Five-year-old Hsu Kai-en (徐凱恩) on Thursday donated his hair to the Taichung Tzu Chi Hospital’s cancer resource center in honor of his late cousin.
Hsu’s cousin Chang Fang-yu (張芳瑜) had been donating her hair to help cancer patients from a young age, Hsu’s mother, Lin Chia-fang (林佳芬), said.
Chang was diagnosed with cancer when she was in the sixth grade and passed away five years later, Lin said, adding that to continue his cousin’s legacy, Hsu began growing out his hair when he was three years old.
Hsu’s four-year-old cousin Wen Tzu-tang (?子瑭), classmate Wang Yueh-chun (王玥淳) and Wang Yueh-chun’s sister, Wang Yueh-han (王玥涵), on Thursday also donated about 50cm of hair each.
Hair loss due to chemotherapy can affect patients emotionally, and their work and social lives, Tzu Chi ontology department director Lee Tien-kun (李典錕) said.
Becasue wigs made of human hair cost NT$20,000 to NT$50,000, the hospital has partnered with a wig company to collect hair donations and lend wigs to cancer patients for free, Lee said.
Patients only need to pay a NT$150 cleaning fee to borrow the wigs, the center said.
Each wig requires an average of eight to 10 ponytails to make and can be used for about two years, it said.
The hospital has been hosting the hair donation program for more than a year and has more than 300 wigs, 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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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