They already have gambling all over Taiwan. But as with prostitution, it’s technically illegal (though ignored for the most part, as long as the cops get their kickback) and run by the gangsters. Taiwan is a sleazy little island rampant with prostitution and gambling, but these two backbones of Taiwanese culture aren’t going to be legal and in the open because of “face”. Someone above mentioned that the biggest group of tourists who come to Taiwan are from Japan - well, why do you think they come here? I’ve seen plenty of these drunken salarymen singing in karoake bars with nubile xiaojies at their side. The influx of Japanese tourists dropped massively, remember, after Mayor Ma’s crackdown on legalized sin.
Touch your heart? That’s not English is it. They don’t have a native speaker for proofreading at least? Maybe the ads are not intended for native speakers.
I would say something like “make the sign of the cross over your heart before you try to cross any street in Taiwan”. They might do better to advertise Taiwan as an adventure holiday. I would never recommend Taiwan to anyone unless they were really interested in Chinese and Chinese culture.
[quote=“Richardm”]Touch your heart? That’s not English is it. They don’t have a native speaker for proofreading at least? Maybe the ads are not intended for native speakers.
I would say something like “make the sign of the cross over your heart before you try to cross any street in Taiwan”. They might do better to advertise Taiwan as an adventure holiday. I would never recommend Taiwan to anyone unless they were really interested in Chinese and Chinese culture.[/quote]
Touch your Heart gives me another idea…Health Tourism…come to Taiwan for your triple bypass operation… Apparently this is getting pretty big in Thailand. eg Phuket. You go there for a holiday + have your Boobs enlarged (+ more serious operations)while you are there. Quality healthcare at a fraction of the cost of the US. Problem would be convincing people the quality was acceptable. Need some ort of international accreditation I suppose.
Rich Taiwanese that can afford all fly out to the U.S. for major surgery rather than put their hands in the Taiwanese system. Taiwanese hospitals and clinics are great for very low-cost care of relatively minor injuries, but for serious life-threatening illnesses? Look at how they handled SARS!
If I were Japanese or Korean or from Hong Kong or Singapore (and I’ve been to all those places) I’d fly over to Taiwan at least once a year to enjoy the mountain scenery, lower prices, warmer weather and friendlier people. But I’m from Australia, and I can’t see too many of my compatriots getting on a plane for what Taiwan has to offer.
There will always be a small group where cost is not an issue . The target market would be those people where cost is an issue ie those that do not drive a Merc S320.
If the argument on quality could be made , & it probably could at some of the higher end institutions here (this would need to be independently verified) then there might be a market.
The problem might be the Taiwan “image” abroad which despite Taiwan being a powerhouse in high tech. is still routed in the cheap Plastic Toy perception of the 1970s.
I agree with you bartleby. If you are from Europe or North America, and you have the choice of Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Taiwan, I think the choice is not going to be Taiwan, unless it’s packaged with another country. I think a Beijing, Hong Kong, Taipei trip would be great fun, and let people see three very different Chinese cultures. But selling Taiwan as a Hawaii would be a tough sell, although maybe some niche markets, like windsurfing or mountain climbing could be very successful.
According to that web site, there is an “International Trave Fair”, the “2003 Taipei International MICE Exhibition and Conference” and something called “King Wind”, hmmm… can’t wait…
Their list of American restaraunts : 202.39.225.132/jsp/Eng/html/sear … ?layer3=34
They don’t seem to want to attract tourists…
The whole site is full of embarrasing bad English.
I always thought this “Taiwan as a tourism center for Asia-Pacific region” was just another squirt of that demented old bat Annette Lu’s verbal diarrhoea. Aren’t these ads just produced by groups trying to rub their noses into Lu’s sweaty arse-crack?
Taiwan tourism? Maybe they can corner the market in tourists that have monkeys flying out of their butts.
I’d pay top dollar to see that.
[quote=“sandman”]I always thought this “Taiwan as a tourism center for Asia-Pacific region” was just another squirt of that demented old bat Annette Lu’s verbal diarrhoea. Aren’t these ads just produced by groups trying to rub their noses into Lu’s sweaty arse-crack?
Taiwan tourism? Maybe they can corner the market in tourists that have monkeys flying out of their butts.[/quote]
If I had asthma right now I’d be reaching for my inhaler!
"Taiwan as a tourism center blablalalala… "
I think most Asian country leaders have this standard phrase about how they are planning to become the centers of different industries. I spent 6 months in Singapore and watched news almost every day about how Singapore was going to become the hub of finance, biotech, media, fish farming and pretty much every industry that is growing these days. Taiwan still has a long way to go before it gets the delirious overconfidence of Singapore.
"Taiwan as a tourism center blablalalala… "
I think most Asian country leaders have this standard phrase about how they are planning to become the centers of different industries. I spent 6 months in Singapore and watched news almost every day about how Singapore was going to become the hub of finance, biotech, media, fish farming and pretty much every industry that is growing these days. Taiwan still has a long way to go before it gets the delirious overconfidence of Singapore.
"Taiwan as a tourism center blablalalala… "
I think most Asian country leaders have this standard phrase about how they are planning to become the centers of different industries. I spent 6 months in Singapore and watched news almost every day about how Singapore was going to become the hub of finance, biotech, media, fish farming and pretty much every industry that is growing these days. Taiwan still has a long way to go before it gets the delirious overconfidence of Singapore.
isn’t that a triple post?
I think the naysayers are right this time. Tourism, intl tourism will never happen here. Well, not for a very very long time.
And that’s okay. Not every country has to be a tourist draw. I mean, you can’t manufacture tourism. There has to be a real draw to come here as a paying tourist, compared to other draws around the world, and frankly, Brett, it aint gonna happen here for a long time to come, and possibly nebber.
That’s okay. Let other places get the tourists. Taiwan will develop in its own way and make a name for itself in its own way. The entire world does not have to be a slave to tourist dollars.
I like living in a place that is not full of tourae, touri or however hakkasonic thinks we should spell that word. Let Japan and Korea and Thailand and China get all the tourists.
Taiwan can go its own way. No casinos please. I hate casinos. Just let Taiwan be Taiwan the way it is. We don’t always have to develop everything into complete shit. Think of Taiwan as a backwater of the world, as an island with no past no present and no future. and what great place to view the passing parade of global terrorism alerts as the West melts into the sunset and the East begins to rise.
Who needs tourists? We got the KMT.
I’d pay top dollar to see that.[/quote]
You can see it for about 2 dollars . Rent the movie Bruce Almighty. There
is a Monkey Coming out of the Butt Scene.
Even though the Monkey out of the Butt market has expanded significantly since the success of this movie, I suspect it would still be a tight one to access & be too narrow for profitable long term growth…
Sorry. Forumosa gets really slow sometimes and I get too annoyed and hit the submit button while waiting for something to happen. Had a couple of error messages as well. Had no idea it would appear three times! 
For a country that keeps getting mixed up with Thailand and gets about as much international media attention as a small African tribal village, it would be beneficial for Taiwan’s independence movement to get tourists here.
But I think Taiwan is too late and puts too little resources into this. They need to find a niche. But where is it?
- Casinos -> Australia & Macao
- Multicultural -> Malaysia (truly asia)
- Whale and Dolphin watching -> Australia
- Shopping -> HK, Singapore, Japan
- Wild untouched nature -> New Zealand
- Great beaches -> Malaysia
Green Island is actually a 5 star diving location. And there’s a lot of places with good potential for hiking. What about the niche of great mountain hiking? Or it could go with being a gourmet’s heaven?
Once a niche was found, they would have to create a national brand and guard this brand to avoid sending mixed messages. Only three countries in Asia are doing a good job here; Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. But considering Taiwan’s inability to create brands, I doubt that this will happen.
Another key issue is the facilities.
I did a website for a beautiful wooden lodge resort up in Ali-Shan. They didn’t want the website in English as nobody could speak English there. (They did want foreigners in the pictures though 
)
Totally agree with Matthew on the airport duty free shops. It’s sad. A lot of people have been telling me how they expected to be able to buy a lot of electronics at the airport. (Since a lot of it is made here) But there’s not ONE shop selling this at CKS.