With the white tung blossoms bursting into bloom starting this month, more than 106 Hakka communities from six counties in Taiwan invited the public to enjoy the lily-white drifts and experience the rich Hakka culture at a series of events nationwide.
The fourth annual Tung Blossom Festival, sponsored by the Council for Hakka Affairs to promote Hakka culture, promises to draw more visitors this year with a line-up of creative events and improved transportation services.
The white flowers and the sturdy trunks of the tung trees make them an excellent symbol of the Hakka people, representing the group's patience for hard work and the purity of their spirit, according to the council.
"The Tung Blossom Festival has become a successful model in the cultural industry by creating both cultural and economic values for the Hakka community," the council's acting chairman Lee Yung-de (
"With more exciting activities, such as tung blossom lighting shows at night, special train services and special tour guides for English and Japanese-speaking travelers, we hope to bring more visitors to experience the beauty of Hakka culture," Lee said.
The festival, which starts on April 16 with an opening ceremony at the Westlake Resortopia (
In addition, 21 "tung blossom sightseeing paths" have been created in the six counties hosing the festival. To make it more convenient for visitors to reach the destinations, the council will provide festival trains every weekend.
In an attempt to attract young people, the popular Taiwanese rock band Mayday will perform during the festival's opening ceremony.
"Japan has the famous cherry blossom festival each March and April. With the Tung Blossom Festival flourishing in Taiwan, we can enjoy the flower sightseeing, drinking lei-cha and listening to music without traveling far away," the band said.
Over 28 festival venues in the Hakka communities are encouraged to develop their own individual merchandise, such as pottery, with a tung-flower theme. Traditional Hakka snacks and food will also be featured in the festival.
Last year's festival generated NT$3 billion in revenues with a total of 2.7 million people attending, according to the council.
This year, the council invited travel agencies from Germany, Australia, New Zealand, the US and Japan to visit the festival, expecting them to bring foreign friends to experience the cultural event.
Tung trees have been valued as a source of lumber and for the water-resistant oil derived from their seeds. Although the trees are no longer as popular for industrial purposes as in previous decades, their wood is still used for carving and firewood.
Detailed information on the festival can be found on the Hakka council's official Web site at www.hakka.gov.tw.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS