The Tourism Bureau yesterday unveiled the design for the main lantern at this year’s Taiwan Lantern Festival, which will be held in Greater Taichung from Feb. 27 to March 15.
The 23.4m lantern is in the shape of a golden sheep, since the next lunar year is the Year of the Sheep in the Chinese zodiac. It will be the tallest main lantern in five years.
The main lantern is scheduled to be lit on March 5, which will be 15th day of the first month on the lunar calendar, and the start of the Lantern Festival holiday, bureau officials said.
Photo: CNA
The main festival exhibition site is near the high-speed rail station in Wuri District (烏日區), but there will be two more sites — one in Taichung Park, the other in Fongyuan District (豐原).
Handheld lanterns in the shape of a white or black sheep will be distributed to festivalgoers.
Lin Chia-wei (林佳葦), who designed the handheld lanterns, said the sheep are made from five pieces of cardboard, with each piece having 10 different colors on both sides.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Users can assemble the lanterns based on their color preferences, the designer said.
Greater Taichung Tourism and Travel Bureau Director Chen Sheng-shan (陳盛山) said the city hopes to attract more non-tour group travelers from Hong Kong and Macau to this year’s Taiwan Lantern Festival.
“The city has direct flights to Hong Kong and Macau, with flight times being about 90 minutes,” Chen said, adding that Hong Kong and Macau residents flying into Taichung could receive discounts for accommodation or souvenir purchases.
On the sidelines of the ceremony to announce the festival, Tourism Bureau Director-General David Hsieh (謝謂君) said that 10 more Chinese cities will begin allowing their residents to travel to Taiwan as free independent tourists (FITs) instead of in tour groups.
The bureau is optimistic that the daily cap on the number of entry permits for independent Chinese tourists will be raised from 4,000 to 5,000 before the start of the Lantern Festival, Hsieh said.
Increasing the number of entry permits for Chinese FITs is seen as an urgent request from Taiwan’s tourism sector, Hsieh said, adding that Taiwan and China will negotiate the issue.
The new Chinese cities selected for the FIT program would be those offering direct flight services to Taiwan, he said.
Bureau statistics show that an average of 3,200 Chinese FITs entered Taiwan per day last year, although more than 4,000 entered per day in November and last month.
Taiwan Visitors Association chairwoman Janice Lai (賴瑟珍) said her group has received many requests from hostel owners urging the government to raise the cap on Chinese FITs.
“Many of them have said that independent Chinese tourists tend to be highly educated individuals who prefer to visit tourist attractions different from those who travel with tour groups. This could benefit more operators in the tourism industry,” Lai said.
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