U.S. Travel Show on Taiwanese Tea and Orchid Island Flying Fish Nominated for Emmy Award

By MOOK Traveler's Life Network, Li Xinyi, compiled and reported

The production team of the well-known U.S. public television travel show Travelscope, aired on PBS, was invited by the Tourism Bureau of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications to visit Taiwan in 2010. They filmed two half-hour special episodes on Taiwanese tourism: “Taiwan: The Culture of Tea” and “Taiwan’s Aboriginal People.” These episodes were broadcast as part of the show’s fifth season. Following their airing, the episodes received widespread acclaim from audiences and have earned three nominations for this year’s (2012) Emmy Awards: Best Special Class Directing, Best Cinematography for a Nonfiction Program, and Best Sound Mixing for a Nonfiction Program. The show has now been aired 17,878 times across public television stations throughout the United States.

Joseph Rosendo, the host of Travelscope who has traveled to nearly every corner of the globe, is also a 2011 Emmy Award winner. He is particularly fascinated by Taiwan’s tea culture and indigenous culture. Through the show, he takes viewers on an experiential journey, including tea ware making, tea picking, tea processing, and tea tasting. He even flew especially to Green Island and Orchid Island to film the underwater hot springs and the flying fish culture of the Tao people. Joseph mentioned: “I had a wonderful time in Taiwan. Aside from visiting tea plantations to learn how to pick tea leaves and attending tea tastings to savor high mountain oolong, I also visited the Lukang Township to see master artisans craft beautiful traditional lanterns, learned to make phoenix-eye cakes, and even went fishing at sea with Tao warriors — it was all so much fun!”

To allow more tea-loving travelers to personally experience a unique tea journey in Taiwan, the Tourism Bureau of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications will plan “Taiwan Tea Journey Part II” in the second half of this year. This initiative invites international visitors to experience Taiwan’s rich and profound tea culture. The event will feature curated tea travel routes through famous tea-growing regions in Taiwan, offering overseas tourists the chance to deeply savor the oriental aroma of tea that rivals the allure of Western coffee.

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