Flocks of domestic and foreign tourists are expected to pour into Chiayi City this week to attend the Taiwan Lantern Festival (台灣燈會), which officially kicked off last night.
The Lantern Festival, also known as Yuan Xiao (元宵), is traditionally held on the 15th day of the first lunar month. It is one of Taiwan’s three main festivals, along with the Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival.
The Discovery Channel named Taiwan’s Lantern Festival one of the “Fantastic Festivals of the World.”
PHOTO: PATRICK LIN,AFP
The main lantern this year features a large, seven-colored tiger jumping over a rainbow with two small tigers by its side. It is named “Heaven’s blessing for good fortune to the people of Taiwan” (福臨寶島), as the pronunciation of the Chinese word for “fortune” (福) is similar to the word for tiger (虎).
Vice President Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) and other dignitaries were invited to light the main lantern last night.
The lantern is complemented by four secondary lanterns, including a soaring phoenix, leaping tortoise, lucky kylin, and a dragon and tiger praying for good fortune.
Aside from the main and secondary lanterns, the festival also features lanterns made by different organizations featuring a variety of themes.
China’s Jiangsu Province is also presenting lanterns at the festival this year and about 500 tourists from Jiangsu are scheduled to visit Taiwan on an eight-day tour, which will include a trip to the lantern festival.
People attending the festival will be given small handheld lanterns as gifts. The Tourism Bureau said that about 100 international media organizations have sent reporters to Taiwan to cover the event. The advertising value of this international media coverage could exceed NT$1 billion (US$30 million).
The bureau estimates that approximately 20,000 tourists from Japan, South Korea and Singapore and other countries will visit the event, which runs until Sunday.
It further estimated that the Taiwan Lantern Festival in Chiayi City, along with other local lantern festivals in other counties, could generate revenue in excess of NT$36 billion.
The release of sky lanterns in Pingsi (平溪), Taipei County, beehive firecrackers in Yanshui (鹽水), Tainan County, and “Bombing Handan” (炸寒單) in Taitung are other well-known Lantern Festival events.
This year’s largest sky lantern was released by President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), a two-story high lantern decorated with an image of a Formosan Blue Magpie.
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