After the lighting of lanterns at the 2020 Taiwan Lantern Festival's secondary exhibition area, it has become a popular check-in spot attracting over one million tourists to date. Recently, citizens have discovered that the public announcements in the Wenxin Forest Park Children’s Paradise sound remarkably similar to a child's voice, and the lively, natural and adorable tone has garnered praises from many citizens and tourists, commenting that the public announcements sound absolutely adorable and that the Taichung City Government has demonstrated ingenious creativity.
According to the Tourism and Travel Bureau, the entrance art installation of the Wenxin Forest Park Children’s Paradise is a castle lantern that symbolizes the protection of Taichung and ensuring that people of all ages will have a good time at appreciating the lanterns. In line with the theme of the Children's Paradise, colleagues from the Tourism and Travel Bureau proposed during the brainstorming session to let children become the park's public announcers. Apart from encouraging children to participate in the 2020 Taiwan Lantern Festival and create wonderful memories together, the aim is also to convey the message that children are in charge here at the park.
According to Tourism and Travel Bureau Director-General Lin Hsiao-Chi, the little public announcers (Chinese, English, and Hakka) all have their unique features. The 4-year-old Hakka public announcer has been exposed to the Sixian Hakka dialect since he was a baby, hence he speaks fluent Hakka and he has already obtained Hakka Affairs Council's Little Hakka Challenge accreditation and recognition from the Hakka Radio as the no. 1 time signal broadcaster. His family and adults all enjoy speaking with him in Hakka.
The little Hakka public announcer commented that he loves admiring the lanterns at the Shakurel Planet and playing sand in the park's sandpit or chasing falling snow with other children. Since the park's opening, he has visited the venue at least 3 times, and every time he gets to appreciate different performances with his parents. He hopes that the whole family will be able to come to the secondary exhibition area to appreciate the lanterns and soak up the festive Chinese New Year's ambiance.
The 3-year-old English public announcer was born abroad and has never been to a lantern festival before. One day, his mother showed him a picture of the Children’s Paradise and he expressed tremendous interest in the joyous theme of the Taiwan Lantern Festival in his home country. He looks forward to visiting the lantern exhibition areas when he returns to Taiwan during the Chinese New Year so that he can listen to his own recorded English announcements. Having lived in Israel with his father, he wants to wish everyone Happy New Year in Hebrew when visiting the park during the Chinese New Year. Visitors coming to the park to admire lanterns will be able to hear the unique Happy New Year greeting during the Chinese New Year.
As for the 6-year-old Chinese public announcer, since he is aware that his voice will be heard by the public, he feels recording the Happy New Year message is especially meaningful so he has practiced it repeatedly with his parents one sentence at a time. He takes the task so seriously that he sometimes even reads the script in his sleep. His dedication is both adorable and heartening.
The Tourism and Travel Bureau indicated that the child public announcement at the secondary exhibition area is mainly used for reminding the lantern festival visitors of the park's closing time, performance activities, and restrictions in the park such as do not touch the lanterns, no unauthorized aerial photography, make sure to carry out waste sorting, and preventing children from getting lost, etc. The heartwarming voice of children serves to evoke the adults' conscience so that everyone can maintain a high-quality environment during the 65-day lantern festival and in turn protect other visitors' rights to appreciate the lanterns.
The Tourism and Travel Bureau also reminds that smoking is prohibited at Wenxin Forest Park, and visitors with pets should pick up and clean up after their fur babies so that everyone can enjoy a fantastic lantern viewing environment.