We all know that Jay Chou (周杰倫) fancies himself something chronic, but his most recent automotive acquisition really takes the cake. Not content with his already considerable collection of luxury sports cars, the Chairman (周董) has recently taken delivery of his very own Batmobile.
According to a report in the United Daily News, the custom-made auto is based on the one used in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman. The car, which takes up to three parking spaces and cost NT$5 million, is not just a collector’s item. Chou said he might have the chance to take it on the road one day. “We’ll see if the paparazzi will be able to keep up with me then,” he said.
Chou’s new toy is an innocent diversion compared to what other celebs have been getting up to, most notably Ethan Ruan (阮經天), who has been caught, once again, with his pants down.
Pop Stop reported last week that Ruan’s girlfriend Tiffany Hsu (許瑋甯) had changed her Facebook status from “In a relationship” to “It’s complicated” after the star was spotted at a hotel in Taichung with an unidentified woman.
Since then, additional details have been pouring in of his louche behavior.
At the time of the alleged indiscretion, Ruan was supposed to be on leave from the publicity tour for hit film Monga (艋舺), in which he starred, to attend his grandfather’s funeral.
Photos submitted by a member of the public to Next Magazine suggest that he might have had a date with a “long-haired hottie” (長髮辣妹) whose going price, according to the rag, is NT$30,000. There is still plenty of controversy as to exactly what might, or might not, have happened, as the dates and locations of the photos are disputed.
Rather less controversial, though equally eye-catching, is Stanley Huang’s (黃立行) most recent romantic involvement. Huang, who is no stranger to speculative gossip, has generally managed to keep a fairly tight lid on the details of his private life.
There has, nevertheless, been intense speculation about a possible new courtship following the breakup of his three-year involvement with singer Dominique Tsai (蔡詩蕓). According to Next Magazine, his new inamorata is model Hu Jia-ai (胡嘉愛). Up to now, Hu has been very much in the minor league, but perhaps now she’ll have a chance to move up from the D list.
Someone else who’s going places is Wang Ying (王瀅), niece of singer Harlem Yu (庾澄慶).
Wang is getting hitched to Jimmy Yang (楊立傑), scion of the Nankuo Construction (南國建設) family.
Suggestions that the whirlwind romance, which is leading to marriage after only six months, is being driven by a pregnancy are providing a rich vein for the gossip rags to mine.
From romance to finance: Chang Chen-yue (張震嶽) is romancing a “long-haired hottie” of his own. The singer is riding a wave, and apart from having nothing to hide (when asked who she was, he simply replied that he had plenty of women friends), his participation in Super Band (縱貫線), together with veteran rockers Lo Ta-yu (羅大佑), Emil Chou (周華健), Jonathan Lee (李宗盛), has proven a huge success.
The Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) estimates the band’s 52-show concert tour (six gigs were added on to meet demand), grossed NT$4.3 billion, with each of the performers pulling in NT$100 million.
In the March 9 edition of the Taipei Times a piece by Ninon Godefroy ran with the headine “The quiet, gentle rhythm of Taiwan.” It started with the line “Taiwan is a small, humble place. There is no Eiffel Tower, no pyramids — no singular attraction that draws the world’s attention.” I laughed out loud at that. This was out of no disrespect for the author or the piece, which made some interesting analogies and good points about how both Din Tai Fung’s and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) meticulous attention to detail and quality are not quite up to
April 21 to April 27 Hsieh Er’s (謝娥) political fortunes were rising fast after she got out of jail and joined the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in December 1945. Not only did she hold key positions in various committees, she was elected the only woman on the Taipei City Council and headed to Nanjing in 1946 as the sole Taiwanese female representative to the National Constituent Assembly. With the support of first lady Soong May-ling (宋美齡), she started the Taipei Women’s Association and Taiwan Provincial Women’s Association, where she
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) hatched a bold plan to charge forward and seize the initiative when he held a protest in front of the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office. Though risky, because illegal, its success would help tackle at least six problems facing both himself and the KMT. What he did not see coming was Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (將萬安) tripping him up out of the gate. In spite of Chu being the most consequential and successful KMT chairman since the early 2010s — arguably saving the party from financial ruin and restoring its electoral viability —
It is one of the more remarkable facts of Taiwan history that it was never occupied or claimed by any of the numerous kingdoms of southern China — Han or otherwise — that lay just across the water from it. None of their brilliant ministers ever discovered that Taiwan was a “core interest” of the state whose annexation was “inevitable.” As Paul Kua notes in an excellent monograph laying out how the Portuguese gave Taiwan the name “Formosa,” the first Europeans to express an interest in occupying Taiwan were the Spanish. Tonio Andrade in his seminal work, How Taiwan Became Chinese,
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