Shin Kong Life Tower, Taipei
The second tallest building in Taipei
The Shin Kong Life tower used to be Taipei's and Taiwan's no 1 building in the past (1993 - 1997), but now it's always in the shadow of Tuntex Sky Tower in Kaohsiung and of course Taipei 101 in Taipei. I haven't seen a huge density of high-rise buildings in Taipei, most of them are scattered around the whole city, not like what you see in Singapore, HK or Kuala Lumpur. And so a very tall building really stands out in Taipei City and so did the SKL tower for me. It's nearly 245m tall and it's located near the Taipei railway station. It's definitely not jaw-dropping like Taipei 101, but it's worth to mention, because it's one of Taipei landmarks. And through time, it grows on you. I have a plan to go on top one day and check the view of Taipei below.
2 KAFKAESQUE COMMENTS:
Reading your blog is becoming a daily trip down memory lane for me.
This building is my "indicator" of how much Taipei has changed since the late 1980s. When I lived there I used to work a few blocks from here. In fact, the bus from the airport dropped me off in front of this construction site on my first arrival.
At that time, it was nothing but a hole in the ground... a very deep hole. The site was usually swarming with guys from South East Asia wearing hard hats and flip flops. When I came back to the US two years later in 91, they were well into erecting the steel structure. Next time I saw it was when I returned to Taipei after being away for 10 years. It was done and Taipei was very different.
One example: a few blocks west of this this building is a street called Huai Ning Jie (懷寧街). A block south of Chong Hsiao W. Rd (忠孝西路) there used to be an old, old guy selling "Shan Dong Big Cake" (山東大餅) from a cart he parked in front of a burned out store. Not sure if he ate this himself as he had hardly any teeth left. I used to buy from him all the time - 一包十塊錢.
Well, on my first trip back in a decade I swung by to see if granpa was still in business. The old burned out store front was now a Starbucks. You can get Starbucks anywhere but it's hard to find a $10 bag of ShanDong DaBing.
Anyways, time to get off memory lane and back to work. Thanks again for sharing.
Kevin
March 19, 2011 2:20 AM
@Kevin: Thanks for your additional info. I think you're improving my old posts, because you add your personal experience. Must be a very different time in the early 1990s, foreigners must have been even a bigger curiosity than now. I would love to read about your first impression of Taiwan or Taipei, when you arrived here. Let me know, if you have written something. If not, you could guest post on my blog :)
March 19, 2011 10:42 AM
Post a Kafkaesque comment!