The National Immigration Agency yesterday said it was trying to locate a Japanese man who claims he has been stranded at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport since Sept. 7.
The man, who identified himself as ZhongZheng, has used his laptop computer to blog about his life in the airport. He wrote that he did not have a return ticket to Japan, did not intend to go back and that after staying in the airport for more than two weeks, he only had NT$28 left.
Airport authorities said they have not received any requests for assistance from the man, but would patrol the area more frequently.
The Border Affairs Corps said the man went to its counter on Sept. 7 and told border agents that he had been scheduled to return to Japan a day earlier, but had no ticket. Immigration officials asked him to go to the Interchange Association, Japan office in Taipei, which is in charge of bilateral relations with Tokyo in the absence of formal diplomatic ties.
He has been missing since then.
“I am a Japanese in Taiwan. I’ve become an illegal homeless resident, but I don’t know how to go back at all. And I don’t really wanna go back. No one has arrested me or taken me away, so I’ll stay here until I die,” the man wrote on his blog.
At first he could afford to get some meals from the convenience store at the airport and even drank beer every day, he wrote. Then he started collecting the coins people dropped on the ground to buy food, he said.
On Sept. 21, he wrote that the only things he had eaten that day were packs of soy sauce and wasabi from a sushi store for breakfast and dinner.
The border agency said it has left a message on the man’s blog in hopes that he would contact the Interchange Association.
A Japanese woman who appeared to be mentally ill was sent home in the middle of July after the border agents reported her case to Japanese authorities in Taiwan.
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