Want China Times
Date: 2015-10-21
By: CNA

Twice, a new South Korean girl group that has drawn attention in Taiwan as

one of its members is Taiwanese, released its first music video Tuesday.

The video of the upbeat Like OOH-AHH shows the nine members of the group, including Taiwanese teenager Chou Tzu-yu, singing and dancing inside an abandoned building and a bus, with zombies.

The video had received over 1.1 million hits on YouTube less than 24 hours after its release.

Members of the group were selected from the South Korean TV talent show Sixteen earlier this year. The show saw girls from different countries showing off their singing and dancing talents in a competition to become a member of Twice.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Oct 22, 2015
By: Lee Chung-hsien and Jonathan Chin  /  Staff reporter, with staff writer

After changing from betel nuts, 63-year-old farmer Chu Kuo-hsing (朱國興)

now grows nationally renowned persimmons, acclaimed for their size and sweetness, at his farm in Taichung’s Heping District (和平).

Chu said he uses low amounts of planticides and fertilizers on his fruit trees, but his persimmons are both sweeter and bigger than the average fruit.

He said his secret is technical assistance from National Chung Hsing University agriculture and natural resources professor Tsay Tsung-tsuan (蔡東纂), who was introduced to Chu by the farmer’s elder brother.

Prior to becoming a successful persimmon farmer, Chu said he grew bamboo shoots and betel nuts with his parents near Taichung’s Dakeng (大坑) area and that he was a leading betel-nut farmer.     [FULL STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/10/20
By: Ku Chuan and S.C. Chang

Taipei, Oct. 20 (CNA) More than 70 percent of foreign tourists who receive

fine tickets for smoking in no-smoking areas have paid up, even though they are not legally binding, officials of the Taipei City Department of Environmental Protection said Tuesday.

Department statistics show that during the first nine months of this year, the department issued 13,012 tickets for cigarette butt littering. A majority of those fined were Taiwanese, with foreign tourists accounting for only 112, many of whom were mainland Chinese.

Many question why foreign tourists feel compelled to pay the fines since they can still leave the country without any consequences. Immigration officials said there are no rules for putting such violations on record.     [FULL  STORY]

Want China Times
Date: 2015-10-20
By: CNA and Staff Reporter

Two women born in Taiwan but adopted overseas when they were infants

said Monday that they bear no grudge against their biological parents and wish only to let them know that they are happy in their lives.

British police officer Larissa Nightingale shared her experience of trying to find her birth mother in Taiwan over the past few days at a news conference sponsored by the Child Welfare League Foundation.

Nightingale, whose Chinese name is Wang E-po, said that this was her first trip to Taiwan and that she has been impressed by the friendliness of the people.

Nightingale was left in front of a hospital in Xindian in Taipei county (now New Taipei) 29 years ago with a note from her birth mother that she could not raise her because she was too poor. She was later adopted by a British couple.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2015-10-19
By: Ko Lin, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Taiwan has surpassed Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, and

other developed countries to become the world’s fastest aging nation this decade, reports said Monday.

According to statistics provided by the National Development Council (NDC), the number of senior citizens aged 65 and above currently stands at 2.86 million of the total population in Taiwan.

The council predicts the country will achieve ‘aged society’ status by 2018, which requires 14 percent of the population to be aged 65 or older. By 2025, the figure is expected to exceed the 20 percent mark, turning Taiwan to become a ‘super-aged society,’ where one in five citizens will be over 65.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/10/19
By: Wang Shwu-fen and Lilian Wu

Kaohsiung, Oct. 19 (CNA) Kaohsiung Shoushan Zoo said Monday it is

accepting a woman’s claim for compensation after her tooth was broken when an elephant hurled a stone at her on Oct. 10.

Zoo director Chuang Hsun-chih (莊絢智) said that when the 26-year-old woman complained to the zoo’s visitors’ center, her mouth was bleeding and her tooth was broken after being hit by the stone.

Chuang said the zoo is insured against such incidents and has referred the case to the insurance company, which has yet to determine the amount of compensation.     [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date:  Oct 20, 2015
By: Dana Ter  /  Staff Reporter

A designer hollers “lunch time” as models — male, female, toddlers and

middle-aged — scamper to folding tables, grab a lunch box and plop themselves on the grass. A group of people next to the makeshift catwalk are trying to rearrange a row of bamboo plants brought down from the mountains of Miaoli County. Next to them, a few male models are hanging pieces of Styrofoam cut to resemble clouds over a sign for the Suraw Atayal Fashion Show (森林之心色舞繞泰雅服裝秀), which takes place on Saturday in the county’s Shei-Pa National Park (雪霸國家公園).

A few bamboo plants and Styrofoam clouds smack in the middle of Taipei did not exactly evoke a sense of the thundering mountains and lush greenery that Taian Township (泰安) in Miaoli County, home to the Atayal tribe, is known for. In fact, the entire affair feels more like an informal gathering of friends than preparation for a press conference and fashion show.

Yet I was also grateful for the fact that there weren’t hordes of crazed reporters and fans clawing at each like you see every year at New York Fashion Week.     [FULL  STORY]