The opening ceremony of the World Games in Kaohsiung on Thursday night left many impressed, with a number of Internet users posting messages on the nation’s largest bulletin board system, PTT, to praise the show as the pride of Taiwan and Kaohsiung.
Posts began appearing on PTT while the ceremony was still in progress and continued yesterday, with the number of posts on that site alone exceeding 1,000.
“It was a glorious moment for the people of Kaohsiung,” an Internet user posted under the name “Tindong.”
Tindong said that he normally found traditional music irritating, but enjoyed it in the opening ceremony.
His post referred to part of the opening performance in which performers dressed as deities danced to folk music, evoking a scene from a typical Taiwanese temple celebration.
KAOHSIUNG PRIDE
“I’m proud to be a native of Kaohsiung,” another Internet user said.
“I can see the changes in Kaohsiung,” another wrote.
“I was so touched to hear [Kaohsiung mayor] Chen Chu [陳菊] deliver her speech in Taiwanese,” another post said.
Chen, who gave an address at the opening ceremony, said “no country in the international community should be forgotten, and Taiwan cherishes every opportunity to embrace the world.”
EXCITEMENT
An Internet user who posted under the name “Politik” described the World Games opening ceremony as exciting.
Politik said that although the opening ceremony may not have been on the same scale as that of other international sporting events, it was clear that all the performers had done their best to show the world the best of Kaohsiung.
Another Internet user, “Designet,” said he wanted to “shout out my love for Kaohsiung” and was so touched that he almost cried when he heard Chen say that “Kaohsiung has shown its confidence and its ability to shoulder the responsibilities of a member of the international community.”
CRITICISM
But some PTT posts leveled criticism at the Public Television Service (PTS), saying the quality of its broadcast of the opening ceremony was less than satisfactory.
A number of Internet users complained that PTS often lost the focus of action during the broadcast and aired too many commercials during the introduction of all the national teams.
“That showed a lack of respect for those countries’ teams,” one Internet user said.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,