Interviewing Cabinet ministers

I've been writing feature articles for 14 years, but recently I enjoyed a career first - interviewing a Cabinet-level central government official. In fact, I interviewed two by email, and their answers arrived in my mailbox within a few hours of each other.

The two are Emile Sheng, minister of the Council of Cultural Affairs, and Chou Kung-shin, director of the National Palace Museum. Yes, that's right - the chief of Taiwan's most famous museum is a member of the Cabinet. I'm assuming this is because, back in the 1960s and 1970s, Chiang Kai-shek and his son regarded their possession of the collection as central to their claim that the ROC was the legitimate government of China.

I interviewed Dr. Sheng about his previous job, CEO of the 2009 Taipei Deaflympics Organizing Committee, for Taiwan Business Topics. The questions I sent to Dr. Chou are for an article about Asia's leading museums for Silkroad, Dragonair's inflight magazine. The former is due out very soon; the latter will appear in June or July.

Books no. 2 and no. 3

Encouraging news from Thailand and the UK. It seems my second book, Taiwan: Dos and Don'ts, is finally going to press. Also, the cover design of Taiwan: The Bradt Travel Guide has been confirmed and the book is now available for pre-order on Amazon.

Petal power (Silkroad)

First came camphor in the late 18th century, then sugar and bananas gained popularity in the middle of the 20th century. Now Taiwan is exploiting its geographical position to become a leading supplier of orchids. To the surprise of many who had written off Taiwan's agricultural sector, the island has emerged in the past decade as the world's biggest grower of mature and seedling orchids...

The full article is in the March edition of Silkroad, Dragonair's inflight magazine.

Citizenship reform is a win-win proposition (Taiwan Today)

In the ROC, as in many other countries, reforming the rules that govern how foreigners can acquire nationality is not a priority for the citizenry. However, Taiwan’s government should consider dropping one of its naturalization requirements that requires applicants to renounce their original nationality.

This would encourage thousands of Antipodeans, Europeans and North Americans already settled in Taiwan to apply for ROC citizenship. Given the nation’s economic difficulties and rapidly aging population, this is something the government surely desires.

Most of these potential citizens, some of whom describe themselves as Taiwanese in their hearts, have called the island home for more than a decade. Many have local spouses and children; more than a few run businesses which employ Taiwanese people.

Not everyone in this category is interested in becoming an ROC citizen, but those who have looked into it describe most of the naturalization requirements as reasonable. Applicants must meet certain residential and financial criteria; there is a Chinese language test, a health examination and a background check. However, one complaint surfaces again and again: that candidates renounce their original nationality. This, they claim, is unfair, illogical and pointless.

It is unfair because the ROC allows those who are already citizens to hold dual nationality. There is no legal obstacle, from the ROC side at least, if a Taiwanese who has become a citizen of another country wishes to retain his or her ROC nationality and travel on an ROC passport. The U.K., U.S. and some other countries allow their citizens to hold two or more nationalities. South Korea and Japan are among those who expressly forbid it. Taiwan’s nationality law is almost unique in being asymmetrical.

If the requirement that those seeking to be naturalized give up their old citizenship was designed to ensure the loyalty of new citizens to the ROC, it is illogical. Those who drafted the rule seem not to have considered that some people already have more than one nationality...

The complete article can be read here.Taiwan's peculiar naturalization rules have been discussed in many parts of the web, notably forumosa.com.

Full steam ahead (Silkroad)

Winter can be chilly in Taipei but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy the great outdoors. For thousands of years, mineral-enriched water has been rising to the surface of hot springs near the city, and at this time of year people warm to the prospect of taking a dip. Renowned for their restorative qualities, Taipei's best springs are a short drive from the city - Xinbeitou, Yangmingshan and Jinshan to the northeast, Wulai to the south...

This article appeared in the January issue of Silkroad, Dragonair's inflight magazine. It's not online. The link goes to an article written by a friend of mine, photojournalist Chris Stowers.

The sound and the fury (Travel in Taiwan)

It had been exhilarating, unlike anything I'd ever experienced. First, the sounds. The eerie creaking of the sedan chair as temple volunteers – like me covered head to toe in protective gear – swung and rocked the icon over a pile of burning spirit money. That was followed by the stewards' whistles as they tried to push the crowd back.

Then the strange silence. When the sedan chair was in position, a few meters in front of a paper-covered frame as big as a truck, the thousands-strong crowd fell silent. Once the technicians had torn off the squares of red paper we could see what lay inside: Row upon row of bottle rockets pointing not at the sky, but at the sedan chair and us in the crowd.

When the fuses were lit, people didn't have to be told to move back. Some tried to take cover behind streetlights; the short cowered behind the tall. The opening shots, however, were into the sky. There were, as you'd expect at a fireworks display, lots of pretty explosions high above the rooftops.

Then rockets came blasting out horizontally. At first they fizzed like tracer bullets over the heads of the audience, but within a second or two the angle of fire was much lower.

Instinctively I turned away from the frame and felt multiple impacts on my back. The physical feeling, I thought at the time, was somewhat like being chased by a stone-throwing mob...

If you go here, you can see the complete article and accompanying photos as they appear in the January-February issue of Travel in Taiwan. The pictures posted above are courtesy of Richard Matheson.

European visitors discover Taiwan (Taiwan Today)

News stories in 2009 about Taiwan's tourism industry focused on two trends: an ability to attract more overseas visitors than ever before, at a time when tourism around the world is still suffering the effects of 2008's financial crisis; and a growing dependence on the mainland Chinese market. Excluding visitors from Hong Kong and Macao, mainland Chinese tourists now account for about one in four of all arrivals.

Taiwan's Tourism Bureau ensured that the arrival Dec. 5 of the year's four-millionth foreign visitor—a 62-year-old Japanese woman called Suzuyo Goto—was a media event. Ever since mainland Chinese tourists started coming in large numbers in the summer of 2008, debate has been raging as to exactly how much benefit they bring to Taiwan's economy.

Another trend has received far less attention. According to statistics posted on the Tourism Bureau's Web site, one of the few markets apart from mainland China to send significantly more tourists to Taiwan in the first 11 months in 2009 than in the same period a year earlier was Europe.

Europe is currently a small market. In November 2009, the 18,165 residents of Europe who entered Taiwan accounted for 4.43 percent of all foreign and overseas Chinese arrivals.

Even though total visitor numbers—including those coming on business, to study or attend a conference, or to visit relatives—from Europe were flat for January to November 2009, tourist arrivals from the continent grew an impressive 18.3 percent year-on-year. It was the fifth consecutive year of growth.

According to the Tourism Bureau, visitors leaving Taiwan in November 2009 had spent an average 6.27 days in the country. Although the bureau does not compile statistics as to the average length of stay of each nationality, it is very likely that the majority of European visitors stayed significantly longer than that. Within the travel industry, it is an axiom that those who travel the furthest stay the longest. There is another reason why a tourist from Europe is likely to stay longer than one from North America or Asia: Europeans tend to have long vacations...

The complete story is here.