Laser beams lit up the sky and blazing lanterns dotted the city as the 2006 Taipei Lantern Festival began at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial yesterday, with tens of thousands of people gathering last night to celebrate the official mark of the end of the Lunar New Year holiday.
In celebration of the Year of the Dog, the festival's opening event told the story of Kokai, a boy from the Tao Aboriginal tribe of Lanyu, and his dog "Wang Wang" and their journey in search of Wang Wang's missing sister "Fu Fu."
At the end of the narrative, a 22m lantern swirled around at one end of the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial, blazing with colors and featuring depictions of Aboriginal song and dance. Surrounding lanterns featured 12 of the city's attractions, including the Taipei 101 skyscraper, the Miramar shopping mall and Yangmingshan.
PHOTO: CHANG CHUNG-YI, TAIPEI TIMES
Good weather yesterday attracted a large crowd to the memorial long before the event began. A long line had formed at 9am for free hand-held dog lanterns provided by the Taipei City Government.
"The design of this year's lantern is cute, and I think this would make a very nice memento for the Year of the Dog," said one girl surnamed Huang, who waited for an hour to receive her lantern.
There will be a lantern show every 30 minutes nightly between 7pm and 11pm during the festival, which runs until Feb. 19.
Lantern festivals began in other parts of the country yesterday. The 2006 Taiwan Lantern Festival was held in Tainan City, with a lantern narrative entitled "Pan Hu Recreates the Heavens," while President Chen Shui-bian (
"We should give Hsieh credit for contributing to the development of Kaohsiung ... My friendship with Hsieh remains the same whether he is in the government or not," Chen said.
In Taichung, Snoopy was featured as a lantern theme for the city's Lantern Festival, with free hand-held Snoopy lanterns a popular draw.
The chaotic Yenshui Beehive Rockets Festival in Yenshui Township (鹽水), Tainan County, meanwhile, attracted a large crowd dressed to protect themselves against injury by the large number of fireworks that were fired at statues of local deities in palanquins.
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
NUMBERS IMBALANCE: More than 4 million Taiwanese have visited China this year, while only about half a million Chinese have visited here Beijing has yet to respond to Taiwan’s requests for negotiation over matters related to the recovery of cross-strait tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. Taiwan’s tourism authority issued the statement after Chinese-language daily the China Times reported yesterday that the government’s policy of banning group tours to China does not stop Taiwanese from visiting the country. As of October, more than 4.2 million had traveled to China this year, exceeding last year. Beijing estimated the number of Taiwanese tourists in China could reach 4.5 million this year. By contrast, only 500,000 Chinese tourists are expected in Taiwan, the report said. The report
Temperatures are forecast to drop steadily as a continental cold air mass moves across Taiwan, with some areas also likely to see heavy rainfall, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. From today through early tomorrow, a cold air mass would keep temperatures low across central and northern Taiwan, and the eastern half of Taiwan proper, with isolated brief showers forecast along Keelung’s north coast, Taipei and New Taipei City’s mountainous areas and eastern Taiwan, it said. Lows of 11°C to 15°C are forecast in central and northern Taiwan, Yilan County, and the outlying Kinmen and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties, and 14°C to 17°C
RSS