Category Archives: Taipei

Taming of the Shrew: the Hakka musical

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What’s being touted as the first Broadway-style Hakka musical will open in October at Taipei’s National Theater. The play, “Fú chūn jiànǚ” (to give the Mandarin title) (「福春嫁女」, My Daughter’s Wedding), is based on Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew.

sources and further reading:

Taipei’s new busstop signs

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white on gray busstop sign reading 'Tianmu New Village', with Chinese charactersThe Taipei City Government has begun to replace busstop signs throughout the city.

The color scheme of the new signs, however, is a poor choice because white letters against a gray background offer little contrast, especially at night.

Here, for example, is are daytime and nighttime shots of the same stop, taken from different angles.

shot of the busstop signs during the day nighttime shot of the busstop sign, showing the low level of contrast at night

The stop is not lit well, so the nighttime photo had to be taken with a flash. So this photo, though the focus came out a little fuzzy, represents an improvement over what people would normally see at night.

Two weeks ago I wrote the Taipei City Government’s Department of Transportation for clarification about the policies associated with this signage but have not received an answer. Everyone I have spoken with in that office has been friendly; but the system is unfortunately still stuck in its ways.

At least InTerCaPiTaLiZaTion doesn’t seem to be in effect. And the new style for displaying bus routes does provide more information to those who cannot read Chinese characters.

List of busstops for the Taipei 220 bus, as given on the new style (spring 2007) of busstop signage. Click for larger image.
(click for larger image)

Taipei MRT stations — a list giving Hanyu Pinyin with tone marks

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outline map of the Taipei MRT systemWhen Taipei’s MRT system — which is mainly a subway system but which also has elevated portions and even sections at ground level — opened, most of its signage was in bastardized Wade-Giles, with the “English” pronunciation of the station names broadcast in the cars resembling a hideous parody of the speech of an especially clueless foreign visitor. Fortunately, the romanization was switched to Hanyu Pinyin and the English announcements were re-recorded to give pronunciations that much more accurately reflected the Mandarin station names.

Unfortunately, English announcements have been added in recent months that feature a high-pitched voice that is probably intended to be ke’ai (“cute”) but which is actually cloying. These must die, die, die! But I’m straying from the main topic.

Anyway, the MRT’s current signage, nicely designed as most of it is, does not give any tone marks. Nor does it provide Pinyin for the station names that are translated into English. And there are also a few mistakes that really need to be corrected in the official forms of the names.

So, I have updated and added some minor corrections to the lists I put up long ago on my first Web site, Romanization.com. The new versions, here on Pinyin Info, are here: Taipei MRT stations in Chinese characters, Hanyu Pinyin, and some English.

lane – 4 = street + $

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A neighborhood along a small lane in Taipei has found a change in the name of their street highly profitable. What was once Jilong Road Section 3 Lane 4 is now Dunnan Street. The area’s lǐzhǎng (neighborhood head) worked for three years to get the change approved.

Although the story below doesn’t mention this, the television report I saw on this had several people in the neighborhood stating that a prime consideration for them was the elimination of the dreaded number four from their address.

Another factor in the boost in the price of real estate there is the new name, Dunnan Street (Dūnnán Jiē / 敦南街), which (intentionally) closely resembles the name of one of one of Taipei’s priciest roads: the nearby Dunhua South Road (Dūnhuà Nánlù / 敦化南路).

Qiángbì shàng xiě zhe Jīlóng Lù 3 duàn 4 xiàng, dàn pángbiān de lùpái quèshì dàdà de “Dūnnán Jiē” 3 ge zì, méicuò zhè tiáo xiàngzi bànnián qián zhèngshì gǎimíng jiào Dūnnán Jiē. Dūnnán Jiē zhùhù: “yěyǒu gǎi Jīlóng Lù, yěyǒu gǎi Hépíng Dōnglù, xiànzài gǎi.. ‘Dūnnán Jiē,’ luànqībāzāo.”

Bùguǎn zhīqián shì jǐ xiàng jǐ hào, zài lǐzhǎng 3 nián de bēnzǒu xià, xiànzài quánbù gǎimíng jiào Dūnnán Jiē, ménpái yī huàn, shēnjià mǎshàng bù yīyàng, fáng zhòng yèzhě yùgū měi píng 30 wàn de hángqíng, tiào dào 40 wàn, huànsuàn yī hù 30 píng de fángzi, xiàn zhǎng 300 wàn. Fáng zhòng yèzhě Yáng Kūn-zhōng: “Yībān rén de kèbǎn yìnxiàng, yǒu gēn Dūnhuà Nánlù yǒuguān de, fángjià kěnéng huì bǐjiào hǎo yīdiǎn.” TVBS jìzhě Gǔ Cǎi-yàn: “Zhèlǐ jiùshì Dūnnán Jiē le, hòumian zhèige háo zhái, píngjūn yī píng yào 5-60 wàn, kējì shǒufù Guō Tái-míng, yīkǒuqì, céngjīng zài zhèbiān mǎi le 4 hù fángzi.” Jiù lián guō tái míng yě céngjīng shì Dūnnán Jiē de wūzhǔ, dēngjì zài tā hé qīzi de míngxià. Dūnnán Jiē zhùhù: “(shénme) Guō Tái-míng, (zěnyàng) màidiào le ba.” Bùguò gǎimíng jiào Dūnnán Jiē zhīhòu, bùyòng dǎzháo diànzǐ dàhēng línjū de zhāopai, fángjià yǐjing yǒu lā tái de xiàoguǒ, zhǐnéng shuō jiào shénme lù míng, zhēn de yǒu chà.

source: Jīlóng Lù xiǎoxiàng gǎimíng “Dūnnán Jiē” — fángjià dà zhǎng (基隆路小巷改名「敦南街」　房價大漲), TVBS, January 20, 2007

Taiwan license plates and English

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Taipei City councilors holding up signs resembling license plates with funny English: PIG-456 and EGG-008It seems that ridding Taiwan license plates of the dreaded number 4 wasn’t enough. A Taipei city councilor, Tim Chang (Cháng Zhōngtiān / 常中天) of the New Party, suggested last year that “drivers are making an ass of themselves” if they drive around with license plates that spell out something that is insulting, ill-omened, or funny in English. He called for such unfortunate combinations to be filtered out in advance and for motorists to be allowed to change their plate numbers.

As the Taipei Times article on this notes, “License plates in Taiwan are made up of two alphabetic letters and four digits for cars, while license plates on scooters have three letters and three digits.”

People in Taiwan can change to another random plate number for NT$1,250 (approx. US$38), while personalized license plates cost at least NT$3,000.

source: Lucky number plate? Not for this ASS, Taipei Times, August 23, 2006

venerating old four-eyes

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traditional image of Cang Jie, depicting him with four eyes

Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou spent part of his final day in office at a ceremony in honor of Cang Jie (Cāng Jié / 倉頡 / 仓颉), the mythical inventor of Chinese characters. According to Ma, this was the first time in history that such a formal ceremony has been held for Cang Jie.

The ceremony was part of a plan to promote the use of traditional Chinese characters (something that doesn’t need promoting in Taiwan itself) and to make Taipei the world’s “capital of traditional Chinese characters.” Perhaps Hong Kong, which is a much larger city, will be disqualified by the World Capital Police for now having too many simplified characters here and there.

Taipei officials also appear to view traditional Chinese characters as a potential tourist draw. (They could be a draw for foreigners wanting to learn Mandarin — if only the government would clarify its rules and make it easier for people to study here.) Officials, however, seem to be thinking more of potential tourists from China, always a good group to keep in mind. Nevertheless, Taipei wants the tourists on its own terms and is prepared to dole out some tough love. The city, according to Ma — who, as someone in the final hours of his time in office, wouldn’t seem to have much authority on this — will “continue to use traditional Chinese characters in the tourism pamphlets and maps that it publishes so that the Chinese tourists will have an opportunity to learn about the characters and appreciate their beauty.”

Doesn’t Taipei think PRC tourists would get more than enough opportunities here in Taiwan to see traditional Chinese characters without making it harder for them to read tourist maps and tourist brochures? After all, even the DPP-run central government, which can hardly be accused of being friendly to China, has allowed government brochures and Web sites in simplified characters.

sources:

Taiwan’s “more amiable English services”

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logo to promote Taiwan's English-language environment; an image of the island of Taiwan appears with a smile and a large A+, with a globe in the backgroundWith the end of the year approaching, it is once again time for Taiwan to tout the quality of the island’s English environment by putting together a “carnival” and tossing online a website in awkward English.

Perhaps word got back to the powers that be that the English in last year’s site was bad beyond belief, because this year’s site to promote English has largely left out use of that particular language! Much of the English that is there, while not so howlingly inept as that in last year’s site, is still awkward, clichéd bullshit. Here’s an example:

The Logo features close affiliation between the globe and the smiling Taiwan, symbolizing Taiwan’s linkage to the world. The expression of “English-friendly Environment” that circles the globe and the sign of “A+” on Taiwan fully convey the ideas of creating a quality and friendly internationalized environment, as well as broadening the scope of social participation. To advance Taiwan’s connection with the world, and provide better services to foreign friends who visit Taiwan, the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission of the Executive Yuan is going to use the Logo as the basis to design a emblem that identifies a quality English-friendly environment, which will be advertised and promoted through a certificating mechanism, in order to increase the number of popular locations that offer quality English services, so that foreign friends can not only easily identify those locations but also get access to more amiable English services.

One of the few parts of the site with any useful information is the page of “Important Achievements of Creating an English Living Environment.” Some of the things listed there even are important achievements. Nonetheless, Taiwan has many fundamental problems with its approach to English — and to romanization, too. One of the biggest of these problems is that English and romanization are treated as last-minute details of little importance.

I could go on and on about this; but it’s all too depressing.

source: 2006 English Carnival

Chinglish International Airport revisited

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I’ve just heard from a well-placed source that the official English name for Taiwan’s main international airport, formerly Chiang Kai-shek International Airport, has been finalized. The form “Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport” will not be used after all. Instead, it will be “Taipei/Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport.”

Huh?

I’m still seeking confirmation.