“How could I possibly have mistaken someone for my own son?” said a man from Taoyuan County, identified only by his family name Hu, after witnessing what appeared to be his son get hit and terribly mangled by a train. The heartbroken father, who made funeral arrangements and held a ritual ceremony, finally realized his son was safe and sound three days later. The bizarre case of mistaken identity, which has seen the family mourn for three days, has left one question unanswered — just who is the dead person?
Hu Fu-chin, 65, was taking a shower on the fourth floor of his house on Oct. 25, when he heard someone knocking on the door downstairs and shouting, “Father!” Even though his 40-year-old son — named Hu Yu-hsin — did not live with him, Hu recognized the voice as his son’s. After quickly finishing his shower, he rushed downstairs, only to find that nobody was there. He then walked to a nearby temple of the Earth God next to a railway line to check if his son was there.
Around 11pm, the father saw a man coming toward him across the railway tracks. From the silhouette the man appeared to be his son. “The train is coming! Don’t come over!” Hu yelled at the man. But the man continued to cross and was hit by the train. The body was so badly mangled that it could not be identified.
The train stopped immediately, and the conductor reported the incident to the railway police and prosecutors. The distraught father hired an undertaker to pick up the damaged corpse.
When a forensic analyst and prosecutors from the Taoyuan District Prosecutors Office examined the body at the funeral parlor, they asked Hu whether he could confirm the identity of the dead person. “How could I possibly have mistaken someone for my own son?” Hu said.
But since the body was severely damaged and no identification could be found, the prosecutors were not able to confirm the identity. To play on the safe side, they did not issue a death certificate, and instead collected samples from the body in order to conduct a DNA comparison with Hu’s blood.
Meanwhile, Hu’s son-in-law went up to Taipei to tell Hu Yu-hsin’s girlfriend of the death. On hearing the news, the baffled girlfriend went back to her bedroom and woke Hu up. The sleepy Hu emerged from the room, terrifying his brother-in-law. After confirming Hu Yu-hsin was still alive, he immediately called his father-in-law and told him the good news. As tears turned into smiles, the startled father’s immediate question was, “Then…who on earth is the dead person?”
After confirming the case of mistaken identity, the father instantly contacted the funeral home to remove the altar that had been set up for his son. Prosecutors were also astonished to learn about the “resurrection,” and said they have instructed railway police to find out the real identity of the body as soon as possible.
(LIBERTY TIMES, TRANSLATED BY THEODORE YANG)
「我的親生兒子,我還會認錯嗎?」桃園縣一名胡姓男子目睹「兒子」遭火車撞得血肉模糊,他傷心地辦喪事、招魂,不料三天後才知兒子好端端地。這樁過程離譜、陰錯陽差的烏龍認屍記,雖讓家屬白哭三天,終以黑色喜劇收場;但是現在問題是,死者是誰?
住在桃園市的六十五歲男子胡富金,日前深夜在住家四樓洗澡時,樓下有人敲門喊「爸爸」,四十歲的兒子胡毓信雖未與他同住,但聽得出是兒子的聲音,匆匆洗完澡下樓卻不見人影,於是走到住家旁、緊鄰鐵道的土地公廟查看。
十一時許,他看見對面有一男子要跨越鐵道過來,從身形判斷認定就是自己兒子,於是高喊「火車來了,別過來!」說時遲、那時快,兒子已被撞得支離破碎,頭臉血肉模糊,難以辨識。
當時列車停下報請鐵路警察及檢方處理,胡某目睹慘劇、傷心欲絕,強忍悲慟僱請葬儀社撿拾屍塊。
桃園地檢署檢察官率法醫到殯儀館相驗時曾詢問胡父,能否確認死者身分?但胡父堅稱「我自己的兒子,我怎會認錯?」
但因屍體支離破碎,又沒帶證件,身分未能確定,檢方為求慎重,並未開出死亡證明書,而是先採集死者檢體,擬和胡父血液比DNA。
結果,胡父的女婿跑到台北縣找胡毓信的女友,告訴她阿信過世的消息,女友感到莫名其妙,回頭到臥房叫醒胡毓信。胡毓信睡眼惺忪走出來,把姊夫給嚇壞了,揉眼確認無誤後,趕緊打電話回桃園告知胡父,胡父也嚇一大跳,轉悲為喜,翁婿兩人接著在電話裡互問「那…死的究竟是誰呀?」
證實是烏龍哭喪後,胡父趕快聯絡禮儀公司撤掉胡家搭設的簡易靈位,檢察官獲悉「死者復活」也嚇了一跳,已經指示鐵路警察儘速比對死者確切身分。
(自由時報記者周敏鴻、余瑞仁、羅正明)
Taiwanese cuisine boasts a rich culture of thick soups, with various options available at street vendors or high-end restaurants. In English, this style of dish is typically called “thick soup.” Western cuisine typically uses flour, cream, or mashed vegetables to create a creamy consistency, while in Taiwan, thick soups are made by simply incorporating food starch into the soup and creating a smooth and silky texture. Tutuo fish in thick soup is such a soup with fried tutuo fish chunks, shiitake mushrooms, bamboo shoots, and wood ears. 台灣羹品飲食文化豐富,無論是巷口小店或是高檔餐廳,都有提供羹料理。羹在英文稱作「濃湯」,西式濃湯是以麵粉、鮮奶油、蔬菜泥等達到濃稠的口感,台灣的羹湯用太白粉即能做出濃稠絲滑的湯頭。土魠魚羹就是在勾芡的羹湯中加入炸土魠魚塊、香菇、竹筍、木耳等食材的料理。 boast (v.) 擁有(令人驕傲的事物) consistency (n.) 濃稠度 chunk (n.) 厚塊,大塊 wood ear (n. ph.) 木耳 The star of this
Huge stretches of coral reef around the world are turning a ghostly white this year amid record warm ocean temperatures. On April 15, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration confirmed the world’s fourth mass global bleaching event is underway — with serious consequences for marine life and for the people and economies that rely on reefs. WHAT ARE CORALS? Corals are invertebrates that live in colonies. Their calcium carbonate secretions form hard and protective scaffolding that serves as a home to many colorful species of single-celled algae. The two organisms have evolved over millennia to work together, with corals providing shelter to algae,
A: So who were Hollywood’s highest-paid stars of 2023? B: No. 5 to No. 2 were: Matt Damon with US$43 million, Ryan Gosling with US$43 million, Tom Cruise with US$45 million, and Margot Robbie with US$59 million. A: Didn’t Tom Cruise top the list? B: Nope, Adam Sandler was No.1, having made US$73 million, which is about NT$2.34 billion. A: Wow, maybe I should change my career to acting. A: 好萊塢去年的片酬排行榜前幾名是誰? B: 第5到2名是︰麥特戴蒙、4300萬美元,雷恩葛斯林、4300萬美元,湯姆克魯斯、4500萬美元,瑪格羅比、5900萬美元。 A: 冠軍竟然不是阿湯哥? B: 是亞當山德勒、片酬7300萬美元,大約23.4億台幣! A: 天啊或許我也該轉行當演員啦。 (By Eddy Chang, Taipei Times/台北時報張聖恩)
A symbol of purity and cleanliness, the color white is the standard color for coats worn by doctors. While this has been the case for well over 100 years, it hasn’t always been so. In fact, before the late 19th century, doctors wore formal black attire, which was similar to that worn by clergymen. Black was chosen for practical reasons—it hid stains from medical procedures and presented a sense of seriousness. The major reason for the color change of the doctor’s coat was to distinguish qualified, professional doctors from those with little or no medical training. Since medical science