Due to the growing number of Taiwanese participating in Peace Boat cruises, the Japanese organization has not only promised that its vessel would dock in Keelung this year for the first time, but would also offer Taiwanese youths room and board in exchange for translation services on its next cruise, South East Travel Service Co said.
The travel agency, which is Peace Boat’s agent in Taiwan, said the group is recruiting young Taiwanese for a cruise that is scheduled to depart in September and is looking for individuals proficient in Japanese, English or Spanish who are concerned with global environmental protection and enjoy cultural exchanges to sign up for the voyage.
Most Taiwanese who embark on Peace Boat cruises are retired or university students, South East Travel said, adding that university students often work onboard a cruise in exchange for room and board.
Local performance groups Nezha Troupe (哪咋劇團), which performs elements of Taiwan’s dintao (陣頭) temple culture, and the New Century Culture Arts Group, which is dedicated to promoting Aboriginal cultural arts and dance, have been invited aboard for the September cruise, the company said.
As Taiwan’s sole representative and operator for Peace Boat cruises this year, South East Travel said it is offering discounts that reduce cruise admittance fees to less than NT$300,000, while Taiwanese men younger than 30 would be able to purchase a ticket at NT$275,000.
Children aged two to six would be able to board for free, it added.
Averaging three cruises per year, Peace Boat’s vessel usually launches from Yokohama, Japan, South East Travel said.
A voyage that departed yesterday is to transit the Mediterranean Sea, while September’s cruise is to be focused on northern Europe and observing the aurora borealis phenomenon, it said.
Peace Boat cruises are not typical pleasure voyages, as every passenger can participate in the organization’s endeavors to offer care to disadvantaged people among its 30 stops through activities including building houses and delivering supplies to impoverished children, it added.
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:
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