Just stumbled across this thread which seems to have been resurrected a few days ago and read the whole of it. Wow… some people have amazingly strong feelings about how the Taiwanese people ought to write their own place names when using the Latin alphabet, and it’s quite entertaining to see those efforts to straightjacket Taiwan’s place names into the pronunciation of Mandarin Chinese. (Surely everybody knows that most of the place names in Taiwan have nothing to do with the culture that brought Mandarin Chinese to the country but derive from the native people of the country, from southern (coastal) Chinese immigrants, and in a few cases (especially in the eastern areas) from Japanese settlement names.)
Anyway, discrepancies between the pronunciation of place names and whatever the official language of the day may be are common all over the world - and if, for example, there were any foreigners here in Okinawa who would insist that all the latinized forms (roma-ji) of our place names be written to match the Japanese standard reading (pronunciation) of those kanji, we would laugh at them - it’s none of their business, to say the least.
Some illustrations from Okinawa:
東風平: in Japanese it might be “higashi-kaze-hira” or (in the “Chinese” reading) “toh-fuu-hei”; and in Okinawa we say “Ko-chin-da”
勢理客: in Japanese (in the “Chinese” reading) it could be “sei-ri-kyaku”; and we say “jittchaku”
保栄茂 : in Japanese (in the “Chinese” reading) it could be “ho-ei-mo”; and we call the place “bin”
南風原: in Japanese it could be “minami-kaze-hara” or (in the “Chinese” reading) “nan-puu-gen”; and for us it’s “ha-ei-baru”
(Of course, those “non-standard” readings can be explained in linguistic terms, but that is irrelevant for the average person.)
Similarly, there is nothing strange about the name of the city widely known as “Keelung” (基隆, previously 雞籠). In POJ it is written “Ke-lang5” - a pronunciation that is apparently derived from a native language - and that sure is closer to “Keelung” than to “Jilong” (hanyu pinyin: ji1 long2). Even in Japanese it is called “kii-ron” or “kii-run” (depending on the skill of the speaker, a sound between “o” and “u” might be used) and not “ki-roh”, which would be the standard reading of those characters.
As it happens, Wikipedia has a decent explanation:
[quote]The city of Keelung was known as Kelung or Keelung to the Western world during the 19th century. However, the Taiwanese people have long called the city Kelang (Taiwanese language POJ: Ke-lâng, Chinese characters: 雞籠, meaning rooster cage).
It has been proposed that the name Keelung was derived from the local mountain that took the shape of a rooster cage. However, it is more probable that the name was derived from the first inhabitants of the region, as are the names of many other Taiwanese cities. In this case, the Ketagalan people were the first inhabitants, and early Han settlers probably approximated “Ketagalan” with “Ke-lâng” (phonetics of the Southern Min Language).
In 1875, during Qing Dynasty rule, the Chinese characters of the name were changed to the more auspicious 基隆 (pinyin: Jīlóng; POJ: Ki-liông, meaning prosperous base). In Mandarin, probably the working language of Chinese government at the time, both the old and new names were likely pronounced Kīlóng (hence “Keelung”). Under Japanese rule (1895-1945), the city was known to the west by Japanese readings of the new name: Kirun, Kiirun or Kīrun. In Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of the Republic of China, the new name is read Jīlóng, although the locals have continued to call the city Ke-lâng throughout changes in government.[/quote]
So, never mind how the name is read in Mandarin, the locals don’t call it “Jilong” (it’s safe to take a hint from the city’s own website: klcg.gov.tw/en/index.jsp ), and it amuses me no end when some foreigners in Taibei or wherever get all heated up about this… 
