The Jioutian Folk Performance Troupe yesterday succeeded in achieving its goal of running a 250km ultramarathon across the Sahara while carrying a statue of the Taoist deity Nalakuvara, better known in Taiwan as santaizi, or the Third Prince.
Ultramarathons are a huge test of human ability, involving running long distances in extreme conditions and inhospitable environments, but the members of the Jioutian Folk Performance Troup took the challenge to another level by having its members take turns carrying the 17kg statue of Nalakuvara in an effort to show the world the beauty of Taiwanese folk art.
The team included eight runners, seven coaches and two team leaders.
Photo: CNA
The youngest team member was 16-year-old Tsai Yi-kai (蔡奕凱), while the only female member was 20-year-old Chen Kuan-ying (陳冠瑩).
In order to endure the extreme climate of the Sahara — which can see temperatures as high as 50?C — for the duration of the seven-day marathon, team members trained for the past six months under the midday sun in temperatures of 35?C to 38?C prior to their departure for the Sahara on Sept. 28 for the ultramarathon, which began last Sunday.
Their training included altitude training on Hehuanshan (合歡山), which is more than 3,000m high, as well as running in the sand in high temperatures in Kenting (墾丁), Pingtung County, and in Penghu County.
In Penghu, team members ran 100km within 24 hours. Team members also ran 40km from central Taichung City to Dadushan (大肚山) and back as part of their training.
Chen, who in the past had been caught gambling by police, but turned her life around two years ago, said the training, including weight lifting and a daily 15km run, was very challenging.
“Chen Kuan-ying and Tsai Yi-kai are all better than me,” said Lee Kuang-cheng (李光正), administrative manager of the troupe and one of the team members. “I fainted during the training in Penghu, but they completed the course without a problem.”
A small number of Taiwanese this year lost their citizenship rights after traveling in China and obtaining a one-time Chinese passport to cross the border into Russia, a source said today. The people signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of neighboring Russia with companies claiming they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, the source said on condition of anonymity. The travelers were actually issued one-time-use Chinese passports, they said. Taiwanese are prohibited from holding a Chinese passport or household registration. If found to have a Chinese ID, they may lose their resident status under Article 9-1
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
PROBLEMATIC APP: Citing more than 1,000 fraud cases, the government is taking the app down for a year, but opposition voices are calling it censorship Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) yesterday decried a government plan to suspend access to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu (小紅書) for one year as censorship, while the Presidential Office backed the plan. The Ministry of the Interior on Thursday cited security risks and accusations that the Instagram-like app, known as Rednote in English, had figured in more than 1,700 fraud cases since last year. The company, which has about 3 million users in Taiwan, has not yet responded to requests for comment. “Many people online are already asking ‘How to climb over the firewall to access Xiaohongshu,’” Cheng posted on
A magnitude 5.7 earthquake yesterday struck off the coast of Hualien, causing brief transportation disruptions in northern and eastern Taiwan, as authorities said that aftershocks of magnitude 5 or higher could occur over the next three days. The quake, which hit at 7:24pm at a depth of 24.5km, registered an intensity of 4 in Hualien and Nantou counties, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries. In Taipei, the MRT railway’s operations control center received an earthquake alert and initiated standard safety procedures, briefly halting trains on the Bannan (blue) line for about a minute.
RSS