For some sushi fans in Taiwan, they don't mind changing their names to 'Salmon' to get an all-you-can-eat meal from a restaurant.
About 150 were said to have taken part in a promotion that's held from March 17 to 18.
The youths also got creative with their new names — Explosive Good Looking Salmon, Meteor Salmon King, and Salmon Fried Rice — among others.
And that's enough for the authorities to plead with them to stop changing their names.
While Taiwan allows people to officially change their names three times, "this kind of name-change not only wastes time but causes unnecessary paperwork," said deputy interior minister Chen Tsung-yen.
Seeing is (not) believing: Motorcycle babe in Japan
A beautiful young woman with a passion for motorcycles may be just every biker's dream.
But many following Japanese motorcycle babe Azusagakuyuki on Twitter were shocked to learn that 'she' is actually a 'he' — and a 50-year-old at that.
The ruse was uncovered after some eagle-eyed fans spotted something unusual in one of the photos on the Twitter account — the rearview mirror of a motorcycle showed a middle-aged man taking the snapshot.
Realising that people wouldn't be interested in a middle-aged man on a motorcycle, he admitted to using FaceApp to make his photos more attractive.
Well, at least those lovely golden locks are real.
Man in Johor Bahru pays RM12, gets whole cinema theatre to himself
It's not every day that you get VIP treatment.
A man in Malaysia recently had the cinema theatre all to himself when he went to watch The Writer's Odyssey.
Facebook user Lee Meng Fei shared that Womei Cineplex's staff arranged for a special screening slot for him after Lee arrived at 11am on March 14, and learnt that the next scheduled timing was at 3pm.
The timing that Lee had missed, 10am, did not have anyone watching, the staff explained.
It's the first time he had experienced this in over 20 years of watching movies, Lee said as he commended the cineplex staff's stellar service.
TAIPEI - A day after confirming the launch of a travel bubble with Palau, Taiwan's health minister said the next on the island's list for a travel bubble would likely be Singapore.
On Thursday (March 18), Taiwanese Health Minister Chen Shih-chung said discussions have begun between Taiwan and Singapore, as the latter has been hoping for Taiwan to match its unilateral measure.
Mr Chen also heads the Central Epidemic Command Centre, which coordinates all strategies related to the coronavirus pandemic.
Transportation Minister Lin Chia-lung on Thursday said that while Japan, South Korea and Vietnam are all discussing the possibilities of travel bubbles with Taiwan, "Singapore is by far the most proactive."
However, Mr Lin declined to reveal more, saying that details are still under discussion.
Taiwan's travel bubble with diplomatic ally Palau will kick off on April 1, allowing two flights of 110 passengers each to fly to Palau. Travellers from both sides are required to be a part of tour groups, and must visit each site and their hotels in a group.
"Taiwan has opted to open a travel bubble with Palau first because Palau has kept its record of zero confirmed Covid-19 cases, so this made policy decisions easier to make," said Mr Chen.
But he admitted that the challenge would be how Taiwan can ensure that its travellers are not bringing the virus into Palau.
"Thankfully, Palau ultimately trusted that Taiwan's screenings are valid and made the travel bubble happen," said the Health Minister.
TAIPEI: A top Taiwanese official issued a plea on Thursday (Mar 18) for people to stop changing their name to "salmon" after dozens made the unusual move to take advantage of a restaurant promotion.
In a phenomenon that has been dubbed "Salmon Chaos" by local media, around 150 mostly young people flocked to government offices in recent days to officially register a change in their name.
The cause of this sudden enthusiasm was a chain of sushi restaurants.
Under the two-day promotion, which ended on Thursday, any customer whose ID card contained "gui yu" - the Chinese characters for salmon - would be entitled to an all-you-can-eat sushi meal along with five friends.
Taiwan allows people to officially change their name up to three times.
But Taiwanese officials were not amused.
"This kind of name change not only wastes time but causes unnecessary paperwork," deputy interior minister Chen Tsung-yen told reporters as he urged the public to "cherish administrative resources".
"I hope everyone can be more rational about it," he added.
Local media ran interviews with people who took advantage of the promotion.
"I just changed my name this morning to add the characters 'bao cheng gui yu' and we already ate more than NT$7,000 (US$235)" worth, a college student surnamed Ma told TVBS news channel in southern Kaohsiung city.
Roughly translated, Ma's new moniker means "Explosive Good-looking Salmon".
"I've changed my first name to 'salmon' and two of my friends also did," a woman surnamed Tung told SET TV. "We'll just change our names back afterwards."
Other salmon-themed names reported in local media included "Salmon Prince", "Meteor Salmon King" and "Salmon Fried Rice".
The United Daily News reported that one resident decided to add a record 36 new characters to his name, most of them seafood-themed, including the characters for abalone, crab and lobster.
HONG KONG: Hong Kong health authorities have defended the practice of physically restraining some babies and children to beds in COVID-19 isolation wards after criticism built over the treatment of families under the city's strict anti-virus measures.
Despite being one of the most densely packed cities in the world, Hong Kong has kept infections low thanks to some of the most stringent quarantine measures in the world, recording about 11,000 infections and 200 deaths since the pandemic began.
Anyone who tests positive for the coronavirus is immediately taken to isolation wards - regardless of whether they are symptomatic or not - and those deemed "close contacts" are sent to mandatory government quarantine camps.
Almost all arrivals into the city must also quarantine in dedicated hotels for three weeks.
The measures have helped curb infections and have been in place for much of the past year, largely without complaint.
But there has been growing pushback in recent weeks after an outbreak hit neighbourhoods favoured by wealthier - and more politically connected - white-collar locals and foreigners.
Social media groups have since filled with comments by families taken to isolation wards or mandatory quarantine camps.
Their complaints include allegations that some parents have been separated from their children, ordered not to breastfeed babies and that some infants have even been tied to beds to stop them moving around.
The allegations have led to a series of statements this week from health authorities defending their policies, including over the use of restraints.
"Generally speaking, the hospital will only consider the application of physical restraint on paediatric patients for the safety and well-being of the patient," the Hospital Authority said in a statement late on Wednesday (Mar 17).
"Appropriate and prior consent will be sought from the parents or guardians," it added.
The Hospital Authority added parents who test negative would usually be allowed to accompany infected children on isolation wards if there is space.
In recent days, the consulates of Switzerland, Britain and the United States have all expressed concerns over how Hong Kong's tough anti-virus measures were impacting families, including concerns that parents had about being separated from children.
The US consulate temporarily closed earlier this week after two staff members tested positive and were sent to an isolation ward.
Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam confirmed special permission had been granted to allow their children to join them instead of being sent into quarantine.
Hong Kong's treatment of mothers during the pandemic has previously come under scrutiny.
Last year, a group of expecting parents fought an ultimately successful campaign to allow birth partners into the delivery room after they were banned during a spike in coronavirus cases.
World Health Organization guidelines recommend birth partners be present, even during the pandemic, and that infected mothers continue breastfeeding their babies.
While authorities relented on birth partners, Hong Kong continues to tell mothers not to breastfeed in isolation wards.
Authorities have also defended the use of mandatory quarantine camps, arguing most of Hong Kong's notoriously cramped apartments are too small for families to self-isolate safely.
WASHINGTON - The United States sanctioned an additional two dozen Chinese and Hong Kong officials on Tuesday (March 16) over China’s overhaul of Hong Kong’s electoral system.
This comes as American and Chinese envoys were due to meet in Alaska for first talks since President Joe Biden took office.
Beijing’s move unilaterally undermines Hong Kong’s electoral system and is in breach of its obligations to uphold the territory’s autonomy, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement announcing the punitive action.
The electoral reforms were approved at a meeting of China’s top legislature last Thursday and are the latest in Beijing’s crackdown on political freedoms and dissent in Hong Kong following the citywide democracy protests of 2019 that turned violent.
“This action further undermines the high degree of autonomy promised to people in Hong Kong and denies Hong Kongers a voice in their own governance, a move that the United Kingdom has declared to be a breach of the Sino-British Joint Declaration,” said Mr Blinken.
Under America’s Hong Kong Autonomy Act, the State Department is required to identify individuals responsible for eroding the city’s political freedoms.
Tuesday’s update brings the total number of individuals sanctioned for reducing Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy to 34.
They include 14 vice chairs of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee and officials in the Hong Kong Police Force’s National Security Division, the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, and the Office for Safeguarding National Security.
Foreign financial institutions that knowingly conduct significant transactions with them are subject to sanctions.
“The United States stands united with our allies and partners in speaking out for the rights and freedoms of people in Hong Kong, and we will respond when the PRC fails to meet its obligations,” said Mr Blinken, using the formal name of the People’s Republic of China.
He and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan are set to meet top Chinese diplomat Yang Jiechi and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Anchorage, Alaska on Thursday.
The US has said it will raise its concerns at the high-level talks over the following: China’s undermining of Hong Kong autonomy, its repression of Muslims in Xinjiang, economic coercion of Australia and aggressive activity in the Taiwan Strait.
Tuesday’s sanctions come as Mr Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin arrived in South Korea - after a stop in Japan - as part of their first Asia tour to reinvigorate and rally Asian alliances to counter a rising China.
BANGKOK: Chinese factories torched as mainland workers hunker down under martial law – Beijing is being pulled into the ulcerous crisis in Myanmar, an unravelling country it had carefully stitched into its big plans for Asia.
During a January 2020 visit to Myanmar, Chinese President Xi Jinping elevated the Southeast Asian neighbour to "country of shared destiny" status, Beijing's highest diplomatic stripe.
The aim was to nudge Myanmar decisively towards China – and away from the United States – and drive through projects worth billions of dollars under the Belt and Road Initiative, including an oil and gas pipeline and a port to the Indian Ocean.
Fast-forward one year, and the strategically located country has tipped into bloody chaos after a coup took out Aung San Suu Kyi's government.
The massive pro-democracy movement which has since unfurled accuses China of waving through the generals' power grab and trading Myanmar's freedom for its own strategic gain.
As Myanmar security forces kill protesters – nearly 150 so far – Beijing faces a dilemma: Back the men with guns or side with an increasingly anti-China public.
"China doesn't really care who is in government, but it wants a government that will protect Chinese projects and interests," said Richard Horsey, a Myanmar political analyst.
But "this is a military that Beijing doesn't think can bring stability ... and the more China tries to build a relationship with that regime, the more the public will be put offside".
Chinese businesses were closed on Tuesday in the flashpoint areas, leaving workers holed up in a "hostile environment" cloaked by martial law, according to a representative of a garment factory in Yangon's Shwepyitar township.
Analysts say ripples of anti-China sentiment in Myanmar could become waves across a Southeast Asian region suspicious of Beijing's reach. (Photo: AFP/STR)
"All Chinese staff are staying inside the factory ... some police have also been stationed there," the spokesperson told AFP in Beijing, requesting anonymity.
Ominous commentaries have since seeped out of Chinese media with one saying Beijing could be prodded "into taking more drastic action ... if the authorities cannot deliver and the chaos continues".
Twitter accounts of Myanmar pro-democracy groups allege – without offering clear proof – that the army carried out the factory attacks to justify a crackdown which left dozens of protesters dead.
Ripples of anti-China sentiment in Myanmar could become waves across a Southeast Asian region suspicious of China's reach, influence and penchant for debt-trap diplomacy to get Belt and Road Initiative projects over the line.
"Any broad-based popular uprising against Chinese interests can be contagious and percolate anti-China grievances through Cambodia, Laos and elsewhere," said Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a professor of political science at Thailand's Chulalongkorn University.
"China had figured out this piece (Myanmar) of its geostrategic puzzle," but now there is "no easy play ahead".
Protesters in front of the Chinese embassy in Yangon on Thursday, Feb 11, 2021. (Photo: Naung Kham)
In Myanmar, public anger at Chinese projects has ended major investments before.
Construction of the US$3.6 billion Myitsone dam in northern Kachin State was spiked a decade ago after widespread opposition, while the voracious Chinese market for rare wood, jade and rubies is routinely blamed by the public for driving the resource grab inside Myanmar.
But alongside economic interests, China also craves the legitimacy of global leadership and "can't turn a blind eye to a 'dark dictatorship'" on its doorstep, Thitinan added.
Beijing enjoys exceptional leverage over Myanmar, yet has so far refused to label the military action a coup.
It is the country's top foreign investor and supplies the Myanmar army with military hardware.
Observers say it also maintains alliances with ethnic militias on the long China border, who have been fighting the army for decades.
Protesters in front of the Chinese embassy in Yangon on Thursday, Feb 11, 2021. (Photo: Naung Kham)
"BACKBONE OF DISRUPTION"
China has denied any advance knowledge of the Feb 1 coup and its official position so far has been to call for de-escalation while supporting "all sides" in Myanmar's post-coup crisis.
On Mar 11, it signed a United Nations Security Council statement strongly condemning violence against protesters – a rare act by Beijing, which has previously shielded Myanmar at the UN over alleged genocide against the Rohingya.
Still, China remains a potential referee, said Soe Myint Aung, a political analyst from the Yangon Center for Independent Research.
"China can play a direct or indirect mediating role for a negotiated compromise," he said.
But first, it will have to chip back at the anger and suspicion in Myanmar.
Anti-Beijing placards are now common at protests, where rumours of Chinese military flights bounce around, while the Internet grumbles with memes urging a boycott of everything Chinese, from computer games to Huawei phones and TikTok.
"China babysits the Tatmadaw, it is the backbone of disruption in our country," said one pro-democracy supporter in Yangon, requesting anonymity.
"China has dug up our jade and jewels, taken our oil and now it wants to cut our country in half with its pipeline."
