This year’s Hakka Expo, which aims to promote the culture and history of Taiwan’s largest ethnic minority, is set to take place across different locations in Taoyuan from Aug. 11 to Oct. 15.
The two-month-long event will be based around two main pavilions and 25 smaller exhibition areas in the northern municipality, and will include more than 50 itineraries that tourists can follow to enhance their knowledge of Hakka people, organizers the Hakka Affairs Council and the Taoyuan City Government told a news conference yesterday.
The two main exhibition centers, the World Pavilion and the Taiwan Pavilion, will feature highlights of Hakka culture, delicacies and traditions, Taoyuan Mayor Simon Chang (善政) said, adding that Taoyuan has the largest Hakka population in Taiwan.
Photo: CNA
The expo will be the best place for people to get an insight into Hakka customs and how Hakka people migrated from China to Taiwan and later further afield, Chang said.
The 25 other exhibition areas are to showcase themes such as Hakka movies, tea, calligraphy and crafts, as well as elements of history, including Hakka’s resistance to the Japanese invasion in 1895, information on the expo’s Web site says.
More than 600 travel agencies are to participate in the expo, which aims to attract about 6 million visitors, including 200,000 foreign tourists, the organizers said.
One goal of the expo is to expand people’s traditional impressions of Hakka culture, which famously include salty pork, printed cloth fabrics and tung blossom, Hakka Affairs Council official Chou Chiang-chieh (周江杰) said.
Since around 1850, Hakka people have been spreading their own special culture and identity around the world, the organizers added.
Chou said he would like to see Taoyuan, home to almost 1 million Hakka last year, become the world’s Hakka capital.
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