The Taipei Times ran an article on April 1st that the two pandas (a gift from the Chinese government) which arrived last December were actually “brown forest bears that had been dyed to create the panda’s distinctive black-and-white appearance.”

It’s said that a zoologist “became suspicious when the pandas began to spend almost all of their waking hours having sex. Pandas are notorious for their low libidos, which make them difficult to breed in captivity…”

The (real) zoo officials think that the prank was not funny at all, as the zoo was flooded with phone calls from as far as Japan, UK and Canada to ask about the matter. The zoo has sent in letters to ask the news portal to clear up the matter.

I’m surprised that people were fooled by the prank; isn’t the sex story a blatantly obvious joke? Well, obviously not obvious enough for some.

Taipei Zoo unhappy with April Fools’ panda prank from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Cows… CowParade Taipei 2009 (Image by Dicky)

Taipei City is the 65th venue for the parade; the exhibition has just ended in early February… a pretty fitting event to welcome the Chinese New Year of Ox.

CowParade Taipei 2009 from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Taiwanese President with the first group of panda’s visitors (Image from Xinhuanet)

The pandas, named Tuan-Tuan and Yuan-Yuan (Tuan-Yuan means Reunion in Chinese), arrived in Taiwan in late December 2008 and underwent a month long quarantine before being officially introduced to the public. A group of 500 orphans and underprivileged kids were the first group of visitors.

The panda diplomacy is seen as a huge leap of relationship between the two political entities. China first suggested the donation in 2005 but was rejected by Taiwan’s leadership back then, but the idea was embraced in 2008 with the change of Taiwanese presidency.

Tuan-Yuan pandas meet visitors in Taipei from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Update – A new video is added to Korean girls group SNSD’s Goobne Chicken commercial.

Japan – Hiroshi Tamaki, Aoi Miyazaki (pic) and Ringo Shiina top an annual list for celebrities who look best in kimonos [Tokyograph]

Philippines – Chinese celebrity couple Dicky Cheung and Jess Zhang is getting married in Philippines on Monday (Jan 12) [Stareastasia]

S Korea – Actor Song Il-gook was temporarily unconscious after felling off his horse last Tuesday (Jan 6) while filming for drama “The Kingdom of the Winds” [Hanfever]

S Korea – Bae Yong Joon and Park Jin Young, two influential personalities of Korean entertainment industry, have come together to form a new company which aim at producing new stars of the future [Coolsmurf]

S Korea – “Devil” co-stars Joo Ji-hoon and Shin Mina reunite in “Kitchen” [K-popped]

S Korea – A fan made video showing his/her selection of top 20 K-pop songs in 2008; a bit biased, but pretty cool… [Youtube]

Taiwan – Boyband Fahrenheit promotes album in Ximending, Taipei [Stareastasia]

Entertainment roundup (January 12, 2009) from YeinJee's Asian Journal

“Fated to Love You” won the best drama series as expected; Ariel Lin was crowned the best actress (in drama series) with “They Kiss Again”; while Jacky Wu and A-Ya claimed the best variety show hosts award with “Guess Guess Guess”.

Other winners are relatively unknown; couldn’t recognise most of the names to be frank. Sharing a few red carpet pics (from Sohu) instead…

The emcees – Patty Ho, Jacky Wu and Tian Xin

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Golden Bell Awards 2008 from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Ximending, Taipei

Ximending is one of the most bustling areas in Taipei with a mixture of new and old culture.

You can find the latest trends and hype in Ximending… fashion, books, entertainment, cosplay, games etc; and on contrary also home to some of the oldest shops and restaurants in Taipei.

Ximending is also a popular place for celebrities to hold fans meeting or small concerts.

Ximending in a relatively quiet night (Image by Kok)

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Amazing Race Asia 3 – Ep 4 & 5 – Taipei from YeinJee's Asian Journal

The plane I was boarding from Kuala Lumpur to Taipei

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Taiwan visit 2008 – random photos (1) from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Taiwanese pop star Jay Chou was the biggest winner, bagging five awards, including song of the year and best composer awards.

Malaysian Gary Chau and Singaporean Tanya Chua claimed the best male/female Mandarin singers title respectively (pic); Tanya also bagged the best producer award.

Taiwanese band Sodagreen won the best group/band award; while Hong Kong star Karen Mok produced the biggest surprise of the night by winning album of the year award.

The awards presentation was shown live at my TV channel… but it was so so boring. The red carpet sucked, the hostesses sucked and the performers talked too much.

The funniest thing is seeing the celebrities pretending to be interested with what was happening on stage when most of them were probably bored to the max.

19th Golden Melody Awards from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Tourists who volunteered for the event came from various countries, including Japan, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong etc.

The world record attempt at Taipei Arena, Taiwan (Image from Huaxia)

The attempt was organised by Taiwan Tourism Bureau to promote health tourism Reflexology is a popular practice in Taiwan for relaxation and improving general health; the activity is gaining popularity among foreign tourists in recent years.

There were no previous attempts made on this category; Guinness have set the requirement to have at least 400 participants with treatment for at least five minutes on each foot… which were met by the folks without much sweat.

World record for simultaneous foot massage from YeinJee's Asian Journal

Jiufen was given a new life in 1989 when award winning movie “A City of Sadness” (directed by Hou Hsiao Hsien and starred Tony Leung etc.) was filmed there. Jiufen has become a popular tourist spot since then and a favourite weekend getaway location for Taipei folks.

The most iconic spot in Jiufen, made famous by A City of Sadness

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Vintage town of Jiufen, Taiwan from YeinJee's Asian Journal

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Shilin Night Market, Taipei, Taiwan from YeinJee's Asian Journal

I always thought that the business idea won’t last long; but with the huge exposures by media and bloggers… seems that these eateries are becoming a bizarre food icon from Taiwan, something like fugu in Japan and live octopus in Korea.

Below are pictures from Modern Toilet, a food chain that operates 12 toilet themed restaurants in Taiwan; these pics are from its outlet in Shilin, Taipei…

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Taiwan Modern Toilet Restaurant from YeinJee's Asian Journal