The 16TN World Tour Lantern Soars – 1,600 Sky Lanterns Illuminate Pingxi’s Lantern Festival Night

▲ The 16TN “World Tour Lanterns” were released today at the Pingxi Sky Lantern Festival. (Photo / Provided by New Taipei City Government, the same below)

By Chen Rui-zhong / Comprehensive Report

The grand finale of the 2016 New Taipei City Pingxi Sky Lantern Festival, themed “Around the World, Extremely Happy,” was held today (February 22) at Shifen Square. The event featured the release of the 16TN “World Tour Lanterns” by New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu, Taipei City Mayor Ko Wen-je, and Keelung City Mayor Lin You-chang. These lanterns combined imagery of the cities in the Northern Taiwan region (New Taipei, Taipei, and Keelung) with scenes of global landmarks to usher in blessings for the new year.

The centerpiece of the event was the towering 16TN World Tour Lantern, with each of its four sides featuring images based on famous tourist spots from New Taipei City, Taipei City, and Keelung City. To create these images, the festival organizers invited six-year-old girl Qingqing, who dreams of traveling the world, to collect photos of international landscapes for the lantern festival. These images were then montaged together to form a composite representation of the three cities’ identities, symbolizing their collaborative spirit and aspirations on the global stage. The organizers also provided a total of 1,600 lanterns for the public to release for free.

▲ (From left) Taipei City Mayor Ko Wen-je, New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu, and Keelung City Mayor Lin You-chang attended the event together.

This year’s lantern festival attracted many international visitors, including tourists from Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Macau, Southeast Asia, and Europe and the Americas. The first group of visitors to receive lantern release vouchers came from Hong Kong and arrived as early as 5 a.m. to queue up. The lantern festival concluded successfully amid the festive atmosphere of the Lantern Festival.