When Canadian-born Hong Kong actor and singer Edison Chen (陳冠希)
and Jolin Tsai (蔡依林)
strutted down the catwalk in 2007 to promote a leading brand of jeans, it seemed like just another fashion show. Months later, however, when explicit pictures were stolen from Chen’s computer showing him with some of Asia’s top female stars in various sexually explicit poses, Netizens were drooling over the prospect that Tsai was among the handful of starlets Chen had photographed.
None, however, emerged.
When the pair showed up last week at the same fashion show, all the old rumors resurfaced.
Organizers, however, were careful to keep the two apart,
with Tsai appearing at the
beginning of the show and Chen at the end. And then there was the mutual backslapping.
Commenting on Chen’s fall from grace, Tsai told the assembled press pack that the scandal wasn’t that bad and she wished him good luck on his forthcoming projects, which include an album of “confessional” songs, slated for release next month. Chen, for his part, said that he admires Tsai’s singing and dancing.
He’s not the only one. Rumors continue to circulate that Tsai’s former flame, Jay Chou (周杰倫), wants to sign her to his JVR Music (杰威爾音樂) label after her current contract with Warner Music (華納音樂) expires this summer.
Both pop stars denied the reports, according to a story in the China Times. The Apple Daily, meanwhile, reported that Tsai has already opened her own record company, which if the precedent set by Chou is anything to go by, is a smart move.
Model Timi Hsiao (蕭依婷), who once appeared in one of the Chairman’s videos, has, allegedly, been caught with drugs.
But that’s not all. A follow-up investigation by the police revealed that Hsiao was involved in a prostitution ring operated by mamasan and former beauty pageant finalist Ling Wei-wei (凌葳威), reported Apple.
Ling is alleged to have pimped out B-grade actresses, singers and models to patrons in Taiwan, China and Singapore for NT$60,000 a pop.
Hsiao later said that she had recently run into financial trouble and only agreed to “dinner dates” as a way of earning extra money and denied that anything untoward had happened.
Ling was quoted as saying that she only arranges the dates with clients and what they do on the assignations is their own affair.
Meanwhile, a SetTV (三立) reporter is in the firing line over a question she posed to child star Hsiao Hsiao Bin (小小彬), the stage name of Wen Hsuan-yeh (溫玄燁).
At a promotional event attended by Bianca Bai (白歆惠), Xiao Xiao Bin’s mom on the hit television series P.S. Man (偷心大聖P.S.男), the reporter queried the five-year-old about a report in the United Daily News that suggested whenever he appeared in a show, its ratings plummeted.
“You are always on television, [but] how would you feel if [audiences] didn’t want to see you anymore?” the reporter asked. The comments clearly got to the youngster because he later asked his father, “Why doesn’t everyone want to see me?”
Needless to say, the stunt has turned into a PR nightmare for SetTV. In a statement, the company said its reporter asked the question as a way of giving the kid “an opportunity to explain himself.”
And finally, an addition to the annual roster of ridiculous polls. The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) Asia-Pacific’s annual Sexiest Vegetarian Celebrity vote celebrates those in the entertainment industry who don’t eat meat. Big S (大S), otherwise known as Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛), and Blue Lan (藍正龍) were leading the Taiwanese pack as of press time. To cast a ballot, visit www.petaasiapacific.com/featureSexiestVegCeleb2010-Eng.asp?c=papsv10epr.
From an anonymous office in a New Delhi mall, matrimonial detective Bhavna Paliwal runs the rule over prospective husbands and wives — a booming industry in India, where younger generations are increasingly choosing love matches over arranged marriage. The tradition of partners being carefully selected by the two families remains hugely popular, but in a country where social customs are changing rapidly, more and more couples are making their own matches. So for some families, the first step when young lovers want to get married is not to call a priest or party planner but a sleuth like Paliwal with high-tech spy
The latest military exercises conducted by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) last week did not follow the standard Chinese Communist Party (CCP) formula. The US and Taiwan also had different explanations for the war games. Previously the CCP would plan out their large-scale military exercises and wait for an opportunity to dupe the gullible into pinning the blame on someone else for “provoking” Beijing, the most famous being former house speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August 2022. Those military exercises could not possibly have been organized in the short lead time that it was known she was coming.
With raging waters moving as fast as 3 meters per second, it’s said that the Roaring Gate Channel (吼門水道) evokes the sound of a thousand troop-bound horses galloping. Situated between Penghu’s Xiyu (西嶼) and Baisha (白沙) islands, early inhabitants ranked the channel as the second most perilous waterway in the archipelago; the top was the seas around the shoals to the far north. The Roaring Gate also concealed sunken reefs, and was especially nasty when the northeasterly winds blew during the autumn and winter months. Ships heading to the archipelago’s main settlement of Magong (馬公) had to go around the west side
When Portugal returned its colony Macao to China in 1999, coffee shop owner Daniel Chao was a first grader living in a different world. Since then his sleepy hometown has transformed into a bustling gaming hub lined with glittering casinos. Its once quiet streets are now jammed with tourist buses. But the growing wealth of the city dubbed the “Las Vegas of the East” has not brought qualities of sustainable development such as economic diversity and high civic participation. “What was once a relaxed, free place in my childhood has become a place that is crowded and highly commercialized,” said Chao. Macao yesterday
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