About 35 homeless men and women attended a Dragon Boat Festival celebration organized especially for them at the Peace Shelter for homeless people yesterday morning.
Each participant received two zongzi (粽子), or glutinous rice dumplings, and was invited to take part in karaoke and foot-massage contests.
The event was organized by the Creation Social Welfare Foundation, with volunteers presiding over the festivities.
"The idea behind this event is to encourage our `street friends' to help others, just as they themselves receive help," foundation secretary-general Kuo Hui-ming (郭慧明) said.
Prior to the event, regulars busied themselves tidying the shelter, while one man, surnamed Chen, set up wooden cabinets to keep the rice free from mice.
Under the guidance of older women volunteers, they also made their own zongzi.
The foundation established the facility in 1991 to improve the lives of the homeless of Wanhua District. It serves lunch and dinner on a regular basis and provides showering facilities, Kuo said.
Tricolored crates lining the walls of the small central room at the facility hold possessions of regular visitors, who number over 100.
"For many, the shelter also serves as a place for much-needed social contact. That can be rare in a marginal lifestyle," Kuo said.
The shelter holds special events for Chinese New Year, the Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival, the major national holidays.
"We work with the Department of Labor to find them jobs," Kuo said.
Above everyone's heads, as if to underscore their efforts, a banner hanging from the crates read, "Encourage our street friends on their climb upwards!"
Expecting around 200 "street friends" to show up, the volunteers had prepared 400 zongzi, but many were left over after the celebration finished.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai