (王泉仁) and wife Lee Ching-ching (李晶晶).
Once tipped as the most likely successor to the Formosa Plastics (台灣塑膠公司) empire, Wang senior is now the chairman of the Grace T.H.W. Group (宏仁集團). He is probably just as famous for being involved in a string of political and personal scandals, not the least of which was siring a now-teenaged son, Wang Chuan-li (王泉力), with his much younger lover, Annie Lu (呂安妮). Wang senior bought a television station last year, sparking rumors that he is preparing to run in the 2012 presidential election.
Despite being just eight months old, little Elizabeth is already being put under the same microscope as the rest of her family. She might want to call Suri Cruise or the Pitt-Jolie brood for media management pointers. The Apple Daily decided that Elizabeth gets her eyes from her mother, but the shape of her mouth and forehead are just like her dad’s. The newspaper included a handy chart containing all the information you need to know about Elizabeth, including that she was delivered by Caesarean section.
Pop Stop readers may remember the marriage in November of actor Ku Han-yun (顧瀚畇), better known as A-tan (阿丹), to businesswoman and footwear fortune heiress Carol Wang (王曉萍).
Ku was roundly mocked in the press for being a gold digger, especially since his reputation as a small-time Lothario best known for flings with several female stars superseded his acting resume. At the time, Ku announced that he planned to retire from show business and work for his wife’s company as a fashion buyer.
The couple have kept a low profile since the nuptials, but our sister newspaper, the Liberty Times, spotted them at the Breeze Center in Taipei last week. The high-heel loving Wang sported a demure pair of flats and a tiny belly pudge, leading the reporter to speculate that she was pregnant.
Spawning or not, Wang was doted over by her husband, who fed her spaghetti at an Italian restaurant and accompanied her as she went window shopping at several designer boutiques. At the end of their outing, the couple were spirited away in a chauffeured car to their luxury apartment in Xinyi District.
Taiwan’s semiconductor industry consumes electricity at rates that would strain most national grids. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) alone accounted for more than 9 percent, or 2,590 megawatts (MW), of the nation’s power demand last year. The factories that produce chips for the world’s phones and servers run around the clock. They cannot tolerate blackouts. Yet Taiwan imports 97 percent of its energy, with liquefied natural gas reserves measured in days. Underground, Taiwan has options. Studies from National Taiwan University estimate recoverable geothermal resources at more than 33,000 MW. Current installed capacity stands below 10 MW. OBSTACLES Despite Taiwan’s significant geothermal potential, the
In our discussions of tourism in Taiwan we often criticize the government’s addiction to promoting food and shopping, while ignoring Taiwan’s underdeveloped trekking and adventure travel opportunities. This discussion, however, is decidedly land-focused. When was the last time a port entered into it? Last week I encountered journalist and travel writer Cameron Dueck, who had sailed to Taiwan in 2023-24, and was full of tales. Like everyone who visits, he and his partner Fiona Ching loved our island nation and had nothing but wonderful experiences on land. But he had little positive to say about the way Taiwan has organized its
The entire Li Zhenxiu (李貞秀) saga has been an ugly, complicated mess. Born in China’s Hunan Province, she moved to work in Shenzhen, where she met her future Taiwanese husband. Most accounts have her arriving in Taiwan and marrying somewhere between 1993 and 1999. She built a successful career in Taiwan in the tech industry before founding her own company. She also served in high-ranking positions on various environmentally-focused tech associations. She says she was inspired by the founding of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) in 2019 by Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), and began volunteering for the party soon after. Ko
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chair Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) returned from her trip to meet People’s Republic of China (PRC) dictator Xi Jinping (習近平) bearing “a gift” for the people of Taiwan: 10 measures the PRC proposed to “facilitate the peaceful development of cross-strait relations.” “China on Sunday unveiled 10 new incentive measures for Taiwan,” wrote Reuters, wrongly. The PRC’s longstanding habit with Taiwan relations is to repackage already extant or once-existing policies and declare that they are “new.” The list forwarded by Cheng reflects that practice. NEW MEASURES? Note the first item: establishing regular communication mechanisms between the Chinese Communist Party