Jacky Wu (吳宗憲), who's made a career as a TV comedian, dropped probably the biggest joke of his life last week when he announced his possible contention on an independent ticket for a legislative seat to represent Taipei's southern district in elections set for November. The only things holding him back at this stage, he told media this week, were his father's and wife's objections.
As for his colorful record of public philandering and most recently driving drunk without a license, these don't seem to raise any questions in his mind about possible doubts voters may have about his trustworthiness when it comes to formulating national policy and handling their tax money. In fact, he has a couple of policy ideas of his own. He's quoted as telling media that his first mission, if elected, will be to get all paparazzi kicked out of Taiwan, singling out Next Magazine (壹週刊) and Apple Daily (蘋果日報) as targets of his impending media purge.
PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES
Part of what prompted his legislative bid is Jacky's current court case against a fan named Linda, who revealed an affair to Next Magazine, she alleges to have had with the TV host. So far, the case remains undecided, but if that one fails, there's always the one brought by his wife against Linda, who once wrote a song for pop singer Elva Hsiao (蕭亞軒), that accuses Linda of trying to harm the Wu family.
PHOTO: TAIPEI TIMES
This week Ella of the pop group S.H.E. spent several days refuting a report on a Chinese Web site that "revealed" that she was previously a boy until a sex change made her a girl. Responding to the minor storm kicked up over the report, she told the Liberty Times (自由時報): "Yeah, I'm a boy. Why don't I just pull it out right here and pee on the floor?" She was joking, of course, but the tom-boyish Ella has been deflecting rumors about her sexual orientation since the group was formed a couple years ago.
More sex organs were in the news this week when Hong Kong singer/actor Nicholas Tse (謝霆鋒) was reported to have had a diamond stud penis ring. In an odd echo of Ella's comment, Nicholas sarcastically quipped to The Great Daily News (
Tse is currently in Beijing on the set of Chen Kaige's (陳凱歌) next film The Promise (無極), which will also star his erstwhile lover Cecilia Cheung (張柏芝). According to the Taiwan Daily, Cheung will mark a first in her film career in this movie with two full nudity scenes that she insisted on filming herself instead of having a body double. Tse won't be the man shooting the nude scenes with Cheung, though. That task will fall on the broad, tanned shoulders of South Korean actor Jang Dong-kun (張東建) and Hiroyuki Sanada.
Last week, TV hostess Big S proved that it's not just poor people who play the lottery when she hit a jackpot worth NT$140,000. It wasn't the NT$900 million that was up for grabs, but it still made her feel rich enough to give assistants at the studio NT$20,000 and use the rest to take her long-time boyfriend Lan Cheng-long (
In the March 9 edition of the Taipei Times a piece by Ninon Godefroy ran with the headine “The quiet, gentle rhythm of Taiwan.” It started with the line “Taiwan is a small, humble place. There is no Eiffel Tower, no pyramids — no singular attraction that draws the world’s attention.” I laughed out loud at that. This was out of no disrespect for the author or the piece, which made some interesting analogies and good points about how both Din Tai Fung’s and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) meticulous attention to detail and quality are not quite up to
April 21 to April 27 Hsieh Er’s (謝娥) political fortunes were rising fast after she got out of jail and joined the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in December 1945. Not only did she hold key positions in various committees, she was elected the only woman on the Taipei City Council and headed to Nanjing in 1946 as the sole Taiwanese female representative to the National Constituent Assembly. With the support of first lady Soong May-ling (宋美齡), she started the Taipei Women’s Association and Taiwan Provincial Women’s Association, where she
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) hatched a bold plan to charge forward and seize the initiative when he held a protest in front of the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office. Though risky, because illegal, its success would help tackle at least six problems facing both himself and the KMT. What he did not see coming was Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (將萬安) tripping him up out of the gate. In spite of Chu being the most consequential and successful KMT chairman since the early 2010s — arguably saving the party from financial ruin and restoring its electoral viability —
It is one of the more remarkable facts of Taiwan history that it was never occupied or claimed by any of the numerous kingdoms of southern China — Han or otherwise — that lay just across the water from it. None of their brilliant ministers ever discovered that Taiwan was a “core interest” of the state whose annexation was “inevitable.” As Paul Kua notes in an excellent monograph laying out how the Portuguese gave Taiwan the name “Formosa,” the first Europeans to express an interest in occupying Taiwan were the Spanish. Tonio Andrade in his seminal work, How Taiwan Became Chinese,
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