As the flying fish season begins, residents of Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) are reminding tourists to be aware of local traditions and taboos.
The most common mistakes tourists make are touching and taking pictures of fishing boats, as well as entering private gardens to look at fish laid out to dry in the sun, Lan An Cultural and Educational Foundation chief executive officer Maraos said on Tuesday.
Such behaviors are considered taboo by the Tao people and are believed to bring bad luck to fishermen, he said, adding that tourists should not enter local residents’ houses or take pictures of them without asking.
Photo: CNA
Some of the pavilions on the island are private and not for tourists’ use, he said.
While most older Tao do not speak Mandarin, tourists can ask other locals to help translate if they need to communicate with them, Maraos said.
Flying fish season, the peak tourist period for the island, began earlier this month after all six Tao communities last month completed the Mivanwa ritual to pray for a bountiful fishing season.
The island welcomes tourists from around the world to visit during the four-month fishing season, but cultural differences between local communities and travelers sometimes lead to misunderstanding and conflicts, Maraos said.
To prepare for the annual influx of tourists, he has created a video and thousands of pamphlets about local traditions and taboos.
The video introduces local life, traditional festivals and taboos, Maraos said, adding that the foundation hopes to preserve and promote the island’s unique cultures.
The video can be watched on the foundation’s Web site and Facebook page.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS