Mysterious Taiwanese offers free meal at restaurant
By DPA, IANSSunday, July 11, 2010
TAIPEI - Thousands of Taiwanese queued up outside a restaurant Sunday for a free meal paid for by a mysterious man who wanted to feed 1,000 people without saying why.
A long queue formed outside the Lotus Heart Vegetarian Restaurant in Yungho near Taipei Sunday morning. Chaos broke out when the restaurant opened, and it had to issue tickets to maintain order.
The restaurant planned to give away 1,000 lunch boxes on eight consecutive Sundays. But due to the demand, it gave away 2,000 lunch boxes on the first Sunday.
Reporters and TV crews waited for the mysterious man, who gave the restaurant 480,000 Taiwan dollars ($15,000) to cook meals for the public, but he failed to appear.
The young man gave the money to the restaurant last week, without explaining his generosity, Hsu Min-long, its owner said.
In Taiwan, people sometimes offer free vegetarian meals to strangers to thank the Buddha for a wish granted, for winning a lottery, or in order to seek peace of mind or a long life.
