Big S (大S) has hit the headlines of the Chinese-language media yet again, this time for putting an end to her two-and-a-half year romance with F4 band member Vic Chou (周渝民). Rumors abound, ranging from the prosaic but credible "divergent career paths and incompatible interests," to the juicier suggestion from Apple Daily that Chou has recently had a relapse into depression after getting too deeply into his role in Johnnie To's (杜琪峰) most recent flick, Linger (蝴蝶飛). According to reports, Chou's name has also been linked with Linger's leading lady Li Bingbing (李冰冰) and TV personality Patty Hou (侯佩岑), whom he met while working on the TV romance series Delicious Relation (美味關係).
Recent reports say that the young Lothario, who swept Big S - five years his senior - off her feet back in 2005, is now history for her. His excuse for his recent inattention to his "big sister" has been preoccupation with the release of the new F4 album, Waiting For You (在這裡等你), which two weeks ago hit the charts at number two, but has since dropped to number 17.
Pop Stop is glad to announce that its prediction that Guatemalan-Taiwanese model Liz Yang's (楊莉思) involvement with David Tao (陶吉吉) would earn her plenty of coverage in the gossip rags has come true. After Tao's two run-ins with police (on both occasions significantly the worse for drink) the rising model has decided that enough is enough. According to Next, the model claims that they are "just friends," that he has been too busy to get in contact and the rest of the usual brush-off palaver. As a result, the model has a four-page spread and a cover (lathered fetchingly in strawberries and cream and wearing cherry-print cotton knickers) in this week's edition of the magazine. Clearly she is not just a pretty face.
PHOTOS: TAIPEI TIMES
According to gossip Web sites, Yang is not the only one getting a leg up from a big-name star. The 19-year-old TV commercial model Chiang Yu-chen (江語晨), who has been associated with Jay "The Chairman" Chou (周杰倫) ever since his fling with Hebe ended, seems to be doing well enough in the romance race to spark the envy of Internet gossip mongers. They have been painting her as a two-timing gold-digger, with possible lesbian inclinations to boot.
In November last year, Little Pan-pan (小潘潘) was caught up in the drug busts that hit the celebrity world. Although cleared, the celebrity says that the incident lost her NT$300,000 over the last three months as gig organizers cancelled shows because of the negative publicity. To console herself, reports say, Little Pan-pan has announced that she will head to the cosmetic surgeon's office so she can put on a new face for the New Year.
CTV's One Million Star (超級星光大道) pop idol "reality" show is finally beginning to slip in the ratings. Bad singing and almost constant rumors that the competition is fixed by record companies have been taking their toll. The show still manages to hold first place though, well ahead of TTV's rival reality show Super Idol (超級偶像). It seems that One Million Star works the rumor mill to maintain its lead, this week generating the snippet that the current second-place holder and Hello Kitty look-alike, Annie Lin (林宜融), is related to the show's producers. With the number of people surnamed Lin in Taiwan, though, even the gossip rags are unable to put their heart into this one. In another story with a rather gloating tone, Apple Daily reported that last year's One Million Star favorite, Aska Yang (楊宗緯), flubbed his first appearance as a guest host on GTV's 100% Entertainment (娛樂百分百).
PHOTOS: TAIPEI TIMES
Taiwan’s English education system is being pulled apart by three opposing forces. Bilingual Nation 2030 pulls students toward English and global communication. Artificial Intelligence (AI) readiness pulls them toward digital judgment, verification and AI-mediated work. But Taiwan’s old exam culture pulls them back toward memorization, grammar drills, timed reading and correct answers. If the education system keeps using old exams to define success, it risks producing graduates who are neither genuinely bilingual nor genuinely AI-ready, but trained for tasks machines can already perform. The first force is Bilingual Nation 2030. Launched in 2018, the policy aimed to “help Taiwan’s workforce connect
It seems every few days one bumps into one of those “real man” comments in which Taiwan is urged to “face reality” or similar, and “make a deal,” with the speaker implying that soon it will be too late. “Deal” advocates always present themselves as having a superior grip on reality, and the manly ability to make the “hard choice.” Their testosterone-laden language often echoes that of Taiwan sellout advocates. Note that such commentary always specifies a process (“make a deal, work with, make progress”), never the end state of what occupation by a violent authoritarian colonialist state will entail. In
“Taiwan’s Opposition Leader Comes to US With a Message Straight Out of Beijing” read a May 31 headline in the Wall Street Journal. Top US administration officials and members of Congress almost certainly read the WSJ, and if there was a bullet point takeaway that people in Washington should absorb ahead of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chair Cheng Li-wun’s (鄭麗文) arrival in DC on June 9, that headline is it. The last few columns have discussed this very topic, and the timing is not coincidental. While those top officials likely do not read the Taipei Times, judging by the number
As someone who normally steers clear of books with “transcendence” or “metaphysics” in their subtitles, this reviewer — a casual observer of local belief systems since the 1990s — found Fabian Graham’s Money God Temples in Taiwan a challenging read. Those who’ve only dipped their toes into temple culture will likely need to parse several sections with special care if they’re to keep up with the author, a British ethnographic researcher whose previous books have investigated religious practices among ethnic Chinese in Southeast Asia. This scholarly volume examines a facet of Taiwan’s religious landscape that didn’t exist a century ago, and
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