I wanted to spend some time on the architecture and buildings of Taipei. For those that don’t know (incl me), Taipei is home to about 3 million people. They share a history with the country of China and technically are part of China to this day. Their Olympic teams are known as “China-Taipei” and they also use an official designation of R.O.C., which stands for Republic of China.
I was very lucky on the first full day on the island to get to do some sightseeing. We had a beautiful sunny (is that what the sun looks like?), warm, humid day to work with, and did we ever.
We started here,
I was very lucky on the first full day on the island to get to do some sightseeing. We had a beautiful sunny (is that what the sun looks like?), warm, humid day to work with, and did we ever.
We started here,
it’s a memorial to one of the founding fathers of modern day Taiwan, Sun Yat-Sen. He’s got a great big memorial museum and garden and is liked by both traditional Chinese people (mainland) and the people of Taiwan. They do a “changing of the guards”, which was interesting to witness. Plus, they had a bunch of school kids hanging around, most in their matching school uniforms. I think for me, being white, it’s funny to see large groups of little Asians all dressed alike.
We then decided to spend some time walking over to and checking out the building known (the world over) as ‘Taipei 101’. It’s so named b/c of the number of floors it has, you guessed it, 101. It currently holds at least a few of the building height records in the world. The Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur seems to be in most of the conversations about height, but it’s mostly spire on top, not livable/usable space or floors.
The entrance we found (among its roughly 2 square city blocks) was the entry first and foremost to a very high end mall. Honestly, it was more high-end than Michigan Ave. and Madison Ave. IWC (a watch brand) has its own store here, among almost any other high-end brand you could name.
This is a shot from the inside observation deck on the 89th floor. They also allow people to go outside onto the 91st floor (below). While it was a very nice day outside, up here it was howling wind and noisy around all the fence supports.
Finally, they have something that I learned no other large building allows anyone to see, and in typical Taiwan-English, they have translated it as the “Super Big Wind Damper”. Basically, to combat any effects of the wind on the building, it has 3 large balls of steel within the building to counteract the forces of the wind. The largest of the three is on the 87th floor and totally visible. It’s about 20 feet in diameter and very impressive. There wasn’t much, if any, movement when we were staring at it… but still really cool.
We then decided to spend some time walking over to and checking out the building known (the world over) as ‘Taipei 101’. It’s so named b/c of the number of floors it has, you guessed it, 101. It currently holds at least a few of the building height records in the world. The Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur seems to be in most of the conversations about height, but it’s mostly spire on top, not livable/usable space or floors.
The entrance we found (among its roughly 2 square city blocks) was the entry first and foremost to a very high end mall. Honestly, it was more high-end than Michigan Ave. and Madison Ave. IWC (a watch brand) has its own store here, among almost any other high-end brand you could name.
This is a shot from the inside observation deck on the 89th floor. They also allow people to go outside onto the 91st floor (below). While it was a very nice day outside, up here it was howling wind and noisy around all the fence supports.
Finally, they have something that I learned no other large building allows anyone to see, and in typical Taiwan-English, they have translated it as the “Super Big Wind Damper”. Basically, to combat any effects of the wind on the building, it has 3 large balls of steel within the building to counteract the forces of the wind. The largest of the three is on the 87th floor and totally visible. It’s about 20 feet in diameter and very impressive. There wasn’t much, if any, movement when we were staring at it… but still really cool.
They also have a lot of other funny old, and unique/modern new buildings all about town. Within 15-20 minutes of walking, you could go from a traditional neighborhood right into the most modern mall or building you’d see in any city in the world.
1 comment:
Marty, what are you doing up at 4AM? Just kidding.
Post a Comment