INTERNET
Taipei expands free Wi-Fi
The number of Wi-Fi hotspots available for free online browsing and downloading is to increase by 3,000 to 9,000 in Taipei, the city government said on Tuesday. Through collaborations with nine business operators, who between them own a total of 3,000 hotspots, the alliance on the Taipei Free platform — which already has 6,000 free Wi-Fi hotspots — is to launch on Saturday, Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) said. Smart device owners can download the “Taipei WiFi Alliance” app to access the 9,000 free wireless network zones, Department of Information Technology officials said. An Android version of the app will be launched on Saturday, with an iOS version to be released after it receives verification, the officials added.
ENTERTAINMENT
‘Our Times’ a box-office hit
The high-school romance Our Times (我的少女時代) has taken the nation’s box office by storm, becoming the fifth highest-grossing Taiwanese film ever in the domestic market as of Sunday. The film has grossed more than NT$400 million (US$12.17 million) since its release on Aug. 13, film distributor Hualien Media International said. Among local box office hits, Our Times trails only the romantic comedy Cape No. 7 (海角七號) at NT$530 million; historical drama Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale Part 1 (彩虹戰士:賽德克巴萊), NT$472 million; comedy David Loman (大尾鱸鰻), NT$428 million; and the romance You Are the Apple of My Eye (那些年,我們ㄧ起追的女孩), NT$410 million. The directorial debut of Frankie Chen (陳玉珊), Our Times looks back at the first love of a woman, who met a mischievous boy when she was in high school. The film has received three Golden Horse Award nominations.
TRAVEL
New visa privileges offered
Taiwanese can now obtain visa waivers, landing visas or e-visas to 153 countries and territories, as five more nations recently granted the Republic of China such privileges, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday. Kazakhstan and Tajikistan in central Asia, and Liberia and Djibouti in Africa granted Taiwan landing visa treatment, while Gabon included Taiwan in its e-visa system, the ministry said. Despite the visa privileges, the ministry said that travelers to Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Djibouti must prepare documents, such as invitation letters, return air tickets and accommodation booking records, to clear immigration upon arrival. To apply for a landing visa for Liberia, travelers must e-mail a scanned copy of their passport to the Liberian Ministry of Foreign Affairs seven days before their departure and submit the application upon arrival, the ministry said. For those visiting Gabon, they must present a travel permit obtained online prior to departure, return tickets, or tickets to a third country and accommodation booking records at immigration upon arrival, it added.
HEALTH
Travel advisory raised
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday raised a travel advisory for China’s Zhejiang Province by one level after an H7N9 avian flu case was reported there on Friday last week. The patient, a 62-year-old woman, had been exposed to birds two weeks before developing symptoms and is now in intensive care, the CDC said, citing Chinese health officials. Issuing a level-two alert for Zhejiang, the CDC said travelers to the province should take the following precautions: Avoid contact with live or dead birds, pay attention to personal hygiene and seek medical attention immediately if symptoms such as a fever or a cough develop. Other Chinese cities and provinces are still on level-one watch, the CDC said. The agency uses a three-tier warning system, with level three being the most severe.
ENTERTAINMENT
Teen set for K-pop stardom
A new South Korean girl group, Twice, which has drawn attention in Taiwan as one of its members is Taiwanese, are to officially hit the airwaves on Oct. 20, JYP Entertainment said yesterday. Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), who goes by the stage name Tzuyu, is the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. Chou joined a competition held earlier this year on the South Korean TV talent show SIXTEEN, which saw 16 girls from different countries vie to become a member of the new group. The Taiwanese teenager was one of the nine eventually chosen for the group. The other members are from South Korea and Japan.
WEATHER
Rain likely over weekend
Rain is likely across the nation during the Double Ten National Day holiday weekend due to an approaching weather front and increasing northeasterly winds, the Central Weather Bureau said yesterday. From today, the sunny and warm weather the nation has seen over the past week could give way to much cooler and more humid conditions that might dominate the holiday, forecasters said. The weather fluctuation could have the strongest impact on northern and northeastern regions, where continuous rain, sometimes heavy, is expected, according to the bureau. Daytime high temperatures in those areas could drop by 4oC to about 27oC, while other parts of the nation could see highs of between 29oC and 31oC.
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
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,
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