■ Society
Tu red-faced after boo-boo
Education Minister Tu Cheng-sheng (杜正勝) has become a laughing stock by accidentally sending a wrongly-worded funeral scroll to the family of a late professor. In the Chinese-style funeral scroll, instead of yin rong wan zai (音容宛在) or "his voice and appearance seem to be still with us," the script reads yin rong yuan zai (音容苑在) or "his voice and appearance are garden," cable news network TVBS said. The Chinese words wan (宛) and yuan (苑) look similar with "yuan" having two crosses on top of the character "wan." An embarrassed Tu apologized to the family, saying the scroll was not written by him, but by a security guard working for the education ministry. More embarrassing is the fact that the guard already wrote 100 copies of such scrolls and a number of them have already been sent out, TVBS said.
■ Crime
Taiwanese man in drug bust
A 26-year-old Taiwanese man has been arrested for attempting to smuggle more than 33,000 ecstasy pills into Indonesia, a customs official said yesterday. Customs officials at Jakarta's Sukarno-Hatta international airport arrested a man surnamed Pao on Friday after finding the drugs disguised as gift boxes in his luggage upon arriving from Taiwan, customs official Siswo Murwono told reporters. Police estimated the drugs to be worth one billion rupiah (US$108,000) and said Pao had admitted working as a courier for a Taiwan-based international drug syndicate. Under Indonesia's tough narcotics law, Pao could be sentenced to death if found guilty in court. Indonesia has increasingly become a transit route and market for drug traffickers despite the threat of the death penalty.
■ Society
Black history marked in film
A mini-film festival will be held today and next Sunday by the Descendants of African People (DAP) to celebrate Black History Month. In the US, the month of February is observed as Black History Month, which celebrates the accomplishments of blacks in history. The festival will include showings of the hit comedy series In Living Color and the films Ray and Ali. The films will run from 6pm-10pm at BLISS at 148 Xinyi Road, Section 4. The entry fee is NT$200, which includes refreshments. The DAP is a social organization for the black community. It holds monthly activities to educate the Taiwanese community about black culture and provide a sense of community for those of African descent living in Taiwan.
■ Arts
Museum recruits volunteers
The National Taiwan Museum in Taipei City has decided to recruit volunteers for its cultural affairs, museum officials said yesterday. People who want to volunteer should be at least 18 years old and should be able to offer service for at least eight hours per month for one year. People skilled in providing online services, offering first aid or videotaping are preferred, they said. The duties of the museum volunteers will include screening films, answering visitors' questions and watching over the museum's exhibits. A ceremony at the museum will take place every year for outstanding volunteers, who will then be recommended to the Cabinet-level Council for Cultural Affairs for selection as national outstanding volunteers, they said. Those interested in volunteering can send their resume to the National Taiwan Museum before March 10 or visit the museum's Web site at www.ntm.gov.tw for more information.
Hong Kong singer Andy Lau’s (劉德華) concert in Taipei tonight has been cancelled due to Typhoon Kong-rei and is to be held at noon on Saturday instead, the concert organizer SuperDome said in a statement this afternoon. Tonight’s concert at Taipei Arena was to be the first of four consecutive nightly performances by Lau in Taipei, but it was called off at the request of Taipei Metro, the operator of the venue, due to the weather, said the organizer. Taipei Metro said the concert was cancelled out of consideration for the audience’s safety. The decision disappointed a number of Lau’s fans who had
A tropical depression east of the Philippines became a tropical storm early yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, less than a week after a typhoon barreled across the nation. The agency issued an advisory at 3:30am stating that the 22nd tropical storm, named Yinxing, of the Pacific typhoon season formed at 2am. As of 8am, the storm was 1,730km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, with a 100km radius. It was moving west-northwest at 32kph, with maximum sustained winds of 83kph and gusts of up to 108kph. Based on its current path, the storm is not expected to hit Taiwan, CWA
Commuters in Taipei picked their way through debris and navigated disrupted transit schedules this morning on their way to work and school, as the city was still working to clear the streets in the aftermath of Typhoon Kong-rey. By 11pm yesterday, there were estimated 2,000 trees down in the city, as well as 390 reports of infrastructure damage, 318 reports of building damage and 307 reports of fallen signs, the Taipei Public Works Department said. Workers were mobilized late last night to clear the debris as soon as possible, the department said. However, as of this morning, many people were leaving messages
A Canadian dental assistant was recently indicted by prosecutors after she was caught in August trying to smuggle 32kg of marijuana into Taiwan, the Aviation Police Bureau said on Wednesday. The 30-year-old was arrested on Aug. 4 after arriving on a flight to Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, Chang Tsung-lung (張驄瀧), a squad chief in the Aviation Police Bureau’s Criminal Investigation Division, told reporters. Customs officials noticed irregularities when the woman’s two suitcases passed through X-ray baggage scanners, Chang said. Upon searching them, officers discovered 32.61kg of marijuana, which local media outlets estimated to have a market value of more than NT$50 million (US$1.56
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