You may have noticed a severe uptick in the use of chicken and duck emojis in recent days all over social media:
Why you might ask? 雞 jī and 鴨 yā put together are a homonym of the word 羈押 jīyā for “arrest/detention” relating to Ko Wen-je’s much anticipated arrested (more details here by the brilliant Brian Hioe) for corruption related to the Core Pacific City Mall project.
Facebook user postIG user post
The first use of the punny homonym is reported to have been the following Facebook Post by 農傳媒 (an agricultural news agency):
They used the caption 「雞鴨來了」（Chicken and duck are here! / 羈押來了 The arrest has come）to introduce a new chicken and duck breeding scheme in the wake of Ko’s arrest.
Xiaola style Cantonese biandang stores have also jumped on the opportunity by selling chicken and duck biandangs according to one of my colleagues.
Although I was pleasantly surprised with the amount of small shops and restaurants that accepted credit cards on a recent trip to Japan (albeit I was only in Tokyo), there’s always a fear that you won’t have enough cash for your trip and you’ll have to withdraw from an ATM at extortionate rates.
I just discovered (too late for my trip) that ESun bank have a tie-up ongoing with Japan’s PayPay (equivalent to Jiekou and LinePay) with suspended international transaction fees through December 31 of this year. To use it, you have to download the ESun Wallet app and tie it to one of your ESun accounts or credit cards. When you’ve done that, you can just hit the QR code scanner, and you’ll see PayPay listed among accepted payment vendors.
Note: the website and app both say you should present your QR code to the vendor, but mine doesn’t show in this section, only in the QR code scanner section.
Most of the restaurants and shops that didn’t accept credit card, did accept PayPay, but I really was surprised at how many places take credit cards (especially given that most of the Google/Trip Advisor reviews specifically stated that they didn’t).
UPDATE:
Apparently 街口 and PX pay also offer this service and the discount (until December 31 of 2024). Also includes returns on transactions):
The general sense of security you feel in Taiwan can lead to you being a little careless with your possessions, expecting them to miraculously reappear before your eyes with little to no effort on your behalf. While this sometimes does happen, what do you do if it doesn’t?
Given that I’m no stranger to misplacing things, I’ve created a short guide below.
Losing stuff in taxi cabs
Do you know the registration/license plate number of the cab?
→ No. Walk into your local police station (or one in the area near where you got into or out of the taxi) and tell them what you’ve lost and give them an approximate time frame for when you got into or out of the taxi and where (“Yes, officer, it was between 11pm and 5am somewhere in the Greater Taipei area.”)
– TOP TIP: if you were too drunk to remember clearly, use Google maps to track your movements and check whether you paid by EasyCard (learn how to use your phone as your Easycard here) and there should be a time stamp by the transaction.
They have a CCTV system that can access footage from most cameras across the city, so you can scroll through the footage (the bits highlighted in red indicate movement detected) quickly until you spot yourself embarking or disembarking from the taxi, and you should be able to spot the license number. With the license number in hand, you can safely change your answer to yes.
TOP TIP If you’re visiting a police station near where you got out of the taxi, it’s quite likely that the driver of the cab has already handed it in by the time you reach the police station (presumably rather hungover and disheveled). So be sure to ask the police officer at reception to check if it’s already been handed in (they might not have been on shift at that point).
→ Yes. Depending on where you are in the country, call one of the numbers below to get in touch with the either the city government police team or the governing authority for taxis and give them the registration/license plate number and they should get in touch with the driver on your behalf:
Taipei City 臺北市政府警察局交通警察大隊：02-2311-6409、02-2375-2100 臺北市政府交通局：02-2725-6888 臺北市公共運輸處：02-2759-2677
Taoyuan Airport 桃園機場計程車：03-398-5558
Taichung City 臺中市政府交通局：04-2228-9111 交通部公路總局臺中區監理所：04-2691-3464
Tainan City 臺南市政府交通局：06-295-3221
Kaohsiung City 高雄市政府交通局：07-222-6816
If you’re unsuccessful in the above endeavors, you can also contact the police broadcasting station, which will broadcast what you’ve lost to all taxi drivers. The lost and found number in Taipei is 02-2388-0066 and you can find the numbers for other regions of Taiwan here. The Taipei branch also has a website and office, where taxi drivers will sometimes drop off items.
I found this Ministry of National Defense poster in the run up to the 7th National Senior High School Honor Guard Competition at Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall (Liberty Square) kind of interesting, in that it incorporates some Japanese in the form of a pun.
The main slogan on the sign reads:
愛國儀級棒
Patriotism is the best!
This is a bit of word play on the Japanese term いちばん（一番） meaning “the best” or “number one”. This is normally transliterated into Mandarin as 「一級棒」, but in the sign, the 「一」 (yī/one) has been substituted for the 「儀」（yí/ceremonial) of “Honor Guard” （儀隊）.
I know I have a penchant for over-interpreting, and this is likely an attempt (alongside the manga-esque figures on the poster) at appealing to manga-loving Taiwanese teens, BUT… this does seem pretty layered.
The ROC Armed Forces have a traditional association with the 外省/waisheng (post-1949 Chinese immigrant population), who often exhibit anti-Japanese sentiment (see previous blog post here). This is because the army had fought the Japanese in China prior to fleeing to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-Shek (a memorial to whom is actually facing this sign). Perhaps then the younger generations within the Ministry of National Defense and the ROC Army are less hung up on these issues and are appealing to a broader church? (This is the over-interpreting part).
Incidentally, the memorial has been subject to inter-party squabbles for quite some time. The square was originally called Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, but in 2007, amid objections from KMT Mayor Hau Lung-pin (郝龍斌) and ex-mayor and then presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), the inscription on the iconic arches was changed from 「大中至正」(a classical Chinese reference which contains 「中正」, one of the many names taken by Chiang Kai-shek) to 「自由廣場」. However, as the KMT were still in control of the Taipei City Government at the time, the MRT and the general public continue to refer to it as Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall. The name of the hall itself was also changed briefly from 2007-2009 to “National Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall” before changing back. The current Mayor of Taipei, Wayne Chiang （蔣萬安） is believed to be the great-grandson of Chiang Kai-shek, so this thorny tale is sure to continue into the future.
Found this beautifully-crafted note in one of the toilets at the Red House (紅樓), part of its power is that it’s actually stuck on the door in a way that seals the door shut:
This cubicle has been blocked again, again, again, again and again, due to inappropriate things being thrown into the toilet bowl. Can those special people that are drawn to use this toilet be more careful and not accidentally dispose of any personal item that’s not piss or shit into the toilet bowl, including toilet paper, wet wipes, condoms, underwear, stockings, trash bags, dental floss, cotton buds, lip stick and pens!
Thanks for understanding how hard our cleaning ladies are working.
This cubicle is under renovation until June 22
The font size seems to underline the sarcastic tone of the note and the combination of a polite register along with vulgar language. To be fair, that toilet seems to attract a lot of strange people.
The post office got a new system recently, which is aimed at streamlining the process for sending parcels overseas. The system isn’t the most user-friendly, however, and my colleague has complained about having to fill out the form over and over again due to the unclear instructions.
I have the 2021 version of the list of countries that require this new QR code process:
If you’ve been outside of Taiwan anytime in the past year, you’ll notice a substantial difference in masking practices. In the US and the UK, I rarely saw anyone in a mask, but in Taiwan, the mask industry is still going strong. As I was walking back home one day, however, I spotted this random sticker on a lamppost, suggesting someone is not happy with the lasting fetish with face masking in Taiwan:
It reads:
「口罩臉 不好看 打扮病夫 很詭異」
“A masked face is not attractive Dressing up like a sick old lady is very weird”
To be fair, for the past couple of months, it feels like the entire city of Taipei has had a cough or a cold and do you really care whether other people wear masks or not?
What do you think? Time to expose our chins to the gods?
Just as in English advertising you’ll see some letters substituted with images, the same happens in Chinese, and you’ll often see parts of characters replaced. I’ve captured a few examples below, but let me know if you spot any yourself!
In what we’ll call questionable taste. A kid with an open mouth takes the place of the 「口」 component of 「吃」 in this sign (and yes, 吃 has most if not all of the connotations of the word “eat” in English). It reads 「吃我 早午餐」 (Eat Me – Brunch).
This congee shop has creatively substituted the central 「米」 component of 「粥」 for a stack of steaming bowls of congee.
Although I dabbled in my youth, I’m pretty much a post-Queen’s Gambit chess player. I’ve really gotten into it over the past few years, although I’m still at around 1000 ELO (Daily), so just thought I’d provide a bit of info on the scene in Taiwan and some useful vocab in Mandarin.
Most of my interactions have been online, but there are some meet-ups in Taipei, also happy to play over-the-board with anyone in and around Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall over lunch times.
If you want to play for Taiwan, you can join Team Taiwan on Chess.com (you can only play for one country at a time, but they’re flexible about the flag displayed in your profile). Also, feel free to add me and play me.
Although Xiangqi (象棋) is more popular here, there is a growing community of chess players too, including stand-up comic, presenter and podcaster Brian Tseng. He’s yet to disclose his Chess.com username, but he’s mentioned chess a good few times in his podcast, particularly in the King’s Gambit (王翼棄兵) episode, where he talks about applying the lessons of chess to everyday life.
You can find some cool stickers on Instagram, by searching for “rvdtor.”
