■ HEALTH
Bureau warns against treats
The Bureau of Health Promotion is reminding those watching their weight to avoid indulging in too many Moon Festival treats or to exercise more as the holiday approaches. Just one small, 60g mooncake can contain as many as 300 calories, the bureau said yesterday. The bureau suggests cutting back on one bowl of rice or walking briskly for one hour to compensate for each 60g mooncake consumed. The bureau warned consumers to be wary of pomelos as well. Although fruit is healthy, the popular treat that is a staple on the Moon Festival table contains more calories than most people suspect. The bureau said that just two segments of a pomelo can contain 60 calories and eating a whole jumbo pomelo can mean an extra 600 calories. This year's Moon Festival falls on Tuesday.
■ CULTURE
Confucius gets birthday bash
Taipei Confucian Temple is organizing a celebration of Confucius' 2,557th birthday, which falls on Friday next week, a temple official said yesterday. The temple will hold a cultural fair along Dalong Street by the temple on Thursday and Friday next week with exhibits on temples and archeological findings in Datong District, where the temple is located. A photo exhibit featuring the nation's Confucian temples will open at the Taipei temple on Thursday and Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) will lead a ceremony the next day in honor of the "supreme teacher," the official said. Confucian groups from Japan, South Korea and Vietnam have been invited by the temple to take part in a seminar on Sept. 29 and Sept. 30, the focus of which will be the impact of modernism on Confucianism and the future of Confucianism.
■ POLITICS
Nominees up for review
Lawmakers have reached a consensus on holding a vote next Thursday on whether to approve President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) nominations for the Judicial Yuan, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) said on Tuesday after presiding over a consultative meeting of caucus whips from across party lines. The meeting agreed to hold three Committee of the Whole sessions to screen the nominees, with the Judicial Yuan presidential and vice presidential nominees to be screened today and the eight grand justice nominees to be screened tomorrow and on Wednesday, Wang said. The legislature plans to hold an extra session on Thursday to vote on the nominees, Wang said, adding that the vote on the Judicial Yuan presidential and vice presidential nominees would take place Thursday morning and the vote on the grand justice nominees would be held in the afternoon.
■ HEALTH
Officials push check-ups
The Taipei City Government yesterday encouraged residents to take advantage of Taipei Citizen Health cards and get free check-ups. The card, available since July, allows Taipei residents to receive a free health check-up after accumulating two card points by volunteering at local hospitals, receiving vaccines or attending forums on health-related issues. Card holders who earn 24 points are eligible for a free advanced health examination valued at NT$12,000 at any Taipei City Hospital branch, the city's Department of Health said. The department said only 27.8 percent of Taipei residents over the age of 65 visit their doctors for regular check-ups -- a figure the department hopes to raise through the points program. All registered Taipei residents are eligible for the card.
■ CRIME
Illegal butcher arrested
Prosecutors and police arrested a man yesterday during a raid on an illegal slaughter house in Tuku Township (土庫), Yunlin County. More than two tonnes of suspect beef, bones and offal were seized in four freezers in the slaughter house and in the house of the suspect, identified only by his surname, Wang. Investigators had been keeping tabs on Wang for nearly six months before staging the raid after being tipped off that Wang had been butchering sick cattle and selling them to meat wholesalers, vendors and meat processors. Wang was preparing to sell a large amount of the beef in the run-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, which falls next Tuesday, according to the police.
■ CRIME
Woman hides as man
Police have arrested a female criminal who has been on the run disguised as a man for eight years, press reports said yesterday. Chen Hui-fang (陳慧芳), 33, was convicted eight years ago of armed burglary and Internet fraud but failed to turn herself in to serve her sentence. Chen disguised herself so well that even her girlfriend did not know that "he" was a she. To convince her girlfriend that she was a man, Chen tied a fake penis -- a condom filled with cotton -- between her thighs, press reports said. Over the years, Chen continued to commit crimes and was caught once, but police released her after questioning. When she was caught again on Monday, police realized that Chen was using a fake ID card and did not "look like" a man, because Chen had no Adam's apple and had no hair on her upper lip. When police threatened to take Chen for a medical examination to clarify her sex, she admitted her identity.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
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