■ NATURE
Yushan song sought
Yushan National Park Headquarters launched a songwriting contest yesterday to come up with an original theme song to represent Yushan (玉山) as part of the nation’s campaign to get its tallest peak chosen as one of the world’s natural wonders. Entries are being accepted until Sept. 30 via e-mail at dandelion50@ysnp.gov.tw, officials at the park headquarters said. A preliminary screening of the entries will be held from Oct. 1 to Oct. 14 to select 10 songs that will enter the final, the officials said. A jury will select the winner and two runners-up by Dec. 15, and an online poll will be held from Oct. 15 to Dec. 15 to allow the public to vote for their favorite song. The total prize money amounts to NT$250,000. For more details, visit www.ysnp.gov.tw. Yushan was on July 21 named as one of 28 finalists in a global online poll to select seven new natural wonders of the world. The voting, organized by the Swiss-based New7Wonders Foundation, will remain open until 2011.
■ CULTURE
Museum showcases jade
The National Museum of History in Taipei yesterday launched a series of exhibitions including displays of old jade and seal carvings and an exhibition on the impact of climate change on the birds that inhabit the Kenting National Park. Taiwanese antique collectors and jewelry creators Li Shau-min (黎少明) and Yin Yu (尹愚) yesterday opened a month-long gem and jewelry exhibition titled “Old Jades, New Inventions: An Exhibition of Min and Yu Creations.” The museum will also hold an exhibition titled “The Art of Seal Carving from Hung Mien Chen” from Aug. 14 to Sept. 27 and an historic document exhibition titled “The Birth of New Taiwan” from Aug. 26 to Sept. 27. A show entitled “Global Warming from the Artist’s Perspective: A Special Exhibition of the Birds of Kenting” will take place from Aug. 25 to Sept. 27, featuring a display of photographs, paintings, sculptures, drawings and books on the birds that live in the Kenting National Park.
■ WEATHER
Storm or typhoon possible
The Central Weather Bureau (CWB) said yesterday it was watching a low-pressure system building to the east of the Philippines to see whether the system develops into a tropical storm or typhoon. The depression was moving westward toward Taiwan at a speed of 20kph at 8am, the CWB said. As the system is expected to gradually increase in intensity, CWB meteorologists forecast that the low-pressure system might develop into a tropical storm or typhoon over the next few days. Meanwhile, hot weather was persisting, with temperatures expected to reach 35˚C on the west coast and 33˚C in the east, with sporadic afternoon showers forecast for mountainous areas, the weather bureau said.
■ POLITICS
Presidential Office opened
The Presidential Office will be open to the public from 8am to 4pm tomorrow, the Presidential Office’s public affairs division said yesterday. The first, second and third floor of the Presidential Office, including the entrance hall, courtyard and presidential reception room, will be opened. Visitors will be allowed to take photographs inside the Presidential Office, the division said. People who are interested should line up at the north plaza in front of the Presidential Office for a security check, officials said. Video cameras and large bags will not be not allowed inside.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching