ENVIRONMENT
EPA warns on air quality
People with allergies or respiratory diseases should take precautions when going outside as strong seasonal winds could lead to poor air quality, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) said yesterday. The winds could stir up dust and increase the concentration of particulates to more than 100 micrograms per cubic meter — about twice the usual level — EPA data showed. The northern and southern regions are the most likely to suffer from poor air quality, but conditions should ease up tomorrow when seasonal winds are expected to weaken, the EPA said.
ASTRONOMY
Meteor show on Saturday
Stargazers will have a chance this weekend to catch the Geminid meteor shower, which is expected to produce scores of meteors per minute, the Taipei Astronomical Museum said yesterday. One of the three most prolific meteor showers of the year — along with the Quadrantids in January and the Perseids in August — the Geminids can be most easily tracked between 3:30am and 5:30am on Saturday, the museum said. However, because of the moon phase, the general conditions for observation will not be as perfect as last year, it said. A Geminid meteor shower, which originates from an asteroid instead of a comet as is most common, occurs when Earth plows through the dusty debris from the 3200 Phaethon asteroid, the museum said.
ENTERTAINMENT
‘Beyond Beauty’ still a hit
The documentary Beyond Beauty: Taiwan From Above (看見台灣) continued its surprisingly strong showing at the box office last week and could crack the list of top 10 box office hits of the year in the nation this week, distributor Activator Marketing Co said yesterday. The film grossed more than NT$25 million (US$843,600) in theaters around the country from Dec. 1 to Sunday, bringing its total gross to more than NT$140 million — NT$70 million in Taipei alone — since opening on Nov. 1, Activator Marketing said. Its single-day box office sales even topped the chart on Thursday last week, beating Hollywood adventure film The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. Already the highest-grossing documentary in the nation’s history, the film should emerge as one of the country’s 10 highest-grossing films for this year this week, the distributor said. Its box office receipts have already exceeded those of superhero film Man of Steel, which hit theaters earlier this year, the distributor said.
SOCIETY
Chimei founder honored
The founder of Taiwanese conglomerate Chimei Group was awarded a medal by Japan in Taipei earlier this month in recognition of his long-term efforts to promote bilateral trade relations and exchanges. Hsu Wen-long (許文龍), 85, received a citation from Japanese Representative Sumio Tarui. He was also awarded a medal, which Tarui said represents the Japanese government’s recognition of his role in promoting economic relations and exchanges between Japan and Taiwan, and his contributions to the internationalization of Japanese enterprises. Describing Taiwan-Japan economic ties as at their best in 40 years, he said this was the result of efforts by people like Hsu. Tarui also thanked Hsu for the group’s US$2 million donation to help with Japan’s relief efforts after the quake and tsunami in 2011. The Chimei Group includes the Chi Mei Museum, which Hsu said has served as a bridge between Taiwan and Japan for more than 20 years through exchanges in arts and music.
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