Christmas celebrations trump Constitution Day in Taiwan

It isn’t a national holiday but has to be marked as the anniversary of the promulgation of the Constitution of the Republic of China in 1947.

Nobody cares about Constitution Day anymore.

Most of the non-Christian people in Taiwan are celebrating Christmas with a gusto which rivals that of the Christendom, and governments took the lead in the celebration of one of the most important Christian holidays. The government of the special municipality of Kaohsiung put up last night what it billed as the world’s largest human Christmas tree.

Altogether 50,000 men and women, each carrying a fluorescent lamp, made a human sea that resembled a giant tree as high as 200 meters on Time Avenue in the southern Taiwan port city.

In Hualien on east Taiwan, 2,000 musicians paraded the main streets on a government-sponsored Christmas carol march Saturday night to mark the occasion in advance.

A 12-meter-high Christmas tree was put up at the Taichung city government square, around which Santa Claus on a sleigh pulled by 30 “reindeer” turned all night.

The tree alone cost NT$600,000, a Taichung municipal government spokesman said. Moreover, he said, all Taichung citizens could light lamps on their Christmas trees free of charge. The municipal government would pay their power bills.

“But,” the spokesman added, “they have to report to the municipal authorities how much power they use to light those lamps.”

No local governments are scheduled to mark Constitution Day today.

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