New Taipei City Celebrates 2011 Christmas Eve
President Ma Yingjiu along with New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu and Taipei City Mayor Hau Lungbin attended the Christmas Eve party hosted by New Taipei City Government tonight (12/24) and wished citizens a happy holiday. Mayor Chu said that New Taipei City boasts the largest Christmas City and the highest Christmas tree in Taiwan and sets to give people a special Christmas experience.
Mayor Chu said New Taipei City Government will continue working on the extended MRT lines at a faster pace, and as to childcare and child education of citizens’ concern, the City Government has also been establishing many public kindergartens to help children grow up safely and happily.
President Ma was pleasant to celebrate Christmas with citizens. He said he is pleased that no one had died because of typhoons in last year and the number of accidents and crimes occurred in this year compared with past years has greatly dropped, and he wished Taiwan in the future can remain peaceful and safe.
In the countdown to Christmas Day, President Ma, Mayor Chu, and Mayor Hau watched the light show of Santa Claus climbing up the highest Christmas tree as attending citizens took out their cameras to record this precious and happy moment.
At the event site there was also a huge LED screen for video conversation with Taoyuan County, Taichung City, and Tainan City. President Ma through video communication greeted citizens living in North, South, and Central region in Mandarin Chinese, Taiwanese, Hakka, and language of indigenous people and wished all citizens a Happy Christmas.
After the light show and the video conversation, President Ma along with the two mayors went to the Eastern Plaza of New Taipei City Government to give Christmas presents to children from underprivileged group.
Today’s Christmas events started with the “shopping carnival” followed by the Christmas parade. The parade started at Fuzhong Shopping District and aggregated around a thousand participants, including mounted police, Samba parade teams, firemen, acrobats, kindergarteners, pets, and immigrants.
At night time the Christmas party was thrown at the Citizen Plaza, staging famous singers such as Rainie Yang, Pin Kuan, Sodagreen, etc. Fans crowed the plaza and cheered all night despite the chilly temperature, making the event a huge success. A total of unprecedented 80,000 people were recorded for participating for today’s Christmas events.