Taipei (Taiwan News) — Since the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Lai Ching-te (賴清德) announced on Monday (Nov. 20) that former Taiwan representative to the U.S. Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) would serve as his running mate in the 2024 Taiwanese presidential election, supporters have come up with bilingual memes that include an English slogan and a homophonic Mandarin version.

Since Lai's announcement, fans noted that the character for "te" (德) in Lai's name means "virtue," while the character for "Bi" (美) in Hsiao's name means "beauty" but when combined with "te" also means virtue (美德). For this reason, supporters have started calling the presidential and vice presidential candidates "Taiwan's virtues."

Other online backers then came up with a creative bilingual meme with the English phrase "Made in Taiwan" and a Mandarin homophonic version "美德贏台灣" (meide ying Taiwan), which translates to "virtue wins Taiwan."

On Wednesday (Nov. 22), digital creator Hsiao Ying-teng (蕭瑩燈) shared his own version on Facebook featuring a photo of Lai and Hsiao standing in front of the Washington Monument. Chang Ming-yu (張銘祐), a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislative candidate from Taipei's Xindian District, shared another version on Facebook.

(Facebook, Hsiao Ying-teng image)

(Facebook, Chang Ming-yu image)